I've been apologising since June about not writing regular posts for this blog.  Today, I'm not going to say sorry - I'm going to say 'See you soon'.  


On Friday, I'll be heading off to Madeira with the family on holiday.  

http://estevesther.blogspot.com.es/2011/04/madeira-y-sus-flores-1.html

There is something about islands that attracts - last year's trip to Sardinia was a total success - I loved everything about it.  The light, the temperature (it was hot, but bearably hot), the food, the hotel, and especially the colours all around me.  I admit I've mentioned these things before.  



This won't be the first time we've been to Madeira.  We went there 15 years ago when our 2 daughters were very young.  They have vague memories of the visit - mainly of the 'mushroom' shower in the middle of the hotel's children's swimming pool!
  

Later today, I'm going to look through the collection of photos we have for that holiday and catch up on my own memories!

I have a ton of ted.com talks to watch - I might view some of the lighter topic talks while I'm away.  

Design for all 5 senses is one of the latest talks to arrive in my inbox.  Pico Iyer: Where is home? is another.

Pico Iyer's talk seems to fit in with me and my situation (and I'm sure a lot of you fellow teachers can identify with his statement and focus of his talk):

More and more people worldwide are living in countries not considered their own. Writer Pico Iyer — who himself has three or four “origins” — meditates on the meaning of home, the joy of traveling and the serenity of standing still.

And to think about while I'm getting ready for my trip, I'll bear in mind the first of three questions asked by Silvia Marinova a couple of years ago in a TED conversation:

Traveling - what is that all about?

1. What is traveling to you - a way of life, growth, escape or...?

2. Where would you most like to go?

3. Can you recommend a gorgeous place where you've been?

In answer to question 2, I've just been looking at the islands recommended by various websites.  I haven't visited any of the Top Ten on them!  Still a lot of traveling to do then!

http://www.tripadvisor.com/TravelersChoice-Islands-g1

I could recommend serveral gorgeous places to go, but it would all depend on what you're looking for.  Right now, I fancy switching off, changing pace (slowing down) and spending time chatting and enjoying experiences and moments with my husband and daughters.

So goodbye for now.  I hope to come back with photos of me looking as relaxed as as I did here in Sardinia!

Source: http://astoriedcareer.com/2012/12/hope-to-see-you-soon.html

Travel inspiration

"We love exploring new places, taking photographs and staying at the most unique hotels we can find. "

I can relate to that!!

The above sentence is taken from the 'About' information on the Global Grasshopper.com website.

As I told you in my previous post, I will be in Italy Monday 26th November through to Friday 30 November.  It's going to be a packed trip and I was trying to work out which cities I might have a bit of time to explore (I'll not have much tourist time, unfortunately, but will probably be inspired to return to certain places as I whizz through them).

  

I hope to get a taste or snapshot of the five cities I'll be giving sessions in - Torino, Milan, Rome, Salerno, Reggio Calabria).

So when I ended up at the Global Grasshopper website after following a link I'd received in an email about eltblogs, I checked out the places mentioned in the article on '10 of the most beautiful places to visit in Italy'.  I'll be paying very short visits to Rome and Milan (2 of the places mentioned) and won't get to see the others on this trip.  I had a fantastic holiday in Sardinia this summer, so I fully support the mention of that island.

And I also took a quick look at the article and photos '10 of the most beautiful places to visit in Spain'.  I found myself nodding when I saw the 10 places that were covered.  Fantastic photos!!

I think the site, the organisation of the features (based around 10) and the photos have some fantastic material for use in class.  I'll certainly be using it for teaching and for personal reasons...  The hidden places in London might contain some great ideas for my upcoming trip to London ......

I'll try and find time to write posts when I'm in Italy.  If I don't post them while I'm there, I'm sure I'll be coming back with vast amounts of inspiration!   

Ciao!

See you in Italy!

You may have noticed that I have not been very active on this blog this week.

That's not because I've been putting my feet up!

Image:  http://storibookdesigns.blogspot.com.es/2010/11/blog-bites-kick-up-your-feet.html

In a couple of hours, I will set off for Bilbao, where I'll be giving a seminar on 'Cambridge English First:  Exam Tips' at the British Council.

Then, on Monday, I have a very exciting trip to Italy!

I'll be giving training sessions in five different cities:

On Monday afternoon, I'll be in Turin at the Istituto Valsalice.

On Tuesday afternoon, I'll be sharing ideas with teachers in Milan at the Istituto Zaccaria.

On Wednesday morning, I'll be in Rome at the Auditorium Antonianum.

Thursday morning it's Salerno at the Mediterraneo Hotel.

And on Friday morning, I'll be in Reggio Calabria.

As you can imagine, I'm really looking forward to this trip!

And the great news is that on Monday, I'll be meeting up with Marina, who used to teach Italian at the school I managed for many years here in Santander.  She got in contact via this blog to let me know and I'm looking forward to catching up and to getting back in touch.

This blog has many readers in Italy and I hope to meet some of them somewhere in Italy next week!

You can find information on the different venues and sessions and register here.

Coping with cold weather

While I was checking my emails, I was listening to Sky News and in the review of the paper, they were discussing the impact of cold weather and snow.

Here in Cantabria, the temperature dropped by 10º(C) yesterday.  Brr!!!!  Many places both in Spain and the UK have had their first snow falls.

http://www.picturesofwinter.net/snow_pictures.html

(There are some great photos of winter on the website I downloaded the above photo)

This reminded me of an article I had saved to share with you via this blog.  I came across it back in September and thought it would make great classroom material.

How does the chef at the British Antarctic Station feed 90 people when the nearest supermarket is 4,000 miles away?


http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/moslive/article-2195789/British-Antarctic-Station-How-does-chef-feed-90-people-nearest-supermarket-4-000-miles-away.html

I suggest that you could start off by showing students the following subheading:

Antony Dubber works in one of the most remote, dangerous and beautiful places on Earth

Ask them to suggest where Antony works.  
Which remote places can they think of?  
Why might this place be dangerous and beautiful?  
What job does Antony do there?

Then, show them this photo and discuss whether they guessed this place:

Next, they could read the article and find out what makes the South Pole beautiful and dangerous, and why Antony's work as a chef there is challenging.

To follow up and focus on language, I thought students could look at the combinations of adjectives and nouns in the text.  (You could give them a list of adjectives used in the text and  they look for which nouns they describe).

For example:
a varied  (menu)
leading (centre)
fresh (fruit and vegetables) (herbs)
spectacular (night sky)
the nearest (supermarket)
the closest (supermarket)
the most popular (treats)
huge (freezers)

Well, I'd better wrap up because I have to pop out now!  Have a great teaching week!




 

An internet invention?

While I was catching up with friends and family on Facebook, I came across a post on a friend (and fellow Cambridge ESOL presenter)'s page:

"The Marquis de Gouvernet replied saying that he should accord only a small number of leaves, not to those who said they were sick, because the abuse was too great, but to those who could prove that they had important business to attend to."

This had me confused for a minute - what on earth was Phil talking about?

Then I read on:

It's international book week. The rules: Grab the closest book to you, turn to page 52, post the 5th sentence as your status. Don't mention the title. Copy the rules as part of your status.

Here is 5th sentence from page 52 of the nearest book to me (the one on the top of the pile of books I have just read):

"It was a wonderful surprise, particularly after the shock and worry of Gary's accident."

It occurred to me that this activity could be done in class.  Students could be asked to find this sentence  (page 52, 5th sentence) in different books in English and then they could discuss which sentence they think comes from which book (looking at the cover), what the book is about.

The sentence from Phil's book shows that the book is about an older period than my book probably.   

I did a search to see when International Book Week is and found that there isn't actually an official international book week!  There is a World Book Day on April 23rd (but this takes place at the beginning of March for the UK and Ireland apparently!)

I also checked to see where this meme had originated (as well as checking out what the word 'meme' itself means! = an idea or pattern that spreads via email, blogs, Facebook...).

Oh, and while I was searching the web to find photos and information for this post, I came across another interesting challenge:

my mission to read a book from every country

As the planet celebrates World Book Day, I'm midway through a plan to read a book from every single one of the 196 UN-recognised countries. Have I gone too far?

You can read more about this challenge here:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/apr/23/world-book-day-read-country

And as usual, this led me to another interesting webpage:

  http://www.pbase.com/abott/196_photos

Many of the photos on this page could be useful for class - you could show students the photos and ask them where each one was taken.  If you showed me the UK photo, I would never have said it was taken there!!!

Singing the praises of internet!

I'm just back from a trip to the UK.  (Well actually, back from a PLANNED trip to the UK and an UNPLANNED trip through France!!)  Along with a group of friends, I took the ferry from Santander to Portsmouth 8 days ago.  The plan was to visit the New Forest area, with a shortish motorbike ride each day and some cultural visits and pub lunches.

Lyndhurst, UK  (Photo from TripAdvisor)

That all changed when I heard on the radio that Brittany Ferries had decided to cancel all its ferry sailings till further notice!

Suspension of Brittany Ferries' Services

We ended up taking a ferry from Dover to Calais and then riding 1,300 kilometres down through France over two days.

We're back in Cantabria now, safe and sound.

Our original trip was planned using some of our previous knowledge, plus a lot of research done using the internet.  For some visits, we had bought our tickets in advance.  The hotel and pub meals were booked in advance too.

The route through France was also helped a lot by access to the internet - while we stopped for lunch, we checked out hotels and booked them online so that when we arrived we knew where we were going, and very importantly, that we had enough rooms (there were 11 of us in the party and we needed 6 rooms, plus somewhere to park the 5 motorbikes and the van securely).

I was very impressed by the Hotel de l'Europe - its location, rooms (small but confortable) and especially  the covered area for parking bikes - a storm broke just as we arrived!!!  I find I am using Tripadvisor more and more to find out things like this!

And I still keep thinking (as I do so often!) - How did we exist before internet?

(I certainly wouldn't be talking to you via this blog!!!)

A jewel from my 'For later' bookmark file

Sometimes when I'm working on the computer and using the internet, I come across interesting websites that I want to come back to, so I have a 'system' for not losing them - I bookmark them in a file called 'For later'.

Just now, I decided it was time - and that I had some time - to check my For later file.  I discovered that over the summer, I had stashed away rather a lot of webpages there.

As you can see from this snapshot of my 'For later' bookmarks, there are a LOT of them and I haven't had the time to organise them - not even alphabetically!!!

I chose one easily recognisable site - http://www.bbc.com/travel/blog.

When I got to the site, I was reassured that my first impression - that it was definitely worth revisiting - was correct.

There is so much stuff that you could use with students here.

Being a blog, the start-up page has the most recent posts, but you can also explore the blog using the drop-down headings at the top:  Explore destinations/Explore themes.

There are articles and videos like the one I have just watched about Madrid.  The reporter, Rafael Estefanía, had to ask local people for advice as to where to find the best street art, how to move around the city in an unusual way, where to watch the sun set

Photo:  http://www.theulifestyle.com/2011/06/living-city-part-i.html

and where to sing to the locals.  

(Interestingly for me, as usual my head started to make connections - at the end of August, I was in Madrid, watching people watching the skyline from that terrace.  I was staying at a hotel right opposite the Circulo de Bellas Artes and was talking about that terrace with my daughter Cristina. It brought back happy memories!)

The video is short - just over 5 minutes - so in my opinion, an ideal length to use in class.  I haven't got time right now to prepare activities for this video (another 'For later' task!), but I would suggest that it could be used among other things as a springboard into talking about what things students do when they visit another city.  They could also prepare a leaflet/presentation/blog entry... with advice for unusual things a visitor could do where they live.

All these suggestions off the top of my head - I'm sure you can think of more.

Oh - and while writing this post, I have just added to my list of 'For later' bookmarks!

I'll no doubt be writing about some of them in future posts!