Merry zombi xmas!!!

Joan just sent us nteresting tips to have amazing Xmas holidaysss!!!

My own moon

Hi !! if you feel like listening to soemthing really nice...just try this...a lovely song from Victor and Héctor. It was their last project in their English class. Lovely song, isn´t it?

Water off a duck's back

A nice idiom  a friend just told me.

Do you know what it means?

Ok...here you have....

If criticism is water off a duck's back to someone, it has

no effect on them at all (often + to ).

Example: She's always being told she's incompetent, but it's just water off a duck's back to her.

Did you get it?
An interesting idiom, isn´t it?

I love my students

Just a couple of lines to tell you I had a lovely surprise. I was at one of my friend´s place,  and then three of my students came in, ......I was very happy indeed to see them and be  able to talk to them! Great to talk to vicent and see how ´mature`he is! ...also Victor   played his record for us  and I had one of my very-super-great conversations with Hector and he even showed me the interface of a video game I was very interested in.  Yes, a kind of good vitamins for  me!!!                                                                                        

How to become a ´Digital Native`?

In the last few years I have become more and more conscious of the importance of what ´to be digital literate` really means, and represent for me....as a teacher. A challenge that has made me ´grow` and  get closer to my students way of learning. though, I should say, that some of them, still have ´tecnological barriers`......soemthing that could be easily erased if we understand that ´ learning ` starts from the very beginning of our school system, we do not have interactive boards at home,...but we should have them at schools.  As we all konw, ´An image is 1000 words worth`.....so here uou have a 4 year-old little girl amazed by what for her was something ´easy` to use.......though she cannot have one of this wondeful tools in her classroom.

Tais toi mon coeur

I read the book last Xmas, my friend paula recomended it to me...........and the truth is that ..........I like it.........but what really touched me was the  end.............then........I understood everything..........it was clear...........nd i wonder ...........How many clocks are there  in our hearts?

I think the film is coming soon, but now we can be delight with this nice trailler and this beautiful song I cannot stop listen to!!! ...by the way....at least the subtitles are in English!!!

Art and the four elemenst

One of my favourite painters, .....the one who paints for pleasure, who enjoys every single minute he is alone , with his work and his silences.........in his little cosy ´atelier`  in front of ´the Alhambra`........One of my favourite paintings is the one you can see if you click on his page....and the other one, is what I see every day when I am here,..... in front of my computer......I can not imagine a day without watching it...my little girl from Sahara.... and Who is your favourite painter? How much do you know about him/her?

Edu

We had been talking about getting together and working on my computer programmes......but the academic course finished...and we did not find the right moment to get together. Finally, we found a day, after Xmas, and before Edu had to start working hard every afternoon on his high school homework.


The truth is, that it was very nice to see him, talk about lots of things ...it was like being at school.......but MUCH better..........we were not under the ´teacher.student role ` pressure...... I always had to talk about his marks, etc,etc,etc..........but this time, .it was just like talking to someone you enjoy to be with and you care a lot!!!

Edu is one of those students who makes me understand that I made a great choice when I became a teacher!!!  He is not only a great students a  wonderful person!

Talented students

We are always talking about being ´inclusive`, how to integrate every students in our lessons..........but, I think...that  even when we try it is more difficult than it seems. Especially as far as taleted students are concerned. I found out that I really like this kind of students, they represent challenge, a different way to work with students...........I just found out that we, as teachers need to brush up our methodolgy and see what our students really need, in the case of talented students.....our methodolgy has to be even more creative......yes probably it may a question of creativicty..........but, do we understand what to be ´talented`really means?

Last November I attended a course on ´Talented Students`. Jose luis Sanchez and Agustin Regadera were our ponents, and they have been helped us in these last three months while we were doing our activities to improve our way to plan activities where talented and gifted students could be also regarded. It was really nice to be there, to meet mothers from the Avast association and start learning a bit more about these wonderful profile of students!  If you want to read a bit more about this subject there are lots of interesting links in the bibliography we got in the course, or just write to me and I´ll send it to you!

Marina

My lovely student marina wrote me a very nice letter. Now she is working as hard as always to get very good marks !!!! high School is not easy at the beginning!!! But as we all know ´Where ther is a will, there is a way`...........and Marina is not only intelligent and creative but very perseverant!!! all my best wishes from here, Marina!!!!

Darqueo´s Web Page

This is my friend´s Paula web page, this is one of the  projects she is in!!!!

Her web page is good and interesting....but not half as great as she is!!!!

New Moon

Yessssssssssss !!! At last We could see the second part of the Twilight Saga......a pity i couldn´t go with my students this year.........but....I still have two more films to come!!! Meanwhile, I´ll carry on working on nice activities for my lessons. Hope you like them!

 

And...........as you can see there are lots of people who have also read the books!!!!!!! Thanks a lot !!! It was lovely to see you and have your help!

Don´t they look lovely?

Learning by Travelling......

Thanks to Akoe International group, several teachers and I went to Denmark. A WONDERFUL place with WONDERFUL people. Our friend Thorkild, from Verstergarden Skolen did a great job and introduced us to many teachers and also took us to different kinds of school. It was really nice of him, especially when he has so much work at his school!!!

Our trip was framed in a Leonardo Project, called Promuve and thanks to this opportunity we learnt a lot about teaching and learning English proces in bilingual and trilingual contexts…..and listen to this………we also saw lots and lots of lovely interactive whiteboard…..all of them from the Smartboard brand.

I was really happy indeed, and the best was when I met Rita, and her group of students. We are still in touch, and believe me……she is a lovely teacher with great teaching strategies and wonderful materials to teach English using ´smartboards` ….click on her name and you will see her page. Enjoy it as much as I did it!!!!

Rita starting her lesson

We are podcasting!!

We are Filming !!!

It was difficult at the beginning but now there are a few podcast and even films recorded by movil phones!!! this is just a great way for my students to learn how to write and how to focus attention on their pronuntiation.....GREAT!!!!. If you want to see some examples just visit a couple of pages like , Elena´s, Raquel´s , Vera´s , Angela Aida´s , or Carlos´s or Angel´s ......but there are many more .....just look at them and write your comments on their blogs!!!

Credits;

• Ovelar, R and Benito M. ( 2005). LA TRANSFORMACIÓN TECNOLÓGICA DE LOS ENTORNOS DE APRENDIZAJE. Retrieved at http://pulsar.ehu.es/pulsar/documentacion/informes_pulsar/Informe_PULSAR_Octubre.pdf.


• BLOGESO Podcast and Movil Project. Retrieved at http://wapus.org/apus/blogswengl1.htm

A Nice little Surprise

This is one of those little surprises which a teacher may receive ....a nice little surprise that once you read it ....it makes you feel fulfilled and happy with yourself, something that makes you happy, recognised and still believe that the choice made ...was the right one.

Here there is one of my ex-students letters. She was my student for several year and believe me she was just great...a pleasure to have had such a lovely pupil!!!.
Her name was Andrea.

De: andrea marco perez [andreuski80@hotmail.com]
Enviado el: viernes, 21 de septiembre de 2007 21:37
Para: maria@escuela2.es
Asunto: surprise! read me please!

Dear ex-english teacher...

I was surfing the web, when I remembered my old school had a wonderful web site... and I wondered... why don't see if there's anything new? so.. I started to checked everything out and then I almost fell off my chair when I saw English Language Resources.
It was AMAZING, seriously, so amazing that it made me write you an e-mail to tell you so. I just wanted to congratulate you for the site you are running, it has improved sooooo much since you started. I know it takes a lot of hard work, but it really worths it. Every student still has got his/her own blog, which is awesome and now you put a lot of youtube videos, media and interesting stuff. Actually, I feel a bit gelous! I'm not gonna lie..hehe
I've also seen the song activities,e-pals project, sciencenglish.. everything is absolutely great!
I hope your stuends apreciate it and enjoy it, and if they don't now, they will in the future and they will notice how lucky they were for having such an english teacher that let them work in a different way.
So a part from that, I hope everything's fine! About me... I've already started my last year at high school and I'm happier than ever! I had quite good marks last course, but I should improve a little bit more to become a dentist.. hehe I think I've decided what I want to study, although everything can still change!
This summer has been perfect, I spent seven weeks in the south of England and I really really learnt quite a lot of english, I improve every year a little bit more.
Finally I will only say that if you need any help, it'll be a pleasure for me doing anything you want. We can't see each other, but once I had and english teacher that taught me how great technology was, you know.. e-mails, internet, blogs and so on..

See you soon!

Lots of love


Andrea Marco

Some thoughts to think about.......

There is something new to add...and to learn....

My student Edu from ESO2 showed me a couple of nice things to add to our blogs!!!. Have a look at MISSi Io´s pet and we can also know the time...we can even have our own ´blogwatch`!!!!

I am so happy to have such students...they really encourage me to carry on working on nice project where we can all learn together!!!

A few more lines at last!!!......


Time flies indeed!!. It seems ages since we started our Blog project. I have been so busy with it that I could hardly have enough time to write a bit about our progress...and we have made lots of progress!! We First learnt how to manage with ´ ` blog tools and possibilities. We soon created hyperlinks to our texts and to our Blogs main page. We also added photos and we have recently found out how to add music and videos , something that has made Blogs very popular in ESO and especially among teenagers in our school. We have also collected all the information about our project where you can read our objectives, visit our blogs and even write us your comments!!! Just visit Wapus !!
Last spring ESO3 and ESO4 participated in a Blog contest Revista Futura supported by Universidad de Valencia ....and...believe or not....we got the first Prize!!!! We are so happy...........it is a great reward for our work ......and I am so proud of my students!!!

Step 1

Step 1
I finally got it!!!
I was very interested in having a ´Blog`project with my students....but I didn´t really know how or where to start by......finally....here I am!!!....I decided to start with some of my 1st and 2nd ESO students....only the ones really motivated and ........their ´blog`project was just their summer homework...they loved the idea and despite a couple of technological problems , .............they had a really nice time!!!

Even Victor from 4th Eso is also creating his blog!!!

Quite sure ...this is going to be an encouraging project!!!

...........I just found out that Violeta has her own photoblog...........very interesting!!!

So............photoblogs and video blogs could be also included in our project!!!

Back from paradise!!!!

Dear students,

Hope you enjoyed your summer holidays....hope you are coming back with lots of energies to start our ´blog project`!!!

Are you ready?