TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD

 We are studying vocabulary related to crime and punishment in our 2nd bachillerato lessons. Topics such as the death penalthy of life sentence imprisonment are being debated and so my students are acquiring vocabulary related to this field.

Two films come to my mind when this topic is raised in the classroom. One is "To kill a mockingbird", one of my favourites. Atticus Finch's Closing argument to defend Tom Robinson is one of the best scenes in the history of movies, in my opinion

In the following activity students will watch this inspiring scene and will fill the gaps with the following words

To Kill a Mockingbird: Fill in the Gaps

WORD BANK

1. trial
2. evidence
3. testimony
4. defendant
5. circumstantial
6. right
7. pity
8. offence
9. guilt
10. crime
11. offence
12. witness
13. courts
14. courtroom
15. integrity
16. jury
17. decision
18. restore
19. duty
20. charged
21. assumption
22. word
23. review

Excerpt:

"To begin with, this case should never have come to _____. The state has not produced one iota of medical _____ at the _____ Tom Robinson is charged with never took place. It has relied instead upon the _____ of two _____ whose evidence has not only been called into serious question on cross-examination but has been flatly contradicted by the _____.

There is _____ evidence to indicate that Mayella Ewell was beaten savagely by someone who led almost exclusively with his _____. And Tom Robinson now sits before you having taken the oath with the only good hand he possesses, his _____. Nothing but _____ in my heart for the chief _____ for the state. She is the victim of cruel poverty and ignorance.

Now, _____ does not extend so far as to her putting a man's life at stake. What she has done in an effort to get rid of her own _____! Now I say kill death, _____, because it was _____ that motivated her. She's committed no _____, she has merely broken a rigid and time-honored code of our society, a code so severe that whoever breaks it is _____ from our midst, unfit to live with. She must destroy the _____ of her _____.

But what was the _____ of her _____? Tom Robinson, a human being. She must put Tom Robinson away from her. Tom Robinson was to her a daily reminder of what she did. Now what did she do? She tempted a Negro. She was white and she tempted a Negro. She did something that in our society is unspeakable. She kissed a black man, not an old uncle but a strong young Negro man. No code method to her before she broke it, but it came crashing down on her afterwards.

The _____ for the state, with the exception of the sheriff of Macon County, have presented themselves to your gentlemen to this ___________and the cynical confidence they bear _____ would not be doubted, confident that you _____ would go along with them on the assumption, the evil assumption, that all negroes lie, all negroes are basically immoral beings, all negro men are not to be trusted around our women, an _____________ that one associates with minds of their caliber and which is in itself, a lie, which I do not need to point out to you.

And so, a quiet, humble, respectable Negro who has had the unmitigated temerity to feel sorry for a white woman has had to put his _________ against two white people's. The _____ is not guilty, but somebody in this ___________ is. Now gentlemen, in this country, our _____ are the great levelers. In our _____, all are created equal. No idealist to believe firmly in the _____ of our _____ and our _____ system, that's no ideal to me, that is a living, working reality.

Now, I am confident that you gentlemen will ___________ without passion the _____ that you have heard, come to a _____, and _____ this man to his family. In the name of God, do your _____, and in the name of God, believe Tom Robinson."