School

Here are two mind maps on school. I tried to put in the maps all my students said while doing the speaking activity on school.
Now you can review what we did at school a practice asking and answering aloud so to get more and more prepared both for the Trinity GESE 3 exams and for the end of year exams too.
To see the maps better just click on them.

Reading postcards from Leon - Spain

Last week we received postcards from Leon-Spain and I delivered them last Tuesday. The pupils wanted to read them immediately and liked what they read and saw on the postcards so much that they would like to go there and visit the town! Maybe one day they will do it!

Reading and looking at pictures form other towns of other countries gives us the chance to know a bit more of the real world around us!

Thank you dear Spanish friends!

Second postcards from our countries

In these last weeks, in class I D, we've been busy taking pictures of our school and of Lugnano, writing descriptions to create the material to send to our European friends of the eTwining project "Postcards from our countries" and making a "who's who" game.

Our school description

View more documents from Chiara Sabatini.

This morning I sent the envelopes to all the school of the project that are: 2 schools in France, 2 schools in Turkey, 2 schools in Spain, a school in the United Kingdom, a school in Poland and a school in Italy.

All the pupils were very much involved,worked really a lot and had fun doing these activities.

 boys and girls!

Diversità linguistica e coesione in Europa

Ieri, per la gioia dei miei alunni, ho partecipato ad un seminario dal titolo "La diversità linguistica come fattore di coesione in Europa" organizzato dall'Ufficio Scolastico Regionale per l'Umbria e da Europa dell'Istruzione. Ho avuto modo di ascoltare interessanti relazioni, tra gli altri, di professori dell'Università di Göttingen (Germania), di Bergamo, di Perugia.

Il filo conduttore di ogni relazione, che ha le basi nelle indicazioni dei documenti europei, si può sintetizzare così:

L1 + 2 LS

E cioè: oggi è fondamentale conoscere bene la propria lingua più altre DUE lingue straniere.

Il prof. Claudio Vinti dell'Università di Perugia ci ha fatto vedere questi tre filmati, che ripropongo qui, non tanto per farci ridere e divertire (che pure ci vuole per tenere desta l'attenzione) ma soprattutto per spingerci a fare delle riflessioni oneste e reali sulla situazione dell'apprendimento delle lingue straniere, per provocarci un po' e per spingerci a fare di più. 

Ho apprezzato molto le parole di questo professore e condivido pienamente la sua conclusione che è stata:

 "Gli studenti, se ben motivati, imparano le lingue straniere".

Allora mi sono detta, e continuo a dirmi che: 

- usare questo blog come ampliamento della didattica;

- usare la piattaforma didattica edmodo;

- partecipare a progetti Comenius;

-partecipare a progetti eTwinning......

può essere un modo per continuare a motivare gli alunni e anche me stessa!

E voi, alunni, genitori e colleghi che ne dite?

Dopo tutte queste parole, guardiamoci ancora un paio di video per ridere insieme e per comprendere il valore dell'apprendimento delle lingue straniere e della comunicazione!

FOOD, FOOD, FOOD!

Cheese and milk

Apples

Hamburger

Vegetables

These are only some items about food, do you remember others?

Here there are a lot of nice exercises to learn more words about food, to review the ones you already know and review some grammar too.
So .....

exercise, exercise, exercise!

http://www.englishexercises.org/makeagame/viewgame.asp?id=3158
http://www.englishexercises.org/makeagame/viewgame.asp?id=3165
http://www.englishexercises.org/makeagame/viewgame.asp?id=3172
http://www.englishexercises.org/makeagame/viewgame.asp?id=3168

Watch also these videos.

St. Valentine's Day

14th February: St. Valentine's Day

Maybe not everybody knows the story of this day and of St. Valentine.

If you click here you can do a nice exercise and discover new things at the same time.

Watch this video and enjoy it. 

And for the younger students: go to this link and have fun with the word search!

Some days ago I spoke my students about a movie on Robin Hood acting Kevin Cosnter and I also told them about the beautiful song Everything I do I do it for you by Bryan Adams that was in that film.

I found this video that reminded my sweet memories and I thought to put it here as a present for all of you! 

Listen and follow the text.

In the link below you find the original video with the Bryan Adams singing the song and Kevin Costner as Robin Hood together with the other actors of the movie. It's really a great video that makes you dream!

Everything I do I Do It For You - video

I wish you all a 

Everyday activities

This is for 1st year students.

We started studying everyday activities, daily routine, and you had to draw and write about your typical day fro homework.
Watch these two videos so you can review the vocabulary you studied at school.






Here are some nice and useful exercises for you to practice a bit more, so ...

LET'S EXERCISE!

http://www.englishexercises.org/makeagame/viewgame.asp?id=5933
http://www.englishexercises.org/makeagame/viewgame.asp?id=513
http://www.englishexercises.org/makeagame/viewgame.asp?id=3429

Giove presentation

Here is a presentation of Giove the students of class II A made for the eTwinning project "Schools get together with History".

Giove is the village the students go to school and it is well known in the area thanks to its castle.

Giove

View more presentations from Chiara Sabatini.


As every castle, even the castle of Give, has its own legends. 
A students from last year told us the legend of "The Ghost and the little girl".

The ghost of the little girl

View more documents from Chiara Sabatini

Translation Competition VI

Here are the due dates for the work the 3rd year old students have to do for the sixth part of this activity:

III B: Flat Stanley, Chapter VI by February 24th

III D: Flat Stanley, Chapter VI by February 24th

     III A: Mercy Watson, Chapter VI by February 23rd

Charles Dickens

Do you know why google today is like this?
Today is Charles Dickens' 200th birthday anniversary.
He was an English writer and wrote Great Expectations, Hard Times, Oliver Twist, A Christmas Carol, David Copperfield and many other novels and short stories.

To know more about his life you can watch this video.





Here is the trailer of the film Oliver Twist, one of Dickens' best known characters.



Here you find more info on Dickens, his life and his works.

"Have a heart that never hardens, and a temper that never tires, and a touch that never hurts".

"No one is useless in this world who lightens the burdens of another"

(Charles Dickens)

Writing stories: a competition for 3rd year students

Last week with some students of the 3rd year we made and experiment!

They did and online exercise on simple past and then choose one of the verbs in the past to write a sentence.

Here you find all the sentences and the second part of the activity. 

So, follow the instructions and write a new story, then send it as a comment on this post.

The two best stories will get a prize!

Safer Internet Day - Sicurinrete

Today is the international Safer Internet Day. Here you can see a video in Italian advertising this event.
It is very important to be aware of to "share" and what not. So, watch the video and remember to be careful when you write about yourself on the net.



If you click here here you can find more info in Italian


The following is an excerpt from an article from this website http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/activities/sip/events/day/index_en.htm

6 key tips to help your child use the internet safely

TALK ABOUT THE INTERNET and dedicate time to explore it together with your child. Ask your child to show you what they like to do online, and try not to be shocked or overreact if you do not share the same interests.
STIMULATE YOUR CHILD'S CREATIVITY. Point them in the direction of the best online content to explore for their development or just for fun). Your child can learn and discover new sites, play games, write blogs, create websites. Stretch his or her imagination.
SET UP RULES or BOUNDARIES TOGETHER. When\Where\Why and for how long can your child use their mobile phone or computer? If you listen to your child and establish fair rules, then he or she is more likely to stick to them.
PROTECT PERSONAL DATA and help your child understand that information or photos they put online can remain visible to everybody forever. Help him to set up the highest level of privacy settings on social networks.
THINK ABOUT USING PARENTAL CONTROL TOOLS to automatically filter certain topics (e.g. violence, porn) and limit the time your child will be able to navigate the web.
AVOID HAVING A COMPUTER IN YOUR CHILD'S BEDROOM. Put it in the living room instead. It will make it easier to follow your child's web-surfing habits on a daily basis.

These 6 are tips for parents and adults but I think that even children can keep in mind these tips so to help their friends and remind themselves what is better to avoid!


Here is another video in English this time!

Awarding European activities.

Last September our school received this certificate that is a Comenius week label. We got it because, as we are involved in a Comenius project, we took part in the activities the eTwinning website organized in May 2011.

To read more about it click here

Some days ago our Spanish partners received a plate to put in their school to say they are part of a Comenius project.

To read this post better clik here.




The experience of the Comenius Project we are still having with our Spanish friends it is really important for all of us because it gives us the chance to know each other better, to know more on different cultures  and to communicate through a common language, that in this case, is English.
I think we are all very happy to have got these awards because this testifies our ideas and our work have been appreciated by the institutions that support us both with money and with training.

Speaking and ... filming!

3rd year students did a speaking activity to practice conversation so to start reviewing for Trinity GESE exams.
What they did was to take turns in pretending to be the examiner and the candidate. So they asked and answered some questions.
I took the questions from an activity proposed in an online moodle journey offered by the support group of Trinity College Italy.

The questions we started with were very easy ones:
What's your name?
Where do you come from?
Have you got brothers and sisters?
What is your brother/sister's name?
How old is he/she?
Have you got pets?
Tell me about your dog/cat/rabbit ....
What do you have for breakfast?

When they finished the activity I asked them to do it again so to film the conversations with my "wonderful" camera.
They agreed and later we watched some of the videos and analyzed them.









I hope this kind of activities will help my students to improve their speaking skills and their fluency.