Session 2 · The Necklace

Sessions 1 · Structure 2 · The Necklace 3 · Comparative literature 4 · The Gift of the Magi 5 · The Interlopers 6 · The Cask of Amontillado Evaluation C1/C2 essay Teacher

Worksheet of this session
Scan to open it on a phone or print it.

Recap check · marked · starts as you come in

Sit down, take your notebook and answer on paper at once. 3 students are drawn at random and marked.

Name the six stages of the story arc.
What is a hook?
Give one type of ending.

Marking scale	Points
Each correct answer	1
Full sentence in English	bonus 1
Total	3 + 1

Corrigé

exposition, inciting incident, rising action, climax, falling action, resolution
the first lines that catch the reader
twist ending, situational irony, open or moral ending

The story

Portrait — Guy de Maupassant, photograph by the Nadar studio, Wikimedia Commons, public domain

Paris, the 1880s. Mathilde Loisel, married to a modest clerk, dreams of luxury. An invitation to a ball and a borrowed necklace change her life for ten long years.

Read the full text of The Necklace (public domain)

From La Parure to The Necklace

You already know this story from French class. In the next session, Comparative literature, you will put the French and English texts side by side.

Describe and interpret the picture

Look at the illustration at the top of the page. You can see: a young woman in a ball gown, a velvet jewel case, a diamond necklace, candles, gold ornaments.

Describe the picture in three sentences.
Which moment of the story does the picture show? What do her eyes and the jewel case suggest about her desire?
Find one sentence of the text that matches the picture.

Useful phrases: It shows… · In the foreground / background… · The colours suggest… · This reminds me of the moment when… · It reveals that… · I think the artist wants us to feel…

Corrigé

Probably the moment she chooses the necklace at Madame Forestier's: she looks at it as at a dream. The luxury around her is the life she believes she deserves.

“She had no gowns, no jewels, nothing. And she loved nothing but that. She felt made for that.”
Maupassant, “The Diamond Necklace”, transl. Project Gutenberg #3090

1. Vocabulary

Word	Meaning	En français
dowry	money a bride brings to her marriage	dot
clerk	an office worker in a ministry	commis, employé
to borrow	to take something you will give back	emprunter
ball	an elegant evening party with dancing	bal
jewel	a precious stone or ornament	bijou
to replace	to put a new thing instead of a lost one	remplacer
debt	money you owe	dette
to sacrifice	to give up something precious	sacrifier
pride	a strong sense of your own dignity	fierté, orgueil
paste	imitation stones made of glass	strass, faux

2. Characters

Character	Who?	Wants	What happens
Mathilde Loisel	young wife of a clerk	luxury, admiration	ten years of hard work, poverty
Monsieur Loisel	her husband, a modest clerk	to make her happy	sacrifices his savings and his youth
Madame Forestier	a rich school friend	to help Mathilde	learns the truth at the end

3. The arc of the story

Stage	In this story
Exposition	Mathilde is unhappy with her modest life.
Inciting incident	The invitation to the Minister's ball.
Rising action	The dress, the borrowed necklace, the triumph at the ball.
Climax	The necklace is lost.
Falling action	Ten years of debt and work.
Resolution and twist	The necklace was paste, worth five hundred francs.

4. Text dependent questions

Why is Mathilde unhappy at the start of the story?
How does her husband react to her tears about the dress?
What does Mathilde choose at Madame Forestier's, and why?
What do the Loisels decide when the necklace is lost?
How does Mathilde change during the ten years?
Explain the twist ending.

Corrigé

She feels born for luxury but lives in a modest home with a clerk; she suffers from the gap between her dreams and her reality.
He gives her the four hundred francs he saved for a gun, which shows his love and his sacrifice.
A diamond necklace: it is the most dazzling jewel, it matches her dream of elegance.
They buy a similar necklace for thirty six thousand francs and return it without telling the truth.
She becomes strong, rough and poor; she does the heavy housework and bargains at the market.
Madame Forestier reveals that the necklace was imitation, worth at most five hundred francs: ten years were sacrificed for nothing.

5. Speaking

Role play in pairs: Mathilde meets Madame Forestier ten years later. One student is Mathilde, the other her friend. Two minutes, then switch.

6. Writing

Write Mathilde's diary entry on the night of the ball (80 to 120 words). Use the past simple and at least four words from the vocabulary table.

C1/C2 track

Is “The Necklace” a moral tale or an ironic one? Discuss in 250 words, analysing the role of pride, appearance and social class. Compare with a modern form of “keeping up appearances” such as social media.

Homework · required

To do for next lesson. It is checked at the start of the lesson in the Recap check.

Exercise 1 · Gap-fill: Mathilde …… a necklace from her friend. She …… it after the ball. The Loisels pay their …… for ten years. In the end, the necklace was …… . (borrows, loses, debt, paste)
Exercise 2 · True or false? Justify. a) Monsieur Loisel is rich. b) Mathilde chooses a diamond necklace. c) Madame Forestier knows the truth at the start.
Exercise 3 · Answer in 50 words: is Mathilde a victim or responsible for her fate?

Corrigé of the homework

borrows · loses · debt · paste
a) False, he is a modest clerk. b) True. c) False, she learns at the end that they replaced it.
Model: Mathilde is partly a victim of her social class, but her pride is responsible: she borrows a jewel to appear rich and never dares to tell the truth, which costs her ten years.

For the teacher

Gerex step	What the class does
Warm up (5 min)	Recall of the last story in three sentences, cold calling or volunteers.
Discovery (15 min)	Reading of the text or extract of The Necklace, first with a gist question.
Analysis (20 min)	Tables in pairs, text dependent questions, shared correction.
Speaking (10 min)	Short oral task, the teacher circulates and notes two strengths per group.
Writing (5 min + homework)	Short writing task, finished at home.

Need	Lever
Struggling readers	Glossary given in advance, audio reading by the teacher, questions 1 to 3 only.
Fast finishers	Extension question, a quotation to explain, a sentence of the story to translate into French.
Dys students	Dys version of the page: Lexend font, larger spacing, sentence starters, shorter tasks.

Recap check, how to run it	Detail
Before the bell	The questions are on the board or projected when students walk in.
Minutes 0 to 4	Everyone writes; no talking. The teacher takes the register meanwhile.
Minute 4	Random draw of three names (cards, app or dice), oral answers.
Marking	Marks on the scale given, noted in the gradebook; homework checked at the same time.
Why	Not one idle minute: the class starts the moment students enter, and homework is reinforced.

Sessions 1 · Structure 2 · The Necklace 3 · Comparative literature 4 · The Gift of the Magi 5 · The Interlopers 6 · The Cask of Amontillado Evaluation C1/C2 essay Teacher

Reminder, the sequence online: https://short-stories-anglais.netlify.app