Irregular Verbs

List of Irregular verbs.

For your information and to be learned by heart.

Also, a new word list for year 10 is available, and a new list is in progress for year 11. Expect that during today.

Happy Halloween!

And a nice trailer of a classic Halloween tale.

Times Final

Dear All,

I will be waiting for you on Thursday, 28th October, from 10:00 to 14:00.
Room 221 or 202.

Picture Descriptions

Image one
Image two

Look at each picture and think of the following:
1. What is the person's appearance like?
2. Based on that, what could be their character?
3. What kind of lifestyle could they be leading?

Does any kind of story that would best describe the events in the photo come to your mind? Spend 5-10 minutes on writing / speaking.

For Fun :)

We're having some English lessons devoted to Psychology and personality (and life-styles).
Here are two links that could be both interesting and fun:

Personality Tests Online - short quizzes that could help tell you something about yourself.
Picture Test - scroll down a bit, then just click on the picture that is most appealing to you.

Maybe you know some other psychological tests that could be interesting for others? ((short, long, easy, complicated, funny - anything you think of in English))

Word list reminders

The new Word Lists have been uploaded for Form 10 and 11. You can find them on the left, just below the labels' cloud.

For the people of form 11 who cannot open .xls files, please follow this link here to get the the google document.

P.S.: prepare for a word test :)

Articles, Essays, Reports - general guidelines

This is a presentation that could give you some ideas that stand behind the creation of essays and articles.

Follow the link to view the presentation.

Cyber Crime

Before you listen, think of the following:

1. Do you know what scamming and phishing is?
2. Have you ever received scamming / phishing letters or e-mails? What was your reaction?
3. What do you think: is this a serious offence? Why? / Why not?
4. What punishment should such thieves receive?




Watch, listen, and try to answer the following questions:
- What happened to the woman’s bank account?
- What do phishers do with your computer?
- Where would clicking a link lead you to?
- What does the new type of phishing scam do?

Word Lists as Google Docs

For those of you who suddenly have no means of opening .xls files, here's the open source version of the word list Follow the Link

Discussion questions

With the development of technology, phishing and scamming has become a widely spread kind of crime. The results can range from a mild prank to a life-threatening disaster.
In pairs or in groups, discuss the following questions:

1. Do you know what scamming and phishing is?
2. Have you ever received scamming / phishing letters or e-mails? How did you react to them?
3. What do you think: is this a serious offence? Why? / Why not?
4. What punishment should such thieves receive?

Memory

Listen to the performance.
1. What is it about?
2. Do you know where the performance comes from?
3. Do you know who the original author of the lyrics is?

(If you don't know the answers to Qs 2 and 3, do a quick search)

Information

Dear all,

The new school year approaches and currently the situation is as follows: I will be taking only two forms this year, meaning that I will not be at school that often.

You can find me on Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday in room 221 or in the methodical cabinet. I'm not sure about the consultation hours yet, but definitely in the morning.
I will be adding them to the menu on the right for your convenience.

Wishing you all a happy start of the season and hope we will be able to improve our level of language knowledge :)

Summer

These are chocolate muffins and herb tea (with a bit of English Breakfast tea added for color and flavor).

And what do you have at five o'clock?

New Zealand Photography

Christchurch, New Zealand

Auckland

New Zealand - all over the place

Prepositions of Place

Just two web-sites you could use as a grammar reference.

Locators: Time and Space
At, In, On - place

Essay Writing

Hi everyone and sorry for the delay. Here is the file I promised you on Thursday.

The Rules of Writing Essays

BBC - Wild China

A short list of comprehension questions + one Question for discussion
Up until 2:11.

Coffee cake

Follow the link to the Russian version of the "Coffee cake" Scenario

Evergreen of Life

A beautiful animation on ecological issues.

Valentine's Day: Eco issues

- What is said about the roses imported from Kenya?
- How many roses were bought last year?
- Why could the roses grown in Holland be worse than those from Kenya?

What counts in the end? What had more weight for you?

Cultural mistakes II

1. When you travel in a compartment with an Englishman, what are you expected to say?
2. And with an American?
3. Is it OK to ask about religion in the US?
4. There is a phrase in Americam English "it's sitting..." what does it denote?

Continue to find the answers to the previous quiz.

Video about palace cats

Watch the video about palace cats and try to understand what it is about

P.S.: palace cat = манул :)

CAAP: Animal therapy

- Which organization started the CAAP?
- What do you need to join the program?
- Why are dogs brought into the hospitals?

Questionnaire for my Students

Questionnaire regarding the study of culture at the lessons of English

To be filled out.

Cultural Competence I

Every week I will be posting 4 statements or situations that are often confusing for the EFL students, but typical for the Anglophone world.
With each next set, I will be posting the answers to the previous one, so those of you who teach English as a foreign language (and perhaps as a second language) can make a sort of a weekly game for your classes.

1. When do you use the phrase "how do you do?" and what should you answer if someone addresses you like that?
2. In what type of situations should you use "sorry"?
3. What should be a typical reply to a compliment?
4. Why is everything offered just once in an English-speaking (especially the USA) country?

How well do you spell?

A game for the classroom (intermediate - advanced)

There's an interesting thing I accidentally stumbled upon while completing an assignment on culture last year. This game could help enhance reading, critical thinking, strengthen the relationships between different fields, and help students realize that a dictionary might have more use than just looking up meanings of words.

Take a word that could be (or was) the topic of one of your lessons. Lets say that we have a text on boredom - and we know that modernity has just been covered during the arts / history classes.
We can give a statement for home discussion, e.g. "boredom is the plague of modernity. Does this mean that it did not exist before that?" And give students hints on where they can find evidence supporting or negating the statement:
- history books (to learn what modernity is and what period it covers)
- articles (if you have any)
- the dictionary (see date of first use in English and where the word came from)

If there is enough time, you can also prepare worksheets with all this data for the students to read and work through during the lesson, individually or in groups (e.g. jigsaw activities and "missing link" exercises).
I'm not sure it could work on the lower intermediate level, but if made simple enough (e.g. in form of a quiz rather than a worksheet) something fun might come out of it.

Amazing Grace

What do you think the song is about? (answers can easily be found on the web)