Poetry is everywhere, across language and culture. Poems are timeless. They can tell stories of events or describe beautiful vistas. Poems connect us with the past and the world around us through universal emotions like love, hate, grief and wonder.

There is no denying that poetry can be very powerful, so why is it absent from the English classrooms? Students often balk at the idea of studying poetry in class. They believe that their language skills are an insurmountable impediment to understanding poetry in English.  However, it can be done, and there are lots of resources online to help and encourage. For example, through video-poems students analyze a poem and relate it to different pictures to create a video-poem. Here you have an example:

Reading Aloud: Goodnight moon

Poems and bedtime stories are usually written to sound smooth and are usually very easy to read. We can improve our english pronunciation by reading them aloud. Here you have an example of someone reading Goodnight moon,  an American children's picture book  published in 1947.  It features a child saying Good Night to everything around him.

Activity: You will hear the audio as many times as you wish and choose a different poem, or bedtime story. Learn to pronounce every word and when you are ready, record yourself reading it. If you prefer, you can learn it and recite it but be very careful with the pronunciation, you should sound as natural as possible.

Record audio or upload mp3 >>

Carnivals are celebrated all over the world. Today we are going to learn some english words related to this topic.

Have fun!!!

Reading fairy tales can be a perfect way to make the english language sound familiar to our children. It can also be a good way of learning vocabulary and basic grammar structures. Below you have an example of one of the millions of tales you can find online which you can use to work on your language or simply to spend an amusing time with your children.

The Evil Sorcerer

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Watching movies in their original versions is a great way of improving our listening comprehension skills. Today I propose watching a clip from the famous movie The Avengers and answering some questions about it.


Here's what you'll do:
1. Click on the video below.
2. Watch the video, and pay attention to it!
    (You can pause and rewind the video if you need.)
3. Answer the listening comprehension form below the video.
4. Check your answers.

 Now answer the questions! -you can check your answers here.

Welcome!

Welcome everyone,

Through this blog we will make our way through english literature, grammar and vocabulary. Every week, you will find interesting activities and you'll be able to watch and listen to very interesting videos and news, fostering the use of new technologies and the use of English. I hope you learn a lot and have fun!!

El uso educativo de los blogs

La educación, como la tecnología, avanza a una velocidad de vértigo y cada vez están más unidas y presentes en nuestras aulas. Hoy en día las TICs nos ofrecen innumerables oportunidades para trabajar en procesos educativos. La educación de hoy se centra en estimular a los alumnos para que no se limiten a ser meros espectadores en las clases sino los encargados de su propia educación.

Una de esas nuevas herramientas es la creación de Blogs por parte de estudiantes. Este nuevo instrumento a la vez que estimula a los alumnos en escribir, intercambiar ideas, trabajar en equipo, visualizar de manera instantánea lo que producen, etc., ofrece a los docentes la posibilidad de exigirles realizar procesos de síntesis, ya que al escribir en Internet deben ser puntuales y precisos en los temas que tratan.

Además, no solo son una herramienta eficaz para mejorar los contenidos académicos, enriqueciéndolos con elementos multimedia como: videos, sonidos, imágenes, animaciones u otros web 2.0., sino que también son tremendamente valiosos para que los profesores se acerquen a los estudiantes de nuevas maneras. 

He aquí enlaces a mis blogs favoritos.


Tiching


The english blog

I am: Introducing ourselves

Our first task will be an introduction of ourselves. In order to do so, first we are going to read a Prezi presentation of the poem I Am by the English poet of the XVIII Century John Clare.






In this poem we have someone introducing himself. We can learn many things about the speaker by analysing the poem. For example:

-Our speaker is a very lonely man. In the first two lines the speaker tells us that nobody cares about him, or even knows who is anymore, and that his friends have abandoned him.

- Misery gives our speaker a death wish. But he doesn't say anything about killing himself.

- He's a religious or spiritual person. He's not really afraid of death because he's confident that he will meet God, his creator.


As you can see, poetry can be a good way of talking about something or someone in a beautiful way.


Now you are going to become a poet. It's time to introduce yourself. How? Your task will be writing an "I Am" poem about yourself. Here you have an example: