Kiwi Bird

I love this film, for me it’s really sad but at the same inspiring. This kiwi bird is determined to make his dream come true. His tear in one of the last scenes of the film shows that he managed to do it.

​A few days ago I showed this film to my students and asked them to write down all the adjectives connected with personality they thought could somehow describe the bird. They came up with: ambitious, determined, stubborn, creative, brave, generous.

Another idea for including this short clip during the lesson might be as follows:

• Show your students a kiwi fruit and a nail, ask them what the connection between the objects is.
• Modify the question and instead of a kiwi fruit ask about the connection between a kiwi bird and a nail.
• Ask students what they know about kiwi birds (long beaks, can’t fly, can’t see well but they can smell and hear well, national symbol of New Zealand).
• Play the film, students watch the film and later write a one-sentence summary of the film and a one-sentence reaction to the film.
• Play the film again, ask students to write down all the actions that the kiwi bird does on the film, then ask students to imagine that they witnessed the first flight of the kiwi bird and write its account in past tense OR if your students are on a beginner level ask them to write narrator’s subtitles to the film in the present continuous, e.g. The bird is flying now.
• Students present their answers.
• Ask some discussion questions about the film:

Why did the bird want to fly?
Was it difficult for him to do it? Why?
Was it worth it?
What dreams do you have? – students write what dreams they have on post-it-notes and put them on the board to create a Board of Dreams. T reads the dreams.

• If you want to continue the lessons ask each student to take one dream (not theirs), then mingle around the classroom and ask other students what they could do to achieve this particular dream. Students ask for advice and give advice.