Lesson #6 (Vocabulary: family + 'have got')

Leon Bridges 'Lisa Sawyer' (adjectives and adverbs)

It's like Sam Cooke has risen from the dead. It really pisses me off when somebody is so talented and younger than me.

Exercise1

Listen to the song twice and complete the gaps with the adjectives and adverbs.

Favourite movie speeches #1 - 'Heart of Glass' (1976) - Open cloze exercise (B1+/Exam)

Exercise 1
Complete the gaps with the correct word.

A rocky island far out 1. ____ the sea, and a second, smaller island. They lie on the far edge of the inhabited world. 2. ____ one island, for centuries, some forgotten men have lived. And because they live on the far edge 3.____ the inhabited world word has not reached them that the Earth is round. They 4. ____ retained the belief that the Earth is flat and that the ocean far beyond ends in a yawning abyss. I see a man on top of 5. ____ rock. For years he stood alone, looking out over the sea day after day, always in the same place, He is the first 6. ____  to doubt.

Lesson #5 (Vocabulary: personality + frequency adverbs - słownictwo: cechy charakteru + przysłówki częstotliwości)

Step 1

Listen to a song and complete the gaps with these adjectives (posłuchaj piosenki i uzupełnij przymiotnikami):

 wise,  kind,  young,  happy,  friendly

'I always get angry when I'm furious' - Bernard Black: the best hater on TV since Basil Fawlty

I like Dylan Moran. He verbalises my thoughts about the condition of the world perfectly. They all rattle in my brain too, but unfortunately, for the lack of any expressive oratory abillities, I can never quite put them the way I want. He does. In this grouchy, pesimistic, tired, deeply European way that is so close to my heart and which is very often misinterpreted, especially by some generally happy nations, like Americans, as the hatred towards all living things. But coming from intelligent and reasonable people, I've always considered this kind of sarcastic outlook as a rather special talent. It does not hide any heavy machinery behind it, no engine designed specifically to take pleasure in offending  others. It's just what it is on the outside. Taking notice of the ridiculousness and hypocrisies of the world and making it lighter for a moment.

Lesson #4 (Present Simple + hobbies and daily routines)

Step 1
Find these words i the dictionary:

hometown          prefer          family member           scattered          end up          root for         team

'Hi, my name is George, I'm unemployed and I live with my parents' - best Seinfeld quotes ever

I usually end my day with a short episode of something. I got into the habit so deep that never mind if I go to bed at 9pm or 3am these twenty minutes are a must. Lately, I've been working pretty hard and apparently, to unwind after a stressful day, the respectable oldies goldies do the best trick, with Seinfeld being on the top of that list. The last time I had a chance to catch a glimpse of an episode was maybe five years ago, and let me tell you - apart from the clothes and the hairdos, it does not get old. Here are some of my favourite words of wisdom:

1.'You know, I think we really need to be in front of a television set. You take T.V. out of this relationship, it is *just* torture.'

(George to his mother)

The Waterboys 'November Tale' (Past Simple)

Exercise 1

What do these verbs mean? Which of these verbs are regular and which are irregular? What's the past form of irregular ones? Check in the dictionary. (Co znaczą następujące czasowniki? Które z z nich są regularne, a które nieregularne? Jaka jest przeszła forma tych nieregularnych? Sprawdź w słowniku).

be, agree, blow, find, ask, walk, arrive, say, sleep, can, see, know

Exercise 2

Listen to the song twice and complete the gaps with verbs from exercise 1 in the past form (posłuchaj piosenki dwa razy i uzupełnij luki czasownikami z pierwszego ćwiczenia w przeszłej formie).

Fast, faster, the fastest - jak długo trzeba się uczyć?

Rozmowa na początku kursu:

-Jak długo trzeba się uczyć? 

-Wiesz, ja się uczę dwudziesty rok i dalej dowiaduję się nowych rzeczy.

-No ale mniej więcej? 

-Kilka lat co najmniej. 

Odpowiedź wyraźnie nie satysfakcjonuje.

Jest jakoś tak, że wszyscy się spieszą. Dosłownie i w przenośni. Żeby skończyć szkołę, żeby iść na studia, potem żeby już pracować, potem, żeby już mieć pieniądze, żeby już nie pracować, żeby szybko schudnąć, żeby się nauczyć angielskiego i go wreszcie umieć.

Troszkę o mnie

Mam na imię Ola. Po latach wzbraniania się przed traktowaniem angielskiego jako główne zajęcie w życiu, po różnych studiach i pracach, do których nie chciało mi się chodzić, otworzyłam szkołę językową i wreszcie jestem zadowolona :). Na tyle, że mimo ogromu pracy zachciało mi się jeszcze prowadzić bloga. Głównie, żeby posegregować swoje myśli ale gdyby ktoś miał ochotę potraktować moje posty jako pomoc w nauce albo w lekcji, zapraszam serdecznie.

Blog prowadzony w połowie po polsku, w połowie po angielsku, oferuje gotowe do wydruku lekcje od poziomu podstawowego (zanim dojdę do C2 pewnie minie parę lat), zadania na podstawie ciekawych tekstów albo piosenek i moje przemyślenia na temat nauczania w ogóle. Nie mogłam się powstrzymać od stworzenia podstrony filmowej - obok języków jest to moja druga pasja, która zanim pojawiły się inne możliwości odegrała ważną rolę w mojej nauce angielskiego.

Lesson #3 (Film lesson + hotel vocabulary)

Step 1
Find these words in a dictionary (znajdź następujące słowa w słowniku).

sitcom        countryside      tall          rude        customer       wife         

work         employee         maid       waiter     

Step 2

Read the text. Match the names with the pictures. (Przeczytaj tekst. Dopasuj imiona do obrazków)

Fawlty Towers is a sitcom about a hotel in the countryside in Great Britain. The manager of the hotel is Basil Fawlty, tall, dark-haired man, usually very rude to customers. His wife, Sybil, actually does all the work. Basil and Sybil have two employees - Polly and Manuel. Polly is a maid and she also works in a restaurant. Manuel is a waiter. Basil, Sybil and Polly are British, Manuel is from Barcelona, Spain. He has problems with English.

What to do with a dream?

I wouldn't write a bad review. I mean, I always find fault in everything, that's just how I roll, but noticing all the imperfections doesn't make me less positive about the whole thing if the thing is good, whatever the thing is. So instead of dwelling on the couple of pointless films I've had a displeasure of watching of late, I've decided to dig up a couple of titles that I just can't seem to get out of my head, never mind how ancient they are, completely blind to any imperfections.

Very loosely paraphrasing Milan Kundera - you can really call something a work of art if it forces you to feel something you have never ever felt before. By this standard, and any other, for that matter, I've always considered 'Fitzcarraldo' of Werner Herzog a work of art.

Three men in a boat (medical vocabulary, level B2+)

Step 1

Have you ever watched a medical drama, eg. House, ER, Grey's Anatomy etc? Which one is your favourite?

Step 2

In three minutes make a list of all the diseases that you can remember.

Step 3

Read the text and add some diseases mentioned by the author to your list.

There were four of us—George, and William Samuel Harris, and myself, and Montmorency.  We were sitting in my room, smoking, and talking about how bad we were—bad from a medical point of view I mean, of course.

Lesson #2 (Countries and nationalities - kraje i narodowości)

Step 1

Look at the graph and try to memorize the countries and nationalities. (Spójrz na graf i postaraj się zapamiętać nazwy krajów oraz narodowości)

Al Pacino as Danny Collins: 'It's spring in my mind, but the autumn leaves they fall'

I've said this before - I love a good story. Well, here it goes. An unknown but promising musician  Steve Tilston gives a newspaper interview in 1971. He talks about the doubts about his future in show business and how he's afraid that the demands of the world and fame are going to crash his spirit and sincerity. None other than John Lennon reads the interview and writes a letter to the struggling artist, giving some advice and apparently, his home phone number. He doesn't adress it directly to Tilston, though, and the letter doesn't make it to the recipient. By some twist and turns of the universe, he gets it a couple of decades later and the question hangs in the air - what if...?

Jamie Woon 'Shoulda' (prepositions/should have)

Exercise 1

Listen to the song twice and complete the gaps (posłuchaj piosenki dwa razy i uzupełnij luki)

 Chorus:

Walked when I shoulda run
ran when I shoulda walked
and don't I know it
and don't I know it

walked when I shoulda run
and I ran when I shoulda walked
and don't I know it
and don't I know it

'Co mam zrobić, żeby wreszcie zacząć mówić po angielsku?'

Na początku każdego kursu zawsze pytam uczniów czego ode mnie oczekują. Pytanie przeważnie na chwilę wywołuje konsternację, a potem 8 na 10 osób zawsze powie, że chce wreszcie zacząć mówić.

Sprawa jest zrozumiała. Ale jakże skomplikowana. 

Największym problemem dla mnie jako nauczyciela jest brak świadomości słuchaczy w kwestii przyswajania obcego języka, a problemem większości szkół, brak takiej świadomości u nauczycieli. Jak wytłumaczyć, że ktoś dogaduje się bezstresowo kończąc kurs na poziomie podstawowym, a ktoś po 10 latach nauki jest ledwo w stanie powiedzieć kilka zdań o sobie?

True Detective 2: Astronauts don't even go to the moon anymore.

 

One of the greatest pleasures in life for me is to hear a good story. Such a kind that leaves you in a state of a slight shock and with a lot of reflection. Being a pessimistic grumbler far too often, I generally hold a view that everything's been said and done and surprising an experienced recipient borders on impossible. But, every once in a while, upon reading or watching something new, I'm put back in my place quite enexpectedly, and thank god for that.

The first season of True Detective was exactly this for me. It had me hooked from the first minute of the first episode 'till the last scene where one of the most beautiful, simple, meaningful-without-being-overly-dramatic conversations in TV history took place. So I tried to lower my expectations before starting season 2 to prevent any initial resentment rising from the fact that it does not measure up.

Lesson #1 (Subject Pronouns and the verb 'be' - zaimki osobowe i czasownik 'być')

Step 1 (Krok 1)

Read and try to remember the following pronouns.

(Przeczytaj i postaraj się zapamiętać następujące zaimki).

ja	I
ty	you
on	he
ona	she
ono	it
my	we
wy	you
oni	they