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Saturday, August 11, 2012
Monday, July 9, 2012
Friday, June 22, 2012
Laureate International Universities Teaching Competition 2012
Jonathan Acuña
Universidad Latina de Costa Rica
LMS for Reading Skills Students at Latina – Designed to provide practice beyond the coursebooks to enhance reading skills. ELT students at Latina use LMS on Google Sites to ensure blended and autonomous learning practice. The rationale behind the LMS is directly linked to the use of free Web-based tools combined with PBL to enhance student literature appreciation and develop students' critical thinking and EAP skills. Students train to build their own reading blogs, to create glogs to display information interactively, and to exercise their creativity in the making of electronic scrapbooks and cartoon-like literary analysis.
Universidad Latina de Costa Rica
LMS for Reading Skills Students at Latina – Designed to provide practice beyond the coursebooks to enhance reading skills. ELT students at Latina use LMS on Google Sites to ensure blended and autonomous learning practice. The rationale behind the LMS is directly linked to the use of free Web-based tools combined with PBL to enhance student literature appreciation and develop students' critical thinking and EAP skills. Students train to build their own reading blogs, to create glogs to display information interactively, and to exercise their creativity in the making of electronic scrapbooks and cartoon-like literary analysis.
Thursday, June 21, 2012
Thursday, June 7, 2012
"Dr. Heidegger's Experiment:" Story Analysis
He was born in Salem, Massachusetts in 1804; he is seen as a key figure in the development of America literature.
He wrote during the romantic era of writing, which was an European artistic and intellectual movement of the early 19th century. Nathaniel is best-know today for his many short stories :“My Kinsman, Major Molineux" (1832), "Roger Malvin's Burial" (1832), "Young Goodman Brown" (1835), and the collection Twice-Told Tales, his four major romances were: The Scarlet Letter (1850), The House of the Seven Gables (1851), The Blithedale Romance (1852), and The Marble Faun (1860)
He died in May 19, 1864.
Summary of the story
DR.Heidegger wanted to made a little experiment but he needed help, then he decided to invited to his study four friends, those friends had several things in common, all of them were old and had lived very sad and unfortunate lives. At the moment that his guests were in his laboratory, he decided to showed them a rose, that rose was special. it was saved for fifty-five years, he poured some water onto the rose and suddenly the rose began to bloom, in that moment his friends knew that he had water of the fountain of youth, the Dr. offered to shared his water but he proposed them not to repeated the same mistakes that they did when they were young and he did not told them that the other part of the experiment was to analyzed their reaction with their new youthfulness
Story's Plot
Conflict
Dr Heidegger wanted to know with his experiment if the people could learned with the mistakes that they did in the past, when they had another opportunity to fix them in the present.
Rising Action
I. The DR.Heidegger decided to made an experiment.
II. He invited 4 friends to meet with him at his laboratory in his house.
III. DR.Heidegger asked to his friends if they wanted to cooperate with his experiment.
IV. He opened a book and he showed them a fifty-five years rose.
V. DR.Heidegger picked up a vase that it was filled with a liquid that looked like water, and he poured some water onto the rose.
VI. A few moments later the rose began to bloom.
VII. DR.Heidegger explained to his guest that the water came from the fountain of youth and it had the property to made the things young again.
VIII. DR. Heidegger filled 4 glasses with water from the fountain of youth, and gave to his friends,but before that he gave the water the azked them, if they wanted to made the same mistakes that they did in the past.
Climax
They broke the vase that contained the water into a thousand pieces. The precious water flowed slowly across the floor. All of a sudden they became to be older again like the doctor’s rose.
Resolution
The doctor completed his experiment, he told them his conclusions, the most important conclusion was that they did not learned nothing from their mistakes , but the doctor’ friends was in shock and they did not listened to him , they decided to leave for Florida to looking for the fountain of youth.
Characters
DR.Heidegger
Physical characteristics: Strange old men with white bear.
Psychological traits: scientific, very intelligent, patient, with great convictions about his experiments, always willing to give a second chance.
Mr.Medbourne
Physical characteristics: old men with white bear.
Psychological traits: He was a rich man, but he was greedy, and he made some bad business deals and he lost his fortune.
Colonel Killigrew
Physical characteristics: old men with white bear, fat, with differents illness.
Psychological traits: He was a great soldier. But he spend his life eating and drinking too much. He is sick all the time.
Widow Wicherly
Physical characteristics: she was quite beautiful, but now she is old, with long gray hair.
Psychological traits: she was conceited, and she thought that she was the most beautiful woman in the town.
The Moral or Teaching of the Story
DR.Heidegger’ friends were unhappy and unfortunate because they made several mistakes in past, they always were lamenting for their lives, but the problem was that they had another opportunity, and they showed the doctor that they did not learned nothing about their mistakes, and they are doing the same things that they did. The doctor shows them that they don’t want to make a real change in their lives .
Personal opinion
Very good story, I have a question, do we are able to learn about our mistakes? How difficult can be turn on the page and start again without ‘’ mistakes ‘’? What are the lessons that we can learn about mistakes of others? I think in many cases we cannot find very good answers for those questions, maybe it happen because we always have a lot of possibilities to do one action, but as Murphy said, If anything can go wrong, it will but in this case I would like to change that phrase like, if we start something in the wrong way, it will be worse every day.
Thursday, May 24, 2012
''Something Funny: Story Analysis''.
A brief biography of the author.
She was born and grew up in Galesburg, Illinois USA, when she was 10 years she began to write; in that moment she knew that she wanted to be a writer.Her first job was a part time job at college as a writer in the local radio station; it gave her the opportunity and the experience that after she needed, she moved to Texas and wrote for NBC station. she had contact with children’s programs in radio and television it was the prelude of her children’s book career including animal and fiction stories.
The Summary of the Story
Janey and Bill was a couple, Janey was getting tired of him because he was late all the time, they decided to went to a party at an old abandoned farmhouse twenty miles away , when Bill was driving he began to tell her a weirdest dream that he had, he dreamed with a tornado and a flying saucer with flashing lights and the people in the flying saucer did not look like anyone he had seen before they had 3 eyes, he described them like a replacement , in his case he met someone who looks and talk exactly like him , when they arrived at the party Janey began to thought that she was tired of pretending to be somebody else and she decided to show him the truth. Conflict
Janey was tired of Bill because he was a bore person , she described him as a dull men.Rising Action
Janey met Bill and he liked when she met him.Two months after Janey was getting tired of him , because he was all the time late.
Bill invited her a party in a abandoned farmhouse twenty miles away.
When Bill picked her up and Janey got into the car, Bill told her about his weirdest dream.
They were talked over his dream inside of the car at the moment that Bill was driving to got the place where the party was.
Climax
When they got to the party and he opened the door in the Janey’s side and she told him ‘’ do you want to see something funny ‘’ and she showed him a third eye in her forehead . Resolution
Bill was in shock because Janey showed him her third eye and he understood that she was a replacement of the original Janey, and also he understood that she was an alien and he will be replaced.Characters
Main CharactersBill
Physical characteristics
He was a white men, he had a black and short hair.Psychological traits.
He was a dull men, he was only interested in flying saucers and spaceship and that sort of things. He had a strangest sense of humor.Janey
Physical characteristics
She was a woman, and also an alien, she had a long hair, she had an extra eye in her forehead.Psychological traits.
She was impatient; she was in a hurry all the time and she was tired of being with him.Irony
The irony was that Janey was an alien and she was tired of Bill and she decided to replaced him ,but he did no know that he was the problem
My Opinion
I have to say that I liked the irony that the story had, at the beginning of the story the author showed us the importance of be comfortable with your twosome (boyfriend) in this case, but I think she had a disagreement with Bill because he was representing the same personality that she had, that’s why she wanted to leave him and she described him as a dull men.
Bill described his weirdest dream, and she knew immediately that every description that Bill gave her was true, and she was not comfortable with the situation, she preferred to told him that he was getting crazy, and the people that he dreamed were not exist.
Finally the author gave us a lection that pretending to be somebody else brings us problems.
Friday, May 18, 2012
Case against Sea Shepherd founder moves ahead | CTV News
FRANKFURT, Germany — A German court has allowed a Costa Rican extradition request involving the Canadian founder of an anti-whaling group to move forward.
Paul Watson of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society was arrested in Germany last week on an international warrant issued by Costa Rica -- where he is wanted for allegedly endangering a fishing boat while filming a documentary in 2002.
Sea Shepherd now says a German court has granted a preliminary extradition arrest warrant to Costa Rica, but has also granted bail for Watson for as long as his case is being considered.
Spokesman Peter Hammarstedt says the court stated that the final decision on Watson's extradition case will be made not by a judge but by the Ministry of Justice.
Hammarstedt says that indicates the German justice minister can dismiss the case against Watson at any time.
Watson is expected to be released on bail of 250,000 euros on Monday.
Read more: http://www.ctv.ca/CTVNews/SciTech/20120518/case-against-sea-shepherd-founder-moves-forward-120518/#.T7bYPpA0EKM.blogger#ixzz1vGZfMUjc
Wednesday, April 25, 2012
Sunday, March 4, 2012
How to pronunce the plural forms of nouns
In American English, the sound of "s" depends on which sound comes before it.
1. If the noun ends in an unvoiced consonant sound: /f/, /k/, /p/, /t/, /th/-(thin), pronounce "s" as /s/.
2. When it ends in a voiced consonant sound, /b/, /d/, /g/, /l/, /m/, /n/, /ng/, /r/ or with a vowel sound, /a/, /e/, /i/, /o/, /u/, pronounce "s" as /z/.
3. If it ends with /s/, /z/, /sh/, /ch/-chair, /zh/-the second "g" in garage, /dz/-(j), pronounce "s" or "-es" as /iz/.
In other words, if the noun ends with a sound other than the 5 unvoiced consonants, pronounce "s" with a /z/ (or with an /iz/ as the case may be).
1. If the noun ends in an unvoiced consonant sound: /f/, /k/, /p/, /t/, /th/-(thin), pronounce "s" as /s/.
2. When it ends in a voiced consonant sound, /b/, /d/, /g/, /l/, /m/, /n/, /ng/, /r/ or with a vowel sound, /a/, /e/, /i/, /o/, /u/, pronounce "s" as /z/.
3. If it ends with /s/, /z/, /sh/, /ch/-chair, /zh/-the second "g" in garage, /dz/-(j), pronounce "s" or "-es" as /iz/.
In other words, if the noun ends with a sound other than the 5 unvoiced consonants, pronounce "s" with a /z/ (or with an /iz/ as the case may be).
Plural forms
Most nouns in English have both singular and plural forms, and the plural is usually formed by adding "-s" to the singular. Most nouns in English have both singular and plural forms, and the plural is usually formed by adding “-s” to the singular. This page explains the basic ways of forming regular plurals in English. For information about forming irregular plurals see Irrgular Plurals of Nouns.
How to form the plural
Noun ending Forming the plural Example
s, x, ch or sh Add -es
boss arrow to the right bosses
tax arrow to the right taxes
bush arrow to the right bushes
consonant + y Change y to i then add -es baby arrow to the rightbabies
candy arrow to the rightcandies
curry arrow to the right curries
most others Add -s
cat arrow to the right cats
face arrow to the right faces
day arrow to the right days
How to form the plural
Noun ending Forming the plural Example
s, x, ch or sh Add -es
boss arrow to the right bosses
tax arrow to the right taxes
bush arrow to the right bushes
consonant + y Change y to i then add -es baby arrow to the rightbabies
candy arrow to the rightcandies
curry arrow to the right curries
most others Add -s
cat arrow to the right cats
face arrow to the right faces
day arrow to the right days
Friday, February 17, 2012
How to use the IPA
How I Use the IPA (and how I don’t)
When I show the pronunciation of a place, I try to always show how someone from that place would actually pronounce it. However, occasionally even the natives can’t agree. For instance, apparently most Chicagoans say /shĭkôgō/ [ʃɪˈkʰɒˌɡo] or even /shĭkôgə/ [ʃɪˈkʰɒɡə], but there are also many who say /shĭkŏgō/ [ʃɪˈkʰaˌɡo], and the latter group may be growing. Keep in mind that all of these definitely have “cot”≠“caught”. I have always called it /shĭkŏgō/ [ʃɪˈkʰɑˌɡoʊ], with a couple of slight vowel differences, since I don’t have an Inland North accent!
I have noticed that many people who use the IPA to show the pronunciation of place names on Wikipedia do several things that I have chosen not to do.
For one thing, they often write both [ə] and [ɨ] in showing the pronunciation of the weak vowel /ə/ in American English. Now this is not incorrect, since for me the word “sofa” /sōfə/ would usually be phonetically [ˈsoʊfə], whereas the word “broken” /brōkən/ would be phonetically [ˈbɹoʊkɨn]. However, in actual practice I find I have a lot of variation: for instance, “sofa bed” /sōfə bĕd/ would usually come out [ˈsoʊfɨˌbɛd], and “sofas” /sōfəz/ could come out [ˈsoʊfəz] or [ˈsoʊfɨz] depending on how deliberately I am speaking, or its position in the sentence. And I find that others have the same problem: in the Appalachian Mountains article the pronunciation is given as “/ˌæpəˈleɪʃɨn/ or /ˌæpəˈlætʃɨn/”; for me the vowels shown as [ə] and [ɨ] in these pronunciations are exactly the same for me, probably both [ɨ]. So for strictly practical purposes I am writing both [ə] and [ɨ] as [ə].
Another thing I find people doing is using British phonetic transcription to show the pronunciation of American place names. For instance, in the Lafayette, Indiana article the pronunciation is given as “/ˌlɑːfiːˈɛt/”. Now, in British English there truly are phonetically long and short vowels: “beat” is phonetically [ˈbiːt], where the vowel [iː] is phonetically long, whereas “bit” is phonetically [ˈbɪt], where the vowel [ɪ] is phonetically short. However, in nearly all North American English dialects, this is not the case: both “beat” [ˈbit] and “bit” [ˈbɪt] have vowels which are phonetically the same length, in spite of the fact that the first has what is traditionally called a “long e”, while the second has what is tradtionally called a “short i”. Scottish English is like American English in this respect. In fact, the “/ˌlɑːfiːˈɛt/” pronunciation is wrong for both British and American English: in British it would usually be [ˌlɑːfɪˈɛt], the [ɪ] being short because it is unstressed, whereas in American English (at least in West Lafayette, Indiana) it would be [ˌlɑfiˈɛt].
second Video
When I show the pronunciation of a place, I try to always show how someone from that place would actually pronounce it. However, occasionally even the natives can’t agree. For instance, apparently most Chicagoans say /shĭkôgō/ [ʃɪˈkʰɒˌɡo] or even /shĭkôgə/ [ʃɪˈkʰɒɡə], but there are also many who say /shĭkŏgō/ [ʃɪˈkʰaˌɡo], and the latter group may be growing. Keep in mind that all of these definitely have “cot”≠“caught”. I have always called it /shĭkŏgō/ [ʃɪˈkʰɑˌɡoʊ], with a couple of slight vowel differences, since I don’t have an Inland North accent!
I have noticed that many people who use the IPA to show the pronunciation of place names on Wikipedia do several things that I have chosen not to do.
For one thing, they often write both [ə] and [ɨ] in showing the pronunciation of the weak vowel /ə/ in American English. Now this is not incorrect, since for me the word “sofa” /sōfə/ would usually be phonetically [ˈsoʊfə], whereas the word “broken” /brōkən/ would be phonetically [ˈbɹoʊkɨn]. However, in actual practice I find I have a lot of variation: for instance, “sofa bed” /sōfə bĕd/ would usually come out [ˈsoʊfɨˌbɛd], and “sofas” /sōfəz/ could come out [ˈsoʊfəz] or [ˈsoʊfɨz] depending on how deliberately I am speaking, or its position in the sentence. And I find that others have the same problem: in the Appalachian Mountains article the pronunciation is given as “/ˌæpəˈleɪʃɨn/ or /ˌæpəˈlætʃɨn/”; for me the vowels shown as [ə] and [ɨ] in these pronunciations are exactly the same for me, probably both [ɨ]. So for strictly practical purposes I am writing both [ə] and [ɨ] as [ə].
Another thing I find people doing is using British phonetic transcription to show the pronunciation of American place names. For instance, in the Lafayette, Indiana article the pronunciation is given as “/ˌlɑːfiːˈɛt/”. Now, in British English there truly are phonetically long and short vowels: “beat” is phonetically [ˈbiːt], where the vowel [iː] is phonetically long, whereas “bit” is phonetically [ˈbɪt], where the vowel [ɪ] is phonetically short. However, in nearly all North American English dialects, this is not the case: both “beat” [ˈbit] and “bit” [ˈbɪt] have vowels which are phonetically the same length, in spite of the fact that the first has what is traditionally called a “long e”, while the second has what is tradtionally called a “short i”. Scottish English is like American English in this respect. In fact, the “/ˌlɑːfiːˈɛt/” pronunciation is wrong for both British and American English: in British it would usually be [ˌlɑːfɪˈɛt], the [ɪ] being short because it is unstressed, whereas in American English (at least in West Lafayette, Indiana) it would be [ˌlɑfiˈɛt].
second Video
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