EFL for Beginners: Píldoras diarias

My birthday

ElenaBen — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 15:16:50 +0000

Hi all, today April 17th is a special day for humankind, Eleonidas was born 32 years ago!

Alas, yes, today is my birthday. Yes, I know I’m getting old but the only thing I don’t want for my birthday is to be reminded of it.

I wanted to share a birthday cake with you:

And remember: It takes a lot time to grow young… (P.Picasso)

Forget-me-nots

ElenaBen — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 22:18:08 +0000

Hi all! No me olvidé de este blog, how could I?…La cuestión es que ahora no estoy dando cursos de beginners, y estoy más centrada en los que sí doy, como el FCE. Por eso mis otros dos blogs están más activos últimamente, eso no quiere decir que este blog esté ‘neglected’, sólo que pasa a actividad silenciosa…in the background…Mientras siga encontrado cosas for your own learning, I will keep on posting them here. No worries! In the meantime, enjoy the pile of resources you can find in the sidebar! (not in the bar!!!)

Talking about food

ElenaBen — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 15:12:27 +0000

Cerrado por vacaciones

ElenaBen — Sun, 16 Mar 2008 23:59:02 +0000

O casi…Spring break: Fallas & Easter.

Be right back…(in a week or so)

Sports: actions

ElenaBen — Sun, 16 Mar 2008 23:58:20 +0000

A day at the Santa Monica fruit market

ElenaBen — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 00:08:16 +0000

Watch this video and learn names of fruit and vegetables. He speaks with an American accent.

Y una cosa más: cuando salen las naranjas (oranges), que están en el puesto (stall), fíjaos que pone en el cartel!…

Fíjaos:

This is an apple.

These are some grapes.

Las diferentes formas, en singular y plural.

What time is it?

ElenaBen — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 23:19:02 +0000

What’s the time, please?
Excuse me, do you have the time, please?

me, me, me or I, I, I…(it’s always…)

ElenaBen — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 09:10:42 +0000

Subject or Object Pronouns, again!

Do you remember what subject pronouns are? Ok, so brush it up.

Ya? Vale, pues vamos a ver qué son los pronombres de objeto. Si los subject pronouns son los que hacen la acción, los que la reciben se llaman pronombres de objeto. A cada persona del sujeto nos corresponde un pronombre de objeto, dependiendo de si somos los que hacemos la acción o los que la recibimos.

I help John: Yo soy el que ayuda…a quién, a John? Entonces John es el objeto de mi acción, si en lugar de querer llamarlo por su nombre, lo quiero sustituir por un pronombre, necesito por tanto un pronombre de objeto. John es ‘él’ y ‘él’ es tercera persona del singular, por lo tanto, in English, ‘he’. Mira la siguiente tabla y observa qué pronombre de objeto le corresponde a ‘he’.

I > me We> us

You> you You> you

He> him They> them

She > her

It > it

Practica con este juego que se llama “Life on the Pronoun Reef”: la vida en el arrecife de los pronombres. La única forma de poder avanzar en el reef es ir cliqueando sobre el pronombre que corresponda en cada frase que se os da (subject or object).

No more I’m sorry? (dance)

ElenaBen — Wed, 05 Mar 2008 10:12:49 +0000

So, it was about time I shared more songs with you…Listening to songs are just a great way of practicing (practiSing, BrE) listening skills and pronunciation, new words and structures you may have already learned somewhere else (in this song: present perfect, and imperatives or commands: do something or don’t do something; speak or don’t speak; eat or don’t eat…And present perfect is used as a past tense to talk about recent things, reciente en el tiempo o algo que aún es reciente en tu cabeza o perdura en ella). Pon atención a la forma de pronunciar I’ve.

Je suis désolé/Lo siento/Ik ben droevig/Sono spiacente /Perdóname
Chorus (=estribillo): I’ve heard it all before (repeat) / I don’t want to hear / I don’t want to know / Please don’t say you’re sorry/ I’ve heard it all before / And I can take care of myself / I don’t want to hear /I don’t want to know / Please don’t say ‘forgive me’/ I‘ve seen it all before / And I can’t take it anymore

You’re not half the man you think you are / Save your words because you‘ve gone too far / I‘ve listened to your lies and all your stories / You’re not half the man you’d like to be

Chorus

Don’t explain yourself cause talk is cheap / There’s more important things than hear you speak / We stayed because I made it so convenient / Don’t explain yourself you’ll never see
(‘Sorry’ in multiple languages)

And you, have you heard it all before?

Unpack your adjectives

ElenaBen — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 15:25:06 +0000

Got home from camping last spring. Saw people, places and things. We barely had arrived, friends asked us to describe the people, places and every last thing. So we unpacked our adjectives.

I unpacked “_________” first. Reached in and found the word “______”. Then I picked “soggy” and next I picked “foggy” and then I was ready to tell them my tale. ‘Cause I’d unpacked my adjectives. Adjectives are words you use to really describe things, handy words to carry around. Days are ______ or they’re ______. Boys are dumb or else they’re brainy. Adjectives can show you which way.

Adjectives are often used to help us compare things, to say how thin, how fat, how short, how tall. Girls who are tall can get taller, boys who are small can get smaller, till one is the tallest and the other’s the smallest of all.

We hiked along without care. Then we ran into a bear. He was a hairy bear, he was a scary bear, we beat a hasty retreat from his lair. And described him with adjectives.

[Turtle, spoken:] Whoah! Boy! That was one ____, _____ bear!

[Girl, spoken:] You can even make adjectives out of the other parts of speech, like verbs or nouns. All you have to do is tack on an ending like “-ic” or “-ish” or “-ary”. For example, this boy can grow up to be a huge man – but still have a boyish face. “Boy” is a noun, but the ending “-ish” makes it an adjective – boyish. That describes the huge man’s face, get it?

[Sung:] Next time you go on a trip, remember this little tip: the minute you get back, they’ll ask you this and that, you can describe people, places and things… Simply unpack your adjectives. You can do it with adjectives. Tell them ’bout it with adjectives. You can shout it with adjectives.