Week 15: February 1st, 2023- Future perfect and continuous and songs!!

 

This is a photo by Isabel Muñoz, the Spanish photographer whose exhibition I saw a few years ago, the one I told you I liked so much. Just for you to know. If you follow the link, you can see more photos of that project.

- We started the class with your little presentations about the research you had done on the scientific topics I had given you.

- We revised the use of the future perfect and the future continuous with the two diaries of our exercise. We also talked about ourselves at the end of the year, for practice.

- We discussed the follwing questions with two songs by two different artists: Sesión 53 by Shakira and BZRP and Flowers by Miley Cyrus. We discussed these questions, plus other aspects you brought up: 

1. What's the story behind the song?
2. What is the singer complaining about?
3. What other people are mentioned in it?
4. In your opinion, why did the artist write this particular song?

Homework:

For homework you have to look for one love song, it doesn't have to be about break-up, with a story behind and read about it so that you're able to tell us about it at the beginning of next day's class.

Week 14: January 25th, 2023- Centenarians, regrets and a resignation

- We reviewed the course together and explained how you found it so that our new classmate could form an idea.

- We discussed the questions I had set for homework, the ones related to the video on centenarian people. 

- We practised the most usual grammar structure for regrets, should have, in a speaking exercise.

- We did a listening exercise about New Zealand's prime minister Lucinda Arden.

Homework:

For homework I'd like you to do some more research about some striking scientific discoveries that are hitting the headlines these days. 

As usual, the way I suggest you prepare for this is to read extensively about the topic while taking notes from which you'd be able to tell the rest of the class about it. It's always very interesting and useful for improvement that you pick up structures or vocabulary you are familiar with but you never use and try to use it when you tell us. Avoid reading from your notes, you only check them.

The topics and people are the following:

• Nacho, Alba B and Gema: Earth's core appears to have reversed its spin and could have consequences.
• Sarai, Jaqueline and Toñi: Humans seem to be able to understand apes better than thought.
• Sonia, Rosa and Alba H: Newly found asteroid, 2023BU, is passing very close to the Earth
• Mario, Fernando and Azucena: Doomsday clock is at 90 seconds to midnight.
• Roberto, María Luisa and Tomás: What is Chat GPT and the controversy about it.

For your reading, you can check these sites or any other you rely on: The Guardian science,  New York Times

Week 13: January 18th, 2023- Year 2022 in a quizz and the future perfect and continuous

 

- We warmed up writing up post-its with the best of last year and wishes for 2023 that we're going to have in a poster.

- We did the quizz of news from 2022 in two groups and both got 12 correct answers!!

- We did a listening about Blue Monday.

- We revised the use of Future Perfect and Future Continuous and practised with an activity with a conversation between a photographer and a manager.

Homework:

- Watch this video about three centenarians. The topic connects to our exercise on advice from old people from last week. Write down notes on the following, to start speaking next day:

1- What are the reasons they give for their long lives?
2. What regrets do they have?
3. What advice do they give?

From your personal opinion, what are the reasons these three people have had such a long life?

Week 12: January 11th, 2023- Happy New Year and New Year's Resolutions

 

- We wished each other a very happy new year and told the class about the good news we had read about over the holidays.

- We shared our New Year's Resolutions in a Mentimeter exercise.

- We read about Resolutions and how to stick to them.

- We saw New Year Resolutions in a Friends' episode.

- We read and discussed about life advice from very old people, taken from a Sahil Bloom's tweet.

Homework:

- Choose one of the ideas on the handout I gave you to organise a short presentation and record it for me. Try to use some of the vocabulary and phrases from the text we revised together:

A: Think back to a successful resolution you made. What was it? What steps did you take to achieve it?

B: Make a resolution for 2023. What steps will you take to successfully achieve it?

Week 11: December 21st, 2022- Good environmental news and Christmas!

 

- We exchanged our sentences connected to the film Don't Look Up and our present reality using speculative language.

- We saw a piece of good  news on biodiversity with the video How wolves change rivers.

- We moved on to a more Christmassy activity and we saw two different videos that we had to describe to the classmate that hadn'r seen them: Coca Cola Christmas Commercial and Mog's Christmas Calamity Sainsbury's Ad.

- We didn't have time for our Christmas Carol Deck the Halls.

Homework: 

- We're going to look for a piece of good environmental news (here you have a site you may want to check) or any other kind of news you find interesting. Remember: read or watch about it, get notes with the main facts and ideas you want to transmit and be ready to tell us on the first day after holidays.

- You can also prepare a presentation about the dangerous situation you have been into, paying attention to the use of narrative tenses and about the film we saw.

- You also have the grammar worksheet on future perfect and continuous with two exercises.

Very happy holidays and merry Christmas for all of you. Have a very happy New Year and receive my best wishes

Week 10: December 14th, 2022- Speculation with the film Don't Look Up

 

- We warmed up explaining our long weekend and the plans we have for the holidays.

- We saw the second vocabulary worksheet of the film Don't Look Up, with extracts from the script.

- We revised the grammar to speculate with some grammar explanation and exercises.

- We completed a gapped text of a video with Leonardo DiCaprio explainig the film.

Homework:

- I want you to use speculation modals (will, may, might, won't) and other language: bound to, probably... to talk about: comet, life on Earth, Bronteroes, the new planet (connected to the film) and temperatures, water, food production, energy use and pollution (connected to our reality)

Week 9: November 30th, 2022- Second part of Don't Look Up

 

- We talked about the different cards that we had read about: Space X, Blue Origin. allegory, Meta, rare earth elements... that were connected to the film.

- We had a look at a worksheet with some language from the first part of the film

- We saw the film's trailer that featured the song Don't Bring Me Down we had worked on in the last class.

- We saw the second part of the film and commented on it.

- Homework: you are going to think about the film and plan a review on it that you can record and send to me.

- If you're interested in some special part, here you have the script of the film.