domingo, 28 de noviembre de 2010

My alter ego

Thinking about what to write I came across the Comic Fair of Getxo and I started to think about my favourite comics. Apart from the typical ones my favourite character was Esther. It was a comic for girls that we could read every week in the Lily magazine as well as the special numbers that were published.
I must not be the only one to remember with longing this comic as today they are publishing again all the numbers as well as a new sequel: Esther is a grown up with grown up problems as we, the readers, have grown up.
Esther comics were special because they represented the life of a teenager and I was a teenager. They werre ceated in 1971 by Purita Campos.
I enclose a video if you want to know what Esther looked like.





Here you can see more photos and the designer of Esther:


viernes, 26 de noviembre de 2010

Me as a teacher

What's my philosophy of teaching? That's very difficult to answer as the word philosophy sounds very important and very "high". It is easier to speak about what I expect when I'm teaching, what I'd like to get from children. 


First of all I want children have a good time and enjoy learning English. Then I want them to see that English is something alive not something restricted to the classroom with no use afterwards. That's why I try to participate in different projects  (eTwinning projects). And finally, and not the less important, I want them to learn English, to be able to communicate with other children and in the future with other adults. 


Our students are as this amount of buttons, all different and with different attitudes, knowledge and aptitude we have to find the best way to teach them.
Perhaps the new technologies will help us to get this aim as they will provide us with new possibilities.  And we have something gain as studentsd are very keen on the new technologies and once their attention caught, we've done the most difficult.


Last year I attended a Eskola 2.0 training. We learnt during the year how to use the new computers, the digital board and other tools. It was interesting because I could see and discover new things but it was not directed to English teaching. It was a general course to get in touch with the new technologies. I also did a course about Hot Potatoes so I could prepare material I used afterwards with my 5th year students when we were providded with the new computers. We also used the digital board with the CD-ROM included in the method we used and another material the school bought.


This year I'm attending another Eskola 2.0 course but this time is especially directed to English teachers. Until now they gave us some ideas.


I'd like to prepare more material especially for my students, but to do so we need time and that's what more teachers lack of, especially "específicos" teachers who must teach nearly all the school and pass throughout all classes, making it quite difficult to pass from a 3 years old class to a 12 years old class (6th year).