Our Rights as women.

News that I’m very interested on in the last few days is the one about the fight for the sale of contraceptive pills. I can’t accept that people who have nothing to do with our decisions want to prohibit us our rights. My uncle was in the last protest against this prohibition, and she was one of the persons who spoke in every media defending our rights. Now she is in the newspapers and in TV news files.

Chiloé... a fascinating place.

I can say that I’ve been in many beautiful places in Chile, in the South and in the North. My family and I use to visit new places on holidays, and one of the places I liked the most is Chiloé. The first time we visited it was when I had 13 years old. Actually we visit it as many times as possible during holidays.
Chiloé is a beautiful place in the south of Chile, which characteristics captivate you all the time. When we visited it the first time we didn’t know much about it, we tried to visit every known place, all churches, buy in every craft market we found, we tried all kind of food, and we got in every motorboat even if we didn’t know where we were going to. Sometimes the best thing of the trip is when you don’t know what is going to happen after.

I have to admit that I gain weight in every trip to Chiloé. I can’t resist to Curanto, roast lamb, churrascos (they’re not meat, they’re big sopaipillas) and seafood… mmm delicious!!
If you have not visited this amazing place, you should. And if you decided to go next holidays, please invite me!

I could write many things about Chiloé and my experiences there. Next time I'll dedicate my blog to my trips...

The Commitments . . .

The Commitments itself as story is very attractive, enjoyable and good developed. When I read the entire book, I felt very involved with the story. At the beginning I had a different point of view of it. I thought it was placed in other times of history, in the 60’s may be, because of the guy who appears in the cover looks to me as a person of those years because of his hair style. Besides, I was a little lost with the story at the beginning because I couldn’t place the story and know where the characters were or what they were doing. Another important thing is the vocabulary used there, because I was confused with words like yis which then I realized that means you, or the word fella which means man. After those confusing characteristics of the book, I decided star reading again. Finally I could enjoy it and understand almost every word and the most important idea of The Commitments.

Then, I watched the movie, which impressed me more. With the book I drew in my mind an image of the characters, but the movie totally change it. I imaged the characters a little bit different, for example; I imaged Joey the lips as a fat men, like Deco in the movie, and Deco an attractive guy (because he was the vocals and the principal image of the band) not a overweight guy.

The chapter’s order in the story was different in both, for example in the book the interview that they had with a news men was after they first gig, but in the movie it was after another gig and in other circumstances. But it really doesn’t change the main idea.

Read the book and then watch the movie was very good for me because I could acknowledge if what I read was okay or similar to what the movie showed. I can say that the movie doesn’t distort what the book wants to mean and present us.

I was thinking about a topic related to education, learning, teachers and students... but i couldn't find one now.
Now I'm listening a song of the cardigans, erase and rewind... this song is very old and the first time i listened it was in the movie "never been kissed" in 2003, i remembered it because it was about a looser girl who wanted to restore herself as a popular student 6 years after she left school...a great movie i think. we could have the same opportunity that she had to come back and do things differently.
well, as you know we learn a lot from songs, and this song says a lot... or it lets me think a lot of my own life. erase and rewind are significant words for me because I'd like to go back to the past and change or erase many things that i would like never had happened. we always can change our minds in the present time, but we can't go back and fix what we did.
erase and rewind only can be possible in that song... or in our minds.
difficult topic... but sometimes is necessary to think about it.

and if you want to connect this topic with education... we can teach more than vocabulary with songs, we can let students think and reflect about themselves.

here it's the song if you want to listen it:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ex2E4vyGem0

BBC Learning English... a great site!

I have to admit that I have never visited this web site, and even imagine that I could think that it is good. Sometimes I’m so lazy when I surf the Net, I just go to the well known web sites. Now I realize it’s very useful for all English learners, especially for us as future teachers.

The idea of this site is great, because it gives a lot of very useful and interesting information that we can use by interacting with the English world. The first thing I tried was “Quizzes and Exams” because of my persistent idea of testing my own English. I liked the way how the site let you possibilities to learn by interactive and fun questions, by giving you advices to succeed in exams and by listening entertainment stories, etc.

I think the best part of the site is where teachers can go and download activities and lessons for their classes; they can plan a lesson and suggest some ideas to improve English classes. Sometimes it’s so difficult for teachers be innovative in their classes, because when in a classroom are 45 students, and all of them want something different the teacher need to find a neutral way to call their attention… and that’s so difficult!! Then this site can be “The Site” for teachers… well it’s just for a while, until all ideas have been used.

Teachers always need to improve their way of teaching, and this site is a very good way to improve it.

I enjoy visiting....

Since I discovered Internet as part of my daily life, I’ve been in contact with many web sites. Those are since Google and the news to “Fotolog” and “Facebook”. The last two web sites are the most visited for me, but the one which I really enjoy and never stops surprising me is Facebook. I found this site because a friend invited me to take a look at it, but at the beginning I didn’t pay attention. Once, in my free and boring time, I decide to go into “the facebook world” and try to discover it, but you can’t imagine what I found there! There were many childhood friends, all my school classmates, friends around the world, interesting ways to communicate, nice people who want to meet you, music, books, and many things!!!

The impact of this site on my life is relevant in terms of communication with people interesting for me, because I can know what they are doing or what happens with their lives. But sometimes I don’t mind if I didn’t update my profile or my likes or whatever. I just enjoy it in my free time and when I don’t have anything else to do.
Internet is just an easy way of entertainment, and facebook is just a hobby for me.

Do you have a Facebook profile??? if not... you might try it here www.facebook.com

"Here global warming is a reality, not a prediction."

Many villagers of Ghoramara islands are really worried about global warming. Not in terms of what could happen in the future or about the predictions of it. They have to dramatically shore up their houses against the sea water, which everyday is attempting to drown all their possessions. Islanders know that everyday begins and ends in the same way. When the day get dark they have to climb up their thatched huts, and at the sunrise they go back to their “normal” routine in the ground. Furthermore, Ghoramara has lost a third of its land mass in the past five years. This entire problem is because of the melting of Himalayans glaciers, which everyday is raising the level of rivers and seas.

Victims of this rising of sea level are the priority refugees of the global warming. Even though these people have been helped for the Indian government, the government is more worried about its own interests rather than in the vulnerable people. Testimonies from worried people are commonly to hear, such as: 'We worry that the same thing could happen to us here. It feels like we have no escape from the sea'.

You can click here to read the article. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/mar/30/india.flooding