Well, the Easter break is now over and I'm back doing private lessons.So here's something I've been doing over the last month or so with some success. Recently, there have been quite a few big-budget Hollywood films with an historical flavour (Troy, Kingdom of Heaven, Alexander etc.) As a result I've been using them with my private students in order to get them to read and discuss stuff in the lessons.
The basic idea is that I give them the dvd and ask them to talk about how accurate Hollywood has been in depicting the period. Now with films such as Troy and Alexander this isn't too difficult as they study those periods in their greek school lessons, so it just means taking a quick look at their school books. They then discuss similarities and differences between what the movie shows and what their history books say. This can be fascinating and can form the basis for any number of further discussions.
With historical periods less familiar to them you can use the film as a the basis of a research project. For example In the Kingdom of Heaven, which is based on real events and historical figures, you can ask them to do research on the people and places mentioned. Again the idea should be to focus on the differences between Hollywood's view of history and what they have found.
If you choose to do this before you give them the movie write down the peoples' names, places and dates so that they have somewhere to start on their internet search.
On the other hand, If you do this after they have seen the movies ask them to note down the names, places etc as they are watching and then do their internet search.
BTW If you don't have a copy of the film a quick trip to the video club and a liberal application of DVD Shrink will do the trick.
Just be warned that sometimes the movies touch upon sensitive cultural issues (eg. Alexander the Great's sexuality) so if you feel your students maybe mortally offended avoid the exercise.
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