Thursday 24 October 2013

ADJECTIVES + PREPOSITIONS



I've always thought prepositions are brain teasers. You never know if you're using the correct one. Even for advanced learners it's always a difficult issue, since for one of our Spanish prepositions, there are usually more than one possibility in English. What can we do then?? The best option, in my opinion, is to read a lot. Reading is the only natural way we have to get to know which prepositions are used in any given expression. The problem comes when we find out that our students are not exactly eager readers of literature in English. Let's face it, even though they are surrounded and constantly in contact with English, it's not enough.

Our 4th ESO students have just seen in class a list of some common adjectives and the prepositions which usually follow them. For those of you who weren't in class today, here is a list of the adjectives + prepositions we will be working with.  

Here are some examples of the use of adjectives + prepositions:

"I'm tired of bad news"



He's bored of watching TV. 





He's worried about the bill.




They were shocked at his strength. 


They are different from the others.




For more practise on adjectives + prepositions you can visit the following sites:


http://www.perfect-english-grammar.com/adjectives-and-prepositions-exercise-1.html


 


 




Sunday 20 October 2013

Dinosaur stories




Last Friday, our new native assistant, Nithin, helped 4th ESO students with the pronunciation of the -ed past endings. For this purpose, they invented a story about dinosaurs in which each student had to say one sentence using a regular verb in the past. Students learned a lot and we all had fun. Here is the result:



4th ESO Group A

First we talked to a T-Rex. The T-Rex was dangerous. The T-rex worked in the jungle. We cooked breakfast for the T-Rex. We asked the T-rex, “What is your name?” The T-rex said my name is Eustaquio. Eustaquio liked to play tennis. After, Eustaquio watched a piece of meat. We waited for the bus with him. In the movie Jurassic Park, they filmed velociraptors. He invited me to his house. We watched a film on the TV. Eustaquio ate us. But we killed him from the inside. Then he smiled. But then we found another T-Rex. And he was called Gervasio. We invented fire and burned him. The other dinosaurs traveled to the future with us. In the future, we killed all the dinosaurs and we cooked them. In the future, we cooked a barbecue. 

4th ESO Group B


One day the dinosaurs started to destroy the universe. The dinosaurs invented the work. The dinosaurs were pink. The dinosaurs watched TV. The dinosaurs were very dangerous and they liked to destroy the University of Ourense. All the class traveled to the past to save the universe. The dinosaurs listened to music, hard rock. They invited some aliens. The dinosaurs talked English. The dinosaurs cooked the cookies for the mermaids. The dinosaurs traveled on the bus. A dinosaur married another dinosaur. People wanted to do something to save the universe. The whole class that went to save the universe died because of an atomic bomb. The dinosaurs tattooed the young people. A dinosaur survived and he killed a lot of people. I played football with Tommy, he was a Tyrannosaurus Rex. Rex cleaned the universe. I went to the wedding between the dinosaurs where everybody danced. The class rose from the dead and wished they were back in Santo Angel.
 

Sunday 13 October 2013

Activity: Face reading

3rd ESO Groups A & B

Describe the following people's personalities taking into account the Face Reading Guide from the SB p. 9.








Monday 7 October 2013

Summer is gone...isn't it??

Starting the 2nd week of October....leaves on the ground, morning fogs, early nights. Looks like everything is telling us that we've just dived into autumn...except for the weather!!! Do not misunderstand me. It's not that I don't like hot. I do love it but, hasn't it been enough?? Apparently not, so in order to keep this summertime atmosphere, I've decided to update the blog today with some compositions of our 3rd ESO students about their summer. Here they are. Read, enjoy and re-taste summer:

Mª Alejandra Ruiz
3rd ESO A

After finishing school in June, I went to Ireland to study English and to learn to write it and speak it well. 
I visited Ireland, it's very nice. I liked Ireland very much. It's beautiful.
I went to Ourense and I was a week in Ourense and after that, I went to Colombia with my family because my family and I are Colombian.
On the first days we were resting in the house of my father. We went to visit many places with my father. Some of them were San Andrés, an island of Colombia which is in the Caribbean. The beaches there are beautiful. 
It's amazing the amount of colors which the sea may have. It's said that's the sea of the seven colors. I also flew in paragliding with my father and we went to the town where my father was born. It's called the Cocuy and it's very nice.
It's where I could ride a horse and a lot of other things. It's a unique experience. 
This was my summer.



Miguel Rosales
3rd ESO A

I have a strange friend. He's a Super Wild Pig-Bear called Paco. He's very hairy and he loves cookies. He lives in my house but he doesn't sleep at night. He waits for the sun. I've spent all my summer with him. We played football twice a week. He was the best of the park and everybody said:"WOW!!, he's amazing!!"
On Wednesdays we played on the computer all day long. He doesn't like playing but he loves to watch me doing it. 
On Tuesdays and Fridays we went to the swimming-pool. It was fun but...he has a lot of hair!
At weekends we did a lot of things: travelling, discovering the city, sleep...and we sometimes phoned our other strange friends (the catbird, the red swimmer dog, the politicrat) and we played on the computer with them again!!



Andrea Mosquera
3rd ESO B

When I finished the course, I started to prepare the suitcase because later, I went to a summer camp in Gandarío, A Coruña. It was about aquatic activities like surf, windsurf, aquatic ski...
We were 100 people, so I made a lot of new friends. We spent there 12 days and I really had a lot of un. When it finished we were all very sad because we had to come home.
After this I spent one week in Ourense, meeting my friends, going to the pool...But then I went eight days to Madrid to visit the city. It's a big city and so beautiful!! We went to museums, the zoo, the Royal Palace, Aranjuez, Toledo, etc...I loved it!!
After this I went to Valencia to the beach. It was a good time, the beach was beautiful and I had a lot of fun with my family.
When I came to Ourense, I went to my village for some days and then I spent time going for a walk with my friends and family, going to the pool, to the cinema, doing a pyjama party...
When the summer finished I had a lot of photos, it was a great summer.



Ezequiel Álvarez
3rd ESO B

My summer was good. I went to the beach a lot of times and to the pool more times than the beach.
In July, I went to my village and I played with my XBox 360 a lot of time and I watched TV and went to the river. In August I stayed in Ourense for one week or two, I don't remember, but I listened to a lot of music. I went to the pools of Monterrei, to the pool of my uncle and I watched a lot of television too. The other weeks I went to my village. 
 In September I stayed here and I talked with my friends. I played with my PC and I got the things ready to school.



Thursday 3 October 2013

SUBJECT & OBJECT PRONOUNS and POSSESSIVE ADJECTIVES

Remember: 

  • pronouns are used instead of nouns. Subject pronouns are always before the verb and object pronouns are always after the verb.
  • adjectives always go in front of nouns


Download the activity HERE