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Young hero

Level:	Intermediate
Language:	British English

This lesson use the 'dictogloss' procedure to study grammar, which involves the teacher and students in communicative interaction, text creation, and error analysis. The lesson is taken from Grammar Dictation.

Topic

Accidents
Heroism
Families

Language points
Sequence of past tenses
Infinitives of purpose
Interrupted past
Reported/indirect speech

Warm-up

1 Write the following word rose up on the blackboard:

brother    screams   fire

    young hero   

 burning   tap   bike

Pre-text vocabulary
to dash (v) to run quickly
flames (n) fire
to drag (v) to pull along the ground
toddler (n) a young child
to put out (v) to stop the fire
to praise (v) to say that you admire someone
to heal (v) to recover
burn (n) an injury to the skin caused by fire

Text

1 A nine-year-old boy dashed through flames to pull his younger brother to safety. 2 The little boy had been playing with a cigarette lighter while sitting on his bike. 3 The older boy said he was standing in the kitchen when he heard his brother screaming and ran to help him. 4 He dragged the toddler to the bathroom and turned on the water to put out the fire. 5 Doctors praised the young hero for his quick thinking and said the young boy's burns would heal with time.

Notes

S2 had been playing – The past tense is used to indicate that one past action (playing) occurred before the other (dashing through flames to rescue his brother).
S2 while sitting – The participial phrase indicates two simultaneous actions of duration in the past: playing and sitting.
S3 said – What follows here is reported speech. See also S5 for reported speech after said.
S3 standing...heard – This is the interrupted past time construction.
S3 screaming – The present participle here acts rather like an adjective describing the noun brother. Note the fact that coming after (rather than before) the noun, the participle indicates that screaming is a temporary rather than permanent quality or condition of the brother.
S3 and – The conjunction here serves as a sequence marker: and (then) ran to help him. Another example occurs in S4: and (then) turned on the water.
S5 the young hero...his...the boy's – Young hero and his refer to the older boy, and the boy's refers to the younger boy.
S5 would heal – Would is an example of backshift from will in direct speech: the boy's burns will heal in time.
S5 with time – Or in time.

Related title

Grammar Dictation

Source

Oxford Teacher’s Club:
http://www.oup.com/elt/teachersclub/articles/young_hero?cc=gb