February 2 is Groundhog Day. Groundhogs are small brown
furry animals. They live under the ground, and they eat grass and berries. Groundhog Day is based on folklore. The
folklore is that if the groundhog comes out of its hole and sees its shadow
then there will be six more weeks of winter weather. But if the groundhog comes
out of its hole and doesn't see its shadow, then there will be an early spring.
and
Happy Lunar New Year --
It's the
When you're finished celebrating these two holidays, you can practice this week's idioms and vocabulary here.
Mary Chapin Carpenter is a wonderful singer-songwriter. This week we listened to her song This Shirt which tells a great story of her old shirt.
Here are the lyrics:
This shirt is old and
faded
All the color's washed away
I've had it now for more damn years
Than I can count anyway
I wear it beneath my jacket
With the collar turned up high
So old I should replace it
But I'm not about to try
This shirt's got silver buttons
And a place upon the sleeve
Where I used to set my heart up
Right there anyone could see
This shirt is the one I wore to every boring high school dance
Where the boys ignored the girls
And we all pretended to like the band
This shirt was a pillow for my head
On a train through Italy
This shirt was a blanket beneath the love
We made in Argeles
This shirt was lost for three whole days
In a town near Buffalo
'Till I found the locker key
In a downtown Trailways bus depot
This shirt was the one I lent you
And when you gave it back
There was a rip inside the sleeve
Where you rolled your cigarettes
It was the place I put my heart
Now look at where you put a tear
I forgave your thoughtlessness
But not the boy who put it there
This shirt was the place your cat
Decided to give birth to five
And we stayed up all night watching
And we wept when the last one died
This shirt is just an old faded piece of cotton
Shining like the memories
Inside those silver buttons
This shirt is a grand old relic
With a grand old history
I wear it now for Sunday chores
Cleaning house and raking leaves
I wear it beneath my jacket
With the collar turned up high
So old I should replace it
But I'm not about to try
Monday is Martin Luther King Jr. in the USA. He was and is a very important person in U.S. history. If you want to get more information about him, click here. If you want to see a short clip of his famous "I have a Dream" speech, click on the video below.
And if you want to practice some vocabulary (mostly idioms) from the first week of school, click here.
I hope you all have a great weekend!
Denise
Thursday, January 9, 2014
HAPPY NEW YEAR!
...and welcome back.
This semester, this blog is going to be geared for intermediate ESL -- Levels 5 - 6. We'll be learning a lot of vocabulary, idioms and focusing on learning past participles and the present perfect tense. (For example, I have taught English for 22 years. You have studied English for 2 years.) I plan to post something every weekend, starting the weekend of January 18.
