Thursday, June 04, 2009

#1050 Potato Pals, TESOL Certificate, Facebook Reunion, See-saw


Show 1050 Thursday 4 June 2009
Watch today’s show at YouTube or BlipTV.

Hi, I’m Sarah, welcome to The Daily English Show.

Firstly, thank you very much to the people who have commented on the videos for my Japanese vlog experiment. I really appreciate it.

Today I’d like to recommend a video for kids. Well it’s supposed to be for kids but I think adults might enjoy it too. I sometimes use a bit of kids material in adults classes – just to have a bit of fun and to have a break from the more serious material. And also because you find vocabulary that you don’t necessarily find in the adult material. So they can learn words that can be useful when talking to kids in English.

For example, this video is about playing at the park – which is something that children love doing … so if you meet a child that speaks English, this could be a good conversation topic. But if you’re too busy studying business English you might not know important words like see-saw or jungle gym or tag.

Here’s what they do at the park in this story:

slide on the slide
swing on the swings
ride on the see-saw
climb on the jungle gym
play tag
jump rope
play in the sandbox
make friends

By the way, if you’re talking to a New Zealand child, you should say skip instead of jump rope and sandpit instead of sandbox.





The Acadia Report
Acadia University, Wolfville, Nova Scotia, Canada

Today I’d like to tell you about the teaching English course at Acadia University.
It’s called a TESOL certificate. TESOL stands for: Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages

I’ve got quite a few emails and comments from people saying they’re thinking about teaching English and should they bother getting a certificate. And my advice is, yes.

Of course it is possible to get a job without a qualification like that, but I don’t think that’s the point. The value in doing it is what you learn. Before I came to Japan I did a certificate in language teaching at AUT in Auckland, New Zealand and I’m really glad I did because I learnt a lot. At the same time I also did a language teaching paper at Auckland University and a linguistics paper – and I found them both really useful.

So Acadia offers a course and you can do an intensive four-week course or a longer part-time one. I think a lot of schools and universities offer both styles like that. The one I did was part-time – it took about half a year and there was a two-hour class twice a week. And quite a few assignments during that time, as well as teaching experience.



STICK NEWS



Kia ora in Stick News today a woman in England was reunited with her son after 27 years thanks to Facebook.

In 1982 a father picked up his three-year-old son from his ex-wife’s house in England.
He was supposed to bring the boy back at the end of the weekend – but he never came back. Instead the man took the boy to Hungary.
The mother said that over the years she tried everything, but couldn’t find out what had happened to her son.
According to the Daily Mail the woman, who is now 62, had almost given up hope of ever seeing her son again.
Then her younger sister tried searching his name online and lo and behold the son’s Facebook profile popped up.
Mother and son then exchanged emails and last week they were reunited.

And that was Stick News for Thursday 4th June.
Kia ora.



Word of the Day

Today’s word is see-saw.

This is a see-saw.


photo by: Gabriel Pollard

And see-saw is also a verb … for when things go like this.

to keep changing from one situation, opinion, emotion, etc. to another and back again

For example: Share prices see-sawed all day.



conversations with sarah

#664 Do you use Facebook?

Step 1: Repeat Jane’s lines.
Step 2: Read Jane’s lines and talk to Sarah.

Jane Do you use Facebook?

Sarah Ah, yeah, I have an account. But I’ve only logged in about once in the past year.

Jane You don’t like it?

Sarah I just think that … I can’t keep up with email so I think if I start using Facebook as well that will be another thing for me to fail at.

Jane But Facebook’s awesome. Everyone’s on it.

Sarah Yeah. Maybe I should use it. Actually I’m planning to start using it again, sometime soon.

Jane Well, I sent you a request, so add me as a friend if you ever log in.

Sarah OK I will.



filming notes

The ending photos were taken on Thursday 4th June 2009 in Kutchan between 6 and 7am ... on my morning walk :)



















links

today's news
today's STICK NEWS pictures

Potato Pals - YouTube
Potato Pals - blog
Potato Pals - Oxford University Press
Interview with Patrick Jackson (Potato Pals author)

music

show start
artist: Kevin MacLeod
track: Future Cha Cha
from: Brooklyn, NY, United States
artist site

The Acadia Report start
artist: DJ iPep's
album: Home Mix 2007
track: Concerto
from: EVREUX, France
album at Jamendo
artist at Jamendo
artist site

WOD start
artist: DJ iPep's
album: Home Mix 2007
track: Game Toy
from: EVREUX, France
album at Jamendo
artist at Jamendo
artist site

cws start
artist: Kevin MacLeod
track: The Jazz Woman
from: Brooklyn, NY, United States
artist site

qa start
artist: ioeo
album: triptracks
track: triptrack2
from: Saint Raphael, France
album at Jamendo
artist at Jamendo
artist site

qa bgm
artist: Cliffhanger
album: Comb your hair
track: Up against some hard fellows
from: Sweden
artist at Jamendo
album at Jamendo

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