Liking Language (English)

I really like this video from Stephen Fry.

I agree with everything he says. He speaks very clearly, I feel I could maybe use this in an advanced English class...ohhhh :)

Anyways enjoy, also if you are a teacher, have you used this video? Or do you have an idea for how to use it? I'm thinking some kind of reading activity, and then watching it after....hmm hmmm

Getting an ESL (EFL) job in Germany

Sorry for how long this post took!
Partially I am lazy, and I forgot, and today after deciding I wanted to write this post I couldn't find the new button that blogger had to make posts...anyways here we go.

How I got to Germany:
I took German at university and there is a lovely little program put on by the DAAD where Canadian students who have graduate with a German degree can go to Germany and assistant teach at different high schools in Germany. Other nationalities can also apply, but there are different restrictions (for example the English girls I met on this program did not have to have a finished degree to go to Germany. It all has something to do with the Visas). The program lasts for eight months, you get paid a stipend (read no taxes!), and you only HAVE to work 12 hrs a week. It's pretty sweet, and if you like it, and your school likes you, you can always stay a second year (as I did!). After the second year though, you are on your own!

Other places to look for jobs:

I also worked at a company called inlingua  which was good. They have schools all over Germany ( and Europe!), and it's a really easy job. All you really need is to be an English native speaker. Now depending on where you go the school will be more willing to help you get your visa. If you go to a bigger city where there are more English speakers, they could be less inclined to help you, but you never know! There is a German visa for people between 18 and 30 (work and travel), which is pretty easy to get as long as you have a job. A big help at many inlinguas is to have a basic knowledge of German or at least a willingness to learn, a drivers license (they have lessons outside of the school and you get paid more for those!), and some knowledge of business English. Some downsides of inlingua are that you will probably only get hired as a free lancer, and sometimes that can be tricky at the visa office. For some reason if you say you want to work as a free lancer many cities in Germany then want a company that you are working for....which seems strange...Also as a free lancer you won't be guaranteed hours (though this was never a problem I usually had to turn hours down!) and you won't get any health insurance. Health insurance in Germany is pretty pricey, but it depends on how often you feel you will need a doctor... inlingua will also help train you if you have no experience, they have all the books and tests and example lesson plans for every unit you have to teach. So it's definitely good if you have never taught, and no one comes and watches your lessons so if you are more experiences you get a chance to use your own stuff :) Just keep your students happy and no problems will be had!

There is also Berlitz and Wall Street English. Berlitz is supposed to be similar to inlingua.  Wall Street only hires full time contract, so for visas they are waay easier. But Wall Street likes it if you already have a visa...tricky!

If you want to work in a German high school as a teacher you have to have two subjects (I'm pretty sure speak German). But every state is different in Germany in NRW they have this program , which a friend of mine used to get into the system. She had History and German, but taught History and English, she also had to do 2 years of half teaching half university courses before she could become a full teacher. But once there she was a gov't employee and it's a pretty good job then!

So yes that's a bit to consider about living in Germany and teaching, pretty much I would recommend going for an inlingua job and then working through the system into a high school or even university level teaching position it's much easier from within Germany.

Hope that was helpful! And thanks for reading!

Here is another blog post about teaching in Germany, and it gives a clearer picture of what it is like to teach at inlingua. http://blog.young-germany.de/2012/04/teaching-english-in-germany-faq/

More for the book club with gr 9s

We wrote a test today to see if the class actually read the book (Memoirs of a Teenage Amnesiac).

Here is a copy of the test, I just thought up a couple questions trying to see if they had read AND understood the story...ha!

Memoirs of a Teenage Amnesiac Test

1. Why was Naomi at school during summer (when she fell down the stairs)?
   a) She was attending summer school.
   b) She was doing work for the year book
   c) She was working on her photography project.
   d) She was just walking around with her best friend, Will.

2. How many years did Naomi forget?
   a) 1
   b) 10
   c) 5
   d) 4

3. Naomi was adopted by her parents Grant and Rosa Porter. TRUE/FALSE

4. Who was James Larkin?

a) Naomi's tennis playing boyfriend who she forgets after falling down a flight of stairs.

b) Naomi's best friend and co-editor on the year book.

c) Some guy who rode in the ambulance with her after the accident.

d) Becomes Naomi's boyfriend; he is depressed about his brother dying; makes videos.

5. Naomi doesn't like Chloe at the end of the book. TRUE/FALSE

6. Which school subject(s) helps Naomi remember?

a) French

b) Math and Physics

c) Photography

d) Gym

7. Naomi becomes a bridesmaid for her dad and his new wife. TRUE/FALSE

8. Name one example of Naomi changing. Explain how she changes.

_____________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________

9. “For a moment, I would not even realize who I was looking at, and, instinctively,

I would turn away.“ Who says this? Why? What are they talking about?

_____________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________

10. How did Naomi lose her memory?

_____________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________

______________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________

English Stack Exchange Question

And the one I asked today about 'I wish' statements...

We shall see if I asked it correctly or if it gets voted off for being useless ; )

http://english.stackexchange.com/questions/63914/difference-between-he-wishes-it-didnt-and-he-wishes-it-wouldnt/63915#63915

English Stack Exchange Question

I forgot I was posting my English Stack Exchange Questions here!!!

Anyways this is one from awhile back about how to end business emails or letters in English.

http://english.stackexchange.com/questions/55161/whats-the-difference-between-yours-sincerely-and-sincerely-yours

Song Ideas for Beginner to Intermediate English Learner's

Songs are a great way to learn a language. I don't think that they should be the only method, but every once and while they are good change :). 


I've used a song from the Barenaked Ladies (woot Canadian content!) called 7,8,9. It has a bunch of fun word plays (when you joke about something using words; clever use of words), for example seven ate nine. These are great for your intermediate students and even with beginner students working out what these mean as a group is great. 


Some ideas for how to use songs:


1) Cut up the lyrics and let the students listen to the song while putting the lyrics in the right order. Helpful tip: Make sure to mix up your lyrics before cutting them up. I've had students just try and line up to my cuts, totally not the point of our exercise!


2) Standard fill in the blanks. An oldie, but a goodie. 


3) For intermediate to advanced learner's you can switch some of the words in the song with rhyming words. Depending on their level you can tell them how many switched words there are, or underline the words that have been switched or let them have a go at it in partners. If you are having difficulty finding rhymes I like to use this website http://www.rhymezone.com/.

4) Let them watch the music video of the song and have them guess the story (this only works when there is a music video, unless you a exceptionally skilled in youtube videos). Then read the lyrics together and see who was closest to the real story. Another version of this is to have a set of pictures that relates to the text in the song and let the students listen to the song while they put the pictures in order.

5) Listen to the song and try to sing along with it. This works especially well with young, beginner learners. I haven't tried this with adults yet, but depending on the song I could see it working!

6) I used the BNL song with a group of intermediate students and we just looked at the words and phrases that were unknown to my students and discussed the German equivalents. You could then move the discussion into English idioms (see my post here for some examples). We also talked about cultural differences for example in German cats only have 7 lives while in English they have 9.

Anyways that was a very short list of what you can do with songs in an ESL or EFL classroom.
Here is the video for BNL 7,8,9. You google the lyrics.

Another good song from BNL is If I had a Million Dollars, great for teaching the 2nd Conditional. 

Book Club with gr. 9's part 3

Here  are the links to the Venn Diagram Sheet and Sequence Sheet mentioned in the first blog post about the Book Club activities for my gr. 9 German class with the book Memoirs of a Teenage Amnesiac by Gabrielle Zeville.

Venn Diagram

Sequence Chart

And these are the quotes that I wanted my students to comment on. Unfortunately I don't yet have a copy of the book, I just read it on my Kindle so there are no page numbers yet. When I get my book i will update this...promise!


Quotes to Comment on

• “I have always been required to fill in the blanks.” (pg...)
• “He felt comfortable and broken-in like favorite jeans.” (pg...)
• “I didn't need to remember him to know exactly how to tease him.” (pg...)
• “But I understood what Dad was like because I was like that, too. This was why I couldn't look at him.” (pg...)
• “I'll never leave you, kid.” (pg...)
• “For a moment, I would not even realize who I was looking at, and, instinctively I would turn away. It is rude to stare at strangers...” (pg...)
• “I hung up the phone and felt lonelier than ever.” (pg...)
• “ 'I give everything away. I believe Naomi, that your possessions possess you, do you know?' I wasn't sure.” (pg...)
• “We both really believe that [yearbook] can define the school and the way people see the school. A good high school yearbook can make a better school. And better kids. And a better planet. And a better universe. We write the story of the year. If you think about it, it's a huge responsibility” (pg...)
• “When I saw myself in the bathroom mirror, I felt sort of elated. It seems strange to say even now, but I finally recognized the person in the mirror as the person inside my head.” (pg...)
• “...I can't stop thinking about your hair. It intrigues me. It's like you have nothing to hide behind anymore.” (pg...)
• “He made me feel transparent when I was still opaque to myself.” (pg...)
• “A good nickname tells you something about the person it belongs to, and it was so with [Will's]” (pg...)
• “ 'There are all sorts of things I could tell you,' he said, 'if you ever wanted to know them'.” (pg...)
• “Screw the past. It made me so happy to hear someone say that.” (pg...)
• “I interrupted, 'I don't care about any of that. It's in the past.' It was my new philosophy. It had to be.” (pg...)
• “These things tend to take on a momentum of their own.” (pg...)
• “Once he'd translated, I replied without really thinking, 'Ni l'un ni l'autre. L'appareil-photo,' meaning 'Neither, I blame the camera.' ” (pg...)
• “It's when you don't need something that you tend to lose it.” (pg...)
• “And I was crying for gravity. It had sent me down the stairs, and I'd thought that meant something, but maybe it was just the direction that all things tend to flow.” (pg...)
• “I had thought the way I felt about Will was just a room, but it had turned out to be a mansion. He had turned out to be a mansion.” (pg...)
• “You forget all of it anyway...You forget all of them. Even the ones you said you loved, and even the ones you actually did. They're the last to go. And then once you've forgotten enough, you love someone else.” (pg...)
• “...'I will' is nicer. It has the future in it. 'I do' just has the present.” (pg...)
• “...all that made our quiet a kind of song. The kind that you hum without even knowing what it is or why you're humming it. The kind you've always known.” (pg...) 

*** so we changed what had to be done for the quotes, the students had to look up where the quotes were and tell us who said it and why it was important, hence I have not added the pages. If you want the pages though you can message me and I will send them out! ***