The Last Laugh: The origin of this crisis

This is one of the most famous videos that went around the world right after the first subprime crisis, back in August 2007... A lot of water has passed under the bridge since then, huh? Well, over four years have gone by, and they couldn't be more right! And thanks Ramón for your talk on where money comes from... very educational!

A bit of literature for your holidays

Holidays are here! Just the perfect time for some relaxing reading, right? Here's my proposal for you guys: A short story from one of the greatest Canadian writers: Gravel, by Alice Munro. Gravel is a story recently published in the literary magazine The New Yorker, and I'm sure you're gonna enjoy it. Check out the glossary too, with vocabulary you may need to know while reading. And once you're finished reading, you will have to start thinking about the discussion questions below, since we're gonna have a literary debate during the first week of class!

Gravel, a short story by Alice Munro

Glossary from Munro's Gravel
Discussion questions

In case you feel like listening to more stories by Munro during the holidays, here are a couple of audio files containing two stories from Munro's last collection, Too Much Happiness:

Free Radicals

Some Women

Ooops! And happy new year!

Another ad: The Soccer World Cup in Africa

Last Wednesday Ainhoa told us about this ad in class, and, as I can see, she made a pretty good description of what's going on in it. Click on play if you wanna check it out, and thanks Ainhoa for sending the video!

More on Ads: Be Stupid by Diesel

Yesterday we discussed the different emotional appeals that ads may have, and we saw that most of them have a target, and a specific point. Here follows an advertisement by Diesel from last year. Please, watch it and think of the emotional appeal(s) involved, the target, and the point of it. Maybe you would like to start developing your thoughts by actually noting how it makes you feel. Does it have a covert message? You're welcome to express your ideas by commenting this post, or sharing your opinion in class.

Latest news on the Amazon Rainforest

We are losing Earth's greatest biological treasures just as we are beginning to appreciate their true value. Rainforests once covered 14% of the earth's land surface; now they cover a mere 6% and experts estimate that the last remaining rainforests could be consumed in less than 40 years. 
The Brazilian Senate passed a bill that weakens Amazon protection just a week ago, with probably far-reaching consequences. To find out more about governments', environmentalists' and scientists' stance, take a look at this article from Nature magazine.

Seasonal Forests

Remember the motto Think global, act local we were talking about in class the other day? Well, now we're gonna go from the local to the global: Here follows an awesome documentary on Seasonal Forests all over the world, by BBC Planet Earth. Please, enjoy the scenery, the images are just stunning . But, of course -and  not to forget what we're here for, before watching the video, complete the worsheet below:

Seasonal Forests: Students' worksheet

Work on the new vocabulary, and read the listening comprehension questions, you should be able to answer these as you watch the video, or once you've watched it.
And now, enjoy the documentary:

Planet Earth: Seasonal Forests

(NOTE: If you want to have English subtitles on it, download this file Seasonal Forests_English subtitles, and save it in the same folder as the .avi file above. Then use theVLC media player to reproduce the .avi file.)

Have a beautiful and relaxing week!

SOS Public Education: We will survive!

Recorded by fellow teachers in a Valdemoro secondary school. You rock guys! Keep it up!

The Cree Indian Prophecy

The Cree are one of the largest groups of Native Americans in North America. Cree tribes spanned over a broad territory, from the Rocky mountains all the way to the Atlantic Ocean. Men were hunters and fishermen, whereas women took care of their children, built their family's house, and gathered plants to eat and herbs to use for medicine. Nowadays, each Cree community lives on its own reservation. Both genders take part in storytelling, artwork, music, and religious festivals.
Click on this link to read more about the famous prophecy we just saw in class.

Still working on some barriers to be removed! Art may be another powerful tool to free ourselves

Poses (2011), a living by Yolanda Domínguez, visual artist and performer

“Poses” is a direct criticism of the absurd and artificial world of glamour and of fashion that magazines present. Specifically, the highly-distorted image of women that they transmit through models that do not represent real women and that avoid all those who are not within their restricted parameters.

These images are virtually the only feminine reference in the mass media and they have a great influence in both men and women when building our roles in terms of behavior and ways of thinking. 

Using these impossible  stances of the  fashion publishing houses as a symbol of how  grotesque and unreal this industry is, a group of real women transfer these poses to daily scenes: the queue of a museum, the supermarket or the bus stop, sparking off the reaction of the spectators (on the other hand, regular consumers of these images).

The aim: to make it clear how ridiculous, and at times harmful, it can be to follow these models that the world of glamour imposes on us.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Search the words related to Thanksgiving on this word search
Find out more about this big-time celebration in North America in wikipedia

Theater evening in Madrid: Would you like to join us?

Check out the proposal for a theater evening on Saturday December the 3rd: 

Saturday, December 3rd 5pm
Teatro Alcázar - C/Alcalá, 20- Madrid 
10 euros if we make a party of 20 people
Sign up at Conserjería!

An interview with pianist Keith Jarret

Listen to this interview with pianist Keith Jarrett and relax... The speakers speak slow, the interview is accompanied by music, and the questions I'm posing below shouldn't be too difficult for you to answer, so this exercise is meant to make listening comprehension not a stressful but a relaxing experience ;-)

1. On April 9th 2011, Jarrett presented the album he had been working on for two years. True or false?

2. What factors does the pianist mention as guiding his compositions?

3. What does the pianist mean by having "an out-of-the-body experience"?

4. What's the disadvantage of playing solo, according to Jarrett?

5. The story Jarrett is telling in his last album is the story of his divorce. True or false?

6. Having played for so many years makes it easier for the pianist to perform in front of an audience. True or false?

7. According to Jarrett, it was the atmosphere in Rio that determined the success of his concert. True or false?

Click on this link to read the transcript

How often are we actually wrong?

Can you think of the last time you thought you were wrong about something? Probably a while ago, right? We could all use watching this really stirring talk about how humans deal with feelings of being right or wrong. At the end of the day, if you think about it, it's not a big deal to be wrong once in a while, don't you think? Enjoy!

If you wanna see this talk with English subtitles on it, go directly to the TED webpage, search for the title "On being wrong" and select English at the bottom of the image.
Take a look at the Real English vocabulary and make sure you understand these expressions in context. You may wanna use a monolingual dictionary.

The Healthcare Sytem in the USA and Spain

In case you wanna go through all the info on US and Spanish Healthcare systems our US visitors showed us last Thursday, please click on the slide shows below. Really intriguing data indeed!
           On US Healthcare                                                  On Spanish Healthcare

As a follow up to this interesting talk, you might wanna watch Sicko, the documentary film by Michael Moore on the US Healthcare system. Read the synopsis below:

This documentary looks at health care in the United States as provided by profit-oriented health maintenance organizations (HMOs) compared to free, universal care in Canada, the U.K., and France. Moore constrasts U.S. media reports on Canadian care with the experiences of Canadians in hospitals and clinics there. He interviews patients and doctors in the U.K. about cost, quality, and salaries. He examines why Nixon promoted HMOs in 1971, and why the Clintons reform effort failed in 1990s. He talks to U.S. ex-pats in Paris about French services, and he takes three 9/11 clean-up volunteers, who developed respiratory problems, to Cuba for care.

                          Clik on this link to watch the documentary Sicko online

How to be happy in seven easy steps!!!

Finished the quiz? Are you a a glass half-full or glass half-empty kind of person? You'll find out in class! For the time being, no harm in watching this inspiring video!

Strikes for Education

Click here to read the article we saw in class this week. 
And listen to a short news story  about the current situation in Spain. Then complete these three sentences:

a.  Teachers on strike protest against _________________ and _______________

b.  Teachers plan _________________________ for ____________________

c.  It is claimed that the cuts are done to __________________________________

¿Por qué hacemos huelga? Carta abierta a nuestros/as alumnos/as

Hola: 
Me gustaría publicar aquí una carta que mi compañero Juan López, profesor del aula de al lado, ha mandado a sus estudiantes explicando por qué hace huelga. Me he tomado la libertad  de reproducirlo aquí para vosotros/as. Gracias, Juan. Pinchad aquí para leer la carta.

October 15th, 2011: United for a Global Change

Do you want to watch the news report on October 15th 2011 one more time? Just click on play.

Now, practice your listening skills answering these listening comprehension questions.

And, once you're done with that, check your answers in the

key to the listening comprehension questions.

Also, read here a news story on Wall street protests, from the New York Times.

Do you wanna come to the theater? Check out Margaret's proposal!

First day of class information

click on this link to view full information

What's going on with our public education system?

craving for a hamburger?

Some nice tips on those funny English sounds

Still in trouble with some of the English sounds? No worries, just click on the link below and practice a whole bunch of them. Just listen and repeat! 
practice your English sounds

A taste of slam poetry for your ears: What teachers make

WE NEED OUR TEACHERS BACK!