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Halloween Time

 (proceed to read with ghostly voice ) The Spookyest night of all, when the ghost walks among us and vampires and witches take the city ...  However, the most scary question is... WHAT TO DO WITH MY STUDENTS?!?!?

Halloween for children. 

- Hanged Halloween: PRINTABLE, orange cardboard, scissors, glue,  thread and of course colour pencils.
After practising basic Halloween vocabulary: Ghost, spider, black cat, pumpkin... My youngest children get to colour in one of them and glue it to a piece of orange cardboard. They need to ask for it in English 'I want a cat' (of course, sometimes I only get ' cat, please' haha)

TIP: if they are too young, cut them before giving them to the children so they only have to colour and glue it. 

      : if they are a bit older you can try getting them to write the name of what they're doing. 

 - Foot Ghost: All you need is a piece of white paper, pencil colours, scissors and the child foot!

Trace the foot and once they've finished, cut it. We will do a face where the ankle was, children can draw the face or - if they are old enough  - wiggle eyes. Do as much as you need to decorate the classroom. 

- Handy Spiders: Basic material, white paper, colour pencils, scissors and two hands. 

Trace the hands in the piece of paper. They are going to need help as they need to do both hands, I let my students to pair and they help each other or if I happen to have an older child, then he is in charge of helping the little ones. 

TIP: Colour the hands before cut it them, otherwise the might break the fingers and then... drama. 

When the have it all coloured and cut, glue the hands trying to form a 'V' with the thumbs - that would be spider mouth-. Draw/Glue eyes.

Finally, my favourite! Ghostly glass!

You need: A plastic glass, white crepe paper, wiggle eyes, glue, scissors and thread.
Optional: paper circles to practice letters and glue them at the end of each crepe paper strip.

With my young learners, I use three circles where they should write 'Boo'. Children love doing this because they get to glue things together and it can get messy.

Older kids, five circles to spell the word 'Ghost'.

And last but not least: Halloween Trivia! meant for teens and adults. I love trivia games basically because I consider them a superb way to practice vocabulary while playing and relaxing at the end of the lesson.

Five categories which provide around 15 minutes of game. I divide the class in teams and they have to get at least two points of each category. Adults play in pairs and they need to get two points of each categoty.

I hope you find this games/activities useful and that you have a Spooky week!

B.P

Forthnight Game. Clue!

Happy Wednesday!

To start off the month I bring you some mistery, it's the classic game: Clue.                                     

Of course, I haven't invented the game but I've gathered all the essential for you. In addition to a new way of playing, to make it more 'classroom friendly'. First step: Get ride of the dide. 

Second step:  DownloadGame_Clue

I normally use this game as a way to practice the right questions/answer dynamic because sometimes students don't go further than the yes o no answer and as teachers we know the importance of a full short answer. 

So, I don't use a dide, I simply give to the students at least one card of each, until there are none left. And one of the brown long papers where they take notes. 

When I'm playinh with A2/low B1, each student need to think of a question  when it's their turn and if someone has a card which proves them wrong, he or she shows the card ONLY to the student who have done the premise.

If I am playing with higher leves, we add could/should + present perfect. As every two rounds of questions, they need to elaborate a theory of who, with what and where.

Also, I enjoy a bit of theatre and before we start I play the theme song of Murder She wrote haha. 

Hope you enjoy the game as much as my students do, 

Lots of icing, 

B.P. 

Back to work!

Hello again my fellow Puddings!

I really hope you have had a relaxed summer and that you have a whale of a time. My summer has gone way too fast in between canvas, oil paintins, English grammar books and of course some 'tapas' and lots of ice-cream.

So, let's get down to business and start this school year full of beans and with out batteries charged.

To start the month I decided to go with a fun idiom: Have a whale of a time. 

The idiom has been created with a little help of the student slang at the end of the nineteenth century, as 'whale' was used in reference to someone exceptionally strong or brilliant. 'He's a whale at soccer.' 'She's a whale in English.' And so, a whale of a time, means a great time in large quantities (let's not forget whales are rather big animals). Of course, you might have curiosity about how whale got to mean great, there's more info here, but the recent meaning of the idiom is certainly not too old.

Also, I've learnt that sometimes my students are more keen on knowning differents uses for the same expression, so this year we will be doing a bit of both: origin and usage. 

Have a nice beginning of the course! 

See you around, 

B.P 

Monday idiom. Have a blast!

Finally my beloved Pudding we've reached the end of the School year, now we can all enjoy a lovely summer and ...

This awesome expression has a certainly blurry and unknown past which it's not written anywhere. What I can tell you is that this expression has a synonym; Have a ball! and they both mean to have a great time.  

So, see you with more expressions, games and activities when we all get back from a well-deserved holiday!  

Have a blast fellows! 

B.P 

Monday idiom: Hit the books.

My deary Puddings,

It's that time of the year when our students have to hit the books and prove their knowledge. Also, it's that time when we have to be more supportive and understanding, we all know that being too nervous can really make things go wrong.

Sadly, it doesn't mean that students get to literally hit or kick the books out of frustration. But there are a few, rather fun, origins for this idiom and I've decided to choose the one most interesting/fun for me. 

We know that 'Hit' as a verb has different meanings, one of them is: to Star or begin. Some people said it could have been originated after the idiom: Hit the trail, which cowboys used when starting out on a journey. Why did I think that's fun? Because they haven't said how trail became books. 

So, I created my own origin. I think this idiom is such because when you have to study during college, books are heavy and often hard and so when you open it on the table you're hitting the table with it. Therefore you hit the books (technically you hit the table with a book but let's not get to technical).

Good luck on your exams!!

B.P

Monday idiom. Once in a blue moon.

Hello Puddings! 

Holidays are just around the corner and we all need a big last effort to enjoy a well-deserved lazy summer.

When I'm on holidays I enjoy a good cup of tea and a mystery novel. Once in a blue moon, I'm very lucky and there's a summer storm which creates the perfect atmosphere. 

Also, summer is the time to meet friends and maybe a trip to the beach. I am normally late, however, in summer I'm late once in a blue moon because I have lots of free time.  

"Once in a blue moon I listen to folk music,"

"I go to the cinema once in a blue moon."

Although a literal 'blue moon' (light blue, do not expect a bright colour) may occur due to specific atmospheric conditions: volcanic eruptions or large fires leave particles in the atmosphere which could colour the moon, the phrase has nothing to do with the actual colour. 

Every two or three years, a year has 13 full moons instead of 12, that extra moon is know as 'blue moon'. Nonetheless, the moon wasn't always blue. 

Back to Mediaeval England, we can find the first known use of the expression in an anti-clerical pamphlet published in 1528. One of the characters does a sarcastic reference saying "Yf the say the mone is belewe* we must beleve that it is true".  'Belewe' is an Old English word which had two separate meanings. One of them was 'blue' and the other one was 'betrayer'.

So, it seems that later on in time and owing to the rarity of an extra moon, 'Blue moon' is used colloquially to mean a rare event. 

Good luck with your marks and make your once-in-a-blue-moon activities into habits now that you will have the time. 

Cheerio,

BP

*I also found the term: Blewe. 

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Info: www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2013/06/the-origin-of-the-phrase-once-in-a-blue-moon                 

       www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/once-in-a-blue-moon.html

       https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_moon#Origin_of_the_term