Preliminary (B1)

Hello all!

We’re closer and closer to getting back to normal, you can practically feel it in the air!

Exam classes

Hello everyone!

First of all, we’d like to thank you for the extra popularity this blog is experiencing. Last Saturday was the best day of the week with an increase of 1475% in visits! You’ve made us all proud. Thank you so very much! 😀

Today we welcome a new week #athome full of hope that we’ll be able to see each other soon. 🙂

It’s exam time!

Hello everybody and happy December!

It’s that time of the year again, and I don’t mean Christmas!

Word formation ( Part 1)

Hello everyone and happy November!!

Improving your writing skills

Hello everyone!

How’s April treating you? I hope you’ve all had a chance to enjoy the sunny spells we’ve been having lately as well to do the suggested exercises our last post on Inversions Part 2! Let’s take a look at the answers:

Conditional sentences (Part 1)

Hello everybody!

How did you do with the Reported Speech sentences from the last post? Let’s take a look!

The Passive Voice (Part 2)

Hello everyone!

Last January we wrote a post about the passive voice (you can check it out here) but we told you that it was part 1! So today we are going to take a look at 2 other types of passives (usually for Intermediate students and above) which can be quite tricky to master.

Let’s take a look at the following active sentence:

Learning English through play

Hi everyone!

How did those question tags go? Check your answers here:

Answers

And as for the extra challenge….

Each step counts

Hi folks!

How’s the weekend going? I hope you have enjoyed our quiz on idioms in the previous post, our students surely have! And as promised, here are the answers: 1B, 2A, 3A, 4C, 5A, 6B, 7C, 8A, 9A, 10B, 11A, 12C.

Today we have a post about the younger students, our kiddies. Carol Banet (Head of Junior Department) has written the following article to shed some lights on the YLE exams, why they are becoming so popular and her experience when students prepare and take these exams. Enjoy!

How many times as a teacher or as parents have we asked ourselves ‘How can I motivate young children to study English?’ ‘What can be done to maintain their interest?’ ‘How can they be motivated?’ ‘What about making the time spent at school more enjoyable and entertaining?’

Cambridge Young Learner exams can be one of the ways to answer these questions.

What are Cambridge Young Learners exams?

Cambridge Young Learner exams are tests specially designed for children at primary and lower- secondary school. These tests are an excellent way to motivate our students to learn English, build their confidence using a foreign language and  show parents the progress the students make.

Why should students take Young Learners exams?

These are not the classical tests students normally do at their schools. These are activity- based tests which focus on putting into practice English for everyday situations, covering familiar and interesting topics for the students specially designed to develop the skills students need to communicate in English as a second language in a natural way.

Tests where the most important thing is not what students cannot do but what they can do!

What level are the exams?

There are three levels: STARTERS, MOVERS & FLYERS. All of them designed so students improve their English following a well planned, interesting syllabus. These exams are aligned with the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR).

The exams are divided into three parts, covering all language skills appropriate to each level: Reading & Writing, Listening & Speaking.

What do students get after doing the exam?

All students will receive an award. They will be awarded a Cambridge Certificate which will show a number of shields, according to the student´s performance in the different parts of the exam.

Personally speaking, I really think that this is an excellent way to motivate students to see how they can make the study of a subject something more interesting, enjoyable and practical. Soon students at this early age will not be afraid of taking exams and they will see them as something natural and normal in their education. Parents would be surprised if they knew how many times students who have done one of the tests are asking when they will be taking the next.

Written by Carol Banet

Pronunciation (-ed )

Hey guys!

How are you doing? In Euroschool we couldn’t be happier!!! We have been awarded with the Achievement Award 2016!!!

Do you know what that means? Well, in case you missed it last year, this is an award given by Cambridge English to the best Exam Preparation Centres. We are top notch! 🙂 And the best part is that it is not us saying it: it’s Cambridge! So before getting hands on with pronunciation we want to thank YOU: this wouldn’t have been possible without all your effort to pass.

Here’s the award:

PRONUNCIATION:

-ed pronunciation is usually an issue to students of all levels so, today’s post is going to be dedicated to helping you with this matter.

The first thing you need to understand is that the pronunciation of these endings is going to depend on the last sound of the word without the suffix. (If you are not familiar with the phonetic chart, check out this link: https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/phonemic-chart )

For example:

“Watch” is pronounced /wɒtʃ/ and its last sound is /ʃ/. This means that when adding the -ed suffix it will sound like this: /wɒtʃt/. You can see that a /t/ sound has been added at the end.

“Love” is pronounced /lov/ and its last sound is /v/. So in the past and past participle forms it will sound like this: /lovd/. Here, a /d/ sound has been added.

“Lift” is pronounced just as it is written: /lift/, with a final /t/ sound,  and in its -ed form is pronounced /liftid/

/t/, /d/ or /id/?

As mentioned above that will depend on the last sound of the word which  we know is sometimes difficult to identify. However, we have made this chart in which we categorise those sounds depending on the pronunciation of the -ed suffix.

(Please note that these are not phonemic symbols but an approximation of how they sound when we pronounce them)

/t/	/d/	/id/
/p/ /k/ /f/ /s/ /sh/ /tch/ /ks/	/b/ /g/ /v/ /z/ /dj/ /m/ /n/ /r/ /l/	/t/ /d/

This chart works not only for verbs but for any other word with -ed ending.

I know that phonetics are not very popular amongst Spanish students but I really encourage you to learn them! Your teacher at Euroschool can help you! Meanwhile, if you want to start digging around on your own, here is a great video to get started:

YouTube – British Council Phonemic Chart

As students, we usually think that our pronunciation has to be spot on and that we should know how to pronounce every word. We tend to put a lot of pressure on ourselves! Well, maybe the following video will help you to be a bit more relaxed about it!

Check it out! It’s just hilarious! 😆

<a href="http://www.slideshare.net/EuroschoolOfEnglish/slideshelf“>http://www.slideshare.net/EuroschoolOfEnglish/slideshelf

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