Friday's Assignment

Here are your tasks:

1. Make sure to complete what you haven't finished from earlier this week, and showcase it on your blog.
2. Role Play: Being Rich and Poor

Thursday's Assignment

Welcome back, bargain hunters!

1. Write a trip report for yesterday's budget-conscious adventure.



Is there a difference between tightwad, spendthrift, and thrifty?

1. Make a list of the things you bought, from where, and how much you spent on each.
2. Include a picture or two from our Facebook album.
3. Then, in about 30 words, describe what the best experience that you had was, and what the worst was.
4. In another paragraph, write down something useful you learnt or was surprising to you.
5. Publish your report and write comments on your classmates' reports.
2. Listening and Vocabulary: Budget Hotel Rooms
3. Role Play: Ending Excessive Spending
4. Discuss in a group of at least three classmates 3 ways to reduce spending. Create a Chirbit.com recording of your advice.

Field Trip Wednesday: Thrift's the Word!

Thrifty snacks and savoury schnitzel treats that threaten none--food and shirts and shoes and tasty things await our field trip this Wednesday!
Survival in the big city could cost an arm and a leg. You could pay a bomb. You could pay through your nose. You get the idea.
In line with our weekly theme of Budgeting, our field trip on Wednesday, June 24, will be for budget shopping. There will be both food and non-food items we'll be looking at, as well as opportunities to make careful choices as newcomers.

Here is our itinerary, beginning and ending at Don Mills Station, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.:

1. Dad’s Cookie Outlet, 370 Progress Ave
2. Goodwill Community Reuse Centre, 350 Progress Ave
3. Patty King Factory Outlet, 321 Progress Ave.
4. Salvation Army Thrift Store, 1225 Kennedy Rd
5. Agincourt Food Bank, 1911 Kennedy Rd ... To find a food bank nearest your home, check out this tool. Also, check out this article!

Tuesday's Assignment

Lobsters can be a pretty expensive item, a luxury item for Father's Day. What do you say when you want to reduce the amount of something used or consumed? What would you say to someone who would buy a lobster a day and couldn't really afford it? Guess and discuss which one would be correct:

1. You should cut lobster
2. You should cut back lobster
3. You should cut back on lobster

Now check out the cartoon and do the tasks below:

Here are your tasks:

1. Role Play: Reducing Household Expenses
2. Write about 3 ways your household spending has changed since coming to Canada. Have a classmate check your work before publishing.

Monday's Assignment

This week we'll focus on money. So, which aspect of finances will we be looking at? Watch the video below and answer the following:

1. What do the following words mean: expected, income, expenses, estimate, balance the budget, outweigh, variable expenses?
2. What is a budget (0:50-0:55)?
3. What are the three steps of budgeting? Take notes, compare them with a partner, and publish them with these instructions on your blog.

Once you've learnt something about budgets, here are your tasks:

1. Listening and Vocabulary: ABCs of Money Matters
2. Role Play: Staying within Budget

Job Hunter/Applicant/Candidate Exercise Feedback

So, we have finally completed the job interview exercise in class! What is your feedback? Have you done anything like this before?
Did you learn anything about pronunciation? What about idioms? Anything else?
What did you like about it? What did you not like about it.
What went well? What didn't go well?
Here's the link if you need to have another look at the handouts.
Place your feedback under Comments, below.

Friday's Assignment

Some have traced the roots of volunteerism in North America to the freedoms and responsibilities gained from the 16th-century Reformation. Others cite the Great Awakening. Regardless, the fruits of voluntarism are many and have spread to other parts of the world.

Can you think of some famous people who were volunteers?

Here are your tasks:

1. Listening & Vocabulary: Job Interview
2. Role play with a partner: Volunteer Talent
3. Read this article about famous volunteers, and list their names and the organizations they are associated with. Add your own story--real or imaginary--about a successful volunteer.

Thursday's Assignment

Just as you don't want any typos on your face or dress in an interview, you probably won't want any on your resume either.

What's so funny about this cartoon?

Here are your tasks:

1. First, make sure you have published your own resume. If you have not done so, check the assignments from earlier this week.
2. Check out this resume. Then review your own resume before leaving a comment on your classmates’ resumes on how to improve.
3. Read this article and take notes on the 4 kinds of resume. Which one would you most likely try? Which would be least likely? Give reasons as you discuss with a partner.

Wednesday's Assignment

Some tongue twisters for you to practise with a partner and record on chirbit.com:

1. S/SH
2. V/W
3. S/TH
4. bacteria, cafeteria, interior, inferior, exterior, superior, ulterior, posterior, criteria, Siberia, imperial, serial, cereal, material, bacterial, ministerial, epithelial, managerial, arterial, ethereal
5. Other tongue twisters

Payscales in Canada

Let's create your resumes today!

Have you finished Monday's and Tuesday's work? Here are your tasks:

1. Find your targeted volunteer companies on Facebook and LinkedIn.
1. Like those companies.
2. Make Facebook and LinkedIn friends with your classmates.
2. Create a chirbit.com recording based on your transcription of the video clip on Monday afternoon.
3. Create a resume on MS Word to a different volunteer position. Edit it yourself and with the help of at least 3 classmates before publishing.
4. Place a resume-writing resource on hold.

Tuesday's Assignment

What's wrong with the picture below? "A Indian"? Anything else?

Is it right to put on your resume a different species, gender, or ethnicity from what you were born with? What if putting down a different identity would help you to get a job? The lady on the left claimed to be an American Indian. The one on the right has two white parents but claimed to be black.

 




Did you understand the video?

Getting your facts right and getting your resume right are key to applying for a job, even a volunteer job.

Here are your tasks:

1. Write notes on the Six Rules to Resume Writing.
2. Discuss with a partner the elements and design of a good resume.
3. Create your volunteer resume and cover letter using the above wizard. If you cannot save your work, use PrtSc and snag.gy to save and publish it to your blog.

Monday Afternoon's Assignment

Thank you for putting up the new active verb tense chart! Now let's try the following:

1. Start from the beginning and work through the first 3 lessons of this course. Take notes, keeping in mind the 3 volunteer positions you have chosen.
2. Listen to this video. What new information did you learn that is different from this morning’s? Transcribe 3:45 - 4:17, check it with 2 partners, and publish it.

Field Trip Possibilities

Please have a look at the following and indicate under Comments which month you'd like to go on which:

1. UofT, Kensington Market, Chinatown (any time)
2. St Lawrence Market, Sugar Beach, Loblaws (July - September)
3. Rouge Beach/Bluffers Park (summer)
4. Edwards Gardens/Willket Creek Trail/Sunnybrook Park
5. Cherry Beach/Ashbridges Bay/The Beach (summer)
6. City Hall, Caribana (July)
7. Scarborough Ribfest (July - August)
8. Fruit/Vegetable Picking at Farintosh Farm, Stouffville (July - October)
9. Trent-Severn Waterway (summer)
10. Wine/Ginseng, War of 1812, Welland Canal, Niagara Peninsula (any time)
11. Port Hope/Ganaraska Fishway (October)
12. Any other venue you may think of!

Monday's Assignment

Good morning, and welcome back! How was your weekend? Did you step forward to help somebody? Did you offer anyone your services without pay? Guess what the theme is for this week.

Here are your tasks:

1. Vocabulary--learn the new words and make sentences with them: Volunteer work
2. Role play with a partner: Getting praise and recognition
3. Find 3 volunteer positions you can apply for, and show the details on your blog.

Friday's Assignment

So, besides habits and diet, what else is important to a healthy lifestyle? Have you given much thought to developing a healthy mind?

Do the words on the directory sound familiar? Whose words do they sound like to many native speakers?

Here are your tasks:

1. Vocabulary: Hobbies
2. Role play: Developing a Healthy Mind
3. Role Play: Mental Disorders
4. Plan a 3-minute speech to your family about having a healthy lifestyle in terms of quitting dangerous habits, eating a balanced diet, and developing a healthy mind. Record and publish your chirbit.com clip. Leave comments on your classmates’ blogs.

Wednesday's Assignment

What food are you packing to bring to the field trip to Tommy Thompson Park tomorrow morning? Something yummy? Something unusual? Something nutritious? Whatever it is, make sure it's a no-litter lunch. Don't forget drinking water! Bring a light jacket in case of chilly gusts from the lake, and wear good walking shoes and perhaps sunglasses. Also don't be late--be in the lobby downstairs by 9 a.m.

Hmm, do you know anybody who does that? Recognize the cartoonist?

What do you think the topic is today?

Here are your tasks:

1. Vocabulary: A Diet Plan
2. Role Play: Eating Unhealthy Foods
3. Make a list of dishes you would prepare in a day. Using online flyers, make a grocery list and estimated budget. Have a partner check before publishing your list and budget. Leave comments on five classmates’ posts.

Monday's Assignment

Smokers are often targeted in campaigns for healthy living. But how about looking on the bright side?

LOL if you get it and think this is funny. How many cartoons here by Randy Glasbergen can you find?

Here are your tasks:

1. Vocabulary--take notes: Healthy Lifestyle
2. Role play out loud with a partner: Quitting Smoking
3. With a partner, scan these posters and use this online tool to create a fresh poster together. Save and publish the poster on your blogs, and comment on five of your classmates’ posters.

Canadian Geography-Themed Tasks

Oh, wait, here's one more map! Guess what it's all about:

How do you think the new train will stack up against Uber rides?

So, to cap off a difficult week coping with the IT situation and quarterly assessments, here's something you might enjoy:

1. Watch this comparative video and do the exercise.
2. Watch this video on Churchill and do the exercise.
3. Research events, studies, and recreation at Tommy Thompson Park.
4. NEW: How about taking a photo of your completed handmade maps of the world, Canada, Ontario, and Toronto, and posting them on your blog?

This week's schedule for MicroSkills