My videos in Spanish to learn English

Hola ¿cómo están? Tanto tiempo.
Les dejo mi primer video para aprender gramática inglesa.
Espero que les guste.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MxGDcYduQQw

También los invito a visitar mi página de facebook 

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Elteacherjulian/329060973855406

The future is coming

I have been trying to find time to do many things, and most of the time, I have found myself losing a lot of time, and then having few to do what I have to do.

I must say that I have tried many things in order to create interesting things to help my students in dealing with the English language. Some worked, some didn't.

But even though, I don't want to quit to try, I feel most of the ways to help them are not being interesting for them.

So I feel that I have to do a really big change in my way of teaching. How? I don't know yet. But something must be done.

The future is coming, and technologies are the called ones to help in the process of learning.

I decided to continue writing on this blog, but I won't have enough time to do all I want to do with this blog. My first idea was to contact other teachers and get some ideas. I did. But I feel that it didn't work as I thought it would do.

I started using twitter, mainly to get information, because I don't consider myself the top one to be followed. And the page on facebook. well, it worked when I needed it to be used with my students, so I will continue using it in the future. But not as much as I would like too.

Then I tried ivoox to create podcasts, and I found it very interesting. But again, the time is so short for me, and I feel that even creating videos on youtube, it won't be enough to call the attention. Probably, there must another way out there, for me, to help my students in their process of learning a new language.

But you, what do you think? Which is the best way to learn a language? With material and content published in a page on internet, a podcast, facebook twitter, a video in youtube, or what??

Family day coming

Yes, just to say I am still alive. It's just been a hard and busy month, that is why I haven't been able to come and leave some words.
Next friday, we will celebrate the day of the family at my school, I hope many families will come and share time with the students. They will have the chance to see the works of the students and eating all as a big family. I will be sharing with you all about that day.

Students were working on Facebook

Last month was a nice month for Chilean people, because we celebrate our national day on 18th, but actually, we celebrate the whole month... eating.

Anyway, the time went fast, now it is October which means that there are 2 month left to end the year.

So, it has been so busy in these days.

Well, the last thing I have done with my students, was using facebook to give them the chance to write in English. I set 6 topics, and they had to choose 4 of them, and leave some comments with their opinions. You can check their comments on my facebook page.

It is the first time I use the social network, and I think it was interesting for them too.

If you have more ideas about how to use facebook, or even experiences related with this topic, then you can leave your comments.

Students writing books

I have mentioned already about my idea of creating a book. Yes, writing a book. But I know that it is hard, if there is no commitment and desire to create something like that.

Of course, that maybe, you must be thinking in a novel, but there is no need to do such a hard thing (no yet).

I will give you some ideas so your students can create a book.

1.- In groups, every student can create a couple of short poems. Let's see they create 6 or 7 short poems, they can have 24, 28 or even more poems per group. Then, if there are some students good at drawing, they can add some pictures and then they have their own booklet with poems.

2.- Every class, they can create paragraphs telling a story. With the time, they will have a long story to share with the rest of the class.

3.- They can create a blog, and adding posts as a journal or diary, so at the end of the month, they will get a collection of posts to create their own blog.

4.- There is an idea that I like so much. It is based on a teen series, where the student can create a manual to survive in the school, giving some tips and ideas to help students at school.

5.-Haikus are very short poems to be created not in Japanese, but in English.

6.-Twitter.... Yes twitter. OK maybe not all the students have twitter, but for instance, at a certain moment in the class, you can tell them to write a sentence about what they are doing, or thinking or watching. Then they will collect all these ideas as "thoughts in the class".

7.- They can create a book of "jokes". Students are good at telling goods, then tell them to write them all in English.

If you have more ideas, don't forget to share them.

Poetry in the class

I am taking a course through internet about modern american poetry. I know I am not expert on poetry, and to be honest, I haven't read poetry since years. So I thought it would be a nice way to go back to that amazing and interesting type of writing.

Blogs are good ways to get informed about what is going on around the globe. And it was in this way, that I knew about this course online given by Coursera. At the same time, I thought it would be a great opportunity to learn more new vocabulary in English.

The course started on monday and it will last for 10 weeks. The teacher and the group of mentors are excellent. Even if it's been a couple of days, I have learnt many new ideas and words.

Besides, it is a good way to know more people interested on poetry. (There are more than 30,000 people on this course)

You must really check Coursera.