Telling the Time

You can use games for children if you want to work with the time in English. Here you have some games:

• BBC game
• ICT game
• Digital-Analogic time
• More exercises

If you are ingterested in the songs we saw in class, here are the links:

• My name is Luka
• Something stupid

Cooking at Christmas

Preparing cookies or desserts for Christmas...? Here you have a file with recipes for typical ones. Click HERE.
If you want to do soemthing special for Christmas, especially with your children, have a look at this site:
http://www.eslkidstuff.com/ChristmasGames.htm
See you in class!

Learning with videos from YouTube

There are some videos in YouTube to learn English. You can watch them to improve (mejorar) your English. Here you have an example: Jennifer ESL or Learning English with Jennifer. This is one of the first lessons and I think it's really good. Just watch it!

Another possibility is to practaice with videos for kids. Here you have an example with our lesson about jobs and what people do at work:

If you want to practise and you can do it with your little children here you have links for children:

• http://learnenglishkids.britishcouncil.org/en/ : this is a webpage for learning English and there are videos like this one 
• http://www.youtube.com/user/kidsonlineenglish : a bit long and boring but it's repetitive and it's good for learning.
• http://www.manythings.org/: although it's not only for children, it has a lot of games especially for vocabulary so you can practice vocabulary with your children here

Just to finish with, watch this funny video to see that not only Spanish aren't so good at learning English, click here and have a good time.

See you in class!

Present Simple

I prefer to call it habitual present because it's connected to how to use this tense, quite different from the present simple in Spanish, but you can call it as you like. It's referred to habits, routines, general truths, etc.

Present simple is formed with the infinitive and you must add the subject pronoun to know who does the action; e.g.TO PLAY --- I play, they play. there are 2 exceptions:

• the verb TO BE has 3 forms: I AM - he, she, it IS - we, you, they ARE
• the verb TO HAVE has 2 forms: I, you, we, they HAVE - he, she, it HAS

But in these two verbs the rule of having an -S in the 3rd person in singular is there. The problem is the spelling and the pronunciation, but it has the same rules as we have for plural forms:

• ending in CONSONANT+Y ---  -IES e.g. copy -- he copies  but play -- she plays
• ending in sibilant sound you add an extra syllable  /IZ/ : Peter finishes work at 5

As we saw in the previous lesson with the imperative form, we use DON'T for the negative form, but we have to use DOESN'T for the 3rd person in singular. As I explained in class this auxiliary is like the initial interrogative mark ¿ in Spanish. Have a look the examples: Do you like chocolate? Does she go with you? 

If you want to know something else about this tense go to this useful link but the explanation is in English:

http://esl.about.com/od/thebasics/a/beginner_present_simple.htm and then you can do the exercise at the end of the link or click here

If you need a simpler explanation you can go to this link: http://isabelperez.com/happy/tenses/present_simple.htm

To finish with go to My Name Is Luka : this is a marvellous song and present simple is used in it.
The other song to practise with present (simple and continuous) is Eternal Flame

I hope you can understand this tense. See you in class!

Starting with prepositions

I've just found this page to learn the most important prepositions of place. It is for children but I think it's quite funny and interesting, especially if you use it with your own children. Enjoy it!
When you are sure about the use of these prepositions you can work with them using these examples:

• Where's my laptop?  It's on the table, near the lamp, between the books and the printer, etc.
• Where are my pencils?  They're in the box and on the table, behind the laptop, etc.

If you still have problems go to this link to see a diagram of prepositions and the translation into Spanish:

http://www.lingolex.com/prepositions/prepositionsen.htm 

Lesson 1C: Possessive forms

I usually explain the possessive forms as a whole (como un todo completo) and I show the relationship with the rest of pronouns. Here you have a diagram with examples to help you:

My students look at the board / the windows  --- They look at it / them
Susan has a book / pencils  ---  Her book / her pencils (no matter singular or plural)

CHART OF PRONOUNS

	Subject  Pronouns SUBJ+VERB	Object  Pronouns OBJ+VERB	Possessive Adjectives ADJ+NOUN	Possessive Pronouns
1st person	I	me	my	mine
2nd person	you	you	your	yours
3rd person (masc.)	he	him	his	his
3rd person (fem.)	she	her	her	hers
3rd person (neutral)	it	it	its	(not used)
1st person (plural)	we	us	our	ours
2nd person (plural)	you	you	your	yours
3rd person (plural)	they	them	their	theirs

To work with the pronouns and possessive go to these exercises but I'm afraid they're not for beginners or starter level:

• exercise 1: a short explanation and exercises
• exercise 2: a page with a lot of exercises

See you in class!

Working with phonetics

Last week I gave you a web page to practise with pair words (words with a very similar pronunciation). If you want to visit it, go to: http://www.shiporsheep.com/
If you need the pronunciation of a word, you can use this link, but it's not a real dictionary as it hasn't got the meaning of the words, just the pronunciation: http://www.howjsay.com/
If you need the pronunciation of a chart (tabla) of phonetics go to http://www.oupchina.com.hk/dict/phonetic/home.html
To finish with and as a peculiar page, you can visit this link with different pronunciations of English in the UK, Ireland, America, Australia, etc. Just a curious thing: http://www.fonetiks.org/
But if you want to practise and go further (mas allá) you can go to this link with examples and exercises http://www.agendaweb.org/phonetic.html
Have a nice practice!

Lesson 1B: Nationalities

There is a rule (regla) which says that nationalities and languages are in capital letter. Let's have a look:

Lesson 1A

We have finished lesson 1A and we have studied the verb TO BE in the possitive form. For those who have a higher level, not  just starter, here you have the diagram for the use of this verb:

These are the forms of the verb TO BE in the present tense:

	IMPERSONAL FORM	AFFIRMATIVE FORM	NEGATIVE FORM	INTERROGATIVE FORM
SINGULAR	There is There isn’t Is there …?	I am --- I’m *You are -- You’re He is --- He’s She is --- She’s It is --- It’s	I am not ---I’m not *You are not --- You aren’t He is not --- He isn’t She is not --- She isn’t It is not --- It isn’t	Am I …? *Are you …? Is he …? Is she …? Is it …?
PLURAL	There are There aren’t Are there …?	We are --- We’re *You are -- You’re They are -- They’re	We are not --- We aren’t *You are not --- You aren’t They are not --- They aren’t	Are we …? *Are you …? Are they …?

 *The pronoun you (2^nd person) is used for singular and plural, like in Argentina with vos.

Special characteristics

•  It’s the only verb which is principal and auxiliary one at the same time; compare these examples: 

Is she at school?       but             Does she go to school every day?

•  It’s used in continuous and passive verbal forms; for example: 

    They are playing now   or     English is spoken here

The negative and interrogative form are in lesson 1B. See you in class!
- exercise 1: very simple; affirmative form
- exercise 2: only ffirmative form

                                                                         

The alphabet

We are working with the alphabet but we have seen it in class not in order as usual but in groups; here we have the groups according to the pronunciation:

VOWELS	A /eɪ/	E/i:/	/e/	I/aɪ/	O/əʊ/	U/ju:/	others
CONSONANTS	H J K	B C D G P T V Z /zi :/ (USA)	F L M N S X Z /zed/ (UK)	Y/waɪ/		Q W	R  /ɑ:/(UK) /ɑ:r/ (USA)

  

Remember the pronunciation of some letters in English are not the same as in Spanish; we saw t - d - p - v for example. We also saw there are letters with different pronunciation like th /θ/, /ð/.

If you are not familiar with the phonetic symbols and you want to know how to practise go to this link, although it has too many simbols. We'll use less in class. Click here.

If you want to practise with the alphabet you can visit these sites but there are more in youtube if you like:

• http://www.ciberatalayas.com/cursos/alphabet.htm : the traditional song with the alphabet.
• http://www.learnenglishkids.britishcouncil.org/en/songs/the-alphabet-song : another version a bit funnier.

Starting with English, starting with classes

Hello everybody!
We are starting classes on October, 15 and we are going to study the basic things in English. Let's start with numbers. This is what I'm going to explain in class.

NUMBERS

There are 3 groups of numbers:

1.  From 1 to 12 : the numbers with "proper names"

NUMBER	NAME	PRONUNCIATION
1	ONE	/wʌn/
2	TWO	/tuː/
3	THREE	/θriː/
4	FOUR	/fɔː(r)/
5	FIVE	/faɪv/
6	SIX	/sɪks/
7	SEVEN	/ˈsevən/
8	EIGHT	/eɪt/
9	NINE	/naɪn/
10	TEN	/ten/
11	ELEVEN	/ɪˈlevən/
12	TWELVE	/twelv/

2.  From 13 to 19 : the -teen numbers

NUMBER	NAME	PRONUNCIATION
13	thirteen	/ˌθɜːˈtiːn/
14	forteen	/ˌfɔːˈtiːn/
15	fifteen	/ˌfɪfˈtiːn/
16	sixteen	/ˌsɪksˈtiːn/
17	seventeen	/ˌsevənˈtiːn/
18	eighteen	/ˌeɪˈtiːn/
19	nineteen	/ˌnaɪnˈtiːn/

3. Numbers from 20 to 90 : the -ty numbers  (in Spanish we say -ta)

NUMBER	NAME	PRONUNCIATION
20	twenty	/ˈtwenti/
30	thirty	/ˈθɜːrti/
40	forty	/ˈfɔːˈti/
50	fifty	/ˈfɪfˈti/
60	sixty	/ˈsɪksˈti/
70	seventy	/ˈsevənˈti/
80	eighty	/ˈeɪˈti/
90	ninety	/ˈnaɪnˈti/

The main difference between the group 2 and 3 are:

•        The ending : -teen /ˈtiːn/ a long /i:/ (like two ii in Spanish)    -ty /ti/ short /ɪ/
•         The stress (acento/golpe de voz)       group 2 □□      group 3 □□

How to write numbers:

                Twenty-four      sixty-seven     There is a hyphen (-) between the two parts

Activities:

• Exercise 1: look at a clock and say the numbers in order and then jumping from one to another
• Exercise 2: dictation of numbers like telephone numbers or additions: 23+30 ; 47+50
• Exercise 3: you can practise with this page with listening comprenhension of numbers; click here

Videos with numbers to help you with pronunciation:

·         http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HM30Ad5nQ24 : pronunciation of mumbers from 1 to 20

·         http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_7AmBGd4tmU : numbers for kids.