Killing Paris Hilton

One fun aspect of teaching EFL is that you occasionally get to indulge long-held (or short-held) fantasies. A week ago, I got to indulge one of mine: I got to kill Paris Hilton.

There's a classic EFL came called "Alibi" that works as follows:

1) You tell the class there was a murder the previous night. You can choose anyone you want as the "victim"--another teacher, a celebrity or "celebrity" a la Miss Hilton, anyone will do.

2) Two students are chosen as the suspects in the murder. They have to try to get their story straight.

3) The rest of the class interviews the two suspects separately and decides if they are guilty.

The point of the game is to get students to practice the past continuous ("What were you doing last night at 7:00").

So I chose to off Paris Hilton, as this is someone I was sure my students would know of, and enjoy seeing "killed". Russians are as hard-pressed as Americans to name any achievement or talent that enables Miss Hilton to enjoy her current level of fame.

My students did admirably. The suspects got their story pretty straight, and were let off the hook.