Skype Lessons

Hey guys.
I am sorry it took me so long to write another post again btw.


Soo what I wanted to tell you guys about iis...

I think all of you know that I spent one month in Canada and that I went to school there. Well, some of my teachers there offer Skype classes now. Why? They want us to keep up with our good "English".
Why am I taking English classes? Since I failed on the writing part on our last PC I know that I have loads of work to do to improve my written English. Yeah that's why I applied for Skype lessons.

how does this whole thing work?

Well .. There's one teacher. His name is Alex. At the beginning it is important to discuss with him about what you need to improve on. When you agreed on that, the first Skype class can start ..
I had to write two paragraphs and also had to sent them to his Mail account.
Then he corrected them. To discuss and talk about my mistakes, Alex set up both, a Word and a Google Drive document.  :)

Summing up, I can say that I am happy that I have the chance to take Skype classes since he is a prettygood teacher and I am sure I can learn loads of things from him😀😀

A bit of Irish History..

Both, Daniel O’Connell and O’Neill were Irish men and both tried to fight for their rights. Nevertheless, their ambitions, the fight itself and the way everything ended up was different. When we examine their goals, we can see that Daniel O’Connell believed in human rights and wanted to bring the Catholic Church into Irish politics. O’Neill’s plan, on the contrary, was to protect his family’s estate from the British. When we look at their fight we find that O’Connell caused a large conflict because one section of the Irish population – the Protestants – feared his rising. On the other hand O’Neill failed in fighting his battles, despite succeeding in the first battle – in the Battle of the Yellow Ford in cooperation with O’Donnell. After asking the Spanish for help and trying to push further, they lost the second battle. Lastly, the way everything ended up was the following. Daniel O’Connell was seen as a revolutionary from now on, while O’Neill and his family had to leave Ireland for Europe to remain safe. All in all, O’Neill and O’Connell had the same approach to fight for their rights, the results of their fighting and the way in which they were seen in the end was not similar.

PC1

PC 1 ended to be a disaster… but I will come back to that later.

Well prepared and organised I thought, I arrived at University to get started for the upcoming exam. It was our first PC this year. This is why I wanted to do my best to get an excellent grade at this one and also because I had already failed on it last year. However, PC1 had started and I decided to begin with the vocabulary section. Once I was done with this section I switched to grammar and reading. Well.. the last part to deal with was the writing part. I thought I did a good job on this one and on all of the other parts. That is why I walked home happily after my exam. This would change , though.

Two weeks after our exam we got back our VGR part of the exam. Luckily, I passed this one. I thought after passing this part I was happy… Yeah. Today we got back the writing part and I learned that I didn’t pass the exam. I was so angry at myself and my plan Is to do a better job on the 2^nd and 3^rd PC.

What I want to now to do a better job on the next PC:

•  I want to spend more time on studying for the vocab part so that I can make sure I will not spend so much time on it while sitting this exam
•  I want to improve my listening skills
• I want to do an excellent  job on the grammar part
• And I will count the words and read the instructions so that I can do a way better job on my writing part

Paragraph: Dictionaries

Having looked at a number of monolingual print dictionaries in class this week, I have decided that such dictionaries are not for me. I would rather use online dictionaries for many reasons. Print dictionaries in general are not practical. Every time you want to look up a word, almost the whole book needs to be looked through. With online dictionaries the word just has to be typed in and the information shows up in seconds. Concerning definitions, synonyms, example sentences, and so on, I also prefer online dictionaries because the range of them is much bigger than in printed ones. Another aspect I do not admire is the fact that print dictionaries have nothing like an App you can download on your phone. In case you need to know a definition for a word, you either have to bring the heavy, big book with you or wait until you are at home to look it up. Summing up, I can say that I would not buy a monolingual print dictionary since the online ones are more useful and practical.

(181 words)

 

  

Me as a language learner

Dear Fiona,

I started studying Transcultural Communication two years ago. Unfortunately I have not been as successful as I imagined thought I would concerning my studies. That is why I have to retake this course.

When I started studying I had neither had any special language learning experience, nor had I been to an English speaking country. That is exactly what changed this summer. I spent one month in Vancouver, where I took language courses and also improved my English by just speaking the language.

Concerning my language learning strengths, I am honestly not sure about what they are. Speaking could be something I am good at because I had one month practice in Canada. However, what I definitely can tell you more about are my weaknesses and what I want to focus on this semester, since I am in this course for the second time. Grammar has always been a problem and so it is my greatest concern. To evaluate this problem, my plan is to do some exercises at ‘’engishpage.com’’. I am also way too nervous when it comes to sitting an exam. In situations like that I make mistakes I always regret afterwards.

Summing up, I can tell you that I have high hopes for this semester and year. My plan is to study a lot for the upcoming exams and do my best to pass all of them so that I can take the Kommissionelle Gesamtprüfung.

Best wishes, Irina    (243 words)

Dictionary review description

And there is another interesting function called ‘’teaching and learning’’ and it is also divided into education, which is mostly about how to plan teaching lessons. The next part is called ELS, which prepares for important exams with readings and I guess listenings too. And the last part is called grammar and it explains things like adjectives, nouns, prepositions and you can do some exercises and that’s it. And one thing I don’t like about Your Dictionary is the fact that there are so many ads.  [and you can decide whether you want to use it or not]

 

By and large I am happy with my speaking. I think my pronunciation is okay and so is my speaking fluency.  I couldn’t find any grammar mistakes either.- However I figured out that I tend to overuse the word ‘’and” which can be annoying. Also I tend to speak in a quite low register.

1 month in Vancouver

As some of you know or might guess, this year in August I spent one month in Vancouver (British Columbia, Canada). I had an amazing time there and that is exactly what I want to tell you more about. My friend and I, we both had decided in January that we want to spend one month abroad. First, we did not really agree on this subject. I wanted to spend one month in England, but she did not. However, in the end we decided to spend this month in Canada, which was the best decision I could have possibly made.

It all started on the firth of August, when my mom brought us to the airport. Our first flight to London was horrible; the pilot tried to pass a funder storm, which did not actually work. The airplane was just shaking and I thought I am going to die. Well, after our horrible flight, our twelve hours stop in London and our eight hours flight to Vancouver, we safely arrived there.

The first person we met was our host mother. She is such a nice person but since we did not get enough sleep, we went to bed early. The next day was our first day at school. Nervous and curious at the same time we entered our school, and saw many people. At the beginning of this day we had to pass an exam, so that they could figure out on which level of English we were. After that, our class finally started. School was educational and awesome, we met so many friends and nice people. It was not just for fun, though. We had to write one essay every week and do our homework. Apart from spending five hours at school (Monday to Thursday), we did some other interesting things to – let’s say – explore the city.

My friend and I went to see many breathtaking places, like Stanley Park (biking along the seawall), McMillan Space Centre, Buntzen Lake, Whistler, Play Land, Deep Covem … What I enjoyed the most was Capilano Suspension Bridge.  I had so much fun there but it was the most horrifying place my friend had ever been at, I guess. Additionally we spent lots of time with our host family. Wednesday was our gym day.  On this day we always got up at 0500 and spent one our biking at our host father’s gym. Also we had lunch and dinner with our host family two times every week. We did go out every week either.

Summing up, I can tell you that I had an amazing time in Vancouver. I’d like to tell you more.. but If I had told you everything, I guess my blog entry would be  100001124984 pages long.

About a nice conversation with Salome :-)

 

The girl’s name I could luckily talk to in our morning class is Salome. Salome is an exchange student, coming from Georgia. When I asked her why she chose Austria as her country to spend one semester in, she said ‘’why not?’’.  However, the months she spends here she wants to improve her English, study a lot and travel. Two of the countries she wants to travel to will be France and Italy. Salome wants to visit Italy in January because of the big upcoming Parade. It was a pleasure getting to know her.

Culture Days _KGP

I went to see like 21 presentations, 18 Irish topics and 3 American ones, since I was interested in so many topics. The were about:

1. Animal Symbolism in Irish Mythology (I)

2.      The history of ISL (I)

3.      Homophobic Bullying in Irish schools (I)

4.      Oscar Wilde and William Yeats – so different, yet so similar (I)

5.      Transition year – working towards maturity (I)

6.      Appreciating Life - Donal Walsh's Fight Against Suicide in Ireland (I)

7.      Psychiatry in Ireland in the 1950s and 1960s (I)

8.      Ireland vs. Austria - Whiskey Distilleries - Challenge accepted (I)

9.       Life of Irish Traveler Women (I)

10.  Gaelic and its use in Northern Ireland (I)

11.  Hill of Tara - Historical and spiritual at the same time (I)

12.  Oprah Winfrey: perhaps the most influential woman in America (A)

13.  How the Columbian Exchange changed the world (A)

14.  Delta Blues (A)

On my KPG I want to be tested on the topics 1-5 listed above. I want to be tested on the topic of„Animal Symbolism in Irish Mythology“ because it is interesting to know what each animal stands for and what they are likely to be. The topic of the “History of Irish Sign Language” is also interesting for me since, I study Austrian Sign Language. Both Sign Languages have some similarities. It is important for me to learn more about the history of other Sign Languages. I want to be tested on „Homophobic Bullying in Irish schools“as well, since this an interesting topic and much more should be done about that. The comparison of the two authors Oscar Wilde and William Yeats, was also worthwhile. I have not read any books of them; I like Oscar Wilde’s quotes though. The topic of the “Transition year” was also interesting. This year is a great opportunity for Irish people after graduating and should be considered for Austria too.

All in all, I had two great days. All culture projects I listened to, were highly interesting and it was not easy to choose the five most interesting ones.

 

Th or t, of or off – the wrong/right pronunciation can change everything!

One of my friends studies teacher education with the subjects English and History. Due to this fact she had to take a course called Pronunciation. Today was the final oral exam. To do well on it, we met a few hours before her exam and practised reading texts. I learned many interesting things about the pronunciation. I learned which things should be considered and many other things.

The wrong pronunciation can confuse native speakers; it can change the whole meaning of a sentence. Therefore, the points that have to be considered are the following ones:

It does make a difference when the ‘’s’’ in a word is unvoiced or voiced.

It also can have a different meaning when the’’ th’’ is voiced or unvoiced. It is important to pronounce it in a correct way.

Concerning the suffix  ‘’ed’’ it is also important to not pronounce it as a ‘’t’’, this is just wrong wrong wrong J

The pronunciation for the words ‘’bin’’&’’pin’’ and ‘’off’’&’’of’’ should also be a different one.

Now it’s your turn: Try to read this text out loud!

1. Geoffrey saw the pass/path and took it.

2. Thora and Thelma read all about the trees/threes.

3. After the rain, his booths/boots were covered with mud.

4. All the students saw the free/three men and applauded.

5. The new manager really liked his new theme/team

1) I laughed at the joke. 

2) Our work is finished.

3) The snake killed the mouse. 

4) The teacher helped the student. 

5) When I was younger, I wanted to walk on the moon. 

6) We hiked to the top of the mountain. 

7) James rented his apartment. 

8) We can’t go swimming because the pool is covered.

9) That old house is haunted. 

10) We hunted for her keys, but could not find them.

I’ll really try to consider all these points on Thursday!!!

http://www.eslflow.com/pronunciationlessonplans.html

One year at University

This year at University was probably the most interesting one. I’ve learned a lot, improved my English (that’s what I think) and experienced a lot of good things and bad things. I’ll come to that later.

The semester started, of course, in October. I had signed in for too many courses, like SUK1, two other English courses, sign language and other different things. Otherwise it won’t have been challenging – just kidding J SUK1 turned out to be the most difficult one. I spent many hours on studying for all the exams and at the end it did not even work out the way I wanted.

The 2^nd semester was challenging as well. After passing the “Sprachprüfung” for Sign Language, I could sign in for SUK1. This semester I had 5 exams until now and many other things to do, the semester turned out to be awesome though. I’ve learned so many things, improved my English (even when it’s just a little bit) and I’ve already passed Sign Language.

I wanted to mention the good things I experienced. I met so many nice people. I’m so happy that I had the chance to get to know them.

Summing up, I really learned a lot, this is one of the many things:

"Life is a song - sing it.

Life is a game - play it.

Life is a challenge - meet it.

 Life is a dream - realize it.

Life is a sacrifice - offer it.

Life is love - enjoy it."

Life is awesome. It’s so important to take it the way it is. Every person is awesome. And the most important thing is: Don’t give up - No matter what. In German I would say: “Ma gibt nur an Brief auf”.

SUK PC2

Today was the most horrifying day, excuse me.. no.. the most amazing day of the year. I got to finish my last PC this semester. Yay J

My day started like every Thursday. I got up at 7:45, got on my way to university. Nothing special. At University we just talked about the upcoming exam. Everyone was nervous and interested in what the pc will look like. In class we learned how to write a report. Nothing special either.

However, at 18:30 the PC did start. I planned on starting off with the writing task, since the other way round it has not worked before. When I saw what the report was about, I changed my plans though and started with vocab and grammar. Some parts of the things tested on grammar and vocab were totally okay, but some things I were not easy at all. Like the exercise about collocations. I don’t know if I’ve got any of them right. I hope I do. The other parts were partly okay and partly difficult. After  50  minutes we had our vocab and grammar part to be finished up and switched to the writing task.

The writing task was about .. aah I don’t have to tell you what the writing task was about. It was not easy at all for me. The main problem was the fact that I got to nervous. I changed my topic of the 3 paragraphs like thousand times and I started to write 20 minutes before the end of the exam. Awesome. I hope it will be graded positive.

After whining about the pc, I wish you a nice/beautiful day. Bye.

A new Down's syndrome test - Why??

A new test, detecting if a baby has Down’s syndrome, was invented. This can be tested in the FIRST trimester.  The new kind of analysis a baby’s DNA in its mother’s blood.

 Current tests can be administered between the 11^th and 13^th week of pregnancy, using ultrasounds and a hormonal analysis. This method of testing is a first look at the feasibility of screening for the chromosomal disorders.

However, the new method can limit the false positive rates to 0.1%.  Which is good, but… now to the main reason why I want to talk about this topic…

What is the right thing to do after being tested positive and the knowledge of having a baby with this kind of disability? Is it okay to have an abortion? Is it okay? I can persuasively say that I think it would not be okay.  Having an abortion means ending the short life of a human being - Just because it is unique? Every human being deserves to have the chance to live. So why do there even tests exist to find out if a baby has Trisomy? I don’t know. I would ban tests like that. 

Canada Day

Since I am going to spend one month in Canada this summer, it’s interesting to me to know how they celebrate their most important day of the year.

However, first of all I want to tell why I am going to spend one moth in Canada, where exactly, what I am going to do and much more. I am going to live in Vancouver, North Vancouver exactly. My plan is to improve my English by taking language courses and living with a host family. I want to see as much of the city and the surrounding areas as possible. I won’t be alone, because a friend comes with me. It’s going to be an amazing time and we well learn and see a lot. J

So, now I want to switch to Canada’s most important day and how to celebrate it. When is it celebrated? - At the 1^st of June. And what is celebrated? - The birth of the nation and when Canada gained its freedom from British rule.

Now to the tips:                                                      

1.   Dress in a patriotic way to show your pride for Canada (dying the hair colour and wearing Canadian flags and clothes are options too)
2. Being a part of parades can mean a lot of fun
3. Having a cookout with your family is a nice tradition too (It depends on the area you live, but here are some meals to cook: Deep fried bread dough with cinnamon and chili (beaver tails), Lobster rolls or fried clams, Baklava… )
4.  Letting off fireworks can be awesome too 

Birthday weeks

Our families birthday weeks have been special to me and all my family members and always will be. Our birthday weeks start with my cousin’s birthday at the 29^th of May and I am the last person to celebrate her birthday at the 6^th of June. My aunt’s birthday is at the 5^th of June and my mom’s birthday at the 31th of May. However, birthday weeks mean spending way more time with our family than we usually do. My mom and grandmother always bake a lot of cakes and cooked desserts.

We all sit together, talk a lot, tell funny stories and have a nice time.  Unfortunately I have a lot to learn this year, so there’s not enough time to celebrate.

My experience with Invisalign

Some of you might not have heard about what Invisalign is? So I’ll explain first. Invisalign is a method to straighten your teeth. How? - With almost invisible plastic trays. Each of them has to be worn for 2 weeks. The length of the treatment varies from case to case (6 months to 3 years or longer).

In case some of you have not noticed, I’ve been wearing them since August. But why did I decide to get them and when?? It was almost one year ago when I decided to make an appointment with my dentist to see what options I had to straighten my teeth. I could have decided to get brackets or Invisalign trays. My decision was, of course, to wear Invisalign trays, since they are almost invisible. Before they started preparing my trays, I could see what my teeth would look like once it is finished. It looked amazing. However, it took them three months to prepare my 36 pairs of aligners. It was the end of July when I first got them. OMG, it hurt so much the first night and at the beginning I could hear a little bit of a lisp. But I go used to them and it’s getting better from tray to tray.

I would recommend choosing Invisalign as a method to straighten your teeth. As I mentioned, they are almost invisible. No one will notice and they don’t hurt as much as brackets.

Formula 1 in Bahrain

As all of you guys know, I am kind of addicted to watching Formula 1 races. I can’t miss any of them. Luckily, season 2013 has just started and the first four races couldn’t have been more exciting.

 

 

The last race in Bahrain was the most interesting one, starting with a fight for position one including Vettel, Alonso and Rosberg. After the first lap, the race was easy for Vettel. The fact that he was at the first position from this moment on, made it easier for him to spare his tyres. For people like Alonso this race wasn’t a piece of cake. His DRS system was damaged. You probably don’t know what DRS is, right? DRS improves the acceleration of the car and gives it more power to overtake. FORTUNATELY, Alonso couldn’t use this system. That’s the reason he ended up being on position 8.  This race was disappointing for Rosberg as well. Starting from the Pole, he just could finish this race on the 9th position, according to 4 pit stops and a car which couldn’t spare his tyres. Räikkönen did an incredible job on this race as well. Since his car could not meet up with the expectations on the qualifying, ending at the 2^nd place was an incredible result for him. Apart from that, there were like thousands of other interesting things to watch.

I’m looking forward to watching the next race in almost one week.

The Rainbow Run

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=toQfPmA8IIo

Have you heard about the Rainbow Run in Ireland? I have not… until now. The Rainbow Run is Irelands most awesome and fun run. It involves participants of all abilities and ages and getting doused from head to toe with coloured powder paint.  : )

When?   - While they run.

The good thing about that run is that it does not matter how fast you run, no record times will be measured. The goal is just to enjoy yourself and finish being covered in loads of colour.

The winner is the person who has the most fun.

There is not special dress code, but they would recommend being dressed as white as possible.

Another good thing is that a part of the ticket sales goes to a company fighting cancer.

OMG, amazing ha?

I would totally love to go there.. Who wants to join me ? Maybe next year? :D 

Love food Hate waste

While I was searching for a blog about food on the internet, I found a really interesting one. The blog’s name is ‘’Love food hate waste’’ and it’s all about, you might guess, facts of how much food we actually waste and how we can limit the huge amount. This blog also tells us that the inhabitants of England throw away 7.2 million tonnes of food and drinks from homes every day, which is not just sad because millions of people are starving (and we throw good food away), it’s bad for the environment too.

However, one amazing feature is called ‘’Do I really waste food’’? With this feature you can ‘’explore your kitchen and see where you might be wasting good food without even realising and find out ways to waste less’’. This feature was quite interesting because I learned a lot about saving food.

Another interesting thing about this blog was one post, which was about Free, healthy and tasty lunching for the kids. Here are just two tips provided by this blog entry:

1

1. .      “Vary it each day. Don’t stick to the same lunch. It’ll get boring. For instance try using Wraps (which freeze well) one day, rolls the next. By keeping them in your freezer you can use whatever you want each day, even if plans change, and no waste!”
2.     “Make it bite-sized, finger food – easy to eat. Mini strips of homemade pizza, mini sandwiches made from frozen bread and cheese, or slices of easy cheesy pasta bake.”

These things would have helped me and my mom when I went to school. Since I am a little bit fussy, I didn’t eat my lunch that often. :-P

http://england.lovefoodhatewaste.com/content/facts-about-food-waste-0

Schapendoes

I know.. We shouldn't post anything about our animals, but I'd really like to tell you something about my dog and about his breed, His name is Smily and he is 14.5 years OLD. Sometimes kinda' annoying but such a lovely member of my family.
Schapendoes are in general Dutch Sheepdogs and their origins can be found in the Netherlands. They were originally herding dogs. Unfortunately, the breed became almost extinct during the World War 2 but it gott better,, as far as know,
Appearance:

• medium seized dog
• small ears covered with long fur
• height: up to 60cm
• weight. 12 - 20kg

Temperament; 

•  friendly
• high spirited
• affectionate
• intelligent

Awesome, right? ;-)

Ýou are beautiful!!!

People judge. People judge other people because of their appearance. Everyone has to be perfect. Everyone should be thin, have perfect hair and so on. This leads to many problems. Oneof  them is  anorexia nervosa.

Anorexia nervosa is an eating disorder. People (especially girls between the age of 15 and 18) think they are fat, even when they have less than 45kg. AN causes in the most cases health problems because they lose too much weight in a short period of time. Typical symptoms are low pulse, low temperature, depression and the fact that they still don’t like the way they look like.

Why?? In magazines and/or on TV there are just models who seem to be perfect. They are thin, have perfect hair. Most of the girls don’t know that the photos are ‘’photoshoped’’ and want to look like them. They stop eating or/and do a lots of sport. They should see how the models really look like and start loving themselves the way they are. Which is not easy but possible.

Two new TV shows I really like

SUK2 Fiona Freepost SS13 TV shows

Since there is no “Private Practice” and Desperate Housewives anymore, I got kind of bored. That’s the reason I looked for other TV shows to replace them.

“The Carrie Diaries”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PBctXyhhRq8

By coincidence I found a TV show called “The Carrie Diaries”. It is all about a girl, Carrie, who is 16 years old and lives in a small town in the 1984’s. Carrie goes to school with her best friends and the guy she has a crush on. Since the story takes place in 1984,  the dress code is a little bit weird. Although, I don’t want to reveal too many details, but I would really recommend you watching this TV show. It’s definitely worth a try.

Btw. The first season has just started at the end of January!!!!

Anger Management

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wbOHhDyjuQ4

Since Charlie Sheen was kicked out of his amazing TV show “Two and a half men”, he wanted to get a second chance by producing a new TV show, which is called Anger Management. Charlie is an anger therapist. The storyline is all about him talking to his ‘’anger management group’’ and having a “relationship” with his therapist and friend. This TV show isn’t as good as expected but still worth watching.

When you have any questions where you can watch these TV shows, feel free to ask me  :-D

The AAC

The Anglo Austrian Circle has one main meeting every week. This is called ‘’Stammtisch’’.  I’ve been there a few times. Every time I was there, it was a lot of fun and I met new people. Now  I want to tell you guys what the Stammtisch is really about, where it takes place and who you'll meet there. The English Stammtisch takes place every Thursday. Where? At ‘’Die Herzl’’. When? At 20:30.


What is it about?? That’s what the webpage says and it describes the Stammtisch the best:
“The AAC (Anglo Austrian Circle) is not the world’s easiest thing to define. It’s a group of people with a common interest: the English language. Other than that, it’s all about diversity and learning about other cultures.”
 [http://www.anglo-austrian.at/]
So... Who comes to the Stammtisch???
Mostly native speakers from countries like (England, Scotland, New Zealand, USA,..), people from other countries (like Russia, Spain, Poland, Hungary, Italy, Croatia, …), students or other people from Austria who are just interested in speaking English.
Everyone is invited to join the English Stammtisch.