Lesson 2: British customs

Lesson 2:

British customs

Warm up

Habits can be 'personal' or 'national'. 'National' habits are called customs. Do you know any holiday customs that we have? (e.g. at Christmas, at Easter, on National Holidays)? Tell the class.

Listen, read and find

Here is some information about customs on two holidays in the UK. Listen, read and find out: "When do children open their Christmas presents in Great Britain?"

This text will be replaced

Christmas is Britain's most popular holiday. At Christmas, people decorate the Christmas tree Εικόνα and their houses, they often send cards to each other and children sing carols in the street . At home, children have got a stocking and Father Christmas (Santa Claus) puts presents in it. They always open their presents on Christmas Day. In the evening the family has Christmas dinner. They eat roast turkey Εικόνα or beef with fried potatoes and Brussels sprouts. For dessert, they often have sweet mince pies or Christmas pudding .

At Christmas dinner, they put Christmas crackers Εικόνα on each plate. In the crackers, there is usually a party hat, a riddle and a toy.

Halloween is on 31 October and is a time of pumpkins, candies, ghosts Εικόνα and witches and people decorate their houses with 'Jack-o-Lanterns' . On Halloween, children dress up in fancy costumes and they go 'Trick or Treat' from door to door. People give them goodies like candies, caramel apples or popcorn balls.

Sometimes there are spooky parties and children often play 'ducking for apples' and 'pin-the-tail- on-the-donkey'.

You've got 1 minute to find the secret words (two words). It's an important

English Holiday on November 5th. Write

the words..................................................Then, count the letters and write

down your score: ...................

New words!

Match the words to the pictures:

Εικόνα

a) ghost, b) Christmas pudding, c) Christmas card, d) Santa Claus,

e)stocking, f) Christmas cracker, g) pumpkin, h) candy,

i) witch, j) Christmas tree, k) roast turkey

1) ………… 2) ………… 3) ………… 4) ………… 5) …………

6) ………… 7) ………… 8) ………… 9) ………… 10) ………… 11) …………

Put these words in the blanks:

put, eat, open, sing, send, decorate, go

1. On Halloween people...........................their houses with Jack-O-lanterns and ............................

to spooky parties

2. Children.........................their presents on Christmas Day

3. At Christmas people..............................roast turkey for dinner

4. At Christmas children.........................their stockings on the fireplace

5. At Christmas people...........................cards to each other

6. Children…………………….carols in the street

Write and speak (+app. I)

Andrew wants to know about Greek customs at Christmas. Can you help him? Write about them and report your ideas to the class. You can use these words:

put, eat, open, carols, send, sing, make, Christmas tree, Santa Claus,

decorate, Christmas cards, presents, always, often, sometimes, never

At Christmas we

Listen and write

Andrew is telling us about another English special day, Bonfire Night (or Guy Fawkes Night). Listen and fill in the information in the box. Use these words:

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penny, guy, watch, November, gardens

Bonfire Night is on (1).................................................... 5th. On this day people (2)....................................fireworks and have bonfire parties in their (3)...................................... Some children make a (4) ................................., a figure of a man made of old clothes. They take their guy in the street and ask for "a (5)..................................for the guy". On Bonfire Night they burn it on top of a bonfire.

Is there a special day like Bonfire Night in Greece or in another country? When, why and how do we celebrate it?

Let's play!

Christmas bag!

Play this game in two teams. In 5 minutes, write as many Christmas words as you can on slips of paper and put them in a bag. Then come to the board and act out (you can't speak!) a word from the opposite team's bag. If the players in your team guess the word correctly, your team gets one point. Play the game for 10 minutes. The team with the most points is the winner.