9/7 The Activity of Replying Letters

Before doing this activity, Rainbow asked Ss to preview the letters. Using the short reply as a model, Ss (four in one group) are required to invent a letter for Davis or 'Mary', the girl who wrote the famous Dear John Letter. I think the idea of letting Ss choose topics is good because different Ss with different personality or different proficiency levels might favor different topics. And two topics can also yield more diversed responses than one. The idea of writing a letter to 'Mary' is brillant. Originally, John is the person who needs Dulcie's advice. Instead of comforting a heart-broken veteran, students are asked to write the letter from John's perspective, and many creative responses are presented (laughter, too ). Surprisingly, no group presented a gloomy John; almost every John was described as a dandy or even gay. Every John said congratuations to Mary as conceited as he could. Well, it seems that nobody wants to give John an image of victim.
Ss not only practice speaking but also writing becasue they need to write down the letter before presentation. Also, this activity helps them get familiar to the reading text before the thorough explanation in the next hour. From their responses, Ss enjoyed this activity very much!