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6.5- Interaction

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  After having a look at my two mates’ blogs and reading the different activities they have carried out in their class, I was surprised by the activity that Lucia, in her blog (English Explorers - Link to her blog ), shares. The activity is accomplished by using TimeToast. I have already used this tool in one of the activities that we had to do in the course, but, I didn’t carry it out in the way Lucia shares she has done it. Lucía used TimeToast as a help for the book that they read in class “The Gruffalo”. That caught my attention since we also have a reading time every week in our class, and sometimes, students find it boring and they get lost in the middle of the session. This is one of the reasons why when I read Lucia’s post I thought that it could be interesting for me to try to do the same with the next reading we had. In this case, the topic chosen was inventions since the text we are dealing with is related to this. We are collaborating with the history department so we ...

Project on Genially: Birthday Party

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  In this case, students from 1st CSE, were asked to plan a friend’s birthday party. They were asked to create a presentation using Genially. In the slides, they had to include information about the party.  The first step was to look on the Internet for pictures that they could find as inspiration for the birthday party they wanted to organize. Once they had the party they wanted in mind in terms of decoration and activities to do, it was time to set a budget. Actually, the budget was given to them, so that they knew how much they could spend.  Their final mission was to create a presentation on Genially in which they explained and showed to the rest how their birthday party was going to be… the decoration, food, was there going to be a food truck? a dj?... They had to investigate typical birthday parties in the UK and US. Furthermore, they were asked to design a birthday party invitation using the app Canva.  The key thing here was to make the rest of the students i...

PIXTON

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 Hi eveyone! I have used Pixton to create a comic with my class (2nd ESO) Using Pixton has been a little bit confusing at the beginning. It took a whole lesson to explain to students all the things it has. I organized my 30 students in groups of three and four. I let them choose the groups so that they could work comfortably. The rule they had was that nobody could work alone and they had to make sure that everyone had someone to work with.  First of all, I dedicated one lesson to know how to use Pixton. I showed them that they could change face expressions, poses, eyes direction, etc. At the same time students were with the school computers so that they could put into practice what I was showing them in class.  Then, the second session, students had to plan the comic before creating it. There was one rule: they had to use will & going to. This was the grammar we were dealing with in that unit. Then, I gave them two lessons to do the comics. One problem I found was th...

EDPUZZLE

 Hi!!! Creating this video using Edpuzzle for the first time has been such a grateful experience since it has been my first time using it. I chose this video since it explains the difference between “will”  and “be going to” step by step comparing each different use of each of them. For example, we use “will” for spontaneous decisions and “be going to” for already planned future actions. In the video, both uses which are opposite are compared at the same time so that students can identify the difference between them quickly. Among the objectives that I wanted to fulfill, we can find: to listen and understand specific information from oral texts in different communicative situations. To do so, the ideal thing is to use different sources such as videos, audios, that may be found on the Internet emphasizing the globalization of English as a language for international communication. Another key objective would be to develop the learner's autonomy, think about the learning processe...

Using TimeToast in class!

It was my first time using TimeToast. I took the opportunity of using these final days before Easter, to put this activity into practice and do something different from the activities that we usually do in class.  Among the learning objectives, the focus was on accepting and valuing a foreign culture and comparing it to their own culture. I think culture is essential when talking about foreign languages. Furthermore, another learning objective was to improve their reading and writing skills. They had to look for the information of these different people’s lives and also, when they didn’t find the information in English, they had to translate it from English to Spanish. I asked them to investigate a famous person born in an English speaking country. They had to create a timeline including all the important events of that person’s life.  The steps they had to follow where the following: Look for a famous person born in an English speaking country. Make a list of all the importan...

READING AS A WAY OF DIS-CONNECTING

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Undoubtedly, reading is essential for cultivating your mind. I remember myself as a teenager who was passionate about reading romantic novels and imagining myself being the protagonist of all of them. Then, I had a period of time in which I didn't want to read anything, since, at school, I had to read lots of books which I didn't like at all. The same happened when I went to university and studied English philology. I was supposed to read lots of literary books. It was not until I moved to England that I started to feel the same I felt as a teenager reading. In England, at the university, teachers gave certain recommended readings and you could choose the books you wanted to do the dissertation about. From that moment onwards, I started reading more often as a way of disconnecting from the "real world".  Nowadays, my reading habits have changed a little bit. Now, I don't like reading on the computer or ebook. I just read things that I have to correct (e.g writings...

5 most common questions asked in an interview

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 Hi!  Are you nervous about a job interview in English? Don't worry, keep calm! Here you can find the 5 most asked questions in an interview.