As you know, after finding a dead bird in the garden, we learned about the important role decomposers play in the life cycle.
We listened to a story in English called “The soil in Jackie’s garden” and, while revising the vocabulary about the garden we already knew, we quickly realized how all the stages are connected and how important it is that the soil has nutrients too.
It was a simple and fun story that, with its repetitive format, helped acquire new vocabulary and structures. Watch the video and play the game to revise the vocabulary like we did!
We discovered that today it is a very special day in the United Kingdom and in the United States of America… today it’s April Fool’s day!
On this day, it is common that everybody plays jokes or tricks to make fun and have a laugh, even companies and newspapers! It is quite fun to read or watch the news today because you have to guess what article is fake.
This is precisely what we did today, we read a lot of real articles (adapted but real) that appeared on the news and we had to guess which two were real. It was not as easy as it seemed! Can you guess the two real ones?Click and have a go!
Reading together to distinguish the fake from the real ones, we realised that the important part was to get the general idea. It was not so important to know all the words in the text because only knowing the key words (which we can translate with the use of dictionaries) and the images that go with it we could guess most of it.
The strategies we used were very different when we had to answer the questions about specific information. In this activity, we had to select first the correct article to locate then the information using the key words.
We have just finished writing the script and we are ready to start rehearsing! We don’t want to give any spoilers but, in the play, there is a part in English. Believe it or not, it was us who wrote it!
At first, we were a bit scared because it was a complex text we had to write but we managed to do it. The key was to break the task in small manageable bits. We agreed that it was better to write the text in Catalan because we were not fluent enough to write a complex text in English. We then put into writing our ideas using simple Catalan expressions and verb tenses.
How can we turn our text into English? Somebody suggested using Google translator but we refused the idea on the grounds that usually the resulting translation is not always correct and that by doing so we do not learn! How could we do it? With the use of dictionaries!
We organized in groups and, together we decided what words were necessary to translate. Surprisingly, we realized that we didn’t need to look for so many words… We already know a lot of words!
Writing the script we came across a new verb tense… the past! By looking at the dictionary, we realized that to write a verb in past we only need to add -ed to the verb but there are a lot of exceptions!
By writing a text like this together we not only practised the structures we already know but we also had the opportunity to reflect on the functioning of the English language and how it differs from Catalan.
As you know, we’ve just passed on the responsibility of writing the story to Joan Maragall students. It was very exciting to participate in the creation of a completely new story!
We analysed all the charaters and we even created a new one. Could we describe them in English! Of course!
We needed vocabulary to describe the physical and psychological characteristics and structures to describe them in English. Once this was done, we looked at examples that helped us write the descriptions together, in groups. Here you have the texts!
It was not that difficult… and we also discovered how useful English dictionary is!
With the our story characters ready, it was time to exploit our creativity and invent our own characters… Would it be a MONSTER, a FAIRY or a SUPERHERO? We drew the characters and detailed, on a form, the basic information such as name, age, height or family.
Once this was done, we had to write the descriptions using not only the previous models but a also writing chart. With all this helpful tools, writing in English is not as difficult as it may seem!
Last week was the first after the experiment of living without screens during seven days. It was a time to analyse the pros and cons of such an activity and we shared all our discoveries. It was very difficult for some, but the general opinion was that it had a lot of advantages and everybody claimed to have changed their routines in some way.
We discovered that these experiment was not new and that it has been held in USA since 1994. This fact made us realize that screen usage is a worldwide problem.
We found a lot of texts about the perils of screens and, of course, they were all in English. This is what generally happens when you make a search on the Internet, that the vast majority of texts are in English. Nowadays, with the use of Google translator, there are no major problems to understand the gist of any kind of text but it is not a good idea to rely exclusively on the answers provided by AI tools. It is much more benefitial to develop strategies that enable you to understand any kind of text. In this occasion, the texts about screens provided the perfect opportunity to practise how to locate specific information.
The main goal of this activity was not to read and understand a whole text but to be able to find the answer of some questions. The questions were in Catalan and, in groups we had to critically analyze all the aspects of the text to select the correct text from a collection and then locate the answer on it.
Titles and images were useful to discard texts that were not related to the topic, for instance, and they also paid notice to words in bold, that offered hints about where in the text the information would be.
The fact of being able to understand texts that were not adapted was very encouraging too! English is not as difficult as it may seem!
As you know, we are trying to find an Irish school that wishes to start a pen-pal project with us so we can learn about their customs while practicing English. We realized that we needed the head teacher permission and we had to adapt… Llegeix més»
While reading the novel that names our class, Rovellons discovered the solar clock and the importance of shadows to tell the time. Can you imagine not knowing what a SHADOW is? This is what happened in the story we listened to the other day: “The Black Rabbit”.
The story is about a rabbit that one day discovers a BIG black rabbit that follows him everywhere. The rabbit is very SCARED but, when he faces a wolf, the black rabbit helps him.
It was a very fun story that helped us remember a lot of the vocabulary we have been working on ( like rabbit, shadow, scared) and discover new words like forest.
Stories are fun and give vivid context that help create connections and associations which facilitate the entire language acquisition process. By listening to stories, When listening to a story in English, one acquires grammar intuitively; picking it up from the context, repeating it an trying to reproduce it.
After listening to the story, we wrote a sentence about our opinion. Writing is very easy with a good scaffold! .
Now it is your turn. Listen to the story and say… Do you like it or not?
If you want to practice vocabulary and have fun at the same time you can try thisGAME. You just need to click on the moles that say the words that appear in the story. HAVE FUN!
As you know, we read in English during 30 minutes every Thursday. We have a portable library with all kinds of books: comics, cook books, art books, picture books, short abridged novels and a lot of science books.
Browsing DK’s “Children’s Encyclopedia”, a Tintin found… Llegeix més»
Yesterday we had a great opportunity to practise English while having a good time by watching a play: Sleeping Beauty (or not).
“Mitjans” and “Grans” had been preparing the theatre for weeks and they knew the story very well: it was a new version of the traditional fairy tale in which the princess, Aurora, changed the story to fit her true desires.
The students laughed and sang together with the characters and… some even became actors and danced or rode toy horses!
All in all, students discovered that, knowing the context and some basic language, it is possible to understand a complex story with lots of unknown words. Why don’t you give it a go and watch cartoons or films in English? You may be surprised!
In “The little Prince” it is said that the planet where the Prince lives is so small that he saw the sunset forty-four times. Having this in mind, the Petits Prínceps tried to answer the question that was waiting for them to start the term… Is it possible to celebrate New Year’s twice?
As you can see, last year there was an air company that offered the possibility to celebrate the arrival of the New Year twice by taking advantage of the International date line. Amazing!
After learning that time zones were stablished in 1883 taking London as the starting meridian, the Petits Princeps looked at the map and discovered what was the time in different cities around the world.
Once they had that clear, it was time to have fun while learning to tell the time in English at the same time. In pairs, they played a game in which they had to guess a city in the world just by saying the time…
It was a perfect and meaningful way to practise speaking!
