American Corner Innsbruck
ACI meets BFI Scavenger Hunt
Friday, June 6, 8-12.45 pm
City of Innsbruck
The American Corner Innsbruck team and the BFI trainer Maria Hitzginger took the participants of an English Business class on an English language scavenger hunt, through the city of Innsbruck.
Ms. Hitzginger had approached the ACI team with the request of help for the organization and administration on the last day of one of her classes at the BFI. The outline that the organizers came up with was to, first of all introduce the participants to ways of coming in contact with the English language in Innsbruck. Secondly, the contents of the course should be reviewed in different surroundings than the classroom situation. Also, everything they encountered that day, all the instructions, tasks, spoken language of people administering the tasks, should be only in English.
The scavenger hunt was divided into nine tasks, of which you can find an outline below:
Task one - the group of 12 participants met Ms. Hitzginger at the BFI to go through some details, revise on some things they would need and fill in a crossword puzzle of business related vocabulary with the solution word being "scavenger hunt". They were then sent off, in groups of four, with the next three tasks described on a sheet of paper. The trainer would be walking from one stop to the next, to make sure everything was going according to the plan, and would then be meeting the groups at the last stop.
Task two - through the directions on the sheet the groups were lead to the train station of Innsbruck and into a newspaper agent. They were asked to look through the assortment of English magazines and books and choose one they were interested in. They did not have to buy it, but write down information on the author, title, prize, and content of the item they chose.
Task three - took them to the tourist information, where they had to get and English city map, and information on their favorite tourist sight of Innsbruck, of course also in the target language.
Task four - they would then come to visit the American Corner Innsbruck office, where staff would answer some questions (What does the ACI do? How long has it existed? What kind of information can one get there?), introduce them to an English language website (Trace Effects), and help them choose information from the selection according to their personal interests. They were also given Marc Twain's Autobiography for second language learners as a present. Before they left, they were given the next four tasks.
Task five - was finding the bus stop of the Sightseer bus and finding out information on departure times and fares.
Task six - took them to the Leokino, a cinema dedicated to showing movies in original language. The information they needed to get there was, which and when movies were shown in English that week.
Task seven - was situated at the University. More precisely it was done in the coffeeroom of the American and English Studies Departement, in the Humanities building, of the University of Innsbruck. An ACI member welcomed them and gave them a worksheet on business English. One by one, they also had to go through a mock job interview in which they had to state and spell their name, an describe their personal qualities, amongst other things.
Task eight - was to find their language trainer at a café close by. They had to recapitulate on everything they did and go through the answers to all the questions with their teacher. They were then joined by a staff member of the ACI, to talk more (of course in English) and give feedback.
The feedback turned out to be very good and the participants were happy with the outcome. The American Corner Innsbruck Staff will gladly assist the BFI and Maria Hitzginger in future scavenger hunts and other joint projects.
Here are some more pictures of the day:
