Food for Thought

NEW VOCABULARY 

Your son's bad behavior is very disruptive to the other children in the class.

There was a curious assortment of objects for sale in the little shop we visited.

Unless the imbalance is rectified and people in poor countries come to live stable lives, the connections among different people cannot be said to be a genuine network of people.

I cannot bear this level of abuse.

He didn't get the job due to a lack of experience.

She ruined her new dress when she accidentally spilt nail polish on it.

He's not a good skater, so he is liable to hurt herself if he goes rollerblading without a helmet.

Critics point out that...

That organisms have the power to nourish themselves and grow.

Much as I crave revenge, I'll turn away and not waste my time assaulting his castle again.

Reported Speech: Reporting Verbs

This is a review on what we have been studying the last few sessions:

1. First of all, we reviewed basic Reported Speech:

- STATEMENTS

Remember that a statement is a sentence, it provides information and is the easiest form that we can report. For example:

"We will do the washing-up tomorrow"
My siblings said that they would do the washing up the following day.

According to this, we learned that there are some specific components that need to be reported/changed in a reporting sentence. They are:

1. Pronouns, etc.
2. Verbs (back shift)
3. Time expressions

You have all the information on pages 113-114 (Student's Book) and we've also copied some extra charts in the notebook.

- QUESTIONS

As we you know, there are different kinds of questions (wh-questions and YES/NO questions). When reporting, we need to keep in mind the type in order to use the correct structure. We have seen that the specific structure for questions is the following:

X [asked] + WHETHER/IF + Clause (Subject+verb+complements) (FOR YES/NO)

X [asked] + WH-WORD + Clause (Subject+verb+complements) (FOR WH)

- ORDERS

As seen in class, these sentences are quite easy to report. Remember that we need to use the reporting verb (for example, order) and then we need to use a TO INFINITIVE. The structure, for affirmative and negative is the following:

X [ordered] TO INFINITIVE + complements
X [ordered] NOT TO INFINITIVE + complements


2. Second, we reviewed the GRAMMATICAL STRUCTURE that follows each reporting verb.

HERE YOU CAN DOWNLOAD OR PRINT THE CHART SEEN IN CLASS

You also have some specific REPORTING VERBS on page 114 (Student's book). 

3. Exercises

Remember that the best way you have in order to improve your reported speech competence is to practise. Here you have some exercises that may be useful for you when preparing your exam. Please, make sure you complete some of them, and if there's any doubt you can ask any of us in class next week.

REPORTED STATEMENTS
REPORTED QUESTIONS
REPORTED ORDERS
REPORTING VERBS EXERCISE

English language in the world

Hi everyone!

I guess you're having a nice week, aren't you? I know that this course is being full of study hours and gropuwork, and it is for that reason why I'd like you to take a break and enjoy this subject. We are going to work on a project for about 3 weeks, with no stress... there's no hurry! I want you to guess the countries where English language is sopken, characteristics, summary, interesting facts about it... Together with it, I want you to know how to use a tool that is going to be very useful for you at university: Prezi presentations. This project is going to be done in groups. Why? because I trust you and I know that you wrok better with partners and friends, instead of with the whole class. Below you have the instructions, tools and tutorials that you need in order to create your presentation:

But before... a Prezi presentation looks like this one (taken from Prezi's website)

PREZI PRESENTATION PROJECT: ENGLISH LANGUAGE IN THE WORLD

GUIDELINES:

1. Visit Prezi and click on "prueba prezi"

2. On your right you have an option that says "continuar gratis". Click on it. This option allows us to create prezi presentations under certain conditions: one of them is that our prezis are going to be public. 

3. Create an account, Provide the email adress of one member of the group and share the password for you to be able to acess anywhere. 

4. Once you are in, you can start creating your prezi presentation (nuevo prezi)

Once you are ready to create your Prezi, here you have the information that you need to include on it:

- A title, for example ""English language in the world"

- The countries where English is spoken (at least 4 countries)

- A few lines about each country (where is it, population, culture, peoples...)

- Pictures of the most interesting places of each country

- Interesting facts (for example, "British people have the highest obesity rate of the European Union")

Here you have some tutorials on how to create a good Prezi presentation.

And just in case you need extra support, here you have a longer tutorial (around 9 minutes) on how to create a prezi presentation (SPANISH) "Como hacer una presentacion Prezi (Bien explicado)"


This activity is going to be evaluated according to the following rubric. Make sure you cover all the requirements in order to get a high grade. Good luck!!

It's all about Slang...

Hi everyone!

For today I want you to have a look at English language slang. What is it? Well, slang is the way people (mainly young people) speak in a certain language. For example, we as Spanish speakers often use qué pasa! instead of buenas tardes/días. That's slang. We may say that te real language of native people is usually slang and it is important to learn this before living abroad, for example:

 

from flickr

Slang consists on IDIOMS, EXPRESSIONS AND SHORTENED EXPRESSIONS/WORDS

Here you have some interesting sites to learn how slang works in America and the UK (among others):

20 Essential American Slang Words for English Learners

30 Awesome British Slang Terms

50 popular English Idioms

                                        

PADLET ACTIVITY: 

I've created a padlet (a page to share ideas) for us to create a broader knowledge of English slang. You can share images, memes, pictures, funny videos, or whatever you prefer in order to learn more English slang. I've already added a video that you'll enjoy a lot.

1. Visit English Wonderland Padlet
2. You'll be requested to sign in with a PASSWORD. Please select "I have a password". It is the following: english2016
3. Once you are in, double click anywhere and you'll be able to share anything you want with the rest of the class

Created with Padlet

Just 2 minutes to improve...