This is one of my favourite topics to work on with students, watching your reactions as the world opens up to you. To students who already follow the news, it is gratifying to see your interest in current affairs brought to the fore in class and to give credit for your curiosity.

It will be easier if you follow the news in French in parallel, as you will know what is being presented  as important in the world and you can ask how does this compare with the BBC News that we will be using in class ? I choose to use the BBC News website because it gives a UK angle on the news and the presenters speak in a very clear and distinct way. If you want to complete your news source, you can also do on-line reading of websites and listen to news stories. Try to write down your source, whenever you make notes on something. It is important to collect information from as many different sources as possible and to then, form your own opinions on a subject. Do not just accept the point of view that is given to you in the news story or report. Be critical.

We will begin by working on the One Minute News from the BBC website. Click on the Paper Boy to access the website.

You must note down the FOUR news stories that are presented in the BBC news bulletin. Make vocabulary notes too and if you have any questions, you can write them down too.

To work more, you can investigate the stories more on-line by doing a search or by looking on other internet news sources. You can read articles on-line or watch news videos.

Here are a few suggestions in the English language ;

http://news.sky.com/

http://edition.cnn.com/ (USA)

http://www.news.com.au/ (Australia)

http://teachingkidsnews.com/ (USA for teenagers)

http://edition.cnn.com/studentnews/ (USA)

Of course, you will complete your knowledge with what you know already in French. This will help you to compare the way different news sources present the same story.