Reading Level: High School

Objective: To facilitate learners’ reading skills through different activities

Activity 1: Have a look at the pictures below:

What do you think they are all about? Talk to your partner.

Can you remember any experience of the kind of incidents that the above pictures

show? How did you feel?

Activity 2: What do you think the article is going to be about? Have you come across these

words before?

Missouri Suburb Desperate OMG KCTV

Top off Transmission fluid Plea Epic Miracle

Activity 3: Read the following article carefully

A Missouri mother of five confronted a thief with text messages after her van was stolen — and

the criminal returned her car just hours later.

Single mom Megan Bratten was at a Kmart in Independence, a suburb of Kansas City, when she

walked out to find an empty parking spot where she had parked her van — the vehicle she uses

to run her business and provide for her family.

Desperate, she did the first thing that came to mind: She began to text message the cell phone

she'd left in the car. 'Hey, you just stole a single mother of five's work van,' she wrote, KCTV

reported. 'You are ruining my life here.'

She continued sending the messages for the next three hours, her pleas getting more desperate

with each one. 'OMG car thief people can you just give me my van back!' she wrote, according

to KCTV. 'It would be epic, the miracle I need right now.'

Finally, the thief sent her a message back.

'I do feel bad,' the message read, according to KCTV. 'My kids needed a meal on the table so

that's what their dad did got them food. I know it’s wrong but it's been so hard since I lost my

job.'

The thief included detailed instructions on where the van was. Bratten couldn't believe her luck.

She rushed to the marked spot with her mother and dog and found the car parked. To her

surprise, the thief even topped off her transmission fluid.

Bratten never called the police. 'I can really relate on the human level of the struggle of feeling

desperate and making poor choices,' she told KCTV. 'I can understand how people act out of fear

making poor choices. 'What matters in the end, he really did the right thing.'

Activity 4: Now try to answer the following questions?

I. Where did Megan Bratten park her van?

II. How much important was the vehicle to her?

III. Did she know that the thief would return her vehicle?

IV. What is transmission fluid?

V. What was the mother’s impression about the thief at the end?

Activity 5: Discuss with your partner on what could be given the title of this article.

Activity 6: How do you feel about the mother’s triumph over getting her car back? What

would you have done if you had been in place of Megan Bratten?

Home TASK: (to be submitted in the next class)

Activity 7: Give an account of what you feel about the criminal? Do you support his action in

order to help his children? Show reasons for your answer.

Citations:

Main article- The Daily Mail, August 26, 2014, Link- http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-

2734630/Give-van-Single-mom-five-confronts-car-thief-text-messages-criminal-RETURNS-

vehicle-transmission-fluid-topped-off.html?ito=social-facebook

Images courtesy: Google Search tags- thief, stealing pics, stolen