Mr. Bob's Posts (62)

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You probably learned the question words in English classes. They are sometimes called called the "Wh" words, to help students remember them.

Who,   what,   when,  where,  why and how are often called question words and most of them begin with the letters "wh".

Which of these words is your favorite and why?

Can you think of any other words that are usually found in questions?

I tell my students to look at the question word before they choose an answer on a test. If the question asks "when" they should find an answer related in some way to time. If a question asks "who" or "where", my students are supposed to look for answers with someone or some place in them. 

This is very simple, but sometimes students are tricked by answers that sound good, but distract them from the correct answer. If we look closely at the question we can usually predict the correct answer.

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Here, There, This and That

Did you know that here and there are sometimes confusing to English learners? These words are selected based on distance from the person speaking. Did you ever get confused by here and there?

This, that, these and those are also confusing words which are based on distance and number, so I will quickly explain the differences between them.

If something is close it is here. If we can touch a book, we would say it is here.

If it is not so close it is there.  If a book is across the room we would say it is there.

Do you remember that singular means one and plural means more than one?

We need to think about singular and plural when we use this, that, these and those.

We will say this or these for things that are close. I should say this key if I am holding one key.

I should say these keys if I am holding two or more keys.

We will say that or those for things that are not so close.

If I point to one key I should say that key. If I point to more than one key I should say those keys.

CloseFar
herethere

Singular

this

that

Pluralthesethose

Here, this and these are close.

There, that and those are not close.  Does that make sense to you?

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I always try to get my friends to blog so they get practice writing in English.  Writing your blog should be as easy as writing to a friend. I will tell you how to do it. Now you have no reason to forget to blog.

Step 1.  On your home page, click on Blog Posts (on the left below your picture) This will open My Blog

Step 2.  Click on the  [+Add] button (at the upper right of the My Blog page)

Step 3.  The Add a Blog Post page will appear with a place for your Post Title and your blog Entry

When you have finished writing, move down the page and click on the [Publish Post] button.

If you want to see what the blog will look life first, you can click on [Preview]. Then you can change it before you post it.

Is this still too difficult? Do you believe you really can't think of a title for your post and want some help?

OK.  Here is some help. If you are still having a problem, go to this website:     http://www.listenaminute.com/

A.  Now listen to some topics in English.

B.  Choose one that you like and write your blog post about it.

C.  Follow my instructions above and write something using your own words.

You must not copy the entry from another site. We can't let you take the words from another person, but you can get many ideas for topics at the Listenaminute.com website

It also gives you a chance to listen to a native speaker talk about many topics.

I hope you will now write a blog.

If you decide to write your own blog, please post a comment here so we can all find your blog and read it.

True improvement comes from practice and the people who have started blogging are improving. Please help yourself by becoming one of My Blogging Friends too.

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Goodbye Friends in Saudi Arabia

My wife and I are moving to a different part of the world to teach.

We will be teaching engineers Advanced Business English, Academic English and Technical English in Japan.

Our home in Japan will have much lower temperatures than Saudi Arabia.  It gets 4.78 meters of snow fall in an average winter.

We will live in the city of Aizu-wakamatsu. This is a very old city in the Fukushima Prefecture. I am including some photos from the Wikipedia Commons, such as the famous Tsuruga-jyo Castle. 

I am also adding a photo of one of the rivers that runs through the city.

I am going from one extreme in climate to another. I have gotten used to a hot and dry climate.  Now I will adjust to a colder and wetter place.

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Change

Change will happen. It can not be avoided in life. People are usually afraid of change because it means they will have to do things differently and learn something new.

Are you afraid of the changes on your web page? Will you learn how to see your recent comments instead of those from when you first came here?

Sometimes people surrender to change and other times they fight it. We should try to relax and watch the changes at MyEC.  We will learn the new ways to do things if we relax.  If we are afraid, we can wait a few days and come back again.

I am thankful that the site is trying to upgrade and improve. If we do not move forward we may begin to go backwards.

Be brave my friends. Let us wait and see what our beautiful new site will bring us.

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Blog by Phone Challenge

I just wrote this blog post on my phone. Now I am posting it to see if it can be done.I will be honest, I didn't use the mobile version of MyEC. I switched to the desktop view. Then added a blog the same as I do on the computer. Can you do this too?Better yet, can you beat my blog by writing one completely in the mobile version?That is my challenge to you.Show us that you can blog from anywhere.If you can, try to do it without using the desktop view.If you succeed you must teach us how. :)
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Read This and Be Happier

Maybe you have felt or even said,  

"No one visits my page or leaves comments for me"

Is this you?

-------------------------------------->

Don't be sad, be active on MyEC.         If you become very active and treat your friends the way you want to be treated, you will be popular and also begin to improve as a person and hopefully as an English student. 

We sometimes get a message from a friend on MyEC complaining that their friends don't comment or say hello. PLEASE DON'T MESSAGE US ABOUT HOW NO ONE LOVES YOU!   You are the one who controls how other people feel about you.

SHOW YOUR FRIENDS SOME LOVE ...  Actually visit their pages and leave them comments instead of wondering why they don't seek you out.  Isn't that what you want them to do for you, anyway?   I may be a poor example for visiting people's pages because I don't get to visit much at all. But, I have been here long enough to know who becomes popular and why.

Remember the famous adage.  "Treat others the way you want to be treated" or in older English,     "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you".

Yes people, this really works.  He who smiles at others sees smiles in return.  He who frowns will not see many smiles.

THE SECRET OF WINNING FRIENDS ON MyEC (actually more than one secret).

1. Be nice... Only speak kindly to others.

2. Be friendly... Try to leave nice comments when you can.

3. Be active... Visit here every day, write something original for a blog and TREAT OTHERS THE WAY YOU WANT TO BE TREATED.

4. Try to create a winning page.  We have instructions on how to be creative and make a winning page. 

Wouldn't you really like to be a STAR member someday?  If you would, then read my suggestions.  All of the things I suggested will help you enjoy the club more and maybe even have a winning page.   So, don't blame others, fix things yourself.

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ESP is not usually for Beginners

This blog post discusses ESP as a type of English class. The blog is not at a beginner level and will be too difficult for beginners unless you take your time using your dictionary and the vocabulary words at the end. I do hope that upper intermediate readers will be able to understand this topic easily.

ESP stands for English for Specific Purposes.  It is sometimes called English for Special Purposes which means the same. 

ESP describes English classes designed to teach specialized or technical English to students who need some specialized vocabulary to help with their jobs or their education.  English for Academic Purposes, Medical English, English for Air Force Cadets, English for the Hospitality Industry , English for Oil and Gas Workers and English for Flight and Airplane Cabin Crews are some examples of specialized English.  The list of possibilities is endless.

Why would a teacher prefer to teach ESP classes over ESL?  One reason is that typical ESL classes need to start with basics or foundation and have a mixture of students with different needs.  If you really love teaching all of the basics and have no interest in specialized vocabularies then teaching ESL is best. That is because ESL or General English, typically means working at acquiring a second language.  And this means that reading, writing, listening and speaking are all taught along with grammar and language structure.

ESP classes usually start with students who already have some foundation knowledge of English.  A class of ESP students are also interested in a similar field of study and can benefit from examples which tie in with their professional experience or their future studies.  Specialized English will be needed most in jobs where communication in the workplace is all in English and in jobs where advanced training and books will be in English. 

Experts from other countries often will have to communicate in English so other employees will need to understand and communicate with them.  Hospitals in Saudi Arabia are an excellent example since doctors and nurses are recruited from all over the world and have only English as a common language to save people’s lives and communicate effectively.

If a student will be responsible for the defense of his country against air attack, will he benefit more from classroom examples relating to a hair salon or to an air defense missile battery? 

PATRIOT Missile Battery in Germany

(All Photos credited to Wikipedia.com)

If the student is going to work in a hospital, doesn’t it make sense to work in class on words and situations common to a hospital setting? 

ESP teachers say, yes, it does make good sense to train with language situations that the students may encounter at work.

Is teaching ESP difficult?  Yes and no.  ESP requires some extra work if the teacher is not familiar with the specialty and curriculum but there are excellent textbooks in many fields to help teachers provide what the students need.  The greater challenge is creating an ESP class from your own experience.  This is what makes ESP appealing to me.

Can you think of reasons that English must be used at airports and other places where international transportation and communication is important?

When teaching Engineers from water treatment facilities, we can use some of their technical knowledge to help them explain work related processes in English.  We need to work with all of the common abbreviations like BOD, technical terms like activated sludge and the various chemical names like Calcium Carbonate, Sodium Hypochlorite  and HCl.  We also need to set up situations in class where the students pretend there is a problem at work and communicate in English to solve it. For example, water treatment engineers may need to ask:

Is the inlet closed?  Yes, but we are still in overflow and going into emergency by-pass. What could be the problem? Do we know when the filter media was last changed or last cleaned? Check the automatic valves.

ESP is more challenging because the teacher must always be evaluating the student’s needs beyond his/her basic communication.  This requires tracking each individual in the class, assessing his/her ability and providing for his/her own needs.  The teacher should always be improvising with new ideas and classroom approaches.  Since students in ESP classes have the same specialized focus as their classmates, it can be easier to get them to collaborate and work on projects together which use English along with their own technical jargon.  Their motivation to learn is usually much greater also, since they can see an immediate benefit to improving their English.  Motivated students want to learn and are a real joy to teach.

Vocabulary:

* Academic Purposes is used to describe classes that help students prepare for higher education such as university study (academics).

* Cadets  are what we call students in a military school.

* Hospitality Industry is used to refer to those businesses like hotels where people are shown hospitality.  Some people also include restaurants under this term but it is also called the Food Service Industry.

* If we say a list is endless, that means there are too many possibilities to easily list or count.  We can also say that a very long trip seemed endless.

*ESL stands for English as a Second Language and ESP stands for English for Specialized Purposes.

*Foundation knowledge can be used to refer to the student’s knowledge of the basics of the language.  The foundation of a building is what the building is built on and supports it. The foundation if a language is equally important to support further learning.

* BOD Biochemical oxygen demand (way of measuring how much organic material is in water)

Additional Vocabulary you should look up yourself:

technical

specialized

purposes or purpose

Questions:

1. Would the pilot of an airplane benefit from a specialized English course? 

2. Would a bank employee?

3. What about a worker in an international hotel? 

4. Why would English be important in a hotel or a bank?

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TESOL Arabia or Driving to Dubai

My wife and I decided that we would attend the TESOL Arabia meetings last month.  It was over 6,000 km of driving and two weeks of our hard earned vacation, but we also got to see Dubai and Oman for the first time.

Arriving in Dubai we had an impressive view (in the dark) of this very modern and very clean city. I took this photo two days later.

We missed the first day of TESOL because the people responsible for getting our exit visas took five days getting our papers so we could leave Saudi Arabia.  I won't criticize the country about requiring exit visas, but someone taking too long cost me a full day of pre-meeting events and more than 2,000 km of driving around the clock to make it when we did.

 

 

Why do English teachers need to go to meetings?  There are two reasons that are most important to me.  These are:

1. the opportunity to hear papers read by other teachers who are experts and

2. the chance to see the latest books and materials for teaching.

This is one of the meeting halls where we heard about research on how students use electronic media and the best approaches for using modern technology in the classroom.  There were other papers being given at the same time so this hall is not as crowded as I expected.

The presenter of this paper had come to Dubai from England.

Maybe my favorite part was the exhibit hall with row after row of exhibits from publishers and educational programs.

I got to meet the representatives for Oxford University Press, Cambridge Press, National Geographic educational resources and many others.  I loved looking at all the books.

There were books for every kind of English need I could imagine, like airplane flight crew, oil and gas workers, auto mechanics, hotel workers, hospital workers and almost anything else that may require English.

The city was nice to see too.

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The SAD Story

Did you know that our exposure to light can have an effect on our mood?  Sometimes this can be strong enough to make people depressed and tired all of the time. When a person is more strongly affected and feels depressed (especially in the Winter) they might have SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder).

Now that the days are beginning to get longer in the Northern Hemisphere, many people with SAD may notice an improvement in their moods.  This is even more likely the further North you live.

Lighting in our work or school environment can also affect our moods. I noticed a difference in my lab when we would have a big project that required starting work around 3:30 AM for weeks at a time. I read about SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder) and experimented with different lighting in my lab at the university.

In our lab, those who came in to work around 3:30 AM performed better with very bright white lighting. I even found that adjusting the light temperature and filters on the microscopes made us more attentive.  I got the idea for increasing the lighting by reading about SAD.

SAD seems to be more common in the far North where winter day length is much shorter and with people who don't spend much time outside during the daytime.  It affects mood and can even cause depression.

Less severe reactions to lower light and shorter days may be called Winter Blues. This is where people are affected to the point that they have less energy but are not actually depressed.  If this is interesting to you, please search the internet and read some more.

Do you think lighting makes a difference to you at your home, work or school?

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School Lighting and Learning

Did you know that lighting can affect the mood and behavior of students in a classroom the same as it can affect adults at their work?  Now there is some experimental work which shows that school lighting can be changed at different times of the day to help students learn.

On a bright sunny morning we may feel very much awake and want to be more active than at other times.  When a day is dark and dreary we may not feel like doing much. We all know that it is difficult to read or study when the lighting is not good and researchers have now taken these ideas a step further. Here is a nice summary of some of this work by Philips Corp.

http://www.annualreport2010.philips.com/content_ar-2010/proofpoints/better_light_learning.asp?global_en_ar2010_relatedlinks

Schools in Holland and Germany tried some new lighting developed for schools that can be changed during the day to help the students perform better.  The link above takes you to the full story and includes a video showing the differences in the lighting.

In short:

The light system has four settings; Energy, Calm, Standard and Concentration.  Philips installs the lighting with a a switch for the teacher to change levels.

The teachers use the very bright lighting (Energy) at the first part of the morning to help the students wake up and pay attention.  They also use this light after lunch to give the children an energy boost or other times if the children seem to be getting tired.

If you read my earlier post on SAD, you can see some of the reasoning behind this lighting.  We know that lighting can energize us and improve our moods.  Changes in lighting can cause us to concentrate, relax, or feel more energetic.

Have you ever seen this lighting system in use? 

Do you think it is a good idea?

Philips says: This also saves schools on their energy costs. 

Green is good.

What do you think?

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Did your classroom ever speak with a classroom in another country? 

Some teachers here in Saudi Arabia have tried this with English classes using Skype or similar video broadcasting services.  Geography or Social Studies students in the UK, Australia, South Africa or North America may like to Skype with your English class. We all can benefit from learning about other cultures.  Wars usually happen between strangers, not between friends.  As we meet people across the world, our friendships help to make the planet safer.

Do you think this would be fun? Let's think about what you might expect if you did this. 

1.  Can you think of any benefits you and your class may gain?

2.  Can you think of any harm that this may cause?

3.  What problems could you expect?  Will the differences in time zones be a problem for you? How can you work around time differences?

4.  How will you contact the teacher in the English speaking country?

If you like this idea please comment with your answers to some of these questions.  There are classes here in the KSA that would love to try such a thing and I think many in your country would also like to speak with students their own age in other countries. 

I can see English Club as a possible spot to assist with such contacts, if we the members make some good suggestions.  There are good teacher organizations in many countries that could help spread the word to teachers that might be interested in participating.

If you are a teacher and interested in this project please reply here.  As a group we just may be able to make this possible for many students.

My suggestions for a better quality experience if you try this:

a.  have a good web camera and good lighting in the classroom (if you use a projector for the video try to have some lighting on your own students so they can be seen by the class a world  away)

b.  test your camera and microphone on Skype with another teacher's computer to see if everyone can hear and see each other well.

c.  consider recording your event so you can show school administrators and parents (a recording should also help if you need money to improve your equipment by showing what you are doing)

I will give more comments about the classes that already tried this if I see people are interested in doing this on their own.

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Most of us like chocolate and many of us like learning.  But LEARNING CHOCOLATE, is that something we should like? What can it mean? Well, I will tell you and if you are a teacher you will love it. "Learning Chocolate" is a cute little website or as they call it a Vocabulary Learning Platform.

http://www.learningchocolate.com/is the URL of the website and so far everything looks very useful for teaching.  It is especially good for the younger children, but there is vocabulary that is useful for adults as well.

These are some of the categories below.  I think you should look at the pages and spend an hour exploring things of interest.  I still prefer MyEnglishClub, but it is always good to know about other resources.  Just remember when you finish with Learning Chocolate, come back here and visit with your friends to keep practicing your English.

 This site can be used to learn new words that you can practice using in our chat rooms.  You can also expand your vocabulary when you write new blogs.  You can click the item to hear proper pronunciation also.     Go forth and keep learning. :)

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Godzilla vs Mozilla

I think everyone has heard of the monster lizard named Godzilla.

What about Mozilla?                    This is Godzilla: -----==>

He's not very nice, he likes to kill people and destroy things.

 

 

 

THIS IS MOZILLA:

 

 

 

MOZILLA is very special in my opinion.

Mozilla is a company that is a *non-profit, for the good of the Web.  Thousands of people *volunteer to help Mozilla turn out their free products to make the internet better and safer.

Have you heard of Firefox from Mozilla?  FIREFOX is my favorite internet browser, which can be compared to others like "INTERNET EXPLORER" from Microsoft or "CHROME" from Google.

Over 450 Million people use Firefox every day.  It is completely free and Mozilla is constantly making it available in new languages.  I suggest that you use it in English for your own benefit and more English practice. If you like Firefox and the idea of a *community of users working to improve the internet, you can help make it better in several ways:

1st.  You can download and use it to improve your internet experience.

2nd.  You can download the newest Beta version and use it to see if you can do everything you need to be able to do.  If you can't then you can answer a few questions so they can make more improvements. Mozilla values their *community of volunteers highly.

3rd.  If you are a programer you can help with programing and testing.

If you never tried FIREFOX you can download it here: IT IS FREE

 

Download: Fast, Fun, Awesome

IF YOU ALREADY USE FIREFOX-- You can download the beta version here and become part of the Mozilla and Firefox community, helping to make the web better.

Download BetaThe other 450 Million users are helped every time one of us volunteers to use the beta version of Firefox.  That is how all of us can work together to improve the web for everyone. 
*Non-profit means a company which is set up to produce a product without making an income for the company.
* Volunteer means someone who works without getting paid. Volunteers make the world a better place by doing things that would be too expensive to hire workers to do. In my opinion that is why Mozilla products like Firefox are better than some of those from companies like Microsoft or Google where paid employees are used.  Without volunteers, MyEnglishClub could not exist in the form that we know.
*Community in this case means a group of people working together to make things better. You could call MyEnglishClub a community as well.  We are here with the same intent to work together and make things better.
We all owe thanks to the volunteers at MyEnglishClub and Mozilla for making the web a better place.
Take a minute to say thank you to all of them when you comment.
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You may know the story of the old man who had two sons long ago.

The sons decided that they wanted their inheritance right away so the father divided his property between them. One son stayed at home and worked to increase his property and help his father.

The other son went far away and wasted his money on many things and did not find ways to increase it. After years passed he had no money and only the clothes on his back. So, he came home to his family.

The father welcomed his son who had been lost to him. He cried tears of joy, found new clothes for the boy and had the fat calf killed for a big feast to welcome his son home.

The son who had stayed home and worked hard all those years felt badly. There was no feast for him. But, his brother who had gambled and wasted his inheritance was given a big feast.

The father explained that he still loved the boy who had been gone and must welcome him the same as he would any son who had been missing. Even though that son had done bad things and not visited home, he was still family and still loved.

This ancient story reminds me of My EnglishClub and our friends who may leave here for a long time. We cannot know what they must do in their lives. They could have a very good reason for leaving for a while. It is not for us to say if it is a good reason or not, because we live a different lives from them.

All we can say is that we still love our friends and we will welcome them back after they are able to see us again. I was gone for much of the time for more than a year, but my friends have been warm in their welcome to me.

It is easy to return here  -  IF YOU DO NOT  -    delete your account


If you are very busy, sad or angry, it may be good to stay away from our club for a while.

Your friends will still love you , because they care about your happiness.

If you delete your account you are deleting your friends. I feel terrible when I am deleted.

You are also deleting all the messages and good history here.

Take a vacation from this club if you must. Just please, please, do not delete your account.

Your account will be safe for a long time so you can come back when your life improves. If you love this club and the people here, they will love you back when you return.

Deleting your account causes hurt to your friends. They miss you and grieve over your loss as if a friend has died. If you are angry at one person you shouldn’t hurt the ones who care about you. Just get your life together again and return.

I was gone and now I am very happy to be back with my friends. This place is more like a family to me and I love to see how everyone grows and improves with time.

I love you friends,

Bob

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RAINING IN SAUDI ARABIA

This is Monday night, April 9 and it is raining.  Even better, it has been raining almost daily since last Wednesday night.  We love the rain here.

The first clouds looked good from the back window of my classroom.

In many countries people are not excited by rain.  In fact, someone might say that the weather was terrible if it is raining.

On the Arabian Peninsula people have a different view of weather than people in wetter climates.  Here, we are excited when we clouds.  If someone says that it may rain, people smile in agreement or sadly disagree because they think the clouds will pass without rain.

The first rain drops had everyone excited!


After ten minutes we were getting hail with the rain and the streets were beginning to fill up.

The only bad part about rain here in Taif City, is that we don’t have much soil to hold the water so it just flows along after it hits the ground.  This is very mountainous (we are a mile above sea level) and rain just runs down the mountains into the streets.  At one place Wednesday night, the street was so flooded that I saw cars floating in the street.  The water swept them sideways and then they were blocking the way for the other drivers.

The rain was beautiful and we even got some hail. There was much lightning and thunder also.  I had to teach the students these words in English because they were new to many people.

There were many cars that got flooded out and some major intersections flowed like small rivers.

We were all happy except those with cars full of water. And, even they were happy for the rain.

Wow! Lightning behind the hospital.

Some streets were like rivers with parts so deep that cars had to stay on one side.

Rain is a great blessing when you have had none since last August!

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My trip to America - Part 1

I just returned this week from a trip to America.  My wife and I went there to see our daughter graduate from university.  This is a photo of her about the time she started going to the university.

I also went home to see my family and friends.  I will tell about that part of the trip later.

I started my trip in Jeddah, KSA. 

From there, my wife and I flew to New York City. 

We got to see two of my wife's sisters while we were waiting all day for our plane to Texas. Here is my wife and her sisters at the airport.

Our first plane took us to Atlanta, Georgia.  There we transferred to a plane for Austin, Texas. 

I think we were traveling for about 38 hours when we arrived in Austin at night.

The first day in Austin we mostly slept and stayed around the house. We did do a little shopping.  The next day we went to the December graduation ceremony at St. Edwards University.

Here is my daughter on her way to receive her diploma.  She received her degree in International Business Management.  She is also receiving her teaching certification in English.  Maybe she will teach in Europe for a couple of years.

We were very happy to see her finish school one semester early.  After the ceremony she and her mom had to pose for a photo in front of a famous door on the campus.

There are many historic buildings as well as modern ones.  The campus is high above the city of Austin.  This is a beautiful campus.

You can see the city below this campus soccer field.

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How to Spot a Spammer

Have you ever gotten a message like this? 

Hello Dear,

How is everything with you,I picked interest on you after going through your short profile and deemed it necessary to write you immediately.I have something very vital to disclose to you,but I found it difficult to express myself here,since it's a public site.Could you please get back to me on ( here the spammer lists some email address or website) for the full details.
Have a nice day.

thanks
fake name= SPAMMER.

It is more likely if you are a brand new member and don't know what to expect.

*****HOW TO SPOT A SPAMMER*****

They are very friendly and just saw your profile,

but say they must write you immediately.

They are usually new and have few or no friends.

They have something very VITAL, IMPORTANT, OR CONFIDENTIAL that they must tell you.

They can't tell you here on this public site (it must be in private).

They request that you contact them for the complete details.

They give you an email or website where you can reach them.

They infect your computer or try to take money from you by pretending to be a friend :-(

They may tell you a very sad story where they need your help.

They offer to show you a photo of themselves.

They need you to send them a little money.

These are never true !!

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What is the busiest schedule you have ever had in school? To be more clear, I am asking how many classes you have ever taken or taught on a weekly basis?

I love teaching English, but I have been teaching 43 classes a week! That is 23 classes in the mornings and 20 classes at night, each week.

I admit that I haven't been able to prepare for classes the way I would like to.  I also admit that I have been very poor at keeping in touch with my English Club friends since I arrived in Saudi Arabia last year.

I would really love to hear from all of my friends that are teachers and see if you have matched or exceeded this class load.  I think I may be close to setting a record for the number of classes taught while still maintaining some little bit of mental and physical health.

The good news is, that this may be changing very soon.  I will probably still have four one hour classes each night, but it looks like I will be working with older students in the mornings and maybe have 3 less classes per week.  That would still be 40 classes per week (8 per day) and really a bit too much, since part of teaching should include preparation time and office hours.

Again, I must apologize to my friends here for rarely visiting, but maybe you can see why I have been absent so much.  At home, my job was from 8:00 to 5:00. 

Our new winter schedule here has me teaching from 9:30 to 1:30 and again from 5:00 to 9:00.  Technically that is an eight hour day with a 3 1/2 hour lunch break.  Eight hours isn't bad if you have some office time to organize your classes.  Also this is much better than the beginning of the semester when the principal insisted that I arrive at 6:30 AM to sign in and then had all my classes scattered through the early part of the morning.

My contract here is over at the end of this month, so if things don't improve, I am not required to stay for another year.  I think that I can now negotiate a better situation and get the contract reworded to clarify any of the points that have been a problem over the past year.

Please let me know what your heaviest ever class schedule was, either as a teacher or as a student. I am very curious to see how 43 classes a week compares to your most difficult schedule.

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VOA - More Video Resources

I am afraid I have been too busy to post much here lately.  Even so, I would like to let everyone know about a good source of English language videos (VOA) that do provide useful information in an easy to follow format. 

If you live in some areas of the world you can receive VOA (Voice of America) broadcasts directly. Voice of America offers English language instruction programs in many countries.  This one is from the Cambodia area.

https://www.youtube.com/user/KhmerSpecialEnglish?feature=mhum#p/p

 

 

This video is about gardening and protecting your garden from too much sun. The announcer / teacher speaks slowly, with careful pronunciation.  Her words are shown below so that you can read along.  This is just one example of the huge number of VOA programs you can find yourself, by using your computer and a search engine.

 

I encourage you to explore the internet on your own. That is better for you than for me to give you all of the links. The more you explore, the more you will learn.

 

Maybe some of you could post links to some more good VOA videos in your comments. to show us all what you have found.

 

I would love to see what you can find and hope this little video is helpful to you.

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