jueves, 24 de agosto de 2017

Travelling as a way of life

If you ask me what kind of books do I like reading,my answer will be adventure ones. I was a teenager, I used to go to the shopping mall with my older brother. We bought the cinema tickets, ate something and then wait for the movie to start. As we had to wait at least an hour, we used to go to book stores and spend our time there. My brother would always pick adventure books,but there was one which called my attention. There was a 30 year old man on the cover with his thimb up, asking for a ride. So I stood up and went to look for a copy of that book.
As I started reading, I couldn't stop. We bought the book.That night I arrived home and read it until I fell asleep. The following day at school I didn´t pay attention in class because I was reading the book. By the second day I had already finished reading "Vagabundeando en el eje del mal". The trip that Juan Pablo Villarino describes in that book is something new, a trip though the middle east, the land which everyone is afraid of. He writes in such a capturing way that you can't stop reading.
After a few years he travelled around Latin America with his girlfriend. They also wrote a book about that trip.
If you like adventure and travelling book, I highly recommend Villarino's book.

miércoles, 12 de julio de 2017

The True Gifts of a Dyslexic Mind


Dean Bragonier comments in this talk the topic of the gifts that dyslexic people might have. These are entrepreneurship, engineer, architecture and arts. But he also mentions that dyslexic people have a tough time with phonetic decoding and that it takes five times more energy for a dyslexic.

After this, he talks about the history of human learning, saying that at the very beginning, humans learned by observing and then imitating kinaesthetically those actions. However, during the industrial revolution, when the printing press was being spreaded all over the world, the door for dyslexic people was closed.

"People who cannot read or who have difficulty learning how to read, feel the same level of shame as people who have engaged in incest" Dr Kaufmann

Dean also explains how difficult it is for children in primary school to be labelled as the "dumb student". And that 35% of dyslexic people drop out of high school. Also, that a 70% of juvenile delinquents have dyslexia. nevertheless, one out of two scientists in NASA is dyslexic.

He recommends using other tools than the archaic text to teach our students and to empower them to discover their real gifts

Link:

miércoles, 28 de junio de 2017

Studying? Exams?


Up to this point in our lives I think that most of us can tell that we have gone through a million and one exams. Oral or written exams, they both make us think of a variety of things. How am I going to handle all this information? Will my brain remember all of this? What is the best strategy to remember and to learn this topic?
Since we were little kids in primary school
we all have been through different studying techniques, we don’t use the same ones and it also depends on the subject or topic that you have to study for. Teachers at school try to teach you how to study, but to my mind there is no universal recipe. Eventually as we grow up and start to understand “the studying situation” we will develop different techniques on our own. We as teachers can also try to help our students to find a way in which they will remember more things, but all this is only advice. They will develop a technique of their own. Trial and error. You will eventually find out what works out best for you.
Regarding the proper situation of sitting for an exam, I’ve been through different stages along my life, it hasn’t been the same. As a young student I had the pressure of my family to pass all my exams, I never had to sit for an exam in December, best student, carrying the flag by the end of the year. But as I grew up, and started college, I realized that getting good grades is not everything that matters. You can get a ten because you know the questions that are going to be asked, or you got lucky and the teacher assessed you on the only topic you’ve studied, or you just studied a lot. So there are a lot of things that influence your grades. Getting tens doesn’t make a better person o student. A good student is someone who is responsible, tidy, manages to get always on time to a lesson, doesn’t interrupt, helps her/his classmates, etc.
So I try to show my students all of these factors, if you are a ten, good for you! But the other things matter too. I love when they do and outstanding work and they are very happy for it because they have worked a lot. That’s a good student. Not the one who got a ten just because he sat half an hour and managed to finish something just to get away with it.
Another thing that we have to take into account with our students, which I don’t why at a superior level isn’t taken into account, is that different ways in which they need to be assessed. Some have to be assessed preferably by an oral exam, others written, some others can just be assessed by multiple choice activities and so on and so forth. At college level this isn’t taken into account, as we are all adults, it is taken for granted that a traditional written or traditional oral exam is enough. If nowadays we are enforcing the subject of multiple intelligences at school level, why this isn’t guaranteed at superior level? We are raising students to a kind of pedagogy that won’t be available for them when they finish school.


jueves, 8 de junio de 2017

I've just  found  this video  on  YouTube, and  it  takes  the  same  topics  we  have  discussed  about  first language  acquisition.
Take  it  as  a summary!

https://youtu.be/_1DlxmLiN3s

miércoles, 31 de mayo de 2017





I found this Ted talk very thought- provoking. It makes you think about the way in which we talk in our lessons, the way address our students and also the people who works with us. It's really worth watching it!




TED TALK- HOW TO SPEAK SO THAT PEOPLE WANT TO LISTEN

miércoles, 17 de mayo de 2017

Why having a school nurse is so important?

Today a situation in  school made  me  think  about  this.  Children  might get injuries or hurt any  time, or maybe  they have  a disease that make them  need a health professional by  their  side. O  what if  they  faint?
Today  at  school  a girl  fainted and  her  father  arrived  at school  earlier than the  ambulance. We  are  teachers, not nurses or doctors, but  we  also have lives in our  hands.
I  found  a BBC  article  that  talks  about the importance of a school nurse  that I would like  to  share  with  you

http://www.bbc.com/news/health-22106939

sábado, 6 de mayo de 2017

Macrofunctions, Microfunctions and Grammar

Step 1
Show students a video from the Olympics, stop the video every time a new sport appear and clarify vocabulary. As they watch the video, hey will have a worksheet to match the different sports to the proper names.
Step 2
Watch another short video and ask students to raise their hand every time a sport the know appears.
Step 3
Listen to a news report, students will have o identify the different sports that the reporter talks about and fill in the dialogue (worksheet)
Step 4
Listen again to the news report and ask students to identify words RELATED to sports
Step 5
Role play. Students will have to work in pairs. One of them is going to be the reporter and the other will be a sports woman/men. The reporter will ask three questions related to sports and the related vocabulary already seen, the other will have to answer
Step 6
School Olympics. Students will have to organize a little tournament for their class, the main vocabulary being sports.

Task
Macrofunction
Microfunction
Grammar
A new student has 
arrived to your school. She/he can communicate with you only in English. You are selected to show her/him the school
Exchanging goods and services
Giving instructions
Demonstratives: This, that, these, those
Adverbs of place: Here, there, etc
Yes/no questions