How does one lose his or her job?
What sorts of conversations happen around the build up to someone being told their services are no longer required?
The English Oz resources below target this idea, catering to Certificate III in ESL (Access) and in particular the unit Engage in casual conversations and straightforward spoken transactions and element 1: Interpret a casual conversation on everyday topics.
The following input is drawn from the popular Australian television series Packed to the Rafters and incoporates a collection of short scenes that build up to a part-time worker being fired from her job.
Here are the student activity sheets and Teacher's Guide documenting options for how to use/apply each section (source video is listed in the materials):
3_VPAU502_EL1_How_to_Lose_your_Part_Time_Job
3_VPAU502_EL1_TG_How_to_Lose_your_Part_Time_Job
Note that there are actually a number of scenes in the source material; I would recommend using the whole sequence to generate a full story with main ideas, opinions and attitudes, and then perhaps a single scene to go into more detail about information, conversational strategies, emotional states and attitudes, implied meanings and ambiguities, etc. Students might also be broken up into groups to explore and document different scenes in the overall sequence.
The TG version recommends a number of things you might cover, but I wouldn't try to do every point/item in every section. It is, to me, preferable to target 1-2 aspects at a time and make sure there is volume and variety in conversational input to notice different things about spoken discourse in different scenes/situations with different speakers.
As with all of my English Oz materials, there are also a range of follow up activities suggested, whether to go deeper, wider or across skill sets.
Cert III ESL (Access) Documentation:
Unit C21 (VPAU502): Engage in casual conversation and straightforward spoken transactions.
Element 1: Interpret a casual conversation on everyday topics
Performance Criteria 1.1: Identify context/situation and relationship between speakers
Performance Criteria 1.2: Outline main topics, and opinions or attitudes expressed
Performance Criteria 1.3: Locate supporting details and implied meanings, where apparent
Performance Criteria 1.4: Identify emotional state/attitude of speakers where apparent
Performance Criteria 1.5: Identify some conversational strategies used
Performance Criteria 1.6: Identify requests to clarify misunderstandings and ambiguous points
;-)
