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Keep your English
up to date 4
Teacher’s pack
Lesson plan and student worksheets with answers
Downsize
© British Broadcasting Corporation 2008
BBC Learning English – Keep your English up to date
Lesson Plan: Teacher's notes
Downsize
CONTENTS
1.
Level, topic, language, aims, materials
2.
Lesson stages
3.
Answers
4.
Audio script
5. Student worksheets 1, 2, 3
Level:
Intermediate and above
Topic:
Work and business
Aims:
Listening skills – A short talk
Language – ‘Downsize’ and other compound words with ‘down’
Materials:
Worksheet 1 – Introductory speaking and vocabulary exercises,
Listening section 1
Worksheet 2 – Listening section 2
Worksheet 3 – Extra work: Vocabulary, language and discussion
Audio script – Available in teacher’s notes
Recording of the talk – Available online at
bbclearningenglish.com
This plan was downloaded from:
bbclearningenglish.com/radio/specials/1720_uptodate4/page5.shtml
© BBC Learning English
bbclearningenglish.com
BBC Learning English – Keep your English up to date
Lesson Plan: Teacher's notes
Downsize
LESSON STAGES
A
Explain to the students that they are going to listen to a talk by Gavin Dudeney, an expert
on the English language, and that the talk is about the way English is changing. This
particular talk is about the word ‘downsize’.
B
Hand out
Student Worksheet 1
. Students do
Speaking, Exercise 1
in small groups or
pairs.
C
Students do
Vocabulary, Exercise 2
-
without dictionaries at first.
Practise the pronunciation of the vocabulary, as they will hear it in the talk.
D
Students read
Listening: Section 1, Exercise 3
and then listen to Section 1 of the talk.
They answer questions ‘a’ and ‘b’.
Students listen again and do
Listening: Section 1, Exercise 4
.
E
Hand out
Student Worksheet 2
.
Students read
Listening: Section 2, Exercise 5
and then listen to Section 2 of the talk.
They answer questions ‘a’, ‘b’ and ‘c’.
F
Students try to answer
Listening: Section 2, Exercise 6
. They listen again to Section 2 to
check/complete their answers.
G
If you wish to do some extra work with the class, hand out
Student Worksheet 3
.
For the vocabulary exercise, give the students copies of the audio script and play the
complete talk as they read.
The language work focuses on other compound words made with ‘down’.
The final discussion uses some of the language from the lesson.
© BBC Learning English
bbclearningenglish.com
BBC Learning English – Keep your English up to date
Lesson Plan: Teacher's notes
Downsize
AUDIO SCRIPTS
Listening Section 1
Language changes so quickly that sometimes it’s hard to keep up. I guess that’s why series
like this come in handy! There are areas that change quicker than others: technology,
politics, business... In technology you’ll often find lots of acronyms such as BRB (be right
back – used in online chat), and in the worlds of business and politics you’re more likely to
come across examples of euphemism, aphorism and ‘political correctness’, where new
terms are coined to hide otherwise unpleasant or controversial ideas.
Who can forget such immortal phrases as, ‘greed is good’ and ‘lunch is for wimps’ – both
coined by the Gordon Gecko character in the film
Wall Street
? Both expressions perfectly
describe supposedly common aspects of corporate attitudes in the eighties, and are well-
remembered today.
Listening Section 2
And it’s from the world of business that the word downsize originated. Today, you’re most
likely to see the word used as a euphemism for ‘firing staff’, or reducing the work force
within a company. ‘Given current sales, we’re going to have to downsize by thirty
percent.’ Popular opinion has it that saying this is less painful, and more acceptable, than
saying ‘We’re going to have to fire thirty percent of the staff’. Of course the result is the
same, but at least the person doing the ‘downsizing’ gets to feel a little more comfortable.
The word seems to have originated in the automobile industry in the seventies, where oil
prices forced companies to design smaller cars which were lighter and therefore more
economical on petrol usage. I wouldn’t get too used to this one, though. The same people
who use the expression seem to have decided that ‘down’ has negative connotations, so
these days you’re just as likely to hear of a company being ‘rightsized’. Of course, if you
lose your job, it doesn’t really matter if you’ve been downsized or rightsized!
© BBC Learning English
bbclearningenglish.com
BBC Learning English – Keep your English up to date
Lesson Plan: Teacher's notes
Downsize
ANSWER KEY
VOCABULARY
Exercise 2
a. euphemism
an indirect way to refer to something that is not good; a way
to pretend that something is better than it really is
b. unpleasant
not nice
c. corporate
connected to big business
d. firing staff
making employees redundant, telling people they no longer
have a job
e.
acceptable
considered to be reasonable or to be something that can be
allowed
f. negative connotation
an additional meaning of a word, which is not positive
LISTENING: SECTION 1
Exercise 3
a.
Technology, business and politics
b.
i.
BRB (Be Right Back) - technology
ii.
Greed is good – business, ‘corporate attitudes’
Exercise 4
a.
True – ‘Language changes so quickly that sometimes it’s hard to keep up.’
b.
True – ‘where new terms are coined to hide otherwise unpleasant or controversial
ideas.’
c.
False – ‘Both expressions … are well-remembered today.’
© BBC Learning English
bbclearningenglish.com
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