Tag Archives: vocabulary

Unusual jobs

Funny Stuff, The English language, ,

I am a teacher, well I am an English teacher, and I do not know whether people might consider this an unusual job but it is.
And why the hell is it an unusual job? Some of you might be wondering, when the very first thing that comes to your mind is the outrageous amount of holidays teachers enjoy. Nothing is easier than being a teacher. You have to be mother, father, friend, counsellor, psychologist, actor, lawyer… You have to be motivating, energetic, enthusiastic, flexible, hard , understanding, strict, compassionate, well-mannered, well-meaning, well-balanced, well-educated, loving, tender….and you can never ever complain as you, as everybody knows, enjoy a scandalous amount of holidays. But /and this is why I love being a teacher.
But I have also cleaned windows, worked as a waitress (I was made redundant after two months), picked apples in a Canterbury Farm ( I was one of the fastest), been an au-pair of dearest David ( I wonder where he is now), worked in a pub….

Surfing the Net I have gathered this bunch of unusual occupations. One might think some of them are made up.
House sitting: This is quite simply moving into someone’s house while they are away, a kind of ‘live- in burglar alarm and someone to keep the house kept and warm. Could be for two weeks or six month’s, you don’t know.
Odor Judgers: Odor Judgers get to smell armpits all day to help make deodorants that will work well. I’m not sure why somebody other than some strange fetishist would want this job.
Chicken Sexer This is a real job title. A chicken sexer sorts through baby chicks to determine if they are male or female, and then segregate them.
Hot Walker: This is the person that walks the racehorses around after a race. It is important, because if a horse doesn’t cool down before returning to his stall, the overheating can cause kidney damage.
Saddle consultants: The people who ensure equine enthusiasts have the most comfortable ride possible and that their horses have the perfect riding accessory.
And you? What about you? Have you got or have you had any interesting, safe, dangerous, boring occupation? Leave me a comment and let me know.

Related links

Becoming a housewife

The Italian who went to Malta

Corcholis or it is raining cats and dogs

What on earth is a palindrome?

Word of the day: Fuck you

Kids Front: another cool website to have fun

Resources, Vocabulary, , , , ,

I was searching the Net to nick pictures to do a hot potatoes exercise for my elementary students on parts of the body when I bumped into this cool site. It’s called Kids Front and although it’s for kids ,I’ve found plenty of funny exercises to use in my classes.

Shall I suggest: Form a New Word  or Homonyms or the more serious Match the Prefix ?

 

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Pixie Lott … fit as a fiddle and other music related idioms

Music, Word of the Day, , ,

Although I can’t say I’m a music junkie I spend a lot of my time listening to music. The kind of music I listen to largely depends on my mood.N ormally, on my way to work I’m full of energy and anticipation so the songs I like listening to are of that kind … but when I am coming back home I need something a bit more relaxing, so I go for classical music, ballads, chill out … and all that jazz. And sometimes if my day’s been crap and I have to think about the best way to face the music, then I appreciate the silence.

Anyway, what I want to say is that I like this chick. I think she’s got a very nice voice, powerful but sweet at the same time .. When I first listened to her, her voice kind of struck a chord; she is somewhere between Amy Winehouse and Kate Perry with a touch of Dufy. Her first album has just been released and I anticipate it’s going to sell like hot cakes.
Her debut single ‘Mama Do (Uh Oh Uh Oh)‘ was a success but, in my humble opinion, there are other very good tracks. By the way, her album is called Turn it Up.


Want to see what these idioms mean ?
http://www.usingenglish.com/reference/idioms/cat/23.html

ELLA: English Language Lab Asturias

Audio, In the Computer Room, Listening, Resources, Speaking, Vocabulary, Writing, , , , ,

I don’t know why it’s taken me so long to recommend you this wonderful site , but …better late than never!
This site has been created and is maintained by three colleagues from three different EEOOIII . On their own they have been awarded different prizes and together they have created this wonderful site. My admiration and thanks to you three: María (from EOI Oviedo), Carmen (from EOI Mieres) and Javier (from EOI Luarca).

Now , for you my dearest students and because I can guess that right now you must be frantic (exam is on Monday) looking for new listening comprehensions to do, I am going to link you straightaway to the listening section of ELLA. The link will lead you to a page with all the listenings , find the ones for you level…. ADVANCED.
http://web.educastur.princast.es/proyectos/ella/?cat=17
If you like the site , don’t forget to send them a post. It is always nice to hear that all you effort has been worthwhile !

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Wordle: creating “word clouds”

Create your own stuff, Resources, The English language, Vocabulary, , , ,

It is not the first time I ‘ve used this tool, but it is the first time I’ve used it to revise vocabulary. I like it because it is easy to use and also attractive and we all know that students appreciate it when you give them something different.
How does this tool help me? Wordle is a “toy” for generating “word clouds” from the text you provide.
In the past I mainly used it to decorate some posts and in class to retell a text. It is a great tool for retelling as the clouds give greater prominence to words that appear more frequently in the source text.

But today I’ve discovered a new use to Wordle. I needed tor revise some vocabulary. I normally do it as a competition game with strips of paper and the word to be revised written on them. But today I tried writing the words to be revised and this is the result. I’ve created two word clouds as I am going to split the class into two and let them compete against each other by giving them a maximum of two minutes to try to define the words to their team. So, I’ve printed the word clouds and used it in the OHP. Hope they like it! I had a great time too tweaking the fonts, colours and layout.

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