4_5850522433915718477 (1).pdf

Published by Macmillan Education Ltd. © Macmillan Education Limited, 2021.
Home >> Adults >> General English >> NEWS LESSONS
How creating wildlife crossings can help reindeer, bears – and even crabs
Level: Intermediate
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Level: Intermediate
Warmer
a. Brainstorm all the different ways a person could make the following journeys if they don’t have
much money or a car.
• Madrid to Berlin
• New York to Los Angeles
• London to Dublin
Key words
a. Find words in the article that match the definitions below. The paragraph numbers are given to
help you.
1. a large wooden box used for moving or storing goods (para 1)
2. feeling sad and alone because you are far from home (para 3)
3. goods that are carried by vehicles (para 4)
4. with the top part at the bottom or lower than the bottom part
(two words, para 4)
5. suddenly frightened or surprised by something (para 10)
6. asked a lot of questions in an angry or threatening way, to get information
(para 10)
7. people who give their good wishes, often to someone who they do not know
(two words, para 14)
8. walking with difficulty because of an injured leg or foot (para 14)
9. a room that you rent that is used for both living and sleeping in
(para 16)
10. something exciting or dangerous that someone is involved in
(para 17)
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Thinking inside the box: the Welsh teen who tried to post himself home from Australia

Level: Intermediate
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b. Use some of the key words above to complete these sentences.
1. Suddenly seeing the face at the window me.
2. The vaccines were sent overseas by air .
3. Thousands of stood outside the palace after the
royal wedding.
4. Looking back, he realized it was just a silly childhood .
5. The criminals were by local police.
6. The car landed in a ditch.

How creating wildlife crossings can help reindeer, bears – and even crabs
Level: Intermediate
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Level: Intermediate
Naaman Zhou
8 April, 2021
A Welsh man has asked for help to find two
Irish men who helped him return home from
Australia in 1965. They packed him up and sent
him in a crate.
Brian Robson, a 75-year-old from Cardiff,
is looking for two men he only knew as Paul
and John.
Robson was a 19-year-old working for Victorian
Railways when he became homesick. But the
airfare cost about £700 and he only made £40
a month.
So he came up with a “stupid” plan, to buy
a small wooden crate and send himself as
freight. Robson said the “horrific experience”
had taken four days, and he had often been
stored upside down.
Nearly 60 years later, Robson said he wanted
to get in touch with the men to thank them and
to buy them a drink.
“I’m 99% sure that they were called Paul and
John,” he said. “Paul really was 100% against
it … but John said, ‘Don’t worry about it. I’ll
persuade him.’ And so, they both helped me.”
Robson bought a box “the size of a mini-fridge”
and packed it with pillows, a suitcase, a book of
Beatles songs and two bottles – one for water
and one for urine. His friends then nailed it shut
and booked Robson as freight on a Qantas
flight from Melbourne to London.
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But their plan didn’t work. The flight was full, so
Robson was put on a PanAm flight instead that
took him to Los Angeles.
A newspaper report from May, 1965 said
Robson had labelled himself “a computer”.
In the US, Robson was discovered by startled
customs officials and then interrogated by
the FBI.
He told the BBC that a man had “looked
through a hole in the crate and we were
suddenly eye to eye”.
“He jumped back a mile and said, ‘There’s a
body in there.’”
After questioning, he was cleared and was
allowed to fly to London on a normal passenger
flight. There he could return to his life in the UK.
Robson had to “push his way past well-wishers”
who greeted him at LA airport. He said, too,
that he had still been “stiff and limping” when
he flew to London.
Robson said he had written to the men to thank
them, but they had never replied.
“We got on famously,” he said. “They used to
come to my bedsit, or I would go to see them,
almost on a daily basis.”
But he admitted to the BBC that the crate
escapade had been “stupidity”.
“If my kids tried it, I would kill them. But it was a
different time.”
© Guardian News and Media 2021
First published in The Guardian, 08/04/2021
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Level: Intermediate
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Find the information and comprehension check
a. Find the following names in the text.
1. the central person in the story and the two men who helped him ,
,
2. two airlines
3. two capital cities
4. two more major (but not capital) cities
5. a national public service broadcaster
b. Are these statements true (T) or false (F) according to the article? Correct any that are false.
1. A Welsh man is hoping to meet up with two men who helped him with a daring
escapade in the 1960s. T / F
2. The men told him to post himself from Australia to Wales to save the airfare. T / F
3. The label said that Robson’s crate contained a ‘mini-fridge’. T / F
4. His plan failed because his flight was rerouted due to bad weather. T / F
5. He was discovered in the USA by FBI officials. T / F
6. When he left LA, many people came to see him depart and wish him a good journey. T / F
Using key language
a. Find the following phrases in the article.
1. make or renew contact with someone (para 5)
2. suddenly move away from something because it shocks or surprises you
(para 12)
3. have a very good relationship (or friendship) with each other (para 16)
4. every day (para 16)
b. Use the phrases to talk about the article.
c. Now, use each phrase to talk about something relevant to your own life.

Home Adults General English NEWS LESSONS
Level: Intermediate
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Discussion
a. Discuss these questions.
• What was the most difficult or awkward thing you have ever sent, or might want to send, by post?
• What did/might you pack it in?
• How much did/might it cost to send?
• Did/Might it arrive safely and were you/might you be happy with the service you received?
In your own words
a. Talk about why people might want to send these items from one country to another, and then
research the ‘correct’ way to send each one.
• a 100-year-old classic car from Europe to the USA
• a young elephant from Africa to Europe
• a two-metre sculpture from the USA to China
• a racehorse from the Middle East to Australia

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Level: Intermediate – Teacher’s notes
Article summary: A man who posted himself
home in a box in 1965 is looking for the two
men who helped him all those years ago.
Time: 90 minutes +
Skills: Reading, Speaking, Writing
Language focus: Vocabulary
Materials needed: One copy of the
worksheet per student
1. Warmer
a. Ask students to brainstorm ways that a person could
undertake the journeys mentioned despite not being
able to afford the ‘usual’ fare. Encourage them to
think of as many ways as possible, regardless of
whether they are safe or dangerous, legal or illegal,
crazy or sensible. Some possible ideas: hitchhiking;
becoming a stowaway in a lorry or on a plane or
ship; walking; using a makeshift raft; cycling.
2. Key words
a. Students find words in the article that match the
definitions and write them onto the lines provided.
The paragraph numbers are provided to help them.
Remind them that this time they are sometimes
looking for two words and not just one, and that a
hyphenated word is counted here for these purposes
as two words
Key:
1. crate
2. homesick
3. freight
4. upside down
5. startled
6. interrogated
7. well-wishers
8. limping
9. bedsit
10. escapade
b. Before reading the article carefully, students
use some of the key words to fill the gaps in the
sentences to ensure that they understand and know
how the words are used in other contexts.
Key:
1. startled
2. freight
3. well-wishers
4. escapade
5. interrogated
6. upside down
3.
Find the information and
comprehension check
a. Students find basic information that is central to the
story and which will aid their understanding of the
finer details of the story.
Key:
1. Brian Robson, John, Paul
2. Qantas, PanAm
3. London, Cardiff (You might want to explain that
Cardiff is the capital of a country (Wales) but
that the country is not a sovereign state.)
4. Melbourne, Los Angeles
5. BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation)
b. Students decide whether the statements are true
or false according to the article and correct any that
are false.
Key:
1. True.
2. False. He asked them to help him post himself
from Australia to Wales as he couldn’t afford
the airfare.
3. False. The label said that Robson’s crate
contained a computer.
4. False. His plan failed because his flight was full
and so he was put onto a different plane that
stopped in Los Angeles where he was found.
5. False. He was discovered in the USA by
customs officials and then interrogated by
the FBI.
6. True.

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Level: Intermediate – Teacher’s notes
The Welsh teen who tried to post himself home from Australia
4. Using key language
a. Students look for phrases in the article.
Key:
1. get in touch with
2. jump back a mile
3. get on famously
4. on a daily basis
b. They use them in sentences about the article.
Encourage them to make at least one sentence
per phrase.
c. Then they use them to talk about something relevant
to their own lives.
5. Discussion
a. Students discuss the questions about something
unusual that they once sent by post or something
they might want to send.
6. In your own words
a. Students work in groups or with a partner to
compete the tasks. Ask them to look at one of the
consignments more closely, find out more details
such as costs and insurance, and then present their
results to the rest of the class.

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