Для многих для запоминания слов на английском языке необходима визуализация предмета.

Так вот сегодня мы и соединяем картинку с названием предмета. Ничего проще и не придумаешь, но наверняка что-то в памяти из данных слов и останется. Взято из Test your Vocabulary Intermediate.

Задание на сегодня будет связано с пассивным залогом (Passive). Я вам предоставляю такую замечательную лёгкую табличку, найденную мной на просторах интернета. Из этой таблицы сегодня нам понадобится только первый столбик (под названием Simple) и первые две строки (Present и Past).

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А вот и само задание:

Я даю Вам три истории в картинках. Вам надо рассказать её письменно, используя данные глаголы, которые необходимо поставить в Present или Past Passive Simple (в зависимости от того, случилась ли история в прошлом, или же рассказывается про постоянные действия). В первой истории только необходимо поставить глаголы в верную форму, а вторую и третью написать полностью самостоятельно.

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Всем доброго дня!

Смотрим на картинки, подписи к ним и решаем, что же надо поставить на второй картинке, чтобы получилось так, как и должно быть :)

Good luck!

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Вот и прошли майские праздники, а это означает, что пора вспомнить и про английский язык.

Сегодня слушаем разные диалоги и пытаемся догадаться, с кем же разговаривает Beth в задании под буквой a), и ком говорит в задании под буквой b). А вот и само задание из учебника (Wavelength Intermediate):

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Всем доброго дня! Очень радостно видеть, что каждый день появляется всё больше и больше желающих попрактиковать себя в английском языке. You are welcome! Добро пожаловать. Надеюсь, что в ближайшем будущем вы начнёте активно выполнять задания, которые я вам готовлю ;)

А пока вы выполняете грамматический тест (опубликованный ещё вчера), у меня появился дикий интерес к тому, ЧТО же наши школьники должны уметь и знать, когда идут на Единый Государственный Экзамен по английскому. И сегодня предлагаю вам выполнить одно из заданий по ЕГЭ (из сборника за 2013 год!).

Итак, читаем и выбираем один из вариантов ответов.

A Gifted Cook

If there is a gene for cuisine, Gabe, my 11-year-old son, could splice it to perfection. Somewhere between Greenwich Village, where he was born, and the San Francisco Bay area, where he has grown up, the little kid with the stubborn disposition and freckles on his nose has forsaken Boy Scouts and baseball in favor of wielding a kitchen knife.

I suppose he is a member of the Emeril generation. Gabe has spent his formative years shopping at the Berkeley Bowl, where over half a dozen varieties of Thanksgiving yams, in lesser mortals, can instill emotional paralysis. He is blessed with a critical eye. "I think Emeril is really cheesy," he observed the other night while watching a puff pastry segment. "He makes the stupidest jokes. But he cooks really well."

With its manifold indigenous cultures, Oaxaca seemed the perfect place to push boundaries. Like the mole sauces for which it is justly famous, the region itself is a subtle blend of ingredients - from dusty Zapotec villages where Spanish is a second language to the zocalo in colonial Oaxaca, a sophisticated town square brimming with street life and vendors selling twisty, one-story-tall balloons.

Appealing to Gabe's inner Iron Chef seemed like an indirect way to introduce him to a place where the artful approach to life presides. There was also a selfish motive: Gabe is my soul mate, a fellow food wanderer who is not above embracing insanity to follow his appetite wherever it leads.

Months ahead of time, we enrolled via the Internet in the daylong Wednesday cooking class at Seasons of My Heart, the chef and cookbook author Susana Trilling's cooking school in the Elta Valley, about a 45-minute drive north to town. In her cookbook and PBS series of the same name, Ms. Trilling, an American whose maternal grandparents were Mexican, calls Oaxaca "the land of no waste" where cooking techniques in some ancient villages have endured for a thousand years.

I suspected that the very notion of what constitutes food in Oaxaca would test Gabe's mettle. At the suggestion of Jacob, his older brother, we spent our second night in Mexico at a Oaxaca Guerrero baseball game, where instead of peanuts and Cracker Jack, vendors hawked huge trays piled high with chapulines, fried grasshoppers cooked in chili and lime, a local delicacy. Gabe was bug-eyed as he watched the man next to him snack on exoskeletal munchies in a paper bowl. "It's probably less gross than a hot dog," he admitted. "But on the rim of the bowl I saw a bunch of legs and served body parts. That's revolting!"

Our cooking day began at the Wednesday market in Etla, shopping for ingredients and sampling as we went. On the way in the van, Gabe had made friends with Cindy and Fred Beams, fellow classmates from Boston, sharing opinions about Caesar saladand bemoaning his brother's· preference for plain pizza instead of Hawaiian. Cindytold Gabe about a delicious sauce she'd just had on her omelet at her B & B. "It wasthe best sauce - to die for," she said. "Then I found out the provenance. Roastedworms."

The Oaxacan taste for insects, we'd learn - including the worm salt

На сегодня я предлагаю Вам сделать тест по грамматике (взят из English File). Проверьте свои знания! А я посмотрю на Ваши уязвимые места и следующие задания по грамматике буду выбирать относительно них.

Если вдруг совсем ничего не видно и не понятно, дайте мне об это знать (на моём компьютере всё читаемо).

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На сегодня задание будет письменное (то есть, надо написать как можно больше информации о себе по нижепредставленным вопросам). И свяжем мы наше задание непосредственно со вчерашним глаголом GET (закрепим, так сказать).

Итак, вопросы (взято из New English File Pre-Intermediate):

1. Do you ever get to school/work late? When was the last time?

2. When was the last time you got lost? Where were you trying to go? What happened?

3. What makes you get angry? When was the last time you got really angry? Why?

4. When was the last time you got a present? What was it? Who was it from?

5. Who do you get on with best in your family? Is there anybody you don't get on with?

6. What do you think is the best age to get married? Why?

7. Which problems in your country are getting better? Which are getting worse?

Отсебятина:

Замечу (по опыту), что письменные задания такого рода (как и устные ответы на такие вопросы) даются крайне сложно, даже если человеку есть о чем рассказать, и у него есть сформировавшееся мнение по тому или иному вопросу. Чаще всего студенты просто ленятся рассказывать, хотя, на самом деле, такие вопросы наоборот помогают пополнить словарный запас и употреблять грамматику в речи. Стоит только сесть писать ответы, как к самому себе возникает много вопросов: а как сказать то или иное по-английски? А какое время лучше употребить? И как здорово, когда есть место, где можно узнать ответы на свои же вопросы! Если Вы не знаете, КАК сказать или написать, спросите у меня, я Вам помогу ;) Зачем же ещё я даю Вам такие упражнения?

Сегодня я предлагаю Вам вспомнить такой интересный глагол под названием GET. Если заглянуть в словарь и посмотреть всевозможные варианты перевода этого глагола, то можно подумать, что английский язык не покорится нам никогда. Но! Мы будем крайне оптимистичны и начнём штурмовать этот каверзный глагол помаленьку.

Итак, задание на сегодня заключается в том, чтобы вставить правильные фразы с участием глагола get в предложение, и не забываем поставить глагол в нужную временную форму ;)

Поехали! Фразы, которые необходимо поставить в предложения (также жду перевода этих фраз):

a. get angry

b. get e-mails

c. get home

d. get married

e. get taller

f. get tickets

g. get on

h. get worse

i. get off

j. get lost

Сами предложения:

1. A: The pain in my back's__________________.

B: You should go to the doctor's.

2. I __________________ 25 __________________ from my boss yesterday. I spent all my day answering them.

(здесь необходимо разделить одну из фраз, то есть 25 будет между get и другим словом ;))

3. You shouldn't __________________ with him for breaking the window. He's only three!

4. A: Can you __________________ me two__________________ for Friday's concert?

B: I might be able to.

5. My mum and I are great friends but I don't __________________with my father very well.

6. John usually finishes work very late. When he __________________ his children are always in bed.

7. At what age do you think young people should __________________?

8. My granddaughter __________________. She's growing very fast.

9. Would you like my sit? I __________________ the bus at the next stop.

10. I didn't have a map so I __________________ .

Упражнение взято из учебника New English File

Исправляем ошибку :) Как правильно сказать, чтобы не получились "маленькие люди", а получилось "мало людей".

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Нравятся мне такие истории. Они вдохновляют. И заставляют верить в то, что всё в наших руках!

Читаем (задание после текста).

The cleverest man on earth

Kim Peek was labelled 'mentally deficient' at birth. By the age of four, he was reading encyclopedias for fun. Today he can play the piano likeMozart and recall any fact from more than 9,000 books.

There is something familiar about this man in the hotel lobby, who is muttering to himself about airlines and heavy snow. He gives a bellow of laughter and people turn round in surprise, then smile as they recognise the shuffling gait and large bespectacled head of Kim Peck. Something of a local hero here in Salt Lake City, it's Kim's life on which an Oscar-winning film was based. Rain Man was a film about an autistic savant with a stounding mathematical skills, although Kim himself is developmentally disabled, not autistic. Most savants possess remarkable expertise in one to three subjects; Kim, an expert in at least 15 different subjects, is known as a mega-savant, although he has a Joe in common with Rain Man, such as the lightning speed at which he can memorise facts.

Recently dubbed 'the living Google', no one in the world is thought to possess a brain quite like Kirn Peck's. As soon as he was born it was immediately clear he was different. His head was so huge that his neck muscles couldn't support it and a later brain scan revealed he had one solid brain hemisphere instead of two. It is possible that, because the two sides of the brain were unable to communicate with each other, the brain may have turned into one megacomputer. However, this is one of many theories, none of which have yet been proved.The analysis of Kim's brain does, however, explain the reason for his severe motor deficiencies. He is looked after by his father, Fran, on whom he totally depends. 81-year·old Fran, although not in the best of health himself, takes care of his son fulltime, helping him to wash and dress and checking on him in the night. Doctors believe it is Fran's unconditional love and belief in his son that are partly responsible for Kim's exceptional brilliance. However, it obviously runs in the family; Kim also has a brother and a sister, both of whom, along with Fran himself, are exceptionally clever and are classed as geniuses.

When Kim was a child, doctors advised putting him in an institution,at which point his parents took him home instead and introduced him to books. By four and a half, although no school would accept him, he had sought out encyclopaedias, atlases and telephone directories, all of which he memorised. It has recently been discovered that each of Kim's eyes can read a separate page simultaneously, taking just ten seconds, rather than the average three minutes. These days, he spends most afternoons in the local library, where he is a much-loved figure.

It's hard to hold a conversation with Kim, whose mind flits from one subject to another with confusing speed. Physically, he can be a little intimidating. A big man, he rises suddenly out of his chair to distribute bear hugs; his mild, kindly father keeps an eye on him andtries to explain what he's talking about. However, although Kim is charming and affectionate, he hasn't always been socially confident. Until a chance meeting with the screenwriter led to the making of Rain Man, Kim seldom dared look another person in the face. It was Dustin Hoffman, the actor who played Kim in the film, who urged Fran to take Kim out into the world. The way in which social contact has transformed Kim's life is immeasurable. It has developed in him a marked sense of humour and he loves meeting people. "It is only since Rain Man that Kim's mind became connected to his heart," says Fran. "Now I think his heart is even bigger than his brain."

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Сегодня предлагаю прослушать необычные новости (quirky news) и ответить на следующие вопросы.

Вопросы к тексту №1:

1. What is Anne Clark offering?

2. How much does it cost to get your dog or cat married?

3. Where does she perform the weddings?

4. Are they legally binding?

5. What do the pet owners get?

6. Why did two animals get a divorce?

Вопросы к тексту №2:

1. How can prisoners in Brazil get out early?

2. What's the name of the new programme?

3. How many days do they get off their sentence for every book they read?

4. How many conditions are there?

5. How long have they got to read the book?

6. What do they have to write after reading the book?

В помощь - glossary и картинки ;)

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(c) Hot English #127

Когда мы даём несколько определений для одного существительного в одном предложении, в английском языке очень важно собладть их очередность, а именно:

в первую очередь мы поставим прилагательное, которое будет выражать наше личное отношение к предмету (например, красивый, ужасный, очаровательный), далее последует размер предмета, затем его возраст, цвет, происхождение (откуда) и затем лишь материал, из которого он сделан. Вот наглядная табличка (взято из Face2face Advanced):

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А теперь несколько заданий для вас:

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Итак, сегодня середина рабочей недели, а значит, самое время немного отдохнуть.

Задание на сегодня из разряда смешных - найти punch lines. Что это такое?

Предлагаю вам определение на английском языке:

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Вчера у нас была интересная статья про деньги, а сегодня хотелось бы почитать Ваши ответы на следующие вопросы:

1. What's the most expensive thing you've bought lately? Why did you buy it?

2. Do you think there are some things in society that we shouldn't be able to buy? What?

3. What are some of the best/worst things you've ever bought? Why?

Для того, чтобы избегать постоянного повторения фразы "I think", воспользуйтесь следующими выражениями:

I suppose - я полагаю, считаю, думаю
I suppose it will rain today. (Думаю, что сегодня пойдет дождь.)

I reckon - я считаю, полагаю
I reckon she is angry at me for leaving her alone. (Полагаю, она на меня зла из-за то, что я бросил ее одну.)

I guess - я думаю, полагаю, наверно
I guess I'll go now. (Я, наверно, пойду.)

I imagine - я думаю, полагаю
I imagine she earned a lot of money with her new novel. (Полагаю, она заработала много денег на своем новом романе.)

I presume - полагаю, предполагаю
That's the new assistant, I presume. (Это тот самый новый ассистент, я полагаю.)

In my opinion - по моему мнению
In my opinion this matter is not as bad as it may seem. (По моему мнению, все не так плохо, как кажется.)

I believe - полагаю, считаю
I believe he is innocent. (Считаю, что он невиновен.)

It seems to me that - мне кажется, что.
It seems to me that they are conspiring against us. (Мне кажется, что они то-то замышляют против нас.)

To my way of thinking,. - на мой взгляд, по-моему
To my way of thinking, his speech was not very convincing. (На мой взгляд, его речь была не очень убедительна.)

As I see it, . - по моему мнению, как мне кажется
As I see it, he has done nothing wrong but helped his family. (По моему мнению, он не сделал ничего плохого, только помогал своей семье.)

The way I see things is that. - как я это вижу, по-моему
The way I see things is that they have committed a crime and have to be punished. (Как я это вижу, они совершили преступление, и должны быть наказаны.)

Понедельник начинаем с прочтения интересной и современной статьи из журнала Hot English.

Читаем статью, узнаем, что же в наши дни реально приобрести за деньги! Переводим письменно один из понравившихся семи пунктов (если есть желание перевести несколько или все - you are welcome!).

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These days, you can buy just about anything. But is that a good thing? Should there be some limits on what we can spend our money on? What Money Can't Buy, by Michael Sandel, asks a simple question: is there something wrong with a world in which everything is for sale?

In his book, Sandel (who is a Harvard professor and philosopher) provides several examples to illustrate his point. For example, in Dallas, schools pay children $2 for every book they read (to encourage them to read), in some US cities people can pay $10 to drive alone in carpool lanes, and in the EU companies can "buy" the right to emit more pollution. So, what's wrong with that?

A lot, according to Sandel. He says that we've gone from having a market economy to having a "market society". And he believes there are two problems with this. Firstly, it makes our world less equal - in a place where everything is for sale, poor people have much harder lives. Secondly, he says there are certain areas of our lives (such as education and the environment) that shouldn't be driven by money. Here are seven more examples of our "market society". What do you think in each case?

1. Paying to upgrade your prison cell: in Santa Ana, California, minimum security prisoners can upgrade to a quiet, clean cell for $90 per night.

2. Selling advertising space on your forehead: a single mother in Utah was paid $10,000 to have the name of a casino tattooed on her forehead. She said she needed the money to pay for her son's education.

3. Paying to go through security more quickly: in some airports passengers can pay to pass more quickly through security checks. Sandel thinks this is wrong because security in airports isn't a commercial service, but a public good and therefore it shouldn't be 'for sale'.

4. Betting on someone's death: at www.stiffs.com you can win money by betting on which ageing celebrities will die within the next twelve months.

5. Paying for the right to call your doctor after hours: some American doctors give their patients their mobile phone numbers in exchange for between $1,000 and $25,000 per year. If you don't pay, you can't call your doctor after hours.

6. Contributing to an election victory: American billionaire Sheldon Adelson has promised $100 million to Mitt Romney's election campaign, to make sure he beats Barack Obama in November. One political commentator has said it "feels like the buying of democracy."

7. Paying to go to the front of the queue: in Washington D.C. you can pay www.lineslanding.com to arrange for someone to wait in line for you. Why? Well, the queues to get into Congress (to listen to debates and hearings) are often very long. So, Washington lobbyists pay $37 per hour to hire someone (often a homeless person) to wait in line for them. Just before the doors to the hearing open, the lobbyist replaces the "linestander". Sandel says this is wrong "because in a democratic society everyone should have equal access to government ".

Сегодня у нас рубрика Mistakes, в которой мы рассматриваем типичные ошибки, которые совершают те, кто желает говорить по-английски.

Снова обратимся к книге "Is that what you mean? 50 common mistakes and how to correct them" by Paul Hancock.

Ваше задание - объяснить, почему первая картинка такая странная и продолжить второе предложение так, чтобы картинка стала другая. Подсказки прям под картинками на английском.

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Ох и нравятся же мне аудирования в учебнике Wavelength Intermediate!

Сегодня слушаем смешной диалог именно оттуда и выполняем задание на картинке (поставить F, если утверждение не верное, и T, если верное).

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Сегодня задание серьёзное, но достаточно простое. Вспоминаем по-тихоньку времена. Сегодня возьмём времена Simple: Present Simple, Past Simple и Future Simple.

Задание одно: определить по смыслу к какому из трёх времён относится предложение (это сделать крайне легко) и поставить глаголы в предложении в верную форму (если надо - добавить окончания, или вспомогательные глаголы do/does/did/will, их тоже надо не забыть поставить на верное место). Для того, чтобы легче было сориентироваться, внизу дана картинка с подсказкой.

Жду полные предложения в комментариях для проверки ;)

Предложения взяты из сборника упражнений по грамматике (автор - Ю. Голицынский). Хороший сборник для доведения знаний по грамматике до автоматизма.

1. He (to turn) on the TV to watch cartoons every morning.

2. He (to turn) on the TV to watch cartoons yesterday morning.

3. He (to turn) on the TV to watch cartoons tomorrow morning.

4. I always (to go) to the Altai Mountains to visit my relatives there.

5. I (to be) very busy last summer and I (not to go) there.

6. I (not to go) there next year because it (to cost) a lot of money and  Ican't afford it.

7. They (to enjoy) themselves at the symphony yesterday evening?

8. Who (to take) care of the child in the future?

9. How often you (to go) to the dentist's?

10. We (not to have) very good weather, but we still (to have) a good time during our short stay in London.

11. She (to do) all the washing in their house.

12. He even (not to know) how to use the washing machine.

13. Two years ago they (to be) rich and money (to be) never a problem.

14. You (to think) you (to be) happy in your new neighbourhood?

15. When the chicken soup (to be) ready?

16. The customs officers at JFK airport in New York (to arrest) that young man when he (to arrive).

17. I (to like) to get on with my friends,so I often (to do) what they (to want).

18. When your birthday (to be)?

Сегодня размышляем на тему: где же лучше всего живётся? В городе или за городом?

Для того, чтобы легче было оформить мысли, предлагаю сначала выполнить следующее задание:

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К каждой фразе, которую надо вставить, есть буква. Номер предложения плюс буква помогут выполнить Вам задание в саааааамом низу.

После этого задания жду Ваши аргументы "за" и "против" жизни в городе и за городом ;)

И помните: главное - не бояться делать ошибок. Поэтому пишите всё, что думаете по данному вопросу, а с ошибками я Вам помогу разобраться.

Good luck!

Есть ссылка на картинку (может, качество будет получше): http://disk.tom.ru/q2nvup1 .

Для чтения прекрасных современных статей на английском существует замечательный журнал "Hot English".

Сегодня возьмём одну статью как раз из этого журнала. Называется она "Science gone mad". Это статья об известном событии "The Ig Nobels". (С Вас - в комментариях написать как это событие называется по-русски).

Вот объяснение о названии на английском:

The name of the competition (the lg Nobels) forms an expression that sounds like the English word "ignoble" which is basically the opposite of "noble" (a "noble" person has excellent qualities of character, including honesty, generosity and selflessness). For more information on lg Nobels, visit: www.improbable.com/ig

Итак, сама статья:

"Science gone mad"

Science is a serious subject, right? Well,not always.The Ig Nobels are prizes for

unusual scientific research­ the kind of research that makes you laugh, then makes you think . The award ceremony for the prizes is organised by science magazine The Annals of Improbable Research , and takes place at Harvard University. Here are some of this year's winners.

The Medicine Prize went to a team from Japan and China for their research on mice that had undergone heart transplants . They looked at the effects that listening to opera had on the mice.

The joint Prize in Biology and Astronomy was awarded to scientists from South Africa and Sweden for discovering that when dung beetles get lost, they can navigate their way home by looking at the milky way.

The Chemistry Prize went to a team from japan and Germany for their research into the biochemical process that causes onions to make people cry. Their conclusion was that it's even more complicated than previously thought.

The Safety Engineering Prize was awarded to the late Gustano Pizzo (from the US) for inventing an electro-mechanical system to trap airplane hijackers. The system drops a hijacker through trap doors and parachuted to the ground, where the police can arrest him.

The Psychology Prize went to an international team for confirming that people who think they're drunk also think they're more attractive. In the study, people in a bar were asked how funny, original and attractive they found themselves. The  higher their blood alcohol level the more attractive they thought they were. The same effect was also found for those who thought they'd been drinking alcohol, when in  fact they'd been having a non-alcoholic placebo drink.

The Probability Prize was awarded to a team from the UK and the Netherlands for their study on cows.

The team made two related discoveries: firstly, the longer a cow has been lying down, the greater the probability that it'll soon stand up; and secondly, that once a cow stands up, you cannot easily predict when that cow will lie down again. On a  more serious note, the study could help farmers and vets detect health problems in cows.

Finally, this year's Peace Prize went jointly to the president of Belarus for making public applause illegal, and to the country's state police for arresting a one-armed man for the offence.

Задание: читаем и письменно переводим (письменный перевод значительно отличается от устного, поэтому не ленимся!) про одну из наиболее Вам понравившихся номинаций.