Integrated skills

1 Discuss the questions in pairs or small groups. 1 What is the earliest thing you remember in your life? 2 How can you be sure that you really remember it? Could it be that someone told you later and you only think you remember? 2 Listen to the story of someone’s first day at school and answer the questions. 1 How did Laurie Lee get to the school on his first morning? 2 What didn’t he understand during the day? 3 How does he feel when he gets home? 4 He refuses to go again. Why does the speaker find this so believable? 5 What did the teacher mean by ‘sit over there for the present’? 6 What did the young Laurie Lee think the teacher meant? 3 Listen again and check your answers.

4 Work in pairs or small groups. Tell your partner(s) what you remember about your own first day at school. ▸ How did you feel? ▸ What happened during the day? ▸ Do you remember anything unusual, surprising or funny? ▸ Was it a happy or an unhappy experience? I remember falling off a chair and hurting my head. I must have been about three. This is such a strange little detail that I’m sure I’m the only one who remembers it. I was really looking forward to going to school and I thought it was exciting. One of the teachers shouted my name and I was frightened. I thought I’d done something wrong, but I had no idea what it could have been!

5 Write a short paragraph about your first day at school or your earliest memory. Add details about what happened and how you felt to make the story more believable, and include one or two events that aren’t actually true.

6 Work in pairs. Read your paragraphs aloud and try to guess which details are invented.

1 Complete the story with the linking words and phrases in the box. during so by as well as that’s why as a result but since previously either

We tend to remember experiences that were (1) _ very good or very bad. Perhaps (2) I don’t remember my first holiday, but I definitely do remember my first camping holiday in a tent. (3) __, we’d always stayed in rented houses, but for some reason my parents decided that camping would be fun.

The weather forecast was good, (4) ___ we were looking forward to playing outside in the woods. Unfortunately, though, it started raining as soon as we got to the camping place, and it hardly stopped for the whole week we were there.

(5) _ the day, we had to find dry places to pass the time, and usually had to pay to go in. (6) , my parents spent more money than they should have done, which annoyed them. What annoyed me was having to share a tent with my brother, who turned out to be a very noisy sleeper. If it wasn’t him keeping me awake, it was the insects that found their way in. I know camping is supposed to be about getting close to nature, (7) __ I didn’t want to be that close.

(8) _ the end of the week, we were all glad to go home. It was certainly a memorable holiday, (9) being a good lesson for the future: I’ve never gone on another camping holiday (10) __ that first time.

2 Write a similar story of a memorable holiday (or other experience) that you had. (It could be memorable for good or bad reasons.) Use the story in Activity 1 as a model and keep the same paragraph structure. Paragraph 1: introduction and background Paragraph 2: the beginning of the holiday / experience Paragraph 3: the rest of the holiday / experience Paragraph 4: conclusion (What do you think about it now?)

In this Unit you have learnt about: ▶ other cultures ▶ verb / adjective + to + -ing structures ▶ verb / adjective + other preposition + -ing structures ▶ modal verbs with infinitives for present meanings ▶ ‘past modal’ verb forms (modal verb + have + past participle) ▶ linking words and phrases ▶ writing about personal memories