18. Old English Verb Paradigm

Number: 2 – Sg & Pl. Person: 3 – 1^st, 2^nd, 3^rd. Tense: 2 – Present & past (Future expressed by lex means or by present). Mood: 3 – indicative, imperative (expresses order or request), subjunctive (expresses supposition and wish). Aspect: 2 – perfective & imperfective (both expressed by the meaning of the V only, via adding prefix E- to show perfectiveness). Types of Vs: strong – Vs changing their forms via Ablaut (7 rows, 7^th – reduplicative). Distinguishing 4 forms – Infinitive, 1^st p. sg., 1^st p. pl. and participle II (bitan – bat- boton – biten). Weak – Vs changing their forms via dental suffix (3 classes). Distinguishing 3 forms – Infinitive, 1^st (3^rd) p. sg. And participle II (deman – demde – demed). Preterit-present – Vs forming their present like strong Vs from their past, and their past is formed like the past of the weak Vs. Irregular – Vs changing their forms suppletively (wesan, beon – to be). Partiviple I is formed by adding suffix ENDE to the stem of the Infinitive, Participle II – by adding the prefix GE- and the ending –EN to the stem of the plural past tense.

15.Speak on the Germanic invasion of Britain and its role in the formation of the nation and the language

During the fifth century, а number of tribes from the north-western European mainland invaded and settled in large numbers. The newcomers were warlike and illiterate. We owe our knowledge of this period mainly to an English monk named Bede, who lived three hundred years later, but his story of events has been proved generally correct by archaeological evidence. Bede tells that the invaders came from three powerful Germanic tribes, the Saxons, Angles and Jutes. The jutes were later considered no different from the Angles and Saxons. The Anglo-Saxon migration gave the larger part of Britain its new name, England, “the land of the Angles”. These Anglo-Saxons soon had the south-east of the country in their grasp. In the west of the country their advance was temporarily halted by an army оf (Celtic) Britons under the command of the legendary King Arthur (In folklore and myth he is а great English hero, and he and his knights of the round table are regarded as the perfect example of medieval nobility and chivalry). Nevertheless, by the end of the sixth century, they and their way of life predominated in nearly all of England and in parts of southern Scotland. The Celtic Britons were either Saxonized or driven westwards, where their culture and language survived in south-west Scotland, Wales and Cornwall. The strength of Anglo-Saxon culture is obvious even today. Days of the week were named after Germanic gods: Tig (Tuesday), Wodin (Wednesday), Thor (Thursday), Frei (Friday). New place-names appeared on the map. The first of these show that the earliest Saxon villages, like Celtic ones, were family villages. The ending –ing meant folk or family, thus, for example, “Hastings” is the place of the family Hasta. Ham means farm, ton means settlement. Birmingham, Nottingham or Southampton, for instance, are Saxon place-names.

The Anglo-Saxon invaders formed several new kingdoms. The Anglii settlements evolved into the kingdoms of East Anglia, Mercia, and Northumbria. The Saxons settlements appeared to have founded the kingdoms of Sussex, Wessex, and Essex. The Jutes appear to have predominated in Kent and the Isle of Wight. Wars between these kingdoms gradually resulted in the consolidation of three important kingdoms, Mercia, Northumbria and Wessex. War continued between these kingdoms as well as raids from the west and north, but they were stronger than the Romanized Britons and able to deal with these raiders. This was the England that the Vikings found when they began to raid.

The Anglo-Saxons had little use for towns and cities. But they had а great effect on the countryside, where they introduced new farming methods and founded the thousands of self-sufficient vil­lages which formed the basis of English society for the next thousand or so years.

The Saxons created institutions which made the English state strong for the next 500 years. One of these institutions was the King’s Council, called the Witan. The Witan probably grew out of informal groups of senior warriors and churchmen to whom kings had turned for advice or support on difficult matters. By the 10thcentury the Witan was a formal body, issuing laws and charters. It was not at all democratic, and the King might decide to ignore the Witan’s advice. But he knew it might be dangerous to do so. For the Witan’s authority was based on its right to choose the kings, and to agree the use of the King’s laws. Without its support the king’s own authority was in danger. The Witan established a system which remained an important part of the king’s method of government. Even today, the king or queen has a Privy Council, a group of advisors on the affairs of state.

The Saxons divided the land into new administrative areas, based on shires, or counties. They remained the same for a thousand years. Over each shire was appointed a shire reeve, the king’s local administrator. In time his name became shortened to “sheriff”.

Britain experienced another wave of Germanic invasions in the eighth century. These invaders, known as Vikings (a word which probably means either “pirates” or “the people of the sea inlets”), Norsemen or Danes, came from Scandinavia (Norway and Denmark). In the ninth century they conquered and settled the extreme north and west of Scotland, and also some coastal regions of Ireland. Their conquest of England was halted when they were defeated by King Alfred of the Saxon kingdom of Wessex (King Alfred was not only an able warrior but also а dedicated scholar and а wise ruler. He is known as `Alfred the Great’ – the only monarch in English history to be given this title). This resulted in an agreement which divided England between Wessex, in the south and west where Alferd was recognized as king, and the `Danelaw’ in the north and east where Viking rule was recognized..

However, the cultural differences between Anglo-Saxons and Danes were comparatively small. They led roughly the same way of life and spoke two varieties of the same Germanic tongue (which combined to form the basis of modern English). Moreover, the Danes soon converted to Christianity. These similarities made political uni­fication easier, and by the end of the tenth century England was one kingdom with а Germanic culture throughout.

The Anglo-Saxons played a crucial role in the development of the English language. Not only did Germanic dialects (which evolved into Old English) replace Latin and Celtic, but loose knit and often feuding hereditary kingships replaced the more centrally governed system of provinces left by the Romans. The Angles came from "Englaland" [sic] and their language was called "Englisc" - from which the words "England" and "English" are derived. The invading Germanic tribes spoke similar languages, which in Britain developed into what we now call Old English. Old English did not sound or look like English today. Native English speakers now would have great difficulty understanding Old English. Nevertheless, about half of the most commonly used words in Modern English have Old English roots. The words be, strong and water, for example, derive from Old English. Old English was spoken until around 1100.

19 .Planning a lesson period

The lesson is a structural unit of teaching/learning process. Every lesson reflects practical, instructional, educational, and developing aims.

1) The practical aim presupposes mastering a FL as a means of oral and written communication that is achieved through involvement of learners into oral and written activity.2) The instructional aim is the expansion of erudition, development of the student’s intelligence, mental ability, power of learning and understanding, which is achieved when the learners work on teaching materials.3) Working under the teacher's guidance on some material, the learners add up to their knowledge about the country and its people. This work leads to forming new linguistic concepts; the pupils are encouraged to use their imagination and develop different types of memory.

There are three generally accepted kinds of memory that mainly concern teachers and students alike:(1) the short-term memory;2) the operational memory;(3) the long-term memory.

I. Organising for Instruction/The first stage involves preparation of students for language learning activity (organising for instruction). It is, first and foremost, the beginning of a lesson: greetings, transition to work, absences, lateness and information regarding the items to be discussed during the lesson.

II. Revising Old Material/This stage is the basic one, as it involves the application of language items taught. The pupils do various exercises, depending on the type of the lesson and the level of teaching. Of course, the material to be revised depends both on the teaching point and the type of drills included in the plan. Some drills may require flash cards, filmstrips, recordings or videoclips..In this stage the pupils master such skills as comprehension, speaking and reading. The stage takes up to 10-15 minutes approximately.

III. Presentation of New Material/Getting the language material into the minds of the learners largely depends on the technique of presentation peculiar to the method; it also depends upon the teaching technique of individual teacher. IV. Practice

Having presented new material, it must then be practised: the learner must produce examples of their own in response to cues given by the teacher or the tape. The teacher provides generalisations in the pupils' mother tongue or the target language. Various manipulative drills may be used.

V. Reinforcement is fixing of new material firmly in pupils’ mind, so that he can handle it correctly and fluently.

VI. Closing Stage It involves the creation of situations, the response to which makes the learners use the words and speech patterns, and combining the new teaching point with what they have already been taught.