Monthly Archives: May 2011

Word of the Day: Thesaurus

Dictionaries, Word of the Day

A Thesaurus    is a reference book in which words with similar meanings are grouped together ( it contains synonyms and sometimes antonyms).

Try this site and see how a Thesaurus can help you online.

 

Writing can be a daunting task when you cannot quite think of just the right word to convey your ideas without sounding redundant and boring. A free thesaurus online is an invaluable resource offering expedient gold mines of vocabulary. To check thesaurus sites available can also be time-consuming. However, one site that will place thesaurus synonyms at your fingertips is thesaurus.net. Our free thesaurus online resource offers a thesaurus dictionary online where your only task is to enter a word you find yourself unnecessarily overusing. This English thesaurus will quickly provide an array of possible synonyms that can be used to enhance writing.

 

 

Treasure Hunt: a funny way to revise

Games, , ,

I’ve been using this idea for quite a long time but though I can remember it was a word of  mouth idea I can’t quite say who it came from, so forgive me if you’re reading this and I haven’t given you any credit.

I’ve tried this game in the EOI with adults and now I have just tried it with teens and I can say it works very well with both, the only difference being that teens are probably “a bit” noisier .

How to revise: this game requires some preparation. You need to decide beforehand if you are going to revise the whole book or one or two units. Then, you have to write some questions (see my own game for ideas here) with content from the units you want to revise and produce a worksheet.

♥In class, ask students to sit in pairs or threes and give each pair just one photocopy. You don’t want everybody in the group to have a photocopy in case they feel tempted to cheat.

♥ Tell them they can use their textbooks, workbooks and notebooks (they’re going to love you).

♥ Explain that the aim of the game is to revise, so they will have to be able to give the right answer to each of the questions in the worksheet.

♥ They can only answer one question at a time and they can only start question 2 when they have answered correctly question number 1.

♥ So students in pairs or in threes answer question number 1 and then they rush up to your table. If you put a tick, it means it is correct and they can proceed to question number 2. Othewise, they have to go back to their group and try again.

♥ The winner is the pair who finishes first, obviously! I don’t normally take sweets to the classroom, so I give them a Free Homework Pass, which they normally kill to get. I download it from here.

Creating posters for the classroom with Juxio

Funny Stuff, In the Computer Room, Slides,

There it is! I don’t think you need any further explanation for what Juxio is. I can only add that it is great fun and that actions speak louder than words. Have a look at these two posters I’ve made for my classrooms and then just explore the website. I only hope my students , after reading this post, will be thrilled  about decorating the walls of the classroom with their own posters (in English, of course)

Kizoa: creating slideshows

Resources, Slides,

With Kizoa you can store photos, edit them, and create amazing slideshows and it’s free! You can also touch up your photos in the editing workshop by adding frames, effects. You can resize or rotate your photos.You can easily create flash shows and assign transitions, animations, text and music to your slideshow. You can send your show by email, post it in facebook or your website ,add it to your blog and  create a DVD but first you need to create an account and upload your photos.

My elementary students are now working with feelings  and this is the slideshow I’ve made for them. I suggest you use it to revise or to teach by pausing the slideshow before the word expressing the feeling is shown.

How do you say 2011?

The English language

Some time ago I published a post about how to say 2010 (click here if  you want to read it) . Now , we are in May 2011 and  I’ve heard the year 2011 said ,so far ,in three different ways. Now, dear native speakers you can see why we sometimes find it a bit difficult to understand your language.But ,although you can say in at least three different ways, I’m going to  stick to the one I hear more often ,’casue this is the one my dear colleague Beth fancies” Two thousand eleven” , though I’ve realized after reading lots of comments that “Twenty eleven” seems to be the most popular.

When asked, these are some the things Internet users have said:

♥”Twenty Eleven should be the proper way to pronounce it. Back in 1996 did we call it “One Thousand Nine-Hundred Ninety-Six” or “Nineteen-Hundred Ninety-Six? No, we did not. We called it “Nineteen Ninety-Six”. Over the years of the last decade we got into a habit of saying Two Thousand at the start of the year because it sounded better than for example “Twenty Oh Eight”. Now we’re in the next decade we can stop doing that, because it’s quicker and easier to say Twenty instead of Two Thousand. I thought it would have caught on by the end of last year, but it never”.
♥”I do it either way.. but I prefer twenty-eleven.”

♥Two thousand eleven.
♥I say two thousand AND eleven

♥I keep going back and forth.But I think I’ll eventually side 20-11 and so on just because it’s less of a mouthful.

I can’t help but think that these problems about the language wouldn’t exist if the English language were regulated by an institution like the one that regulates the Spanish Language , our Real Academia de la Lengua.

You might want to read:

The English language does not have a Real Academia de la Lengua