Monday's Assignment

Welcome back from your Canada Day week's break! How was it?

This afternoon, we continue our work from this morning:

1. Can you guess what this fellow did last week by looking at his three latest pictures? 
1. Write three paragraphs about your holiday week, covering 
1. one special place you went to, 
2. one special person you talked to, and 
3. one special thought you thought about. 
2. Have a couple of partners check your work and then publish it to your blog. If you do not have a blog, find one or two partners who do to show you how.
2. Today, we start a week on global issues on the theme of Canada in the Global Village. 

1. Watch three or four videos here, and tell a partner what you'd like to look out for or take a picture of during our field trip to City Hall and the 2014 Caribana launch tomorrow. Bring a camera, some lunch money or snacks, and maybe a good umbrella or raincoat! We might also be able to catch parts of City Council live. Anyway, we should all gather at Nathan Phillips Square for a class photo at 12 noon. 
2. To get there together, let us meet and leave together from Bayview Subway Station's westbound platform at 10 a.m.
3. Reading Comprehension: Learn and publish sentences with 5 new words from this first Wiki paragraph.
4. First, practise by yourself a few times, and then find a partner and role play: Vacationing on an Island.

Friday's Assignment

1. Write a report on yesterday's schoolwide field trip.

• Include information on the weather, participants, scenery, activities, and food.
• Get pictures from this blog or elsewhere (e.g. Facebook) and add captions to each.
• Have at least two other classmates check your work before publishing.
• Comment on three other classmates' blogs.
2. Compare Kijiji and Craigslist vs other job search sites, such as those you looked at earlier this week. List three differences and discuss them with a partner. (If you prefer the challenge, you can do Task 2 of today's Workplace English assignment instead.)

Thursday's Schoolwide Field Trip

Here are some pictures from the picnic (more on Facebook):

Some of the beautiful people that showed up on a beautiful day yesterday: Nishi, Fottima, Benny, Yun Xia, Salim, Tao, and some of their children

Benny, John, Vanessa, and Yun Xia about to demolish the sushi

For details and map to Bluffers Park, be sure to check out this fabulous website.

Wednesday's Assignment

The first job for many in Canada is often an unpaid one, a voluntary job. As a volunteer, you get not only real Canadian work experience, but your dedication could earn you referrals and recommendations when your bosses become your work references. This morning we look at what volunteer positions available in Canada.

1. Using the editing checklist and corrected blog printouts, update your blogs to reflect the corrections.
2. Listen and roleplay with a partner: Getting a dream job.
3. Find 3 volunteer positions you would be interested in, and tell a partner what they are and why you would be interested in them.
4. If you have some time left, complete the assignments you may have left unfinished.

Tuesday's Assignment

Good morning! Are you "linked in" yet? Today we continue on the theme of job search with an online networking website:

1. Connect with 5 classmates at Linkedin.com. Discuss with a partner how LinkedIn is different from Facebook. Think of three differences.
2. Listen and roleplay with a partner: A job recommendation
3. Reading and vocabulary: Reviewing job applications

Monday's Assignment

Good morning! Welcome to our last week before the Canada Day week off. Can you guess the theme/s of the week?

  

 Here are your tasks for this morning:

1. Find a previous or a prospective job on Monster.ca or Jobboard. Think of who you might want or not want to be your 3 references. Discuss your reasons with a partner.
2. Headphones on, practise singing O Canada with this video. Write down and look up any words you don’t know. Practise again with this guy.

 

 

Friday's Assignment

Great job, everyone, on completing the dreaded editing checklist, some of you for the first time! Here are your tasks for this afternoon:

1. Use your editing checklist to correct your posts on your blog. Make sure to look for all nine items on the checklist and ask two partners to help you check before clicking on the Update Button.
2. Take dictation from this clip: 00:40 - 01:06
3. Check with 3 partners before posting on your blog.

Write your parenting advice on summer to newcomers. Use a numbered list and include 5 to 10 points.


Sometimes parents give up and call in a professional. What do you call a professional who is paid to take care of the kids? What do you call a superhuman professional who is paid to take care of the kids? What do you call one that goes beyond that?

See the rest of the cartoon here.

So, here are your tasks:

1. Choose two of these dilemmas and study them for 8 vocabulary words. Then use these words in an email to give parenting advice to a struggling parent. Feel free to share from your personal experience with parenting, whether with your kids or maybe your parents! Publish your email on your blog.
2. Read three of your classmates’ blogs and leave a comment on each.
3. When you've finished, watch the Super Nanny video below with a partner and discuss your thoughts about the mom's, the dad's, and the supernanny's roles:

Thursday's Assignment

Good morning! Taking the kids out to the park or to a festival can do something for your parenting creds. What's the fun activity in the video below called?



Some of these venues you may visit on field trips, and others you may discover by yourself. Try to think like a parent in today's assignment:

1. Publish on your blog a report on Friday’s extended field trip. Either write it via computer or speak it into an Android/iPhone via the Blogger mobile app.
2. Add some nice pictures. Then go and comment on three of your classmates’ blogs.
3. Check out this weekend's Toronto Waterfront Fest. Learn the vocabulary words using Google/Youtube, and make a field trip itinerary for your family. Share it with with two or three partners.

Wednesday's Assignment

For some people, one of the most memorable aspects of parenting dilemmas is being at a parent-teacher interview.

1. Reading and Speaking: Practise, and role play this dialogue with a partner. Record your voices on audioboo and post the link on your blog.
2. Listening, Writing, and Vocabulary: Listen to this conversation and make sentences with five new words.

Tuesday's Assignment

Have you got a spoilt child? Or perhaps have you been one? Or, uh oh, are you one yourself? Have you ever been disciplined?

1. Have a look at the cartoons and tell a partner how each one is funny (or isn't).
2. Practise, and role play this dialogue with a partner. Record your voices on audioboo and post the link on your blog.
3. Were you ever spoilt as a child? Share an experience with your partner and discuss the difference of views about discipline in your country of origin as compared to Canadian values. Write about your partner's experience on your blog and mutually check before posting.
4. Listen to this old song, "Let the Church Roll On," and identify 3 forms of discipline recommended. Then, to get a Ph.D. in ESL, take dictation of some other ways of discipline in this variation or others.

Monday's Assignment

For this afternoon's assignment:

1. Write a 10-sentence summary of Joseph Rosendo's Quebec City DVD using the vocabulary words you have learnt. Feel free to include pictures and a personal reflection on the possibility of taking your family on a road trip in Canada.
2. Write three comments or share a post of new ideas on the EZ Camping Tips for Torontonians Facebook Page.

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Uh oh. Welcome to a week on parenting dilemmas!

1. Read this page and list out Dr. Phil’s 4 parenting dilemmas. Discuss with a partner whether you agree with Dr Phil’s list.
2. Practise and then role play with a partner this conversation on being a first-time parent.