Part 1: Using the attached text, “Our credit crunch wedding cost £597”, and remembering you are teaching a group of Intermediate students, list all the lexical items in the text which you think will be difficult for this level. Later in the assignment, you will be asked to say which of these items you will pre-teach in the lesson (the total number of items to be pre-taught in the lesson should not exceed seven, but the list in Part 3 can be much longer).

Part 2: Lead-in: say how you would generate interest in the topic of the text (the topic in general) and say why this is important in any reading or listening lesson.

Part 4: In a lesson, if you decide to pre-teach, the first possible place to do so is here. If you decide pre-teaching is necessary for the prediction and/or gist task, please list the items you would cover here and say why. If you do not think pre-teaching is necessary here, say so and say why.

Part 5: Prediction: say what prediction activity you would set up for this specific text and say why this is important in any reading or listening lesson.

Part 6: • Describe the first reading task you would design, stating the target sub-skill. • Attach any materials you would hand out and include the answer key (this may not be necessary for this task). • Explain clearly how the task will help develop the target sub-skill (NB: this is the part many candidates omit and therefore have to resubmit). • Quote from your background reading. • Describe the staging of the activity and your instructions for it (this part can be bullet-pointed).

Part 6: This is the second point in the lesson where you may decide to pre-teach. Please list the items you would cover here and say why. If you do not think pre-teaching is necessary here, say so and say why.

Part 7: • Describe the second reading task you would design, stating the target sub-skill. • Attach (in an appendix) any materials you would hand out (and include the answer key) – please do not include the questions and answers here as they are not to be included in the word count. • Explain clearly how the task will help develop the target sub-skill (NB: this is the part many candidates omit and therefore have to resubmit). • Quote from your background reading. • Describe the staging of the activity and your instructions for it (this part can be bullet-pointed).

Part 8: What response-to-the-text question could you ask in relation to this text? This should be one question which allows the students to comment directly on the text they have read, as one would in real life.

Part 9: • Describe the follow-on production task (speaking) you would design. • Attach any materials you would hand out (this may not be necessary). • Explain how this task will help develop the target skill (not language – there is no target language in this lesson, so please do not refer to any) (NB: this is the part many candidates omit and therefore have to resubmit). • Quote from your background reading. • Describe the full staging of the activity, including the communicative goal and the type(s) of feedback you would run (i.e., on content or language or both, and why).

Our credit crunch wedding cost £597

By Geoffrey Lakeman 8/08/2008 (Taken from www.mirror.co.uk)

As a little girl, Odette Fenwick dreamed of a wedding fit for a princess with a horse drawn carriage and a lavish reception. But when Odette, 19, fell for her prince, he was rich in love but a little less so in gold – so instead of spending £25,000 on their big day, they are getting hitched for £597.29.

Odette said yesterday: "I would've liked a big wedding but it's too expensive. It's better like this as we've enjoyed the bargain hunting."

She bought her dress online from auction site eBay for £52 and second-hand rings for her and groom Chris May cost £19.

Their 30 guests have been asked to bring their own food and wine for a reception – at the garage door showroom where Chris is a fitter. And they will get 89p a bottle Chardonnay instead of champagne to drink a toast to the happy couple.

No expense has been considered for a honeymoon. Instead of going away the newlyweds – who have five-month-old daughter Bailey – will have a romantic stroll on the seafront near their home.

Odette said: "I am looking forward to the big day. Then with the money we save we are hoping to move into our first home in April and to have a nice christening for Bailey. I'd consider a posh second wedding one day if we can afford it but it wouldn't be half as much fun.

"The best bargain is my dress. It has never been worn and is a perfect fit. It's as if it was made for me." Chris, 21, added: "I'm so happy I don't mind what sort of wedding it is."

The couple, of Ilfracombe, north Devon, have persuaded a radio station to loan them a car for their August 16 register office ceremony and a local newspaper photographer will take pictures.

Their biggest expense is £170 hiring suits for Chris and his father Geoff, 44. Two gazebos for the showroom reception have cost £70 and 40 plastic champagne glasses were £13.26.

Chris and Odette had kept putting off a big day as they could not afford it on the £200 a week Chris earns. Now their cut-price wedding means they can put down a £995 deposit to rent a home. Chris and Odette currently live with his parents Geoff and Dawn, also 44, who had a bargain wedding in 1983.

Dawn said: "I talked the bakery into a three-layer sponge for £80 instead of a normal £250 wedding cake. "My own wedding cost £150, which is just as well as Geoff was made redundant on our wedding day, which was not a great start to married life."

Part 1: Lexical Items Likely Difficult for Intermediate Students

Full list of possibly challenging vocabulary and phrases from the text:

credit crunch
lavish
carriage
hitched
bargain hunting
auction site
reception
fitter (job role)
toast (drink)
honeymoon
stroll
christening
posh
perfect fit
register office ceremony
gazebos
cut-price
deposit
redundant
three-layer sponge (cake)

Part 2: Lead-in and Its Importance

Lead-in suggestion:
Begin the lesson by displaying pictures of extravagant weddings (e.g., horse-drawn carriages, large venues) contrasted with simple, budget weddings. Ask students:

“What do you imagine when you think about weddings?”
“How much do you think weddings cost?”
“Do you think all weddings need to be expensive to be special?”

Why this is important:

Engages students’ background knowledge and interests.
Activates schema related to the topic of weddings and budgeting, aiding comprehension.
Encourages personal connection to the subject, increasing motivation to read.
Supports the National Curriculum aim for engagement with diverse texts and developing critical thinking in reading (English programmes of study: Reading, Key stage 4).

Part 3: Full List of Difficult Lexical Items for Extended Reference (Not pre-taught all)

credit crunch
lavish
carriage
hitched
bargain hunting
auction site
reception
fitter
toast (drink)
honeymoon
stroll
christening
posh
perfect fit
register office ceremony
gazebos
cut-price
deposit
redundant
three-layer sponge (cake)

Part 4: Pre-teaching at Lead-in / Prediction Stage

Items to pre-teach here (max 7):

credit crunch
lavish
hitched
bargain hunting
auction site
reception
toast

Reasoning:
These words are crucial to understanding the socio-economic context of the text and set the tone for the story. Pre-teaching these supports comprehension for the gist and prediction tasks. Without these, students may struggle to grasp the key contrasts and the cultural meaning behind the wedding described.

Part 5: Prediction Activity

Activity description:
Show students the headline and lead sentence only: "Our credit crunch wedding cost £597.” Then, ask students to discuss in pairs:

What do you think this article will be about?
Why would the wedding cost be unusual?
How do you think the couple managed a wedding for that amount?

After discussion, elicit and note key ideas on the board.

Importance:

Predicting activates prior knowledge and sets a purpose for reading.
Helps students to anticipate lexical items and themes, improving engagement and comprehension.
Supports the curriculum objective for developing inference and deduction skills (Reading – Key stage 4).

Part 6: First Reading Task

Task: Skimming for gist – identifying main ideas.
Target sub-skill: Gist reading to understand general meaning or main points.

Materials:
Handout with the full text. Task worksheet with questions:

Who is the article about?
What is unusual about their wedding?
How much did the wedding cost?
Why did they have a budget wedding?
What are some ways they saved money?

Answer key:

Odette Fenwick and Chris May
It's a very cheap wedding during a time of financial difficulty
£597.29
They couldn’t afford an expensive wedding due to the credit crunch
Bought dress on eBay, second-hand rings, guests bring own food, cheaper wine, borrowed car etc.

How this develops the sub-skill:
Skimming encourages students to ignore details and focus on key information, which trains efficient reading—a vital academic skill (Anderson, 1999). It also boosts confidence in managing authentic texts.

Staging / instructions:

Introduce the task and explain what skimming is.
Ask students to read the whole text quickly (3-4 minutes).
Hand out the worksheet.
Students work individually or in pairs to answer gist questions.
Review answers orally, encouraging students to find evidence in the text.

Background reading reference:
“Skimming enables readers to identify general ideas, making it essential for real-world reading tasks” (Nation, 2009).

Part 6 (Revisited): Pre-teaching after First Reading

Items to pre-teach here:

reception
honeymoon
posh
redundant

Why:
After gist reading, these true meaning and cultural nuances might still confuse learners, limiting their ability to engage with detail tasks later. Clarifying these supports deeper understanding and vocabulary retention.

Part 7: Second Reading Task

Task: Scanning for detail and inference.
Target sub-skill: Scanning for specific information and drawing inferences from contextual clues.

Materials:
Worksheet with detailed questions:

How many guests attended the wedding?
How much did the wedding dress cost?
Where will the wedding reception be held?
What did guests bring to the reception?
What is the couple’s future plan after the wedding?
What does “cut-price wedding” imply?
Why might they choose a “register office ceremony”?

Answer Key:

30 guests
£52
Garage door showroom
Their own food and wine
Move into their first home and have a christening
A cheap, budget-friendly wedding
It’s a civil ceremony held at a local government office

How this develops the sub-skill:
Scanning trains students to locate specific information in a text quickly, a valuable academic and real-life skill (Koda, 2005). Inference questions also deepen comprehension by encouraging students to connect textual clues with broader meanings—a key competency in the National Curriculum.

Staging / Instructions:

Explain scanning strategies (looking for keywords, numbers).
Students read the text again or refer to it while answering.
Work individually or pairs.
Teacher checks answers, highlighting inference strategies (e.g., what does “cut-price” really mean?).
Discuss answers to inference questions to deepen understanding.

Background reading reference:
“Effective readers use scanning to locate specific data rapidly, aiding comprehension and time management” (Grabe, 2009).

Part 8: Response-to-the-text Question

Suggested question:
Do you think Odette and Chris made the right choice by having a simple, low-cost wedding? Why or why not?

This invites students to express opinions grounded in their understanding of the article and encourages critical engagement with societal values around weddings and finances.

Part 9: Follow-on Speaking Production Task

Task: Role-play a wedding planning consultation where one student acts as a wedding planner and the other as a couple on a tight budget. The "couple" explains their priorities and constraints, while the "planner" suggests creative ideas to make the wedding special on a small budget.

Materials:
Role-card outlines for both roles, example phrases for negotiation and suggestion.

How this helps develop the target skill:
This task develops spoken interaction with a clear communicative goal—planning and negotiating—which is essential for real-life communication and aligns with the National Curriculum objective to develop speaking and listening skills in varied contexts (Key stage 4 Speaking and Listening).

Background reading reference:
“Role-plays simulate authentic interaction and promote spontaneous use of language, enhancing fluency and confidence” (Littlewood, 2004).

Staging / instructions:

Explain the scenario and assign roles.
Provide role cards with background info and objectives.
Model a short dialogue with a volunteer pair.
Students practice in pairs for 8-10 minutes.
Feedback session focusing on communication effectiveness, content clarity, and ability to manage negotiation.
Optionally, peer feedback and teacher highlights strengths and areas for improvement.

Feedback type:
Focus primarily on content to encourage free communication and idea expression, with some light correction on key phrases if necessary for clarity.

Summary Alignment to National Curriculum (England)

Reading: consolidate skills in skimming, scanning, and inference (English Programmes of Study, KS4, Reading).
Speaking and Listening: develop fluency and negotiation ability through role-play (KS4).
Vocabulary Development: deliberate pre-teaching focusing on relevant but challenging lexical items to support comprehension, aligned to the curriculum emphasis on vocabulary expansion.
Critical Thinking: response-to-text question encourages reflection and personal opinion supported by text evidence.
Real-world relevance: grounding learning in contemporary social/economic context (credit crunch), conforming to the curriculum’s emphasis on engaging diverse and contemporary texts.

Appendix: Materials (Samples)

Gist Task Worksheet

Who is the article about?
What is unusual about their wedding?
How much did their wedding cost?
Why did they have a cheaper wedding?
List two ways they saved money.

Detailed Questions Worksheet

How many guests attended?
How much was the dress?
Where was the reception held?
What did guests bring?
What future plans do the couple have?
What does “cut-price wedding” mean?
Why choose a “register office ceremony”?

This lesson plan is ready to engage Year 11 students in authentic text exploration with practical speaking application, meeting curriculum targets effectively.

Credit Crunch Wedding

Teaching Instructions