Unit 4 The Virtual World
I. Teaching Objectives
Students will be able to:
1. understand the main idea(despite the many negative effects of virtual life, the author prefers it to real life) and structure of the text (contrast between virtual life and real life);
2. learn some rules of interpreting new vocabulary and usage related to computers and the Internet in English;
3. grasp the key language points and grammatical structures in the text;
4. conduct a series of reading, listening, speaking and writing activities related to the theme of the unit.
II. Key Points:
The structure, the writing skill, and the main idea of the text will be the focus. Only a few words and sentences, which will be the obstacles for students’ understanding of the text, will be explained in class.
III. Difficult Points:
Some sentences whose meanings are difficult to understand and whose structures are hard to analyze:
1. Line 26-28（Para. 6）: I find myself shyer, more cautious. Or, conversely, when suddenly confronted with real life humans, I get overexcited, speak too much, interrupt.
2. Line 45-47(Para.9): When I am in this state, I fight my boyfriend as well, misinterpreting his intentions because of the lack of emotional cues given by our typed dialogue.
IV. Teaching Materials: Power point and materials
V. Teaching Methods: Lecturing, practicing and discussing.
VI. Teaching Timing: 8 sessions of class
VII. Teaching Process:
1st -2nd periods:Pre-reading; Teacher’s Introductory Remarks and Students’ Discussion related to the topic.
3rd -4th periods: While-Reading (Understanding the title of text A; Analyzing the organization of the text; Explaining Difficult sentences and language points in the text; Summing up the main idea of the text)
5th-6th periods: Dealing with the exercises after Text A. Check on Ss’ home reading (Text B); Post-Reading Task: Theme-Related Language Learning Tasks
7th-8th periods: Listening and speaking tasks.
A. Pre-reading tasks
1.Tasks Ss the following questions on the poem Surfing the Internet: (5 minutes)
—What was the hero doing when his boss came in? (surfing the Internet)
—How did he act in front of his boss? (He pretended to be surprised at the comput er which had crashed “unexpectedly”.)
2.Ss look at the theme of this unit (the Virtual World) and the title of Text A (A
Virtual Life), then try to:
—find antonyms of “virtual world” and “virtual life”;(real world, real life)
—suggest synonyms for “virtual world”;(cyberspace, cyberia, etherworld, virtual reality, Internet world, net world, etc.)
—say what people can do on the Internet.(communicating with people, shopping, reading, entertainment, education, working, hacking, publishing, etc.)
3.Imaginative writing (28 minutes)
1) T dictates to Ss the following paragraph:
For the past two weeks, other participants of the Net Survival Contest(网络生存竞赛) and I have been shut up in bare hotel rooms. Our only link to the real world has been a computer that is hooked up to the Internet (联网电脑).
We have relied on it, not only for food, bed sheets and other daily necessities, but also to set up an e-business (电子商务) of our own.
2) Now Ss will complete the paragraph beginning with: “Now it is time for me
to walk out into the light of day again…” They will give their imagination full play. They will write no more than 100 words.
3) Ss form groups of four to five, and read aloud to each other their own writings.
4) T asks some groups to recommend the best piece in their group to the class.
4.T may lead in to Text A by saying: Some of us like to live a life in contact with
