Flipsides next

Having learnt the active verbs, we'll take a look this week at the passives.

For those of you who need a refresher on the actives, here's the definitive chart (above).

Go .... grammar!

Weekly Schedule

Having tried different formats and received your feedback over the last three months, I've finally come up with a new weekly schedule to try out from December onwards.

Let's give it a go (or, give it a shot/try/whirl) and see how it goes, okay?

Hope by the time you see this, you'd have had a good weekend!

Dunno About This Toronto Mass Choir for Field Trip on Dec. 20

I know many of you were interested in going back to the Roy Thomson Hall for their next free concert, with the Toronto Mass Choir.

So I thought we'd better preview their singing:



Take a look and let me know if you're still keen on going there. We do have alternatives for winter destinations. These include:

- Earl Bales Ski and Snowboard Centre (I've taken a LINC class there before)

- Honest Ed's shopping centre and Koreatown



I believe our school may be planning a trip to the Ontario Science Centre on top of these.

And please click the Comment option to give me your feedback! Thanks!

All over the shop today

Today we started with marshmallows (a fake Marshmallow Test, haha), and then progressed to our weekly theme of Online Shopping with a look at Toys 'R' Us and Amazon.com calling it quits over Toysrus.com, where we got bogged down with the article till lunch.

Now, after lunch, having enjoyed Andreea's wonderful snow pictures, we're listening to a podcast on online shopping, getting hooked up on Google's Collaborative Calendar (what a pain!!), and trying to get ourselves on Facebook, which is quite the Canadian thing to do!

And Rafia gets her special lesson on resume creation, and Azad and Rafia get their own blogs--hey, send me the links quick, willya?

Good to see Nadia, too.

Class Collaborative Calendar

Here's YOUR Calendar on Google:



To get there, here's the LINK.

Feel free to fill in the blanks!

Field Trip to Downtown & Roy Thomson Hall

Six of us, Steven, Janet, Jenny, Hossein, Tao, and I started off from Sheppard and Yonge and got off at King, marching our way west through Toronto's PATH Underground City to the Roy Thomson Hall, where we were joined by Amir.

We got there early and were among the first 50 in line. While waiting to go in, we were chatted up very nicely by a retired nurse and her friend. Too bad, we didn't exchange particulars, but it was a very warm and hospitable touch from a Canadian Canadian!

We finally got our seats, and what a treat awaited. The first item on the program was this:



For those Baroquesquely challenged, it was Alessandro Scarlatti's Exultate Deo--at least that's what the program says, anyway.

And the treat just went on and on:

By Buxtehude, Jesu, meines Lebens Leben, BuxWV62; Toccata in D Minor, BuxWV 155; Befiehl dem Engel dass er komm, BuxWV 10. The Ottawa Bach Choir, conducted by Dr Lisette Canton, made it look easy to produce the voices of angels. Jennifer Loveless on the organ impressed with what hands and feet can do with the largest musical instrument of all, soloing on Buxtehude's Toccata and, later, Bach's Prelude and Fugue in B Minor, BWV 544.

More goodies followed: Jacobus Gallus's Duo Seraphim; Saint-saens' Calme des nuits, Opus 68, No. 1; Eric Whitacre's Lux aurumque; Knut Nystedt's Immortal Bach; and then J.S. Bach himself: his O Jesu Christ, meins Lebens Licht, BWV 118; Prelude and Fugue already mentioned; and Der Geist hilft unser Schwachheit auf, BWV 226.

The last one (one youtube version here) was particularly startling, for you'd never guess from its joyful tones that it was composed for the funeral of Bach's pastor in 1729. I guess it simply reflects his theology, that through knowing Christ one has conquered death and can do brilliant work in the most bitter of settings.

I was grateful for the patience of my class, who put up with my hoarse growling and irritating hisses and tsks as I'd lost my voice. Hmm, we'll see about tomorrow's lesson--maybe a movie! :D

Going Places Tomorrow!

Tomorrow's our field trip downtown to the free concert of the Ottawa Bach Choir at the Roy Thomson Hall.

Sure hope they have livelier pieces than this:



According to the program, they're going to sing pieces by "Scarlatti, Buxtehude, Bach, Saint-Saëns, Villette, Whitacre, Nystedt and more."

If you're coming by TTC, be sure to meet us at the Sheppard-Yonge station at 10 a.m. on the southbound platform! Seeya later!

Thanks, Dave!

TESL practicum student David Kloosterman successfully fulfilled his teaching hours today, and we'd like to thank him for teaching us, over these three past Wednesdays, about past modals, letter writing, and Downtown Toronto.

Dave has a couple more weeks to got before graduating from his course at Seneca, and we wish him the very best of success!

A parade I didn't attend

Except via Youtube:


Yeah, right. Merry early Christmas!

Saturday at the TESL Ontario Conference

Last Saturday I spent the day at the posh Sheraton hotel downtown attending the annual TESL Ontario Conference. Although I missed the free lunch, given only to those who signed up for the plenary session--as the rest of us found out later!!--I was glad to have found some useful resources that I acquired using the generous budget allotted. Among these were conversation books, storybooks with audio CDs, and "English Verb Discs," which cost $3 for those with Chinese captions and $4 for those without. Asked why, the sales guy said that it's cheaper to make them in China, which is where those $3 ones came from. So I picked up all of them, all five discs that he had, which, with GST, came to $15.75.

I'd intended to go to the Art Gallery of Ontario after that, but having marched over there in the relentless rain, all I could see was a snake of people encircling the AGO. Even though entrance was free Friday through Sunday, worth $18 per person, there was no way I was going to queue up for the next couple of hours. I resolved to tour the place via youtube, which I did (see clip).


Instead, I kept going northwest, to Chinatown for lunch and then to Honest Ed's, where I picked up two pairs of winter gloves. By the time I got home, I was totally wasted. I'm glad to be back in my normal habitat of the LINC classroom, and to welcome two new students this morning--Tao and Mersedeh!

HAPPY ESL WEEK 2008!

Learning a second language is never easy, especially for adults. So I'm proud of the progress being made by the learners in my LINC class.

As ESL learners, you will have many experiences that you will cherish and bring with you through life. Some may be good or bad, or funny or weird. It's always a good idea to keep a record of your thoughts and feelings during this time of your life so that you can review them in the future.

Even better, this week being ESL Week, you can publish your writing by sending it to TESL Ontario, organizers of ESL Week:

http://www.teslontario.ca/esl-week/website-writing-contributions/

Writing Contributions 2008
In the upcoming months, weeks, and days leading up to ESL week, November 9-15 2008, we want to thank both ESL teachers/instructors and students for all the hard work that they do throughout the year. As a way to connect our members, learners, and communities alike, we are asking all those involved with ESL to submit a written work related to ESL in Ontario.

We are hoping to post and share your writing on our website as a way to inspire both ESL teachers/instructors and learners by reading the thoughts and stories of others. This is also a great opportunity for our members and their students to have their writing “published”. In fact, we will be choosing a few submissions that will become part of our ESL week display, along with some of our poster contest entries, at Toronto’s City Hall on November 12th-15th.

Here are some possible writing prompts you may wish to use as a meaningful classroom activity:

My ESL class is…
The best class ever was…
My favourite ESL teacher is…
The funniest thing happened in class one day…
My classmates…
Learning English is…

Please feel free to be as creative as you want with your writing! Why not even use this opportunity as a way to teach poetry or even write a song?

All writing should be e-mailed to: administration@teslontario.org . Please include:

The student’s name, teacher and school
or
Your own name and school for teachers/instructors

Be sure to check out our website http://www.teslontario.org// to get other ideas and updates on happenings for ESL week 2008. We truly look forward to receiving your submissions and can’t wait to read what you and your students have to say!

So, what's keeping you? Make sure, when you send your writing to TESL Ontario, to CC: me as well, okay? All the best!!

P.S. Check out the posters at the Poster Contest website--which are your favourites?

Who could climb out of this hole?

I love this short movie--in three short minutes it cuts through all religions and philosophy and gets right to the heart of the matter: life, death, and salvation:


How could one know if any of this is true--who told you, who showed you, so what?

PS: Be careful about following a church or church leaders rather than the Bible. See what happened in this most "holy" place. "Churchianity" is not Christ-ianity.

Just updated the Class Page: Famous ESL Learners

Tough job, but the list includes successful ESL learners from:

Korea


Romania


Iran


And more! Check them out: http://tinyurl.com/6pn78u

Welcome Robert! Goodbye Andreea!

Today, we had a new student come to class. His name is Robert. He's from Tianjin, China.

Unfortunately, Robert isn't fully registered for class yet, but we hope to see him in two weeks.

Also, very sadly, we had to say goodbye to Andreea, who's going back to Romania. We hope to keep in touch with her by email and maybe, if Amir creates a weblog for us, then by weblog.