Matilda - Roald Dahl Nobody has seen Willy Wonka - or inside his amazing chocolate factory - for years. When he announces plans to invite the winners of five Golden Tickets hidden inside the wrappers of chocolate bars to visit his factory, the whole world is after those tickets! Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is perhaps Roald Dahl’s best-known story. The story of Charlie Bucket, the five Golden Tickets, the Oompa-Loompas and the amazing Mr Willy Wonka has become firmly embedded in our culture since it was first published in 1964. Conservative estimates suggest the original book has sold over 20 million copies worldwide; it is now available in 55 languages. Roald Dahl began working on Charlie and the Chocolate Factory in 1961 shortly after finishing James and the Giant Peach, but its origins can be traced all the way back to Roald's own childhood. Roald wrote the screenplay for the film release of Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, starring Gene Wilder as Willy Wonka.
Pronunciation skills: What accent should I teach? By Adrian Underhill ELT Pronunciation expert Adrian Underhill addresses your practical concerns on accents, RP and student identity. Practical concerns What accent should I teach?I suggest you teach your own accent. What about Received Pronunciation (RP)? So, what is the best pronunciation target for my students? This means two separate pronunciation targets: a speaking/productive one and a listening/receptive one. Should students keep their own accent? Won’t changing my students’ accents change their identity? Practical ideas for the classroom 1. 2. Invite them to notice and play with the differences between accents. Twenty one accents One woman, 17 British accents Fun tour of American accents 3. 4. 5. For more practical ideas see my blog www.adrianpronchart.wordpress.com Accents and the L1 grip The interactive phonemic chart
Flippad undervisning Flippat klassrum. Vad i hela friden är det för något? Den tydligaste förklaringen för det oinvigde tycker jag att Karin Brånebäck har gjort med sin ”gula bild”. I korthet går det ut på att eleven ska vara förberedd i ”huvudet” så att eleven kan börja arbeta direkt när lektionen startar. Den tid som du använder till att ha genomgångar kan nu läggas på att vara hos de elever som behöver dig mest. Det finns många varianter av flippat klassrum och du får känna dig fram kring vad som passar just dig och dina grupper. Många lärare ger en kort Youtubefilm i läxa och har kopplat frågor till filmen där eleven får direkt feedback. Personligen flippar jag inte allt utan jag flippar det jag tycker att den gruppen behöver just då. En sida som fungerar bra till att använda för flippat klassrum och för att individualisera grammatikundervisningen är Grammarflip.com. Du skapar ett lärarkonto där du dessutom skapar ett ”klassrum” . Jag kan verkligen rekommendera er att prova dessa sidor. Lycka till! Sara
The most difficult words to pronounce in the English language revealed – as well as the world’s favourite English tongue-twisters | Weird News | News “Worcestershire”. “Choir”. “Sixth”. For almost two weeks, users of the online social platform reddit have been submitting what they consider to be “the hardest English word to pronounce”. After more than 5,000 submissions, the message thread has become a fount of difficult vocabulary, with users from across the world sharing their favourites and personal experiences. There are references to popular culture, some very creative tongue-twisters – and because of reddit’s points system, a rough consensus has emerged as to which are the hardest. Here are the top 10: 10 - Rural Submitted by user ‘mattythedog’, rural appears to cause problem particularly when repeated or put next a word with similar “r” sounds. One user says: “I cannot say Rural Juror - comes out rurrrerr jerrrerr and sounds like I'm growling.” A self-confessed Australian user says: “An aussie would pronounce it 'ruhral jurah.” “This one is entirely impossible for me as a German,” says another. 9 - Otorhinolaryngologist 8 - Colonel
26 Fresh ESL Conversation Starters to Get Students Talking! | Jennifer Teacher 10 Oct I love teaching conversation in the ESL classroom. Part of it must be that because the students able to “converse” in English are better able to demonstrate their personalities, preferences, thoughts… and therefore, I get to know them better. Often it is simply hilarious to see the range of answers students feel free to share in a comfortable environment. If you’re a conversation teacher in an English as a Second Language classroom, there may be times when you feel as though you want fresh ideas, a change in routine or some way to remain slightly unpredictable so your students remain curious as to what tricks you have up your sleeves. Always remember to keep in mind your students’ unique personalities and language learning journey, and never underestimate how engaged they can become with the right activity! Here is a list of 26 fresh ESL Conversation Starters to move your class! Enjoy! Like this: Like Loading... Tags: conversation, Lesson Planning, speaking
18 English words that mean very different things in Britain and America As the old adage famously goes: you say tom-MAY-toes, and I say tom-MAH-toes. We should probably call the whole thing off, right? Ever since the might of the British Empire was expelled from the United States, ordinary folk from both sides of the pond have chuckled at each other's use of the English language and pronunciation. Here are several important examples you need to remember - simply to make sure no one gives you a weird look when you're off on your holidays. 1. UK: A woollen pullover worn in the winter US: Someone who commits suicide by leaping from a building or bridge 2. UK: An eraser for a pencil US: A condom 3. UK: Something a baby wears (noun) US: Frizzy or hairy (adjective) 4. UK: The floor above the ground floor US: The ground floor of a building UK: Flaps attached to a race horse's face to restrict its vision US: Indicators on a car 6. UK: Another word for jewellery box US: Another word for coffin 7. UK: Informal party wear, dressing up as a well-known character 8. 9. US: An old man
Great Free Resources for Teaching Election 2016 The 2016 presidential race has been a roller-coaster ride of suspense and surprises from the beginning — and one replete with valuable “teachable moments” that shouldn’t be missed. Below, we suggest over a dozen instructional strategies and useful, free websites that can help teach students about our nation’s most pressing issues and the way our democracy works, as well as encourage them to voice their opinions about the issues they care about most. Please use our comments section to share additional resources we may have missed. We’ll be updating this page throughout 2016. From now until November, we’ll be offering regular election teaching resources, including lesson plans, Student Opinion questions, contests and an updated version of our four-part election unit. 1. Letters to the Next President 2.0 Overview Want to give your students a voice in this election even if they’re too young to vote? 2. 3. What does Donald J. 4. 5. 6. 7. PenPal Schools | Decision 2016 8. 9. 10. Photo 11. 12. 13.
33 ways to speak better English If you’re reading this, I imagine you want to speak better English and communicate in a more confident and competent way. When we communicate effectively we are able to express our ideas and opinions, share experiences, and build relationships with others. When we struggle to express ourselves, we feel unvalued and insecure. As human beings, we want to participate in group discussions and have an impact on the society around us. In the modern world, we communicate across borders. By speaking better English, people all over the world can hear our voice. Well, English teachers and English classes definitely help. What you need is to become a self-directed learner, somebody who takes responsibility for their own learning and creates their own learning programme to develop their English. Now, it’s certainly true that speaking is a social activity and is best done with other people. You can do the same with your English. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. I want to go for a drink tonight. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12.
Introducing Shakespeare - Mia Smith I engelskans kursplan finns i det centrala innehållet följande bitar med. • Skönlitteratur och annan fiktion även i talad, dramatiserad och filmatiserad form. • Sånger och dikter. Är det bra jag som läser detta som en inbjudan att plocka in den stora barden i klassrummet? I år firar världen också att det är 400 år sedan Shakespeare dog, vilket ni kan läsa mer om här och även här. Perfekt läge att plocka in Shakespeare i klassrummet! Getting to know Shakespeare Som inledning till temat lät jag mina elever bekanta sig med Shakespeare via olika korta youtube-filmer. Vi gick igenom begreppen, några förklarade jag, andra inte. Shall I compare thee? Nästa fokus var Shakespeares sonetter. Eleverna fick sedan läsa den 18e sonetten, Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day parvis, med överdriven betoning på rytmen. Shakespeare’s language För att eleverna skulle få en bättre inblick i varför Shakespeare anses vara så viktig tittade vi också kort på den här musikvideon från Horrible Histories.
How to Improve Your English Pronunciation to Talk Like a Native “What?” “Can you say that again?” How many times do you hear this when you’re speaking? Even if your vocabulary and English grammar are perfect, it can still be difficult for people to understand you because of your pronunciation. Learning to pronounce English words correctly can be one of the hardest parts of learning English. The English language has some sounds that your native language might not, so you will have to learn how to make completely new sounds. Plus, English vowels make it really tricky to know how to say a word. Ah! So that’s why we have eight tips for you, to help you pronounce English words better. 1. Before you learn how to speak, you’ll need to learn how to listen. There are many guides to get you started in learning to listen. The pronunciation practice at Many Things is really slick, especially its huge selection of lessons on minimal pairs. When you want to listen to authentic English instead of pronunciation exercises, you can watch videos on FluentU. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.
Activities for correcting writing in the language classroom How can teachers encourage learners to correct their own writing? Second-time winner of TeachingEnglish blog award, Cristina Cabal, offers a few tried and tested error-correction activities. Does every single writing error need to be corrected? In the learning of a second language, this is a question that stirs up great controversy. While it is true that most spelling errors will disappear as learner proficiency increases, there are some persistent errors – mainly grammatical – which remain despite repeated efforts to correct them. In the following collection of error-correction activities for writing, the main aim is to get students to identify and correct writing errors taken from their own essays. The activities are fun and highly motivating, and because they are fast-paced, I would suggest going through the errors with the whole class a second time at the end to reinforce learning. Use 'grass skirts' This activity is a lot of fun. Use sticky notes Use slips of paper Correct or incorrect?
IDEA International Dialects of English Archive | free dialect and accent recordings for the performing arts The 50 most important English proverbs The 50 most important English proverbs What are proverbs? Every culture has a collection of wise sayings that offer advice about how to live your life. These sayings are called "proverbs". How can you use proverbs to learn English? It's good to know the really common English proverbs because you hear them come up in conversation all the time. You know what they say: when the going gets tough... (Read #5 below to learn the rest of this proverb and what it means.) Learning proverbs can also help you to understand the way that people in English-speaking cultures think about the world. Proverbs can also give you good example sentences which you can memorize and use as models for building your own sentences. The most important English Proverbs This is a list of some of the most important and well-known English proverbs. The meanings of some of these phrases have shifted over the years, so a proverb might have originally had a different meaning than the one I explain. Print this List
12 songs to practice the pronunciation of -ED endings - Luiz Otávio Barros As you know, the “-ed” endings of regular past tense verbs can be pronounced in three different ways: /t/, /d/ and /ɪd/, which is the one most students tend to overuse. Click here for an overview of the rules. Over the years, I have found that /t/ and /d/ are easier to notice and to produce if the verb comes immediately before a word beginning with a vowel sound: liked it – /laɪktɪt/dreamed of – /driːmdəv/ To help students get their tongues around the two sounds, I usually ask them to move /t/ and /d/ to the front of the vowel sound. liked it – /laɪk tɪt/dreamed of – /driːm dəv/ Out of all the ideas and techniques I’ve used in class, this has probably been the most effective. So I decided to put together a 7-minute video containing 12 song excerpts you can use to help your students notice how /t/ and /d/ are linked to the vowel sounds that follow. You will notice that the activities do not test whether students can choose between /t/ and /d/. Thanks for reading – and watching.