CHRISTMAS SPIRIT

Christmas is coming. A wonderful time to enjoy in our classes too. Here are some activities we can do these days after so much struggling with our final term tests. So it is up to you, you can choose the best ones!

--- FIRST : 
CLASS DECORATION and LEARNING

1.-Print out and colour Christmas colouring pages.
2.-Learn  Spanish and English Christmas vocabulary
3.-Practise writing and spelling

4.-Picture vocabulary and games
5.-Interactive book
6.-Other ideas 
7. Christmas test
8. Worksheets
 
--- SECOND : 
CHRISTMAS CARDS COMPETITION
Here are some guidelines to consider while creating your own cards:

1.- Students can participate with different designs.
2.-They will hand their cards to their English teachers.
3.-Deadline is December 20th.
We will value: good written messages, creativity, presentation, use of different languages, originality etc

--- THIRD : 
CAROLS 

1.- Write and copy some lyrics
2.- Sing carols and karaoke with your class 

                                               1º ESO

karaoke version

THANKSGIVING

One more year my students are going to learn about Thanksgiving and they will have to write about gratitude.

But this year I want them to watch this moving art video by Louie Schwartzberg . I am sure that after seeing it, they will all understand why we must be thankful for living every single day, not just as another day, but as the one that is given to us as a beautiful gift.

 

 If you want to see some crafts and activities you can click here

SONGS FOR TEACHING

In this video a teacher sings, raps and dances his way through the present continuous while having a fully laid back 'Good Time' and not getting tense about English tense!  :-)

  
copyright © 2013 Lawrence Hilton
SONGS FOR TEACHING

 

COLOURS

Do you think colours are important in our life?

HALLOWEEN QUIZ

October 31st is Halloween.

 How much do you know about this old festival? Take the quiz!

BLOG ACTION DAY

HOW CAN YOU IMPROVE YOUR ENGLISH?

 By the way, this was one of my favourite songs this summer
Can you understand it?

WELCOME BACK !

• Hi students ! 
• Did you have a good summer ? 
• What did you do ?  
• Where did you go ?
• What about starting this year by learning English with the help of some hip hop ?

HAPPY SUMMER HOLIDAYS!

YES!   Here again,  It seems time flies!

We teachers and students are now celebrating all the hard work we have done as another school year comes to an end.

After months of Edmodo assignments, studying, reading, doing integrated tasks, written tests, homework , oral presentations, singing, dancing,  and speaking tests, most of you are looking forward to forgetting about your school books and are obviously excited about your summer holidays ahead.

For all that , I think we all need some relax, so ...

BUT.... summer and reading have gone hand in hand, for me at least, as long as I can remember. For this reason , no more compulsory reading, but just reading for the pleasure of it. Besides, there are a wide range of benefits gained from reading for pleasure: It increases a sense of achievement, confidence and self-steem. It encourages your imagination. It prevents boredom. And you can do it anywhere.

 Find out here how to be a better reader and the importance of reading when learning a language. 

 And now click on these pictures and enjoy.

      

 

 Keep in touch, please!

MANY KISSES !!!

WORLD ENVIRONMENT DAY AT PORTADA ALTA SCHOOL

World Environment Day ('WED') is celebrated every year on 5 June to raise global awareness of the need to take positive environmental action. It is run by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). It was the day that United Nations Conference on the Human Environment began. 

 This year we have been celebrating this day by means of an exhibition of a photo contest and compositions in different languages .This was part of an initial collaborative project based on tasks where some students and teachers have been very concerned learning about WATER PROBLEMS.

A NICE WAY TO REVISE CONDITIONALS

OUR LANGUAGE ASSISTANT ´S SUMMARY OF THE YEAR.

There were a lot of good times had at Portada Alta with both the students and the staff.

The bilingual section is fun, talented, generally well behaved and full of memorable personalities  The staff are all very kind, funny, and interesting, and I enjoyed our collaborations inside the classroom as well as our exchanges outside of the classroom.

Here is a brief list of my favorite memories with each group along with an explanation of why they are special to me:

1) Science lessons in the laboratory with 1A, 1A is a very large group, and getting to work with them in the smaller space of the laboratory allowed me to interact with them and get to know them more easily. No particular moments stand out, but these lessons would have a special atmosphere that combined the relaxation and playfulness with attentiveness and effort.

 2) Music with 2A--2A is group that has a lot of chemistry, and this was most visible in music classes. Rehearsing "I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus" for the Christmas concert is one of my favorite memories, as well as singing "YMCA", by the Village People, with the boys at the end of the year.

3) Biology with 3A--3A is a group with a high level of curiosity, and, as such, I enjoyed myself with the group a lot in biology and social sciences. Biology comes to mind because, in explaining the biological definitions of words, we would oftentimes go on interesting tangents on the broader concept of the words, as well as any colloquial usage they might have. They were classes that combined the academic with the everyday.

 4) English/Spanish exchanges with the teachers--Everybody on the bilingual staff was highly interested in honing their English, both formal and informal. My favorite moments were exchanging informal expressions in English and Spanish.

ENGLISH LANGUAGE LEARNING TIPS FOR SPEAKING TESTS

And here a funny example of the importance of understanding and speaking good English. Can you notice and copy down some of the big mistakes made by foreign students here?

RUSS - A STRANGE NORWEGIAN TRADITION

In Norway, high school students in their last year before University participate in a tradition called the russefeiring ("russ celebration"). Basically, everyone who is about to graduate has to participate in this three weeks long event.  They all wear a pair of overall or dungarees; the colour is dependent on their stream at school, although most of them are red for academic; they are not supposed to take off these overalls for the entire three weeks!  These three weeks are officially from the first of May (although some started earlier) until the Norwegian National Day (May 17)

There is a list of about 100 tasks printed in the local newspapers every year and the Russ students are supposed to complete as many as possible.  When they finish a task they are given an item, a knot (?) or just the pride of having accomplished this task.

 Here you can see this video about  some creative tasks they had to do such as decorating buses, performing  songs, , or other much funnier activities as in example dyeing their hair in the colour of their  russ (black, red or blue), spending a night in a tree (earns a stick from the tree), crawling  along Karl Johans ( Oslo´s Main Street ) to Slottet (the Royal Palace)  as it is showed in some of the photos I took while I was  in Oslo. 

SHORT STORIES FOR EXTRA READINGS

HERE  you can find a lot of short stories.

WEBQUEST ABOUT WATER

LEARN MORE ABOUT WATER BY FOLLOWING MY WEBQUEST

WORLD WATER DAY 2013

The solution to the water crisis is not simple. It is a big problem that needs a big answer. The water crisis is only going to end when we all work together to help those in need. 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 Watch these  videos  and then copy some parts of the message on your notebooks:

World Water Day 2013 from Water to Thrive on Vimeo.

THE HISTORY OF SAINT PATRICK

IRREGUALR VERB WHEEL GAME

  Spin the wheel to test your knowledge of irregular verb forms Be careful , it’s addictive!

TODAY IS MOTHER´S DAY IN UK

Mothering Sunday, sometimes known as Mother's Day, is held on the fourth Sunday of Lent. It is exactly three weeks before Easter Sunday and usually falls in the second half of March or the beginning of April.

   Learn more by clicking on this link about :

• What do people do?

• Mothering Sunday in other countries

OH NO !! THE TRANSLATOR AGAIN !!

This is what I think when I am correcting some of your homework.

As an example, here is a menu from a place in Galicia someone has done with the help of a computer translator* and a friend of mine has uploaded it in facebook just for fun.

* Machine translator is defined as a computer program that converts instructions written in one language to another without changing the initial logic or meaning in terms of computer language.

HOW TO ASK IN ENGLISH

There are different kinds of questions. Some of them need to use an auxiliary verb others don't. Some of them will be answered with a 'Yes' or a 'No' and others will just give more infomation.

 I think it's time we revise all this Grammar again before moving into another thing.

 Click on the following link and read about it:
  Quesion order
And now do the following exercises:
  Exercise 1
  Exercise 2
After that watch this funny video and copy twenty questions on your notebooks.
( Avoid the ones made by Manuel because they are not correct !! )

INTENSIVE READINGS

Think of some good tasks you can design yourselves to show me you are all reading  your graded books this term:

• Culture Shock (1º Bachillerato)
• Frankenstein (4º ESO)
• Jane Eyre (3º ESO)

 Some ideas :

- Copy all the new words and list them alphabetically.
- Write questions from the chapters.
- Learn  or read aloud some passages by heart with a good pronuntiation.
- Identify sentences and who said them.
- Complete information about the main characters.
- Create  puzzles /  games  with the vocabulary lists learnt.
- A Multiple Choice questionnaire from the book.
- Summarize the story and add some nice drawings / comics
- Role play some chapters with your group.

(There are some more suggestions at the back of your books too)

WEBQUEST ABOUT SAINT VALENTINE

CLICK HERE ON MY WEBQUEST TO LEARN ABOUT SAINT VALENTINE´S DAY

As Saint Valentine’s Day draws near, love idioms and phrases are increasingly popular. While some universal idioms are easily translated, many idioms on love can be difficult to comprehend. Here are 12 popular love idioms and phrases that are used frequently but are quite confounding:


1. Blind Date
2. To Fall For
3. To Find Mr. Right or Miss Right
4. To Get Back Together
5. To Get Engaged
6. To Get Hitched
7. To Have a Crush
8. Head Over Heels
9. To Be Hung Up On Someone
10. To Patch Up a Relationship
11. To Pop The Question
12. Those Three Little Words
 

Click on the watch to get more information about these idioms  ->

PEACE DAY AT SCHOOL

Imagine all the people sharing all the world
imagine people living in peace with no wars
you may say I'm a dreamer but I'm not the only one...

MOVING

Spanish rock group Macaco collaborated with National Geographic and stars, like actor Javier Bardem and musicians Juanes, Juan Luis Guerra, and Carlinhos Brown, on this video  about the movement of people into different  countries.

 

ARE YOU LEFT OR RIGHT BRAIN?

SIMPLE PAST

Here you can find many good exercises to learn about the Past Tense. How many are you going to complete?

INTERACTIVE FLASH WEBSITE TO CREATE YOUR OWN MUSIC

INCREDIBOX is an online music arranging and remixing tool that looks great, is easy to use and is free. It also happens to work really well on interactive whiteboards.

  With this application you can also create a capella beatbox vocal group. Just select your vocalists, set the effects, and let them sing.
Here is my musical composition :

Come on create your own ones  too !!

HAPPY NEW YEAR !

Enjoy the entrance of 2013 with these wonderful performances by Michael Bublé and Rod Stewart in their own countries: