Again, still another techno-tool to help you with your studies. This blog is "work-in-progress" , which means that things are added and removed on a regular basis. Here you'll find extra-reading, extra-listening, extra-grammar stuff, extra writing tips... extra-everything, so it's up to you what you do with it. Needless to say, your feedback, ideas, and comments are very welcome.
*This blog is 'apture-powered', which means that if you highlight a word, a 'learn more' sign will theoretically appear. Click on it and it will show a list of internet links related to that word. Just try.
This is a website devoted to language learning with lots of quizzes and explanations on every aspect of the language, from very easy to advanced (as usual, click on the picture). There is a Games section which I find highly addictive - I particularly like FLUENT and WORD SLAMM (a kind of scrabble). There is also a 'Road to Grammar' version for kids, so everybody in your family can play.
Have fun!
PD: Talking about words that English has borrowed from other languages, we mentioned the other day that 'machismo' is one of them, and you can read it HERE in the Independent's article on recent changes in surnames in Spain.
What can I do to improve my Reading Co? What can I do to improve my listening skills? It's so frustrating, I never understand anything! How can I remember all these words? How can I ....? OK, you are lucky to be studying English in the 21st Century. Here are some recommendations:
For you listening practice, try English Central -best Learning English website of the year 2010. There are lots of short videos -pieces of news mainly- and you can choose if you want them with or without subtitles in English, you can click on a word and see the definition, you can record yourself ... there are lots of things you can do that sure will help you improve your listening skills. Japanese technology at its best and it's FREE -you only have to register. But...oh no, not again!...REGULAR practice is needed. Click on the logo below and you'll be taken to the English Central website.
Newsy videos (also in the 'video bits' section) is also a very good site which offers the different sides of a story and -a bonus for you- the transcript.
The "Reading Comprehension Practice" is a new section on the blog where you'll find the type of texts and Reading compehension exercises used for the Cambridge First Certificate exam, and also for the EOI Level 4 exam (Reading Co. only).
Remember that regular use of your workbook is also essential and it will help you refresh things done in class. And last, but not least, I know you have ALL started to read the "Curious incident...", but just in case you haven't, here's a small presentation to help get you started.
Class time is NOT enough, so remember to take your regular homeopathic doses of English !
-And can't you just give me a pill that I can swallow and get it over with? Sorry, no pills now, maybe in the 22nd Century.
**By the way, how many relative sentences with a preposition can you find in the video?
We've had enough horror stories lately, and I'm not particularly fond of the genre, but you know that I do like E.A.Poe: The Tell Tale Heart, first published in 1843, "a story told through the eyes of a madman who, like all of us, believed he was sane. "
True!—nervous—very, very nervous I had been and am; but why will you say that I am mad?’’
The story is a psychological portrait of a mad narrator who kills a man because he didn't like his 'vulture eye' and ultimately his guilt and madness give him away in the final hallucination that the man's heart is still beating under the floorboards. HA-HA-HA...
This is just a pre-view. You'll have to go to other versions to see the complete story. It's a really short piece, so you can read it HERE
- Columbia pictures 1953 Animation , narrated by James Mason.
- Vincent Price version HERE. You probably recognized Vincent Prince's laugh as part of the rap he performed in Michael Jackson's Thriller, already a classic for Halloween.
- And some more music: Alan Parson's Tell-Tale Heart in Tales of Mystery and Imagination, a record inspired in Poe's work.
**If you like E.A.Poe and want to see different versions of 'The Raven' (The Simpson's included), go to last year's entry.
Happy Halloween, or castanyada, or whatever you celebrate!
The other day we were talking about tag questions, and we mentioned that sometimes all the variety of tag-questions including the use of all the auxilliaries is sometimes reduced by teenage slang to 'innit?' (isn't it?). Ok, Emma Thompson doesn't like that, and she doesn't like the teenage use of 'like' either. You can read it HERE.
Slang : very informal language that is usually spoken rather than written, used specially by particular groups of people. In The Sun you can find a glossary for different types of slang from various occupational and lifestyle groups (hip-hop, police, etc). DON'T use that in your compositions, ya smell me?
Have you seen our house? Our provisisonal provisisonal house is not in the middle of the street, it's up in 'La Collada'. Classes re-start Thursday 21st, 17:30. The show must go on.
This is not the post I had in mind, but as you problably know the wind has torn the roof off the building and all the 3rd floor classrooms are, as you can imagine, destroyed and flooded. You've probably received the 'avis urgent' we've been sending this afternoon to all students, and we have also posted an 'official' message in our school web page . We've been working this afternoon trying to rescue what's left of our computers, beamers etc and still have to assess the damage done. So I'm sorry to say next Wednesday, Thursay and Friday classes have been cancelled. Now we are definitely torn and homeless. But let's be positive and think that every cloud has a silver lining.
Please check the EOI Garraf webpage for official updates on the situation.
The answer, my friend, may be blowing in the wind. Who knows?
*** Update Oct 13th: As you can see, I've posted a slide show so that you can have an idea of the damage. This is not going to be repaired anytime soon. Our laptops and beamers are OK. We are the trolley teachers.
Imagine your are nine years old and your favourite hero knocks on your classroom door. That's what happened to Beatrice Delap, who wrote to Captain Jack Sparrow asking for help to raise a mutiny against her teachers at Meridian Primary School in Greenwich, south-east London. Watch the video, read the story HERE... and depending on who you call I'll join you in the mutiny.
a heartthrob: a famous man, often a singer or an actor, who is attractive to many women
to turn up: to arrive or appear somewhere, usually unexpectedly or in a way that was not planned
OOOps, and a tribute to Solomon Burke, the king of soul ("everybody, needs somebody"...remember?), who passed away this morning in Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport, on his way to a sold out show.
Sorry I don't want to repeat blog entries but the other day we were talking about pronunciation, and I think this story is particularly funny and illustrative of how a sound can completely change the meaning of a word:
These words are called “minimal pairs”, and here (and in your multi-rom) you have many other good examples:
(By the way, sorry about the dirty words -I hope nobody takes offence ... and thanks Anna, happily living in London this year, for sending the link last year).
And now, talking about pronunciation and current events at the same time, in this Daily Express cartoon you can see that problems are pretty much the same in Britain as in Barcelona. The lady is reading a newspaper that says "Yobs rule Britain", but you know that Job/Yob are two different things, don't you?
Do you kow what the hottest place on Earth is? Can rocks grow? How far does dust blow in the wind? How long is a martian year? Test your knowledge of scientific facts and figures with these 101 questions from Live Science.
If you'd prefer the more ethereal, philosophical, or just bizarre, unexpected, trivial and perverse kind of questions (Who invented buttons? How do you mend a broken heart? Do I need a mobile phone?) try The Guardian's Notes and Queries, an old favourite. This is a very popular site in which for more than 15 years readers have been posting questions and answers to what you always wanted to know and were too afraid to ask. It comes in different categories depending on your field of interest.
**Browse through the questions, play with the answers, and make sure you perfectly understand word order in the different types of questions (direct, indirect, subject, object, etc)
Those of you who have kids at primary school level should start brushing up on your maybe long forgotten maths skills. This year British kids will be learning an apparently better method for long divisions and multiplications. Except for those of us who have always had problems with numbers, it's easy to do 3 times 4 (4 x 3), but try "twenty-three times three hundred and five" (305 x 23)! - Not clear enough ? In this BBC article " Why parents can't do Maths today" you'll find more step by step explanations, instructions and also, quite interesting, parents' opinions. - And Here you can test your skills at basic addition, subtraction, times tables, etc. and also learn some maths vocabulary.
Slang : very informal language that is usually spoken rather than written, used specially by particular groups of people. In 
