Christmas’ Carol By Charles Dickens

This time I decided to write about this novel. As most of you already know, this story was written by the end of the 19^th Century.It describes the main characteristics of that time: how poor and  rich people used to live; their differences, values and political issues.

 The story takes place at Christmas time. It is about a poor old man’s life, poor of soul, because it was really very, very rich. He had his own accounting firm. He  was doing very well with business. Scrooge, that was his name, was a lonely man, because he was selfish, stubborn, moody, mean ,and he doesn’t care about anyone except himself. As it was Christmas time, people was grateful, happy. They greeted each other wishing Merry Christmas. Scrooge could not understand that attitude, for him it was not a happy time. It has only one meaning: “bills to pay”. That night when he went to sleep, Scrooge was visited by  his partner’s ghost,who had died seven years ago, at Christmas time. He warned Scrogge that that night three ghosts would visit him to show him his own destiny. By the withdrawing of his friend’s ghost, scrooge was quite shocked from what he had heard and seen. After some minutes, therefore,  he decided to accept what had happened and wait for such ghosts .

That is the way the story goes, one by one ghosts started to appear . Each of them represent a different Christmas time: past Christmas, present Christmas,and future Christmas . Each of them takes Scrooge on some kind of journey through time and space, showing himself at different times of his life and showing people’s life, who was around him, but he despised . Throughout the story, we can see how those trips affected Scrooge’s feelings and emotions, as well as, how nearly instantly he reflects on his actions throughout his entired life. He realises that despite his dull personality, there were people who appreciated him; who believed and hope that he could change the way of being and thinking. After finishing ghosts’ visit, Scrooge fell asleep. When he woke up, he felt himself like a different person. He felt cheerful, generous, friendly ,and happy. 

Kelro

Song: Jealous Guy By John Lennon

I was dreaming of the past
And my heart was beating fast
I began to lose control
I began to lose control
I didn't mean to hurt you
I'm sorry that I made you cry
Oh no, I didn't want to hurt you
I'm just a jealous guy

I was feeling insecure
You might not love me anymore
I was shivering inside
I was shivering inside

I didn't mean to hurt you
I'm sorry that I made you cry
Oh no, I didn't want to hurt you
I'm just a jealous guy

I didn't mean to hurt you
I'm sorry that I made you cry
Oh no, I didn't want to hurt you
I'm just a jealous guy

I was trying to catch your eyes
Thought that you was trying to hide
I was swallowing my pain
I was swallowing my pain

I didn't mean to hurt you
I'm sorry that I made you cry
Oh no, I didn't want to hurt you
I'm just a jealous guy, watch out
I'm just a jealous guy, look out babe
I'm just a jealous guy

Comment: Jealous Guy is in my opinion one of the best songs by John Lennon, in which he manages to express his feelings in such a way that people may place themselves into the situation described. Although jealousy is not “healthy” when in excess, the words used and the way in which feelings are showed, make the hearer feel sympathy for this “jealous guy”. It is a subtle way of illustrating any “common guy’s” insecurity and fear of loosing the love of his life.

Sunshine

'Mum and dad made me multi-task better’

Well fellows, good news. I’ve found this article in which there are some good reasons to be bilingual and to teach a foreign language. Most of us started to study English because it has caught our attention, we noticed that we liked the sounds and maybe we found it familiar. Then, we started to make profits we it, so it become necessary. Now we can add health reasons for study another language as well as to teach it.

The article 'Mum and dad made me multi-task better’ clearly states that being bilingual have some good benefits, such as a delay in developing mental diseases, as for example Alzheimer. Other great benefits are to be focused in confusing situations and to have the capacity of adjusting quickly to changes.  

I hope you find this article useful as I did. I think here we have some other reasons to let know our students that to study another language, such as English is worth.

Click HERE to read the article

Isabella

Breakfast in bed

This morning I made my mom breakfast in bed.
I tried to be careful, but burnt all the bread.
I tried to make sure that the coffee was hot,
By boiling the bit left in yesterday's pot.

I charred a few pancakes, potatoes, and grits.
The sausage, I seared into smoldering bits.
I made her some muffins like miniature coals,
And roasted a package of cinnamon rolls.

I scorched several servings of hamburger hash,
And microwaved bacon until it was ash.
I blackened a bagel, which started to smoke.
The smoke alarm sounded. My mother awoke.

I think she was panicked. She looked up in dread.
I proudly presented her breakfast in bed.
She grimaced, then silently counted to ten,
And asked me to never make breakfast again

Last time I was reading this poem about breakfast. I was doing this because I had to prepare an activity for little kids. When I read it I realized how lovely could be a child when he wants to prepare breakfast to his parents. It doesn’t matter if he prepares a good breakfast or a bad one. The only thing that matters is the intention of making parents feels happy. So, make sure your they feel you love them a lot!!!

Poly

Handy Mandy

If you have Young children in your house, you surely have watched this program. It’s about a man who has different talking tools, and they repair everything. It’s very enjoyable for kids, but also very didactic. While the different stories of Handy Mandy occurs, he teaches language (Spanish if you see it in the original version) using lexical items real contexts. And you should see how easy the children learn watching it! I was talking with my nephew a few days ago, a he told me the name of the tools in English. I was total amused!

Evan

“Brave New World” and “Brave New World Revisited” by Aldous Huxley

“Brave New World” (1932) is a science fiction novel written by the English writer Aldous Huxley (1894-1963). In this novel he presents a futurist world dominated by technology: human beings are artificially “cultivated” and genetically modified to belong to particular castes. Everyone is made to be “happy” by a process of hipnopedia. They live under the rules of a totalitarian man, the creator of the world, ironically called Ford. Everyone who does not belong to this world is considered a savage.

“Brave New World Revisited” (1958) is a recopilation of essays which had been published on the magazine “Newsday”. In this set of essays, Aldous Huxley himself analizes (30 years after the publication of “Brave New World”) the themes of his own novel.The book consists of 12 chapters, each of which deals with a certain topic such as “Brainwashing”,”The art of selling” and “Education for freedom”.Then, Huxley verifies that most of his ideas and predictions were right and some others wrong.

The first time I was asked to read “Brave New World”, I was at secondary school, and I can remember that I found it quite a tedious and odd book, because I have never liked science fiction stories. The thing is that when I was asked to read it for the second time (then at higer education), I read it with much more enthusiasm. I think that I could read between the lines and go beyond the story itself. Moreover, I decided to read “Brave New World Revisited” on my own, and then I found both of them interesting books. It is incredible how Huxley describes and asserts on his predictions of the western world. Even if you read it almost 80 years before the first edition, the description of a society managed by a few, where the influence of government limits citizens on their thoughts, is in a way what is happening nowadays with uneducated people.

IZZIE

Is Spanglish a language?

The other day I read a wonderful article in the newspaper about “Spanglish”. First of all I want to start by defining the word ‘Spanglish’. It is the infiltration of English vocabulary and, less commonly, even syntax into the Spanish language. The most extreme cases of Spanglish can be heard in the United States, where some Spanish-speaking immigrants and their descendants use Spanish and English interchangeably, even in the same sentence. One of the most fascinating things is that the best selling book “Don Quijote de la Macha” was translated into Spanglish. And with this event a great debate was opened: Is Spanglish a genuine language? Some linguists have argued that Spanglish is not a language because it is only for a minority. They think that Spanglish is a form of regional dialect, rather than a Language in itself. On the other hand, millions of Hispanics who speak Spanglish feel that it is an authentic language. They define it as “code-switching", which is the mix of two languages. A group of Mexican people are even trying to open a course of Spanglish at a University in order to teach the language. This is a very good idea for those who like to study languages.

Milkyway