Describing Cities

Hello There

The class today has the objetive of describing cities in the context of different cities around the world.

Pre –task

1. This is a quote of the master storyteller Charles Dickens. He is a master at using description to create a particular mood or idea of a place. Think about it and discuss with your tutor.

“It was a town of machinery and tall chimneys, out of which interminable serpents of smoke trailed themselves for ever and ever, and never got uncoiled. It had a black canal in it, and a river that ran purple with ill-smelling dye, arid vast piles of building full of windows where there was a rattling and a trembling all day long, and where the piston of the steam-engine worked monotonously up and down, like the head of an elephant in a state of melancholy madness.”

Charles Dickens, Hard Times.

2. Discuss the following questions:

a) What is your favorite city in the world?

b) Have you ever been there?

c) When was it?

d) How was it?

e) Would you like to go back?

f) What was the weather like?

g) What season was that when you visited this place?

3.Look at the pictures below, name the cities and describe them.

In order to make it more attractive I have added a snippet about a day in the life of New York city, in miniature . Watch it and have fun.

The Sandpit from Sam O'Hare on Vimeo.

Over to you

Now chose a city you would like to visit from the pictures above and describe it with as many details as you can.

Expanding vocabulary

City: active, bustling, noisy, busy, clean, dirty, windy

Traffic: loud, congested, snarled, busy,
Buildings: old, shabby, rundown, crumbling, modern, futuristic, sleek, towering, squat
Buildings (walls): brick, stone, marble, glass, steel, graffiti-covered
Monuments, statues: stone, copper, carved, ancient, moss-covered, faded, green, bronze
Sidewalk: concrete, cement, slick, cracked, tidy, littered, swept
Paint: fresh, weathered, peeling
Signs: neon, weathered, worn, bright, welcoming, flashing
Buses, cars, taxis: belching, crawling, speeding, honking, waiting, screeching
People: hurried, bundled, smiling, frowning, eager, rushed, busy

Note: If you do not understand some of the words, look them up in a dictionary.

Teacher Nevton