Christmas 2015 is here! Come and join us for a Christmas celebration!!

Dear students & readers of this blog,

Christmas is just a few weeks away. We have completed our first term at the school and that is something to celebrate, so...

COME AND JOIN US NEXT 22 DECEMBER, AT 18.00, FOR A FUN CHRISTMAS PARTY!!


This is the programme for the evening:

Cartel promocional fiesta navidad from leticiaeoiplasencia

We'll have A COOKING CONTEST, A CHRISTMAS QUIZ, CAROL SINGING...and of course, FOOD AND DRINK!!

Afterwards, we'll join the rest of the Departments of the school and we'll share some time with French and German students. A unique opportunity to relax and get to know other people!!

DON'T MISS IT!!!

We all know how people celebrate it in Spain, but maybe we are not so familiar with Christmas traditions in the UK. For example, do you know what is...

• Advent?
• Boxing Day?
• mulled wine?
• mistletoe? 

If you want to learn the answers to these and other questions, click here.

If cooking is your thing, click on the mince pies below, and you'll get the recipes  for lots of traditional British dishes: 

Yes, but Christmas is also celebrated in other English-speaking countries. How do people celebrate Christmas in...

• The USA?
• Australia?
• South Africa?
• Canada? 

What's the story or Christmas Carols? To find out, click here.

These are the Christmas Carols we will be singing at the party. Why don't you practise a bit before?

DECK THE HALLS  

Click here if you want the lyrics with some notes about the vocabulary.

LET IT SNOW (with lyrics)

MAY YOU ALL HAVE A VERY HAPPY CHRISTMAS AND A HAPPY START OF 2016. I'LL SEE YOU NEXT YEAR!!

NB 2 - What were you doing when... PAST CONTINUOUS

Dear students & readers of this blog,

After revising the tenses we studied last year in Basic 1, the time has come to move on and study something new. A new tense.

THE PAST CONTINUOUS

As it is a new tense for us, we need to know some things about it.

FORM

Simple! BE + -ING. Please find a fully conjugated verb below:

And don't forget short answers!!! Short answers are formed with the auxiliary verbs WAS/WERE.

Were you reading? YES, I WAS / NO, I WASN'T

Were they reading? YES, THEY WERE / NO, THEY WEREN'T

USE

We usually use the Past Continuous in the following situations:

• To describe an action in progress at a specific moment in the past.

         E.g. Last night at 9 I was watching TV.

• For an action that was in progress when a shorter action (in the past simple interrupted it.

         E.g. I was watching TV when the telephone rang. 

Have a look at this video that illustrates this use:

• To describe the context at the beginning of a narration or story.

         E.g. The house was silent. John was looking through the window, while Linda was reading a magazine. The clock was ticking, when suddenly...

For a more detailed grammar explanation, click on this wonderful link from the BBC English Learning site.

And now, some practice. Listen to Naziru, Ly and Fernando talk about what they were doing on a memorable day in their lives.

(source: bbc.co.uk/learningenglish)

NB: Describing people

Dear students and readers of this blog,

In our Basic level class we have worked with basic physical and character descriptions. So here you have some resources to work on how to describe a person correctly.

In the first place, how do we ask for somebody's description? Well, don't ask 'HOW IS HE/SHE?', because you'll probably be answered something like 'fine, thanks'. If you want somebody to give you a description of themselves, or of somebody else, you have to ask...

WHAT DOES HE/SHE LOOK LIKE? (For physical appearance)
WHAT'S HE/SHE LIKE? (For personality)

Never EVER confuse this question with 'What does he/she like?', because the answer to that question is something like 'she likes going to the cinema' (likes & dislikes).

• Click here for some useful vocabulary to describe people. 
• Also, if you click on this link, you'll find a nice vocabulary bank.
• And if you want to practise a bit, click here.

Would you like to play a description game? Click here.