Hello! Welcome!

let's blog!

Links to our blog

BLOG_EFL (Wed, 30 July 2003)

[bloglab] (25 Aug. 2003)

Edblogger Praxis (EFL/ESL Link List, 20 Aug. 2003)

[zaptlogs] (26 Aug. 2003)

Useful pages

Dictionary

Picture Dictionary

Irregular verbs

Pronunciation A-H

Pronunciation I-P

Pronunciation Q-Z

Self-study

S.Pres. & Pres. Cont.

Your work

School in our grandparents' days

Sports (dialogs)

Pair dialogues

I'm starving! (dialogs)

Everything you send me will be on this page!

Our blog will include fun and interesting activities, readings and exercises from the Internet that you can do at home when you feel like it (= quando te apetecer). You can also send me your suggestions of activities! I will publish them on this page.

So. . . when you have a suggestion, or something you would like to tell us, please click on the email icon on the right (the bottle). Don't forget to start your message with "Hello" or "Hi" and to include your name and class (7A, 7B, 7C) at the end! I will not publish anonymous messages!

Remember: We are in this together!

With your participation, this blog can be great fun!

Send in you first message right away and I will put it on this page immediately!

Interesting pages

Jogo do 24 Photos: 1+2, 3+4, 5+6

Intriguing page

Student work

Student Recipes (9th grade, 2001-02)

Aug03

Jul03

Jun03

May03

Apr03

Mar03

first activity:

'Decode' my message!

Find the "mystery words" behind the symbols (top left)!

The first student to send me a message with the correct words

will get a prize next class! Get to work!! Hurry up!!!

Congratulations to Jing and Peipei (7. C) for their bronze medal in the 'Jogo do 24' semi-finals last Friday in Lisbon. They did a fabulous job and represented our school superbly!!!

Congratulations also to the great cheerleading team that got first prize for the best school poster!

Take a look at some of the photos! (1+2, 3+4 and 5+6)

And now, here's the cheerleading song they sang outside (not during the competition, because 100% concentration for the players is essential!):

A nossa escola é a maior

Estamos aqui para vos apoiar

Força malta, vamos pensar

Isto é para ganhar!

Cantamos por ti [solista]

Cantamos por ti [coro]

Gritamos por ti [solista]

Gritamos por ti [coro]

Porque a nossa fé está em vós [solista]

Porque a nossa fé está em vós [coro]

Somos nós

Somos nós

O orgulho da Parede somos nós [coro e solista].

31Mar03

Mother: "Did you enjoy your first day at school?"
Little girl: "First day? Do you mean I have to go back tomorrow?"
(Miguel de Paco Moltó)

Student: "Would you punish me for something I didn't do?"
Teacher: "Of course not."
Student: "Good, because I haven't done my homework."
(Miguel de Paco Moltó)

Both taken from "Jokes for the ESL/EFL Classroom - Short Jokes" (http://iteslj.org/c/jokes-short.html)

Now here's an exercise I made in Apr. 1999 for my students to practise the Simple Present and Present Continuous. It is about a cousin of mine. Try it! It's fun and easy!

Hello, teacher!!! How are you?

We are fine, and we are sending you this e-mail to say how much we like your site.

It's very good elabored! It's a funny study site where we have a lot of exercises, texts, historys. We like especiallity your cooking session; it's very, very nice!!!

Felicitations about your site, is "100%"!! Continue good and we hope your site is very visited!!

Kisses,

Camila, Miguel and Ricardo  7. A

Re: how we like your site

Dear Camila, Miguel and Ricardo:

You made my day with your message! (= Ganhei o dia com a vossa mensagem!) Thank you!!!

Because you liked my cooking session on 'oven-baked codfish' (bacalhau assado no forno), I put a link to the page so that others can see it.

BTW, it is not my page, it is our page, ok?

Miguel, how did Jing and Peipei do on the semi-final of 'Jogo do 24' today? I hope they did brilliantly, as usual! And how did the cheerleading group (= claque) behave?

I have two suggestions: First, why don't you explain briefly the Jogo do 24 and maybe we can include a link to some Web page about it? Second, why don't we include in our blog the cheerleader song you sang to 'support' your colleagues? Did you take any photos? We could also put them here!

That's it for now. Have a great weekend, everyone!

Your English teacher

27Mar03

What is happening? Don't you like our page? Isn't there any fun activity here? Nothing that interests you?

I have suggested several things up to now: 

• the math activity above;
• a very curious and intriguing Web site/page! (9Mar);
• impressions or comments on the I'M STARVING dialogues (12Mar);
• your field trip to Conimbriga (13Mar);
• comments to my friends messages about our blog (13-15Mar);
• a short and funny story (16Mar).

Think about these things. Go down the page and take a look. And send your comments about anything you'd like. Remember, you are not going to learn English if you don't practice! Come on! Start sending those messages! Make me happy!

In the meantime, I tried to forget how sad I am and prepared a new page with some of your pair dialogues about a picnic, a class party and at a friend's house after school. Remember? Most of you roleplayed/acted (= representaram) them in class last week. Click here to see if yours is there. And let us know which one you preferred and why, ok?

By the way, is there anything different about this page today? I'd like to know who is the first to notice the change! When you do, I'll include a funny school joke!

23Mar03

How are you?
Godbye and have a nice day!
Sofia 7º B

Re: hello teacher!

Hi, Sofia!

Nice to hear from you! Thank you. :-)
How do you like our blog? Please give us your impressions, ok?
Hope to hear from you.
Your English teacher

19Mar03

Take a look at http://alothman-b.tripod.com/weblog_handout.htm

Isn't that great? People from far away are looking at our blog and talking about it!

18Mar03

Mrs Andrews had a young cat and it was the cat's first winter. One evening it was outside when it began to snow heavily. Mrs Andrews looked everywhere and shouted its name, but she did not find it, so she telephoned the police and said, "I have lost a small black cat. Has anybody found one?"

"No, madam," said the policeman at the other end. "But cats are really very strong animals. They sometimes live for days in the snow, and when it melts or somebody finds them, they are quite all right."

Mrs Andrews felt happier when she heard this. "And," she said, "our cat is very clever. She almost talks."

The policeman was getting rather tired. "Well then," he said, "why don't you put your telephone down? Perhaps she is trying to telephone you now."

Elementary Stories for Reproduction - L. A. Hill. p. 20. OUP, 1976. 

Did you like the story? Do you think it's funny?

Do you have a pet? A cat? A dog? Is there any funny or curious episode you can tell us? We'll be waiting!

16Mar03

Hi, Aiden!

Thanks for your enthusiasm with my first try at blogging! . . .

I wanted to try and have my students interact with me and among themselves. To
get them curious about the page, I did that first activity with a prize. It
ended being a mouse pad that has the shape of a mouse. Ricardo really liked
it. I will have something different every week, either an activity or a joke
they can comment on (do you know of any sites where I can get a joke now and
then without having to make a link to a whole page of jokes?), or some story
I can link to and they can read and comment, etc.

. . . I called it blog7 because I'm
teaching 7th grade this year. Students send their messages to me and I
upload them and add my comments. I check mail 2-3 times a day, because I
like them to know I'm always attentive. Only half of my students have
Internet at home. If they visit the page from school, they don't have access
to email. However, if they like the content, they can always ask a friend or
neighbor to send a message.

It's the first page of its kind at my school and probably in my area, so I'm
also telling my students that we are doing innovative work and that if we
make it work, it'll be a project to show the school at the end of the school
year. BTW, I'm going to present it to my department in a meeting next week.
. . .

Hope to meet you soon f2f!

Teresa

15Mar03

Dear Tere,

Thanks for sharing with us your experiences using blogs with your students. I have been so motivated by their entries, that I decided to start my own blog. You can visit it here:

http://dafraco.blogspot.com/

This is how I started my blog:

Dear Daf,

Dear Buth:

. . . Speaking of blogs, Buth and all Webheads, when you have some time, check the
blog my students and I are gradually building and send your comments. I've
included a link to a part of one of our Sunday chats when we talked about
it. I think my students will enjoy reading comments from some of my friends
on the Internet. I sometimes tell them about WiA.

The blog is at

http://www.malhatlantica.pt/teresadeca/school/blog7.htm

Teresa

Dear Teresa,
. . . Regarding Web-logs, the one you built is very good.I almost liked everything about, including, clarity, easy to use, and the activities are also fun and motivating.It's obvious that your students like, and I hope that it continues working until the end of the year.Your success is our success Teresa.Sorry I missed your presentation on Web-logs at TI. . . At this point I'm experimenting with tools together with my students, like Teresa and other webheads.I hope our projects continue working until the end of this semester. I hope to meet with you then, we might as well, do present together at TI2, maybe, and talk about our experiments.
Wish you the best of luck, and look forward to meet with you in Baltimre.
Buthaina

13Mar03

Hi,teacher!!! I want your to visit your page. That's very good and
interesting. It's good for studing English, especially pronunciation. The
page can improve my English. Thanks for to your help!!!:D Best wishes for
you.

                                    Jing Lou  7oC

Re: Congratulation

Hi, Jing!

I'm glad that you visited 'our' page (not mine) and liked it.
Yes, I hope you can learn some English in a different way and with lots of
fun!
And remember to make suggestions of things you would like to have in this
page.
Have a great weekend!
Your English teacher

VIP(oints):

* * * * * *

Read my short dialog with Miguel Grilo (7.A) this morning when he came into class and said:

-- Teacher, your page is very nice!

-- Thank you, Miguel! Did you send your comment?

-- No. I was in the school computer and there was no mail.

-- Can you send it from home?

-- Yes, if my email is working. I don't understand much about that!

VIP: Miguel, it is comments like yours, Hulda's and Jing's that 'make my day' and tell me that this page is a very good idea!!! Thank you all! And let's continue building it together!

12Mar03

Hello, teacher!!!
I like your page, is very gooooood!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I don`t know how to speak well, but I know that your page is beautiful.
The answer is 98 games.
Am I right?

Hulda Marques nº7 7ºC

Re: resposta da hulda

Hi, Hulda!

Thank you! I'm glad you like 'our' page. :-)
You don't need to speak or write well to send messages, Hulda. You just need
to continue visiting the 'blog page' and make your comments, ok?
Well, I'm afraid the answer is not 98. It's not as simple as it looks. Let
me try and give you a clue (pista). Count the games played by each team. I
hope this helps. If not, tell me and I will try to help in a different way.
:-)
Hulda, keep on thinking! And please tell us how you got 98, will you?
Have a nice weekend!
Your English teacherHi, Hulda!

If you figure it out, please send a message explaining, ok?

9Mar03

MATH  FANS!

To all the Math whiz kids, especially to Jing and Peipei: take a look at the problem below and explain your solution in a message.

Big Eight Basketball Problem

There are eight basketball teams in the Big Eight League, including the LA Lakers. If each team plays each of the other teams twice during the season, how many total games must be scheduled?

Hi  teacher trere's is your dicipher!!!

Hello! Welcome!     (Teacher did i won????)

Ricardo Marques nº18 7ºC  goodbye

Re: decipher

Hi, Ricardo!

Yes, you won! Great! Congratulations!

'Hello! Welcome!' is the correct message. Can you tell us how you deciphered it?

BTW, Ricardo, have you tried the Math problem? It is part of a project I
describe in my new book, _O E-mail na Sala de Aula_. Did you know that?

Thanks for participating. See you in class on Monday.

Have a nice weekend!

Your English teacher

8Mar03

VIP(oints):

I have added a link to an online dictionary (left column, above). You can click on it, write the word you don't know and look at the definition and examples. I hope this helps you.

In the same column I also introduced Homework, because some of you suggested it.

2Mar03

Hello teacher!!! how are you. this page is good and that light over there is a (uma ideia) anda the ather is a (cool)(fixe)

1Mar03

Hi, Ricardo! Thanks for your message. It was the first one! :-)  The secret message you need to 'decipher' is on the left of 'Let's blog'. Try again, ok?  Hope you have nice holidays and fun at Carnival. Bye! Your English teacher