Christmas with a British flavour

Is anybody out there? Hope you're enjoying your holidays.

By the way: I just found out that the British Royal Family has gone cyber! Click here to access their Official Youtube Royal Channel.

Of course, the Christmas day Broadcast is there, together with other delightful videos.

Enjoy the Queen's accent and Happy Xmas to you all.

Pronunciation of Irregular Verbs

Because it's never too late!

Here you are: a list of irregular verbs with their phonetic transcription. You can print it out and stick it on your fridge.

; )

No more doubts! Ever!

-ed Past Simple endings

Fascinating subject today, isn't it? "-ed" endings in regular past verbs!

Look at the Grammar Challenge in the BBC website to listen to the radio programme and download the documents attached. Remember you can also do the quizzes related.

Enjoy the challenge!

Have you got a few minutes?

19 minutes is all you need. Take a seat, grab a cup of tea and relax. Are you ready? If you click here, you'll have access to a very interesting interview: Mark Haddon being asked about The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time. Yes, it's the author himself! Very nice, understandable accent. Don't you think so?

Enjoy!

The curious incident of the bishop in the night time

Would you like to listen to the whole interview? Here it is.

Why not read a short article about the incident? Click here to have a look at it.

Some videos on the topic here and here.

Hope you have a nice holiday.

What's in a name?

Hello again... "Listening" time!

Ok, do you remember File 1 or is it already too far away? The very first topic we tackled was "Names". Here you are two listening exercises, taken from the BBC site (wonderful site, by the way!):

- Nice and short exercise: text adapted for upper intermediate students with full text available (Over 3 minutes). Topic: popular names nowadays.

- "Real English" exercise: fancy a challenge? Listen to a chat between different women in a radio programme- the discussion topic is whether to change your surname when you get married (over 10 minutes). Remember: don´t panic! Pay attention to key words and don't expect to understand everything.

Finally, click here for some very useful pronunciation tips.

Enjoy!

Grammar in Plain English

Hi there again. Are you finding the new grammar bits easy? I'm sure you would like to practice a little bit more. I found a great page called English Grammar Secrets where grammar rules are explained in a very simple and understandable way; they also provide you with exercises to assimilate the explanations.

So why not try reading the rules and doing the exercises on the Future Continuous and Future Perfect?

And of course... your all-time favourite! Click here to practice the structures "Used to" / "get used to", etc...

Do you still want some extra explanation? Click here to access a different site and here to do more exercises on "used to".

Enjoy!

Videos about the Internet

Remember the other day we were talking about wikis? What on earth is a wiki?
Here you have a great video that explains it "in plain English":





There was also some talk about the Internet and how it is changing our lives. I'd like to make you think about "the way we find, store, create, critique, and share information" since the Internet arrived as such. Here you are an interesting document (only video, no sound) which may make us give it a second thought:





Enjoy!

EXTRA MATERIAL that's not in the book

A teacher from a school in Zaragoza has taken the trouble to collect some material which can help you study the contents from File 4 Upper Intermediate:

Why not visit her on her website?

It's divided into units: in each unit (in each "file") you have different headings with the grammar or vocabulary contents we're looking at this year.

Another teacher, this time from Granada University, has done more or less the same in his website. Some of the links are very similar, and the organization is quite the same.

What are you waiting for? Give it a go!

NEW LINKS- listen, watch and pronounce!

WATCH:
Why not visit these videos organized into categories?

There's also this wonderful blog that has a collection of different videos which may be useful for you learners out there.

You have to click on the "Free Subscription" button on this site, but it might be worth it to listen to "Real English".

PRONOUNCE:
Lovely website with phonetic games! Don't miss it.

This phonemic chart might take some time to load, but it's very interesting.

LISTEN:
And what about these group conversations around images, documents and videos?

Grammar links

To improve your writing and speaking:

- Make subjects and verbs agree here.

- Revise Phrasal verbs.

- Have a look at Prepositions.

- Grammar explanations, examples, exercises (all levels).

- Online grammar and punctuation guides.

Writing links for advanced students

- BASIC TIPS FOR WRITING:

Very basic pieces of advice here and here. And a more academic link if you click here.

- SPELLING:

- English spelling rules here and here.

- Spelling game.

WRITING COURSES:

-Writing e-mails.

-Paragraph writing tips.

-Complete writing course online.

-How to improve your writing in 5 minutes.

-Interactive exercises.

PUNCTUATION:

- At last! Punctuation rules and exercises explained here and here. And why not try this other link? Finally, you also have some activities here.

Listening links

Listening quizzes for all levels.

News in English in many different channels. Listen to live programmes or recorded ones.

Storytellers perform their stories for you! Both children and adults are welcome.

Very famous people being interviewed. Take your pick. There are actors, composers, singers, politicians, scientists, sports personalities… I wouldn’t believe you if you said you’re not interested in any of them!

Listen to everyday English conversations. Useful also for developing your speaking skills and your fluency.

Watch TV on the net. Hundreds of videos to play and listen to.

Listening comprehension exercises on various topics.

This is a radio devised specially for students of English, which offers a variety of programmes running all day. They deal with specific aspects of the four skills + grammar and vocabulary. Very, very interesting.

Listen to and watch video, music, pictures and more. Specially designed for students of English too.

Listen to the sounds of English and improve your pronunciation. Watch a video of the mouth pronouncing vowels and consonants.

Drama, prose, poetry, children’s stories… Many of them are read aloud in English! Very entertaining. Their free audio clips provide an excellent resource for students and literature lovers of all ages.

It has audio, video and animated tiny lessons for those tricky, idiomatic parts of the English language.

News Radio for English learners

English Language Listening Lab Online. Here you can practice and learn English by listening to English speakers from all over the world. Games, Songs… etc.