Teachers and Actors

То be a good teacher, you need some of the gifts of the good actor: you must be able to hold the attention and interest of your audience; you must be a clear speaker, with good, strong, pleasing voice which is fully under your control; and you must be able to act what you are teaching, in order to make its meaning clear.

Watch a good teacher, and you will see that he doesn't sit motionless before his class: he stands the whole time he is teaching; he walks about, using his arms, hands and fingers to help him in his explanations, and his face to express feelings. Listen to him, and you will hear the loudness, the quality and the musical note of his voice always changing according to what he is talking about.

The fact that a good teacher has some of the gifts of a good actor doesn't mean that he will indeed be able to act well on stage: for there are very important differences between the teacher's work and the actor's. The actor has to speak words which he has learnt by heart; he has to repeat exactly the same words each time he plays the certain part; even his movements and the way he uses his voice are usually fixed before. What he has to do is to make all these carefully learnt words and actions seem natural on the stage. A good teacher works in quite a different way. His audience takes an active part in his play: they ask and answer questions, they obey orders, and if they don't understand something, they say so. The teacher therefore has to suit his act to the needs of his audience, which is his class. He cannot learn his part by heart, but must invent it as he goes along.

I have known many teachers who were fine actors in class but were unable to take part in a stage-play because their brains wouldn't keep strictly to what another had written.

XI. Ответьте на следующие вопросы:

1. Why does a good teacher need some of the gifts of a good actor?

2. Is there anything in common between the teacher's work and the actor's?

3. What are the differences between the teacher's work and the actor's?

4. Why must a good teacher improvise in the course of the lesson?

XII. Верны ли следующие утверждения?

1. A good teacher doesn't sit motionless before his class.

2. The fact that a good teacher has some of the gifts of a good actor means that he will be able to act well on stage.

3. A teacher's audience takes an active part in his play.

Вариант 2

I. Переведите предложения на русский язык:

1. Tom can drive but he hasn't got a car.

2. I can't understand Martin. I've never been able to understand him.

3. Jill and Terry will be home from school soon. I must cook their lunch.

4. You needn't help with the shopping. John has already done it.

5. At school, I had to learn a lot of irregular verbs by heart.

II. Вставьте подходящий модальный глагол: can't, could, have to, must или mustn't

1. I___stand on my head when I was a child but I___do it now.

2. I really___go home. I___get up early morning.

3. We___ask Bill about his holiday. He doesn't want to talk about it.

///. Переведите предложения на русский язык:

1. Не sat in the armchair smoking his pipe.

2. We consume a lot of oxygen from the atmosphere required for respiration.

3. The problem was discussed at the conferences sponsored by the UN.

IV. Определите причастия настоящего и прошедшего времени (Participle I, Participle II):

1. Не helped me saying this.

2. Discussion provides a valuable means of uncovering errors.

3. There is no satisfying the scientists' curiosity.

V. Переведите предложения на русский язык:

1. Asking "why" is a useful stimulus towards imagining what the cause of purpose may be.

2. Sometimes chance is a factor in making a discovery.

3. Controlling the working conditions is the workers' right.

VI. Определите, каким членом предложения является герундий:

1. Producing children is the only thing that man can't do unlike woman.

2. They achieved a great progress by educating their child at home.

3. I don't see any danger in going there.

VII. Переведите предложения на русский язык:

1. Ought woman to have the same rights as man?

2. I have to accept the universe as it is.

3. So I must try to make the best of the time in which I live.

VIII. Определите, каким членом предложения является инфинитив:

1. It is scarcely possible to foresee a discovery that breaks really new ground.

2. The role of chance is to provide the opportunity.

3. I want to see every healthy man and woman on our planet at work.

IX. Поставьте глагол в правильную форму - герундий или инфинитив.

1. То have time thinking / to think is rare in the world today.

2. When did people decide becoming / to become friends.

3. We go to school learning / to learn how to learn.

X. Прочитайте текст и выполните задание после него.