Diary of a Nobody and The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole

LANGUAGE CHANGE GAME Copyright © 2001 www.teachit.co.uk

TEACHER’S NOTES FOR LANGUAGE CHANGE GAME

1. Duplicate and then cut out each of the quotations on the following sheets, mix them thoroughly and put them in an envelope. You should have one envelope to each pair of students.

2. Ask the students to arrange the slips in two columns, according to which text they

think they are from. 2. Ask the students to highlight the words or phrases that suggested the text to them. 3. Go round and check students’ choices, discussing their highlights and, even more

profitably, possible reasons for any errors. 4. Ask them to compare in detail, two or three sets of slips that have similar subject

matter (e.g. book-buying, food, health, clothes) and write down any differences they notice in vocabulary, syntax and sentence construction.

5. Get them to make a list of which highlights are to do with culture specific references

and which are stylistic or lexical. 6. They should now find one or two slips that they have not previously selected and try

to re-write them in the style of the other text.

This game can be a prelude to an essay question based on two extracts from the texts.

Diary of a Nobody and The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole

Diary of a Nobody copyright © George & Weedon Grossmith The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole Aged 13¾ copyright © Sue Townsend LANGUAGE CHANGE GAME Copyright © 2001 www.teachit.co.uk

Spent the whole of the afternoon in the garden, having this morning picked up at a bookstall for fivepence a capital little book, in good condition, on Gardening. This was humiliating enough, and I could scarcely follow the play, but I was doomed to still further humiliation. There was a roar of laughter which was immediately checked when people found we had really hurt ourselves. Bought a pair of tan-coloured boots, which I see many of the swell clerks wearing in the City, and hear are all the ‘go’. I bought a pair of stags’ heads made of plaster-of-Paris and coloured brown. They will look just the thing for our little hall, and give it style; the heads are excellent imitations. Anybody would have thought I had set the house on fire from the way in which they stormed at me. I will never join in any more firework parties. It is a ridiculous waste of time and money. Woke up quite fresh after a good night’s rest, and feel quite myself again. I am satisfied a life of going-out and society is not a life for me… I went to town without a pocket-handkerchief. This is the second time I have done this during the last week. I must be losing my memory. Fortunately the matter was treated as a joke, and we all laughed; but it was a dangerous experiment, and I felt very uneasy for a moment as to the result. I had intended concluding my diary last week; but a most important event has happened, so I shall continue for a little while longer on the fly-leaves attached to the end of my last year’s diary. It does seem hard I cannot get good sausages for breakfast. They are either full of bread or spices, or are as red as beef. I thought the remarks were rude without being funny, but on tasting it myself, came to the conclusion there was some justification for them. The sparkling Algera is very like cider only more sour. I suggested that perhaps the thunder had turned it a bit acid. There was also a large picture in a very handsome frame, done in coloured crayons. It looked like a religious subject. I was very much struck with the lace collar, it looked so real, but I unfortunately made the remark that there was something about the expression of the face that was not quite pleasing.

Diary of a Nobody and The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole

Diary of a Nobody copyright © George & Weedon Grossmith The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole Aged 13¾ copyright © Sue Townsend LANGUAGE CHANGE GAME Copyright © 2001 www.teachit.co.uk

The excitement and anxiety through which I have gone the last few days have been almost enough to turn my hair grey. It is all but settled. Tomorrow the die will be cast. I have been up and down the stairs all day. I cooked a big dinner for them tonight: two poached eggs with beans, and tinned semolina pudding. (It’s a good job I wore the green lurex apron because the poached eggs escaped out of the pan and got all over me.) We had boil-in-the-bag curry and rice, it was the only thing left in the freezer apart from a bag of green stuff which has lost its label. One madman stood up and said he had a radio inside his head which told him what to do. Nobody took any notice of him, so he sat down again. If I had thirty thousand pounds I would wander the world having experiences. I wouldn’t take any real money with me because I have read that most foreigners are thieves. Instead I would have three thousand pounds’ worth of traveller’s cheques sewn into my trousers. We all agreed it should be up to the individual to dress how he or she likes. I am entering a period of convalescence. I will have to take things very easily if I am to regain my former vigour. There is a loch in front of the cabin and a pine forest and a mountain behind the cabin. There is nothing to do. It is dead boring. Just got back from London. Coach driver suffered from motorway madness on the motorway. I am too shaken by the experience to be able to give a lucid or intelligent account of the day. I bought a book from W.H. Smith’s, it was only fivepence. It was written by an unsuccessful writer called Drake Fairclough; it is called Cordon Bleu for the Elderly. I have been forced to complain about the noise coming from the nurses’ home. I am sick of listening to (and watching) drunken nurses and off-duty policemen cavorting around the grounds dressed as witches and wizards. We quite enjoyed the pantomime but it was rather childish for our taste. Bill Ash and Carole Hayman were good as Aladdin and the Princess, but the robbers played by Jeff Teare and Ian Giles were best. Sue Pomeroy gave a hilarious performance as Widow Twankey. In this she was greatly helped by her cow, played by Chris Martin and Lou Wakefield. Thank God the snow is melting! At last I can walk the streets in safety, secure in the knowledge that no one is going to ram a snowball down the back of my anorak. The only thing that really worries me about my appearance now is my ears. They stick out at an angle of ninety degrees. I have checked them with my geometry set so I know it is a scientific fact.