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Lesson 26 – Something has to change!

Warm up

  1. On the board, write Human rights, and ask what the students know about it. Write Anima! rights, and ask what they know about it. If they do not know much, explain that animal rights organizations want us to stop using animals in cruel ways, e.g. in cruel sports or testing new products to find out if they are safe for people. Like human rights, animals have rights too. Ask students what they think.
  2. Tell them they are going to read a page from an animal rights Website. Give out the photocopies and direct them to section 1. Ask which organization the page is from (Fight for their rights). Ask what the text is about (animal testing).
  3. Fight for their rights: Animal testing
    Animal testing is used in many ways for many reasons, in smoking tests, for example, dogs breathe cigarette smoke continuously to find out how dangerous smoking is for people. Two of the most common tests are the Draize eye test and the LD50 test.
    The Draize eye test is used to find out if a new product, like a new soap, will affect people\’s eyes. In the tests, rabbits\’ eyelids are kept open with clips, and they can not move their heads. Then the product is put in their eyes. The tests last a week, but many animals break their necks trying to escape from the pain before the test is complete.
    In the LD50 test, LD means \’Lethal Dose- that is how much of something you can take before it kills you. It tests any chemical by giving more and more of it to a group of animals until 50 percent of them die. Some experts say animal tests correctly predict effects on people only 38 percent of the time, and there are other ways of testing

    that do not need animals. So why do we do them?

    1. \"\"You are going to read a page from an animal rights Website, Look at the text below. Which organization the page is from (Fight for their rights). What the text is about (animal testing)?
  4. Tell students to read the Web page and help their neighbors with anything they do not understand. Ask them to compare their opinions on the different tests. Put these questions on the board:
    Why do we do the test?
    Is it useful?
    What would happen if we did not do it?
    Should we allow it?
    What should we do about it?
  5. Check what they think of each test in turn: smoking dogs, Draize, LD50, but be sensitive to students with strong feelings. Use this exchange to practice the structures in the Key language.

Main Activity

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  1. Tell students they are going to look at another important issue. Put them in groups of three or four. Direct them to the information on Global warming and Clean water for everyone, and ask each group to choose one. While they are deciding, write these questions on the board:– What are the main parts of the problem?
    – Why is it a problem? 3 What are the causes?
    – What are the results?
    – What should we do about it?
  2. Talk about the information and the questions. You should each write short notes, not sentences, about the problem.
  3. You are going to explain your subject to the class. a Global warming group talks about question 1. Groups who did Clean water ask questions.
  4.  Repeat step 3 for all the other questions with different groups until the topic has been covered.
  5. Repeat steps 3 and 4 for Clean water.
  6. Discuss with your group which topic is the most important problem and what we should do about it.

Follow up

Students write a brief summary of their topic using the questions as a guide to its structure.