Christmas from Poland

Our peers from Swidnick want to wish us a Merry Christmas with these words and this picture!!!

May joy and happiness snow on you,

may the bells jingle for you, and
may Santa be extra good to you!

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas from 4th ESO

The students of 4th ESO want to wish you...

eTwinning Project Launched

Finally our eTwinning project has been launched!!! During this week the students involved in the project will start to work on it, sending an e-mail to their Polish peers with a Christmas Greeting.


To break the ice, though, this morning we have took a photo to send to Poland. Here you have it!

Merry Christmas from 1rst ESO

The students of 1rst ESO have prepared a rhyme to wish everybody...

1rst-A

1rst-B

A Christmas Carol

This is your teacher's Christmas Carol for you:

Do They Know It's Christmas

"Do They Know It's Christmas?" is a song written by Bob Geldof and Midge Ure in 1984 to raise money for relief of 1984–1985 famine in Ethiopia. The original version was produced by Midge Ure, and released by Band Aid on 29 November 1984.

The song became the biggest selling single in UK singles chart history, selling a million in the first week alone. It stayed at Number 1 for five weeks and ultimately sold more than 3.5 million copies domestically. 

Do They Know It's Christmas

Band-Aid

It's Christmas time,
there's no need to be afraid.
At Christmas time
we let in light and banish shade.


And in our world of plenty
we can spread a smile of Joy
Throw your arms around the world
at Christmas time.


But say a prayer,
Pray for the other ones.
At Christmas time it's hard
but when you're having fun...


There's a world outside your window
and it's a world of dread and fear
Where the only water flowing is
the bitter sting of tears.


And the Christmas bells that are ringing
are the clanging chimes of Doom.
Well, tonight thank God it's them instead of you.


And there won't be snow in Africa this Christmas time
The greatest gift they'll get this year is life.
Where nothing ever grows
No rain or rivers flow.


Do they know it's Christmas time at all?


Here's to you...
Raise a glass for everyone.
Here's to them
Underneath that burning sun.


Do they know it's Christmas time at all?


Feed the world...
Feed the world...
Feed the world,
Let them know it's Christmas time again.


Feed the world,
Let them know it's Christmas time again.
(Repeat several times and fade)

Christmas Vocabulary

To remember the main Christmas vocabulary, here you have this presentation:

On-line Christmas Fun

Lots of links to on-line games to have fun this Christmas:

• Christmas Bounce
• Evil Elves 2
• Present Pileup
• Christmas Tree Light Up
• Dodge to the Lodge
• Gift Raid
• Thin Ice
• Santas Gift Jump
• Sky Jump
• Snowman
• Snow Drift
• Ashton's Family Resort
• Snowline
• Happy Santa
• Santa's Cannon
• Santa's Chimney Trouble
• Santa Caught Christmas
• Christmas Tree Sleeding

Christmas Tongue Twisters

Now it is time to enjoy Christmas while practising your oral skills:

• Seven Santas sang silly songs.

• There's chimney soot on Santa's suit.

• Tiny Timmy trims the tall tree with tinsel.

• Santa's sleigh slides on slick snow.

• Eleven elves licked liquorice lollypops.

• Kris Kringle chose to climb the chimney at Christmas.

• Bobby brings bright bells.

• How many deer would a reindeer reign if a reindeer could reign deer?

Festivals and celebrations around the world

After many time thinking of how to motivate you to study more English and improve your ICT skills, we have decided to be involved into a project together with a Polish school into the eTwinning programme. The students who are going to take part in it are volunteers from 2nd, 3rd and 4th ESO. 

The project, which is supposed to begin in a few days, is called Festivals and celebrations around the world, and its aim is learning about the festivities and holidays celebrated in Spain, Poland and other parts of the world; and promoting cultural and linguistic diversity.

Our twinned school is called Zespół Szkół nr 2 - Gimnazjum nr 3 im. Noblistów Polskich w Świdniku, and it is in Świdnik, a Polish city that you can situate at this map of Poland:

eTwinning

Collaborative School Projects in Europe

eTwinning is an educational programme which promotes and offers tools for setting up joint educational projects in the Internet among two or more educational institutions in different European countries, based on cooperative work, the use of ICTs and the realization of the potential of the European dimension in education.

eTwinning began in 2005 as part of the European Union eLearning program for the integration of the new information and communication technologies (ICTs) in the education and training systems existing in Europe. It is currently a measure which accompanies the action of the Comenius programme within the Lifelong Learning Programme which started in January 2007 and will finish its present phase in 2013. The eTwinning platform unites at present approximately 90,000 teachers registered in Europe  (more than 8,300 of whom are Spanish) and about 5,000 active projects (data from March 2010).

Joint school projects, which are more and more frequent in Europe, motivate the students from different countries to cooperate together. They learn from other cultures while they are practising skills related to the new technologies and foreign languages and develop contents from any of the subjects in the study programme.

The teachers have the opportunity to meet other European teachers and exchange ideas, which helps them to improve their own teaching methods by comparing and applying different approaches, broaden the knowledge of a precise field or simply exchange information.

In 2010, the number of participating countries was 32, of which 5 do not belong to the European Union (EU): Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia (non EU), Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (non EU), France, Germany, Greece, Holland, Hungary, Iceland (non EU), Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxemburg, Malta, Norway (non EU), Poland, Portugal, Rumania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Turkey (non EU) and United Kingdom.

The Nightmare before Christmas

The Nightmare Before Christmas is a 1993 film directed by Henry Selick and produced/co-written by Tim Burton. It tells the story of Jack Skellington, a being from Halloween Town who opens a portal to Christmas Town.

Jack Skellington, the pumpkin king of Halloween Town, is bored with doing the same thing every year for Halloween. One day, he takes a walk into the woods and discovers some trees with different doors representing various holidays. The Christmas Tree door attracts his attention so he comes into the world of Christmas. Christmas Town is amazing to Jack, so he decided to share it with the citizens of Halloween Town, and they decide to make their own Christmas celebration.  The problem is that they can't get it quite right...

One of the most famous cuts from this film is This is Halloween. Watch the clip:

Here you are the lyrics of the song:

[SHADOW]
Boys and girls of every age
Wouldn't you like to see something strange?

[SIAMESE SHADOW]
Come with us and you will see
This, our town of Halloween

[PUMPKIN PATCH CHORUS]
This is Halloween, this is Halloween
Pumpkins scream in the dead of night

[GHOSTS]
This is Halloween, everybody make a scene
Trick or treat till the neighbors gonna die of fright
It's our town, everybody screm
In this town of Halloween

[CREATURE UNDER THE BED]
I am the one hiding under your bed
Teeth ground sharp and eyes glowing red

[MAN UNDER THE STAIRS]
I am the one hiding under yours stairs
Fingers like snakes and spiders in my hair

[CORPSE CHORUS]
This is Halloween, this is Halloween

[VAMPIRES]
Halloween! Halloween! Halloween! Halloween!
In this town we call home
Everyone hail to the pumpkin song

[MAYOR]
In this town, don't we love it now?
Everybody's waiting for the next surprise

[CORPSE CHORUS]
Round that corner, man hiding in the trash cam
Something's waiting no to pounce, and how you'll...

[HARLEQUIN DEMON, WEREWOLF & MELTING MAN]
Scream! This is Halloween
Red 'n' black, slimy green

[WEREWOLF]
Aren't you scared?

[WITCHES]
Well, that's just fine
Say it once, say it twice
Take a chance and roll the dice
Ride with the moon in the dead of night

[HANGING TREE]
Everybody scream, everbody scream

[HANGED MEN]
In our town of Halloween!

[CLOWN]
I am the clown with the tear-away face
Here in a flash and gone without a trace

[SECOND GHOUL]
I am the "who" when you call, "Who's there?"
I am the wind blowing through your hair

[OOGIE BOOGIE SHADOW]
I am the shadow on the moon at night
Filling your dreams to the brim with fright

[CORPSE CHORUS]
This is Halloween, this is Halloween
Halloween! Halloween! Halloween! Halloween!
Halloween! Halloween! 

[CHILD CORPSE TRIO]
Tender lumplings everywhere
Life's no fun without a good scare

[PARENT CORPSES]
That's our job, but we're not mean
In our town of Halloween

[CORPSE CHORUS]
In this town

[MAYOR]
Don't we love it now?

[CORPSE CHORUS]
Skeleton Jack might catch you in the back
And scream like a banshee
Make you jump out of your skin
This is Halloween, everyone scream
Wont' ya please make way for a very special guy

Our man jack is King of the Pumpkin patch
Everyone hail to the Pumpkin King

[EVERYONE]
This is Halloween, this is Halloween
Halloween! Halloween! Halloween! Halloween!

[CORPSE CHILD TRIO]
In this town we call home
Everyone hail to the pumpkin song

[EVERYONE]
La la-la la, Halloween! Halloween! [Repeat]

Kathy and Jake's Problems

Jake and Kathy are a couple, but they are arguing because of their different interests: while she wants to go out, he prefers to stay at home to watch a basketball match. 


Listen to Khair-Un-Nisa and Juan playing this dialogue taken from their student's book. Don't miss it. They have been superb!

Little Red Riding Mood

Watch the first chapter of Little Red Riding Mood by Facemoods to learn about safe on-line surfing, paying special attention at Facebook..

See two more chapters of this series following these links:

• Chapter 2
• Chapter 3

The Fonix 2.012: Be Prepared!

The Fifth English Competition for Catalan Schools (THE FONIX 2012), designed to promote the use of English among school students through a fun and educational competition in an informal educational setting, is hereby announced.

The objective of the competition is to select a finalist from each of the first two stages: local, territorial and the winners at the final stage.

The exercises in all the stages of the competition will consist of writing tasks, each based on a different theme (for example: geography, history or music) The written tasks contain a variety of activities on vocabulary, reading and writing.

STAGES OF THE COMPETITION: 

• LOCAL STAGE: The tests will be held at each school between 12 of January and 15th February 2012 inclusive.

• REGIONAL STAGE: The tests during the regional stage will be held on Saturday 3rd March at 12:00 midday, and will last for a maximum of 60 minutes. The location of the examination will be made public well before the test date.

• FINAL STAGE: The date and the location of the final stage of the competition will be announced on the official website.

THE PRIZES:

The following prizes will be awarded to the candidates who classify for the final stage of the competition:

• 4 two-week stays in “English Summer Camps” in Catalonia for the four winners in the 5º pri. to 2nd ESO  categories.

• 4 two-week stays in an English-speaking country for the four winners in the 3rd ESO to 2nd  de Batxillerat/ Grau Superior de Cicles Formatius  categories.

• 8 standard on line English courses and 8 sets of study materials for the runners-up in each of the 8 categories.

• 32 standard on line English courses for the third, fourth, fifth and sixth placed candidates in each of the 8 categories.

• Sets of study materials for the remaining finalists.

If you want to have an eye, watch this video:

Further information about the competition can be found on the official website.  

WHO ARE “THE FONIX”

Did you know that the Fonix comes from the English language phoneme table? have a look at the table below and see if you spot the similarities:

We would like to introduce you to:

Which is pronounced like "TH" as in "THORA"		Which is pronounced like "OO" as in "HOOK"
Which is pronounced like "G" as in "GORDON"		Which is pronounced like "S" as in "ASIA"
Which is pronounced like "TH" as in "HEATHER"		Which is pronounced like "OR" as in "GEORGE"

They are fictional characters which look a little bit like Martians. They are noisy, excitable, adventurous and full of energy. They get on really well with young people. In fact – this is why they are called THE FONIX, because in English SMS messages – this is how we write PHONICS.

The Fonix 2.012

The Fonix official website

Thanksgiving Special

In the United States, Thanksgiving is observed on the fourth Thursday of November. The holiday is celebrated in remembrance of the pilgrims who reached Plymouth Rock in 1620, and in order to give God thanks for it. 


This year, Thanksgiving will be celebrated on Thursday, November 24th, 2011.


To learn more about Thanksgiving day and have fun, simply visit the following  mini-site.

Don't Worry, Be Happy

For the Feast of the Presentation of the Child Mary, next Monday the 21rst, we all are going to listen and sing a famous song by Bobby McFerrin: Don't Worry, Be Happy.

Here you have the video-clip of this song and its lyrics. At the end of the post you can also find a link to an on-line exercise about this song.

Here's a little song I wrote
You might want to sing it note for note
Don't worry, be happy

In every life we have some trouble
But when you worry you make it double
Don't worry, be happy

Don't worry, be happy now
Oo, oo

Ain't got no place to lay your head
Somebody came and took your bed
Don't worry, be happy

The land-lord say your rent is late
He may have to litigate
Don't worry, be happy

Look at me, I'm happy

Ain't got no cash, ain't got no style
Ain't got no gal to make you smile
Don't worry, be happy

'Cause when you worry your face will frown
And that will bring everybody down
Don't worry, be happy

Don't worry, be happy now

Click here to check out the on-line exercise about this song.

Dialogues Unit 2 (1rst ESO-A)

Here it is the work of the students of 1rst ESO-A with a dialogue from Unit 2 of their books:

• Group 1: Marisol, Aroa, Ramón & Guanlong:

• Group 2: Rimsha, Ángel, María & Moruna:

• Group 3: Carmen, Laila, Yassmine & Chengjie:

• Group 4: Jairo, Enriqueta, Jingyao & Chaimaa:

• Group 5: Areeg & Hassan:

The Past Simple Tense: Grammar

The Past Simple expresses an action in the past taking place once, never, several times. It can also be used for actions taking place one after another or in the middle of another action.

• Most Verbs

Most verbs conjugate by adding -ed like the verb "wait" below.

Positive	Negative	Question
I waited. You waited. He waited. She waited. It waited. We waited. They waited.	I did not wait. You did not wait. He did not wait. She did not wait. It did not wait. We did not wait. They did not wait.	Did I wait? Did you wait? Did he wait? Did she wait? Did it wait? Did we wait? Did they wait?

Exceptions in spelling when adding -ed
after a final -e only add -d	love – loved
final consonant after a -l or short, stressed vowel as final consonant after a vowel is doubled	admit – admitted travel – travelled
final -y after a consonant becomes -i	hurry – hurried

• Irregular Verbs

Many verbs, such as "have", take irregular forms in the Past Simple. Notice that you only use the irregular verbs in statements. In negative forms and questions, did indicates Past Simple.

Positive	Negative	Question
I had. You had. We had. They had. He had. She had. It had.	I did not have. You did not have. He did not have. She did not have. It did not have. We did not have. They did not have.	Did I have? Did you have? Did he have? Did she have? Did it have? Did we have? Did they have?

• To Be

The verb "be" is also irregular in the Past Simple. Unlike other irregular verbs, there are two Past Simple forms: "was" and "were." It also has different question forms and negative forms. Always remember that you DO NOT use did with the verb to be in the Past Simple.

Positive	Negative	Question
I was. You were. We were. They were. He was. She was. It was.	I was not. You were not. We were not. They were not. He was not. She was not. It was not.	Was I? Were you? Were we? Were they? Was he? Was she? Was it?