My review of the year

Around this time of the year (end of one, start of another), I enjoy watching and reading summaries of what has happened over the past 12 months - the good, the bad, the fascinating, the pathetic, the amusing, the annoying ... .
Yesterday, I watched the Google video of the top searches from 2013.

 
http://www.google.com/trends/topcharts?zg=full&hl=en

As usual, there were many things I'd forgotten about.  Did you find the same?


I found myself reflecting on what I'd been up to both personally and professionally in 2013.  Not a bad year in retrospect!

http://www.crossfitinvictus.com/events/january-2014-invictus-events/

In January, I was in Alcalá de Henares, along with many, many other people who are involved in the Cambridge English Language Assessment here in Spain.  The conference kicked off a very important year for Cambridge English:  the Centenary year - 100 years since the first Proficiency exam took place.

In February, I was busy preparing and giving seminars, as well as watching a few webinars.
I would really recommend the Webinar on Youtube on How the Cambridge English Advanced Writing paper is assessed.  Here's the link again:

Right at the very beginning of March, I was lucky enough to be invited to take part in the ih Young Learners Conference in Rome.  I managed to attend some (though not all) sessions and also met some extremely motivated teachers and Directors of Studies and Teacher trainers.  And as usual, I learnt a lot myself and discovered some wonderful ideas and facts on the internet as I prepared my session.

I also met lot of inspiring teachers in Granada and Malaga in April.  I also remember the impressive venues!!!

And in May, in my hometown - Santander, lots of familiar as well as new faces cane along to the Writing Inspired seminar.  Again, I learnt a lot while I prepared the session.

In June, my days were busy, busy, busy as they always are - driving round Cantabria, coordinating the Young Learners Test sessions.  Thanks once again to the fantastic team of speaking examiners that are so reliable and willing.  You make a frantic period of the year much less frantic!!!

July and August were pretty workfree (as you can see from the shortage of blog posts!!!)  

September is the time when most of the Iberian Presenter Team meet up in Madrid to coordinate the year's seminar programme.  The team grew considerably this year and we are busy, busy.  It's great to see so many sessions taking place in Portugal now.

In October, I went back to my daughters' school to help give out the Young Learners and KET  and PET certificates.  I love going back to the school and I get so much pleasure seeing these students grow and bumping into the first candidates who took Starters there and have gone on to study and to use their English to achieve so much.

November flew past, with seminars and another certificate ceremony in Pedreña.

I loved the display that they had up in Pedreña with some students and their aims for what they wanted to do with English - hope you don't mind being 'shared' Pablo!!!

And so, we've reached the end of another year.  Not a bad one in all and once Kings Day is over, it'll be back to work!!!  I'll try and write a bit more frequently on this blog - my 1st Resolution made!!

Have a great year everyone!!!


Anne

Merry Christmas!!

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Cambridge English Language Assessment 

Spain and Portugal

The facts behind the film

I have always loved finding out unexpected or intriguing facts.

We are very near Christmas.  My daughters will both be arriving home tomorrow for the holidays (they are working and studying in Madrid).  No doubt at some point these holidays, we will watch the film Love Actually together.  It's become a tradition (in fact, I have watched this film when it's NOT been Christmas with them several times too!)

Here's a link to the trailer for the film (in case you need reminding...)

I was looking on the internet for something else, when I came across a fun trivia article about Love Actually.  I found some of the trivia amusing so I thought I'd share some of it with you!

1  The word “actually” is spoken twenty-two times in the film.  

'Actually' is actually a very common word in English, so that's actually a pretty appropriate number of times for it to appear!!!

2  The director Richard Curtis always has a character named Bernard in his films.  Why?

When director Richard Curtis was in college, his girlfriend left him for a man named Bernard. As a literary form of revenge, Curtis writes an unpopular character named Bernard into each of his screenplays. In Love Actually, Bernard is Emma Thompson and Alan Rickman’s "horrid son."

3  The airport footage at the Heathrow airport is real. A team of cameramen hung out at the airport for a week, and filmed real families, friends and lovers reuniting. 

4 Liam Neeson is seen several times with a toothpick hanging out of his mouth. This is because after he quit smoking, he was never without a toothpick to take its place.  

And some other bits and pieces about Love Actually - it's been over 10 years since the film was released.  To coincide with the 10th anniversary, some of the cast were asked to share their current activities.

Link to this here.
Reading it, I learnt another bit of trivia:  the Director's children were in the film!!!

Richard Curtis (Writer/Director): It keeps taking me by surprise! It’s quite helpful to know it’s been ten years because it’s an easy way for me to keep track of how old my son was, who appears in the film. There’s a scene where they’re up onstage performing the Nativity play, and he’s got a Spider-Man mask on, and there’s a big close-up of a very perplexed-looking five-year-old. And my daughter is one of the lobsters!

The most hilarious moment of the whole film I always feel is when Rowan Atkinson giftwraps a present.  I've sometimes been in a hurry to buy a present or been worried about the person who it's for turning up before it's wrapped and put away, so to finish, here is the clip.  Just brilliant (as Rowan Atkinson so often is!!!)

http://www.hotflick.net/pictures/big/2003_Love_Actually_219.html

http://klipd.com/watch/love-actually/gift-wrapping-scene

What day is it today?

Today has been a special day.  Not for me in particular, but for the world generally, a sequential date.  I'd never come across that term before - and I've lived through others, but just didn't realise!!

Last year, the 10th November was a sequential date - 10.11.12.  The year before, the 9th of October was too.  (9.10.11)  Today, for a second, we lived through 1/12/13 14:15.16.

http://heidiscottage.blogspot.com.es/2013/11/111213.html

Not that I was aware of this happening - I discovered the term sequential date just 20 minutes ago via a friend's Facebook post!

Apparently, dates like these are often chosen for special events - like getting married.  It will certainly help people remember their wedding date!  Apparently, wedding venues in Las Vegas were really busy when the USA celebrated this same date - back on the 12th of November (because of course there, they write the date with the month first and the day second).

There has been nothing particularly memorable in my day - the usual combination of work and sport.

Mind you, the sunrise this morning was pretty impressive ...

and the south wind meant that Santander was glowing all day!  

Christmas adverts

Today I've been working on some posts for another blog that I sometimes contribute  to (not as often as I'd like!)

Behind the Selfaccessgroup are some very dedicated teachers who want to help students and teachers in their strive to learn English, like English and do well at school and in the PAU.  I've been involved in the group for 6 years now (I've just realised now when I looked at my Documents file that it's been that long!), but the group has been meeting and preparing materials for a LOT longer than that!

One of the posts I'm working on is around the theme of Christmas.  I mentioned a few weeks ago that I really like the Inspiration Room.    When I was preparing that post, I watched the Royal Mail advert that was going to be shown in the lead-up to Christmas on the Inspiration Room website.

I then came across an article in Harpers Bazaar   The article runs through some of the adverts from the biggest firms in the UK, including John Lewis, Marks and Spencers and Debenhams.

For use in class, I'd suggest that you could contrast the Harvey Nichols advert  

'Sorry, I spent it on myself'

with the TK Maxx UK advert 

Our new Christmas '13 campaign is a celebration of that very special moment when you receive a unique gift you know has been chosen with great thought and care.

It'll be Christmas before we know it.  So let's start gearing up by watching some adverts created for this time of the year.