some HEADY HEADLINES

I still recall the puzzle of some newspaper headlines:

WOMEN MAN WINNING YACHT
DOG IN WELL DRAMA: NEW RESCUE ATTEMPT TODAY
P.M. MOVES TO CUT DOWN EXPENDITURE
NEWTOWN WIFE TO BE STRANGLED
HOME SECRETARY UNDER FIRE AGAIN
BAD TEACHERS FACE SACK 
EX-TROOPS CALLED UP TO DISCIPLINE PUPILS (Daily Mail FEBRUARY 26 2011)
EGG TALKS: AGRICULTURAL ADVISERS MEET
GVT HINTS AT RATIONS AS OIL SINKS
RUSH TO SUN ENDS IN JAMS
CHURCHES VICTIMS OF ART RINGS
FIRST LADY DROPS A BRICK
NEW FLYOVER SPEEDS TRAFFIC FLOW
ALL OCTOBER RAINFALL RECORDS BROKEN
HOUSEWIVES HIT BY DEARER LOAF
FISH TALKS TOMORROW
SPENDING SPREE DESPITE GLOOM
EUROMANIA HAUNTS LANGUAGE OF FOOD
A CURE FOR CANCER
EGG ON HIS FACE
OAP´S SCOOP $IM ON POOLS
CHIPS ARE DOWN FOR JOBS
CHAUVINIST HUSBAND DIVORCED
CAUGHT RED-HANDED
CAVE RESCUE
BAN ON MIGRANT CHEATS
BOTTOM-PINCHER OWNED UP AFTER WRONG MAN HELD
RETURN BY EAR MAIL
P.M. TO VISIT THE ROCK
BRITONS PUT HIGHER VALUE ON LEISURE THAN WORK
US SNUBS BRITAIN
EASTWOOD SPLITS FROM HIS SECOND WIFE
HOLY GUACAMOLE!
HEANEY, THE HUMBLE HEART-THROB OF POETRY
NHS RECRUITS THOUSANDS OF DOCTORS FROM THIRD WORLD
HIGH TIME BRITAIN STOPPED BEING UNCLE SAM´S POODLE (Daily Mail 31 Aug 2013)

Sometimes we may come across some amusing headlines:

PUERTO RICAN TEEN NAMED MISTRESS OF THE UNIVERSE

MAN ACCUSED OF KILLING LAWYER RECEIVES A NEW ATTORNEY

ARMY VEHICLE DISAPPEARS

FEDERAL AGENTS RAID GUN SHOP, FIND WEAPONS

STARVATION CAN LEAD TO HEALTH HAZARDS

MIRACLE CURE KILLS FIFTH PATIENT

MEAT HEAD RESIGNS

BARBERSHOP SINGERS BRING JOY TO SCHOOL FOR DEAF

HOMICIDE VICTIMS RARELY TALK TO POLICE

HOSPITALS RESORT TO HIRING DOCTORS

STATISTICS SHOW THAT TEEN PREGNANCY DROPS OFF SIGNIFICANTLY AFTER AGE 25

PARENTS KEEP KIDS HOME TO PROTEST SCHOOL CLOSURE

 

See if you can make sense out of the following headlines:

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

KEEP TALKING

Find all the questions.Ask your partner and Write his/her answers:

whatdidyoudolastweekendwhatclothesdoyouliketowearwhattimedoyouusuallygo

tobedwhatareyougoingtodotonightareyoureadingabookatthemomentwhenisyou

rnextholidaywhatisyourfavouriteenglishworddoyouplayasportwhosisyourfavou

ritesingercanyoucountfromonehundredtozerowhatareyougoingtodothisweekendw

henisyourbirthdaywhohasgotabeautifulsmilehasyourhousegotagardenwhenwerey

oubornwhattimedidyouhavebreakfastthismorningwhatdidyouhavewhereisyourb

ikedoyoupractiseskateboardingwhatareyouafraidofwhatdoyoulikemostaboutt

henighthaveyoureadfiftyshadesofgreyhaveyoudoneyourhomeworkareyougoingo

uttonightwhereareyougoingtothiseveninghowwouldyouliketodiewhatsyourjobwhatisit

whatkindofanimalwouldyouliketobewhatwouldyougivemeasabirthdaypresentwhat

kindofweatherdoyoulikebestwhatgivesyouspecialpleasurewherewouldyoul

iketoberightnowwhichhumanqualitydoyouconsiderthemostimportanthaveyoulost

anythingdoyoubelieveinlifeafterdeathareyouprejudicedagainstaparticularracedo

youtellthetruthdoyoucallthepolicewhenanemergencyhappensdoyougetnervousatexams

 

Based on an idea by Friederike Klippel Keep Talking C.U.P..

Readers Forever

One of the best teaching and learning times is when it comes to classroom reading. It´s difficult to recall all of them but the following is a list of graded or simplified readers which have motivated students to keep on reading and discover the pleasure and wonders of reading on their own.Stories are my passion.We read for entertainment and information and in order to get some nourishment for the soul....

           Author                                       Story 

Edgar Allan Poe     Tales of Mystery & Imagination..... 

Oscar Wilde  The Picture of Dorian Gray

Charles Dickens Oliver Twist, David Copperfield,...

Mark Twain Huckleberry Finn, Tom Sawyer,...

John Milne  The Long Tunnel

Arthur Taylor The elephant man

O´Henry  New Yorkers

Saki(H.H.Munro) The Open Window..

William Saroyan The Barber´s Uncle,The first day at school..

D.H. Lawrence The Fox, The rocking Horse winner,...

Thomas Hardy The thieves in the cupboard

Anton Chekhov The lottery ticket,..

Guy de Maupassant  The Necklace,.. 

Daphne du Maurier  Rebecca

Jules Verne Around the World in 80 days

Mary Shelley  Frankestein

H.G. Wells  The Time Machine,Invisible man,..

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle Any Sherlock Holmes story...

Nick Hornby  About a boy

William Shakespeare A Midsummer Night´s Dream

Alan C. Mc Lean   Born to run

James Joyce The dead,..

Daniel Defoe Robinson Crusoe

Jonathan Swift Gulliver´s Travels

George Bernard Shaw Pygmalion =My fair lady

W. Somerset Maugham A man from Glasgow, Mackintosh,..

John Steinbeck  The Pearl

Richard Chisholm Meet me in Istanbul

Bram Stoker  Dracula

Ernest Hemingway  Death in the afternoon,Men without women

Theodore Dreiser An American Tragedy

Wilkie Collins  The Woman in White

Colin West  Big Wig

Francoise Sagan  Bonjour Tristesse

Roald Dahl   Matilda, The Twits...

Helen Fielding  Bridget Jones´s Diary

J.K. Rowling  Harry Potter and the Philosopher´s stone ..

Norman Whitney  The Stranger

Washington Irving  Rip Van Winkle

   T.C. Jupp   Rich man, Poor man

Michael Hardcastle Don´t tell me what to do

George Orwell Animal farm

Harriet Beecher Stowe Uncle Tom´s Cabin

Henry James  The Aspern papers

Bret Harte Adventure on Bolinas Plain

Jack London  White Fang

Jane Homeshaw  Tin Lizzie

Martin Sinclair  Sports Stars

Malorie Blackman  An Eye for an Eye

John Tully  Muhammad Ali king of the ring

Toni Murphy  Bruce Springsteen

Stephen Rabley  Tina Turner

Peter Dainty  Marilyn Monroe

Stephen Crane The Red badge of Courage

Nathaniel Hawthorne Mr. Higginbotham´s Catastrophe..

James Thurber  The Night the Ghost Got In

John Grisham  The Firm

Raymond Chandler  The long Goodbye

Graham Greene  The End of the Affair

Winston Groom  Forrest Gump

Michael Crichton  The Lost World Jurassic Park

H.E. Bates  Silas the Good

Paul Theroux   The Mosquito Coast

William Golding  Lord of the Flies 

Martin H. Mayal   The Cave

Ambrose Bierce The Devil´s Dictionary

Alistair Mac Lean   Santorini

Dian Fossey  Gorillas in the  mist

Joy Adamson Born Free

Jane Goodall In the Shadow of Man

Lewis Carroll Alice´s Adventures in Wonderland

W.W. Jacobs The Monkey´s paw

What other stories have you read(films you have seen) that are not included in the above list?

  

Try to classify the above authors according to their nationalities:
British, American,Irish,etc..

 

 

                    

from PASSION to COMPASSION

Part of the natural process of growing up(shouldn´t it be called growing down,too or shrinking?) and then growing old is moving from Passion to Compassion.

What do you think the following situations may mean?

In which contexts could we find the expressions below?

 

(half way between) OMISSION AND COMMISSION

from GRACE TO DISGRACE

ACTION TO REACTION

OPPRESSION TO DEPRESSION

DESPERATION TO EXASPERATION

OCCUPIED TO PREOCCUPIED

COMPOSE TO DECOMPOSE

CONSTRUCTING TO DECONSTRUCTING (Cuisine)

FLEXION to INFLEXION to REFLECTION

HAPPINESS to ´A PENIS

ILLUSIONS to CONCLUSIONS

PROBATION to APPROBATION

AGE to RAGE

UNDERESTIMATION to OVERESTIMATION 

from INFORMATION to FORMATION

UNIFORMITY to DEFORMITY

CRASH FOR CASH (gang)

CASH FOR CRASH (a scam) 

from THE HEART to ART (See Art Attack)

Your own very special name

We´ve tried to give our students English names in the English class as often as possible. Sometimes they were just direct translations of their Spanish equivalents(Try to find their real Spanish names):

John Brown, Michael Good, Henry Cross,Paul Siversmith; Jane Smith, Peter Bighouse,Helen Young,Angela Rivers,Immanuel Meadows,Richard Quarryman,Silvia Rich, Anthony Doors, Robert Orange tree, Edward Ray, John Martin, Andrew Bald, Alice Sardine, Angie Red, James Spain, Marisa Grey-haired, Marisol White, Diana Walls, Rosemary Rock, Christine L. Heads, Rick Thinny,Michael Pinkish, Emma Little Doors, John War,Wenceslas Apple tree, Snow Queen, Frank Rabbit, Rosemary Goat,Alice Bucket, Elizabeth Fat,Charles Warrior,Tony Bunches, Gorka Fair-haired, Mike Beautiful,John Castle, Helen Clearvillages,Anne Bottle,Joe Shoemaker, etc..

or their nicknames translated into English: Little fish, Little goat,Chips,The cuban, The chinese, the gas deliverer, Edwin,etc..
However, some surnames are obviously untranslatable: Ruiz, Pérez, García, González, Rodríguez,etc..
Mind you, other surnames are phonetically similar in both languages: Gil = Hill; Carrión = Carry on,Morán = Moran,etc..

In our culture we are traditionally given a name or two at birth but some of our students may not be very happy with both of their names and prefer to be referred to by their favourite name, nickname or affectionate term which I try to adapt into English in the belief that a person´s own name is the most essential part of a teacher to recall.

Native Americans were given a name shortly after their birth, but later in life many received a new name because of a feat they performed or a trait they exhibited. Some even received many names in a lifetime.The Teton Sioux, for example, used even three different names for each person as they aged. 

Here are some Native American (Indian) names:

 

Big bear

Happy girl

Little flowers

Brave wolf

Broken arrow

Sun boy

Snow bird

Iron Eyes

Black crow

Red Elk

Angry buffalo

WHAT WOULD YOU WANT YOUR NAME TO BE IF YOU COULD CHOOSE YOUR OWN VERY SPECIAL ONE?

Ex:

Pizza eater, Cold fingers, Warm feet, Desert flower; Rain drop,..

Remember the famous line " I don´t know about freedom, except the sweet slavery I feel when I hear his/her name I can´t avoid thrilling goose flesh"

Native Americans: A forgotten genocide

Few chapters in History have been so absurdly romanticized as the story of the Indians of the USA as portrayed in films, novels and the victors´version of events:the good ones versus the bad ´uns...
Our task is to be fair-minded and find out about the sorrows, the dignity in suffering,their fight for survival and the search for freedom of these Native Americans, the original inhabitants of the American landscape.

Find out as much as you can (tribe,deeds, contribution  to its age) about the following 30 Native American leaders:(remember Wikipedia is our best help)

 

TECUMSEH

TENSKWATAWA

OSCEOLA

OPOTHLE YAHOLA

PUSHMATAHA

POWHATAN

POCAHONTAS

POPÉ

PONTIAC

CHIEF WASHAKIE

LITTLE TURTLE

LITTLE WOLF

TAMAHAS

TILAUKAIKT

SACAGAWEA

SEQUOYAH

SATANK

SATANTA

CHIEF JOSEPH

SITTING BULL

GERONIMO

CHIEF SEATTLE

CHITTO HARJO

NIGANITHAT

RED CLOUD

CROW KING

RAIN-IN-THE-FACE

LOOKING GLASS

COCHISE

NACHEZ

KICKING BEAR

WOVOKA

Things I´ll "NEVER" do

It´s quite hard to use the word"Never"...More often than not a student has said things like:"I´ll never marry a divorced person". Years later you meet him or her with a divorced partner plus the children of a previous marriage.So, circumstances alter cases and life is a perpetual flow. Remember, never say "Never".

Here is a list of typical students´promises:

I´ll never smoke marijuana

I´ll never learn Swahili

I´ll never put a lonely hearts ad

I´ll never go on a singles cruise holiday

I´ll never be(come) gay

I´ll never be sent to prison

I´ll never have children

I´ll never become a Muslim

I´ll never pay for sex

I´ll never take part in a porn movie

I´ll never make jokes about God

I´ll never play golf

I´ll never use the Internet again

I´ll never speak to   XYZ again

I´ll never wear a bikini/ a Real Madrid scarf/...

I´ll never eat snails/ squirrels

I´ll never marry a black person/ a gipsy/..

I´ll never commit suicide

 

Can you think of other activities you will NEVER do?