PART ONE: SPEAKING.

TASK ONE: Match the words with the pictures. Then, answer the questions.

1. bells.
2. a candle.
3. a candy cane.
4. carol singers / carolers.
5. a Christmas card.
6. Christmas lights.
7. a Christmas pudding.
8. a Christmas stocking.
9. a Christmas tree.
10. crackers.
11. decoration / ornament.
12. the fireplace.
13. a gingerbread man.
14. holly.
15. mistletoe.
16. a present / gift.
17. a reindeer.
18. Santa Claus.
19. a snowman.
20. toys.
21. a wreath.
22. a (Christmas) Yule log.

Do you decorate your house for Christmas?

____________________________________________________________________________
Do you hang up a stocking?
____________________________________________________________________________
Is your Christmas tree real or artificial?
____________________________________________________________________________
When do you put it up?
____________________________________________________________________________
When do you take it down? How long do you keep your Christmas tree up after
Christmas?
____________________________________________________________________________

TASK TWO: Read about the FOOD people eat for Christmas. Match the words with
the pictures. Then, answer the questions.

In the United Kingdom and Ireland

Christmas dinner in the United Kingdom and in Ireland usually consists of roast turkey (or duck,
or goose), roast potatoes, Brussels sprouts, stuffing, cranberry sauce, and Christmas pudding.
In the United States

Christmas dinner in the United States is very similar to the British version. American people eat
turkey, green beans, corn, stuffing, cranberry sauce, and pumpkin pie. Dessert often includes
pumpkin pie, fruitcake, or mince pie.

In Australia
Christmas dinner in Australia tends to be very similar to the traditional English version.
However, since Christmas is celebrated during the summer season, meats such as ham,
turkey and chicken are sometimes served cold. Barbecues are also a popular way of avoiding
the heat of the oven. Seafood such as prawns (shrimp) is common, as are barbecued cuts of
steak or chicken breasts, drumsticks and wings. Fruit of the season include mango and
cherries.
In France
In France and some other French-speaking countries, the réveillon is a long dinner (and party!)
held on the evening preceding Christmas Day. The name of this dinner is based on the word
‘réveil’ (meaning "waking"), because people stay awake until midnight and beyond.

1. capon.
2. caviar.
3. crayfish.
4. foie gras (with toast).
5. goose.
6. lobster.
7. oysters.
8. scallops.
9. smoked salmon.
10. truffle.
11. turkey.
12. venison.
13. white pudding.
14. the Yule log.
What is the typical menu for a Christmas meal in your family / your country?
What do you usually eat for Christmas?

TASK THREE: Talk about Christmas and YOU.

You can write down a few notes (not whole sentences) here:

No inspiration? Here are some questions to help you!

Do you enjoy Christmas time?
Do you celebrate Christmas in a special way?
Does your family have any special Christmas traditions?
What is the best Christmas present you have ever received?
How did you celebrate Christmas last year? What did you do last year on Christmas Day?
What kind of presents do you expect to get this Christmas?
When do you open your presents?
How old were you when you learnt that Santa Claus did not exist?
PART TWO: LISTENING.
Recording 1: Christmas Eve
Listen to the recording and then, answer the following questions.
1. When is Christmas Eve?
_________________________________________________________________________
2. What do people do on Christmas Eve?
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
3. What do children do on Christmas Eve?
_________________________________________________________________________
4. Listen to the rest of Christmas traditions and put them in the order you hear them.

Recording 2: Christmas Day in Canada

Listen to Anja interviewing Fred and answer the following questions.
1. What time do children open their Christmas gifts in Canada?
6.00 a.m. 6.30 a.m. 7.00 a.m. 7.30 a.m. 8.00 a.m.
2. What do family members do when it is time to give the presents?
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
3. What is the most exciting part of the day for Fred?
_________________________________________________________________________
4. What do Canadian people love eating during the Christmas holidays?
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
 Recording 3: Boxing Day
Listen to Todd interviewing Nicola and answer the following questions.
1. When is Boxing Day?
_________________________________________________________________________
2. Right or Wrong?
Boxing Day is celebrated in England only. Right. Wrong.
3. When did the tradition of Boxing Day start?
in Shakespearan times. in Victorian times. in WWII.
(1564-1616) (reign: 1837-1901) (1939-1945)
4. What happened on Boxing Day?
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
5. What do people usually do on Boxing Day?
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
6. What does Nicola particularly do on Boxing Day?
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
PART THREE: READING.
The Origin of Christmas Pudding
1§ Christmas (or Plum) Pudding is the traditional end to the British Christmas dinner. However,
what we know as Christmas pudding now is a far cry from the original pudding.
2§ Christmas pudding can be traced back to the 14th century when porridge like mixture, called
‘frumenty’ was made of beef and mutton with raisins, currants, prunes, wines and spices. This
would often be more like soup and was eaten as a fasting meal in preparation for the Christmas
festivities.
3§ Towards the end of the 1500’s, frumenty had become more like a plum pudding. It had been
thickened with eggs, breadcrumbs, and dried fruit and given more flavour with the addition of
beer and spirits. By the mid 1600’s it had become the traditional pudding to end a Christmas
meal, but in 1664 the Puritans banned it. They thought it was a ‘lewd tradition’ as the
ingredients were far too rich for God-fearing people.
4§ King George 1 had apparently tasted and enjoyed Plum Pudding and re-instated it as part of
a traditional Christmas meal in 1714. By Victorian times, Christmas Puddings had changed into
something similar to the ones that are eaten today.
5§There are many superstitions surrounding the Christmas pudding. Some say that it should
have thirteen ingredients, representing Jesus and his Disciples. In other households, everyone
takes a turn to stir the pudding mixture with a wooden spoon. You should stir in an East to West
direction. This custom honours the three wise men who came from the east.
6§ Although traditionally we eat our pudding at Christmas, the sprig of holly placed on top of the
pudding is said to represent Jesus’ Crown of Thorns that he wore at his crucifixion. Obviously
this custom is more in keeping with Easter. Also the spectacle of flaming alcohol on a pudding is
said to represent Jesus’ love and power.
7§ In the middle Ages, holly was also thought to bring good luck and to have healing powers. It
was often planted near houses in the belief that it protected the inhabitants. Putting a silver coin
in the pudding is another age-old custom that is said to bring luck to the person that finds it.
Taken from: http://themagicofchristmasshop.co.uk/html/TheOriginofChristmasPudding.htm

Q. 1 VOCABULARY.
• Paragraph 1
Find an EXPRESSION meaning ‘a very different expression from something’.
This expression is ________________________.
• Paragraph 2
Find a VERB meaning ‘to eat little or no food for a period of time, especially for
religious or health reasons’. This verb is ________________________.
• Paragraph 3
Find a VERB meaning ‘to become less liquid’. This verb is _____________________.
Find a NOUN meaning ‘taste’. This noun is _____________________.
Find a NOUN meaning ‘a strong alcohol’. This noun is _____________________.
Find a VERB meaning ‘to prohibit / to forbid’. This verb is _____________________.
Find an ADJECTIVE meaning ‘obscene’. This adjective is _____________________.
 Find an ADJECTIVE meaning ‘living a moral life based on religious principles’.
This adjective is _____________________.
• Paragraph 4
Find a VERB meaning ‘to restore’. This verb is _____________________.
• Paragraph 5
Find a VERB meaning ‘to move a liquid or substance around, using a spoon or
something similar, in order to mix it thoroughly’. This verb is ____________________.
Find an ADJECTIVE meaning ‘able to make sensible decisions and give good advice
because of the experience and knowledge that you have’. This adjective is ________.
• Paragraph 6
Find a NOUN meaning ‘a small stem with leaves on it from a plant or bush, used in
cooking or as a decoration’. This noun is _____________________.
Find a NOUN meaning ‘a small sharp pointed part on the stem of some plants, such
as roses’. This noun is _____________________.
• Paragraph 7
Find a VERB meaning ‘to make something healthy again’. This verb is ___________.

Q. 2 True or False? Justify by quoting the text.

a. The recipe for Christmas Pudding has never changed over the centuries.
Right. Wrong.
____________________________________________________________________
b. Christmas Pudding is not a new dessert.
Right. Wrong.
____________________________________________________________________
c. The first Christmas Pudding was rather liquid.
Right. Wrong.
____________________________________________________________________
d. Christmas Pudding has always been part of the Christmas festivities.
Right. Wrong.
____________________________________________________________________
e. The making of a Christmas pudding has several religious explanations.
Right. Wrong.
____________________________________________________________________
f. If you find the silver coin hidden in the pudding, it means you will become rich.
Right. Wrong.
____________________________________________________________________
 Christmas Pudding Recipe

TASK ONE: Translate the ingredients into your mother tongue.

1 lb sultanas _______________________________________________________

1 lb raisins _______________________________________________________

1 lb currants _______________________________________________________

½ lb glace cherries _______________________________________________________

¼ lb mixed peel _______________________________________________________

¼ lb flaked almonds _______________________________________________________

¼ lb chopped walnuts _______________________________________________________

1tsp cinnamon _______________________________________________________

1tsp ground ginger _______________________________________________________

½ tsp ground cloves _______________________________________________________

½ tsp ground nutmeg _______________________________________________________

1 lb Demerara sugar _______________________________________________________

1 lb breadcrumbs _______________________________________________________

1lb suet _______________________________________________________

5 eggs _______________________________________________________

4oz brandy _______________________________________________________

½ pint Guinness _______________________________________________________

TASK TWO: Put the instructions in the rights order!

____ Then cover with tin foil.

____ Add liquid and stir thoroughly.

____ Mix all dry ingredients in a large mixing bowl.

____ Leave to stand over night.

____ Transfer into well grease pudding basins and cover with greaseproof paper and tie
around bowl.

____ Cool and allow to mature for at least one month before Christmas.

____ Steam puddings for two hours.

PART FOUR: WRITING.
Choose one of the following subjects.

1) How did you find out that Santa Claus wasn't real? How did you react?
2) Do you think Christmas has become too commercialized?
3) Why do some people not like Christmas?
4) Describe the best (or worst!) Christmas you have ever had.

I chose subject N°___.

____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
PART TWO: LISTENING.
Christmas Eve
http://www.elllo.org/english/Games/G017-Christmas.html
OK, let's talk about Christmas. Actually first, let's not talk about Christmas so much but Christmas Eve,
so Christmas Eve refers to the night before Christmas. Eve refers to evening, and Christmas Eve is
usually a time you get together with your family. Sometimes families have a big dinner. Sometimes you
get together with friends, but for children Christmas Eve is when Santa comes, so it is very important for
children to put cookies and milk out for Santa so when he comes and delivers presents, he has
something to eat.
OK, speaking of cookies, one of the more popular cookies of Christmas is the gingerbread man. Now the
gingerbread man obviously looks like a little man, and it has a very unique taste. We usually only eat
gingerbread cookies at Christmas. They taste pretty good. I've never made them, but I love to eat them.
OK, one tradition for Christmas is to decorate your house with lights. We often put lots of Christmas
lights on the outside of our house, and some people do different colors. Some people just do white lights,
but it's really popular in America. Some people actually leave the lights on until, I don't know, February.
They forget to take them down with the new year but having Christmas lights is really popular.
OK, so now it's Christmas morning and Christmas morning one of the first things some people do is they
go to church. They go to Christmas Service. For Catholics it's called Christmas Mass and they go and
they celebrate the birth of Jesus, which is the reason why we have Christmas, basically, the reason for
the holiday.
OK, another morning tradition usually is to open gifts. Usually, the children run down and they check the
gifts under the tree. Usually the children have to wait until their parents come down, so often on
Christmas morning little kids are bugging their parents to "wake-up, wake-up, wake-up" so they can go
down and see what they have for Christmas.
OK, another tradition for Christmas is the nativity scene. Now the nativity scene is the scene that has the
story of Christmas so it would be basically a 'Joseph' and a 'Mary' and then 'The Baby Jesus' and then
sometimes 'The Three Wise Men' and then usually it's called 'in a manger' which is like an old, I guess
an animal shack or something, I'm not sure, but often people have a nativity scene inside their house, or
outside their house to celebrate Christmas.
OK, that's it. That's part one about our things about Christmas. Stay tuned for more.

Christmas Day in Canada

http://www.elllo.org/english/0801/T843-Fred-Day.htm
Anja: So, Fred, tell me, what do you guys do on Christmas day? Like, what do you eat? When do you
open the gifts? Who's coming over? Are you going to visit your family?
Fred: Well, Anja, the routine in Canada for Christmas is quite simple. The kids get very excited on the
25th because early in the morning, at around seven o'clock, that's when we open the gifts.
Anja: Oh, you open the gifts in the morning?
Fred: That's right.
Anja: Oh, wow.
Fred: At around seven o'clock in the morning, we... well, as I kid I remember being so unbelievably
excited, so at night, I don't think I could sleep. I was too excited about waking up early in the
morning and then opening my gifts, so what we do is that, the parents put the gifts under the
Christmas tree, and then early on the 25th, in the morning we all gather around the Christmas
tree and then, one-by-one, we open the gifts.
Anja: So you open the gifts in your pajamas, and then you...
Fred: That's right. But that's not the most exciting part of the day.
Anja: Oh, it's not.
Fred: No, the food is.
Anja: The food.
Fred: The food is the most exciting part of the day. Well, in Canada we eat lots of, as you may know,
we have maple syrup.
Anja: Oh, yes, that's right. You are really famous for that, right?
Fred: For maple syrup. Maple syrup is something that Canadian people love eating during the
Christmas holidays and so all of the time through the week of the 25th until New Year's Eve, the
first of January, we cook many kind of different dishes and we just put maple syrup on it.
Anja: Oh, really. For instance, what do you eat? Is there some traditional food you have for Christmas
in Canada?
Fred: Of course. We have traditional food. As you may know, pancakes.
Anja: Of course.
Fred: Yes.
Anja: I love my pancakes.
Fred: You do, you do, yeah. Yeah, I love pancakes, too. We put maple syrup on it. Oh, it's so good, you
know, and you know what else is really good?
Anja: What is?
Fred: We fry pigs ears.
Anja: Oh, my god you do?
Fred: Yeah, it's delicious, and the tongue of the pig as well. We fry it. And then we put maple syrup on
it.
Anja: Oh, wow, I didn't know that. That's quite interesting.
Fred: Yeah, it's delicious. You should try it one day.
Anja: Oh, I will definitely.

Boxing Day
http://www.elllo.org/english/0151/195-Nicola-BoxingDay.htm
Todd: Nicola, you're from England.
Nicola: Yes, I am.
Todd: OK. Now in England you have something called "Boxing day".
Nicola: Yes, we do.
Todd: So, we don't have that in America. What is Boxing day?
Nicola: Well, boxing day is always on the 26th of December, the day after Christmas day, and it
was originally called boxing day because it was the day in England when the very rich
people in Victorian times gave presents to their servants, the day after Christmas, and
usually it would be something like money, or food but they would give it to them in a small
box, and so on December the 26th, servants would receive their boxes,the Christmas
boxes, and that's why it was called Boxing day.
Todd: OK
Nicola: Today, people don't really receive money or food so much, sometimes you give extra tips
at Christmas, but Boxing day has stuck. So that's the name.
Todd: What do people do on Boxing day?
Nicola: Nothing really. Uh, eat the leftover turkey, turkey sandwiches, watch TV, and in my family
we usually go and watch dog racing, grey hound racing. Yeah, and lose some money...
Todd: Lose money!
Nicola: Yeah always. At least I do.
Todd: Wow, cool. Dog track. Is there a dog track near your house?
Nicola: Yeah, there is, where I live, yeah.

PART THREE: READING.

Q. 1 Paragraph 1: a far cry from.
Paragraph 2: to fast.
Paragraph 3: to thicken – flavour – a spirit – to ban – lewd – God-fearing.
Paragraph 4: to re-instate.
Paragraph 5: to stir – wise.
Paragraph 6: a sprig – a thorn.
Paragraph 7: to heal.
Q. 2 a. False. (‘what we know as Christmas pudding now is a far cry from the original
pudding’)
b. True. (‘Christmas pudding can be traced back to the 14th century’)
c. True. (‘This would often be more like soup’)
d. False. (‘in 1664 the Puritans banned it’ + ‘King George 1 […] re-instated it as part of
a traditional Christmas meal in 1714’)
e. True. (‘thirteen ingredients, representing Jesus and his Disciples, ‘You should stir in
an East to West direction. This custom honours the three wise men who came from
the east ’, ‘the sprig of holly placed on top of the pudding is said to represent Jesus’
Crown of Thorns that he wore at his crucifixion’, ‘the spectacle of flaming alcohol on a
pudding is said to represent Jesus’ love and power’)
f. False. (‘Putting a silver coin in the pudding is another age-old custom that is said to
bring luck to the person that finds it’)

Christmas Pudding Recipe

_6_ Then cover with tin foil.
_2_ Add liquid and stir thoroughly.
_1_ Mix all dry ingredients in a large mixing bowl.
_3_ Leave to stand over night.
_4_ Transfer into well grease pudding basins and cover with greaseproof paper and tie
around bowl.
_8_ Cool and allow to mature for at least one month before Christmas.
_7_ Steam puddings for two hours.

• Mix all dry ingredients in a large mixing bowl.

• Add liquid and stir thoroughly.
• Leave to stand over night.
• Transfer into well grease pudding basins and cover with greaseproof paper and tie around
bowl.
• Then cover with tin foil.
• Steam puddings for two hours.
• Cool and allow to mature for at least one month before Christmas.

*************************************************************************************************************
You may also be interested in:
http://www.elllo.org/english/0801/T839-Fred-Santa.htm (Santa Claus in Canada)
http://www.elllo.org/english/0801/T838-Anja-Santa.htm (Santa Claus in Switzerland)

http://www.foodtimeline.org/christmasfood.html
http://www.classbrain.com/artholiday/publish/article_256.shtml
http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A660836
http://www.britainexpress.com/articles/Food/christmas-pudding.htm