Travel and languages

There are many people  who enjoy travelling around the world. They decide to visit different countries to know more about the culture, eat and drink their typical dishes and drinks or simply forget the routine or have a good time with their families or friends. 

Nowadays, more and more people, especially young, decide to travel to learn or improve a foreign language. They have different ways of travel like an Erasmo, an academic exchange, a language immersion programme, a scholarship or even to work as an au-pair.

As far as the country chosen is concerned, surveys show us that young people prefer English speaking countries like United Kingdom, United States or Australia. Nevertheless, they also choose other European countries or even Asian to learn other languages like German, French or Chinese.

Why should we choose to travel abroad to learn or improve a new language?

There are many reasons but maybe the most important are:

1. A language immersion in a foreign country is the best way to learn a language.
2. You will learn faster and better the language.
3. It is not the same study that live with it 24 hours per day.
4. You will listen different accents.
5. Living in a foreign country and learning a foreign language provide  more opportunities to find a job.

Once that you decide to travel, the problem is when you arrive in this foreign country and you can’t understand natives speakers because they speak too fast or they have a close accent. Another problem can be that you don’t speak their language or you can’t express yourself in an appropriate way due to your English is not good. For these reasons,  we explain some tips to enjoy more with the adventure, especially the first weeks.

1. You have to know some cultural traditions of that country.

All countries have their own cultural traditions, for this reason, before travelling, it is very important to search for information of the country that you want to visit like traditions, social customs, symbols, dress code...

We have to respect their traditions and we should also get dressed in a suitable way to the place we visit.

2. You must learn basic vocabulary and common expressions.

When you travel to a foreign country is important to learn some basic vocabulary of their language because they don’t have to understand English or another language that you speak. Besides, if you learn some basic expressions,  you will get on better on your trip. You can find words or expressions in a printed dictionary or in an online dictionary.

Make the most of the trip to have a basic knowledges of a new language.

3. If you have to ask something to somebody, be polite and speak slowly.

When you ask somebody a question, don't forget be polite. It is also very important to use a suitable tone of voice and speak in a correct speed. People will treat you in a more respectful way.

4. Use the help of images, gestures or indications.

When you arrive in your new city and you don´t understand a lot, you can use the help of different pictures and gestures. Moreover, it is important to buy a map to locate better  places.

How can you improve or learn a foreign language once that you are settled?

Once that you are adapted to your new atmosphere, you should not forget:

1. Speak,speak and speak
2. Observe all things that surround you.
3. Visit different places.
4. Meet new people.

If you decide to go to study abroad, you can visit this blog that contains a lot of information about travelling abroad. It shares other people travel experience and their own experience. It also shows useful links and advices.

http://thestudyabroadblog.com

What happens if you can not travel?

If you don't have the opportunity to study abroad, you have other ways to improve your language skills. Some of them are:

1. Watch films, series or TV programmes in original version

It is good for improving your listening skills because you listen different types of speeds and accents. First, if you want, you can put subtitles but in same language as the original version

2. Read books.

Reading a book in original version, you are learning a lot of new words and you are also improving your speaking. Moreover, the more books you read,  the better you write.

3. Read foreign newspapers.

Besides be informed, you can improve foreign languages. Sometimes, reading  a newspaper can be difficult because it uses typical vocabulary and it often omits words. However, you practice reading skills and you learn new vocabulary of distinct topics.

Normally, general press is easier than specialized press. In any case, you should choose a topic that you like.

4. Change the language of your electronically devices or social networks.

If you change the language of your devices, you will be able to understand a lot of new words.

5. Listen music of different foreign singers

It is a good way to practise  listening while you have a good time. Moreover, you can learn new words and expressions. You should choose memorable songs with simple lyrics and a singer with a good articulation.

6. Look for apps where you can speak with native people.

Talking with native speakers is the best way to improve language skills. Nowadays, it exists many apps like busuu, italky or skype  where you can speak with people of whatever place of the world.

If these advices are not enough, here you have a video of how to improve your English speaking skills (by yourself):

Mónica Otero Adán and Laura Pérez Pérez

Learning English with Adventure Games

Video games can be an excellent source for learning English. Being in front of a console or a computer and playing video games can be a good interaction with English. The stories, the tutorials, the dialogues, the texts… everything can give you the chance of looking at the words, phrases and sentences as they were applied in a real context.

In some cases, it involves more than listening and repeating words. It requires using the language to keep playing because the instructions or hints are included in either phrase the character say or the text you find along the way. Besides, what the characters say is part of the story, so it’s like reading a book in which the action is being described.

There are as many interesting stories and challenges in video games as there are novels and topics in books. Elements like questions, expressions and, of course, a lot of vocabulary are some examples of how games show and apply grammar rules that students learn in school. This means that it doesn't matter what your preferences are, you will always find something for you.

Incidental learning

Playing video games doesn’t have to be a waste of time. Actually, game players can learn a lot through the engagement and immersion provided by the game. This is known as incidental learning: unintentional, unplanned -but not unconscious- learning which results from other activities. This happens through repetition, observation, social interaction and problem solving.

Video games lead players through a series of levels and situations. These changing situations challenge the players to solve the different problems they face. In order to do that, games have to provide the information and tools required to solve these problems. Thus, the need for understanding this information becomes crucial to keep playing and progressing. In this regard, the combination of verbal and visual information in a game can create a much better environment for learning.

The fact that video games involve incidental learning -as opposed to intentional learning- and the playful spirit of the different tasks the players have to perform prove that this form of entertainment can be also an excellent resource to second-language acquisition.

As you can see in this video, a cutting-edge Chinese school is currently using online video games for teaching English.

Adventure Games for learning English

An adventure game is a video game in which you play as the protagonist of an interactive story. The main feature of these games is they emphasize on the story; this allows them to be based on other narrative media, books or films. So, the essential elements of this kind of games are: exploration, storytelling and puzzle solving.

Pointing and clicking are the two actions that a computer user can do with the mouse: moving the pointer to different locations of the screen and pressing a mouse button, usually the left one. This is a method used in adventure games: pointing the mouse over different objects and pressing the button to complete actions or to move the character. In spite of these simple control actions, you have to choose among a finite number of possibilities.

In most games, the possible actions you can do appear, as infinitives, in a lower menu. So, the more you play, the more you get used to the meaning of those verbs. In addition, the semantic connection between those verbs and the items of the gaming environment can be learned through trial and error. For instance, I can’t select “close” while I’m pointing another character, so I must use it with doors and other elements which can be opened/closed.

Adventure games players are required to connect the meaning of some written words with the pictures of the elements displayed on the screen. This connection means knowing not only the name of the objects, but also actions associated with them. Thus, players can improve and expand their vocabulary. Moreover, learning new navigation controls during the gameplay can enhance memory training and, as a result, it can increase the vocabulary absorption capacity.

These games are also known for representing the dialogue as a conversation tree. This means that players have to choose among different sentences when they interact with a non-player character. One specific choice triggers one specific response from the game character and it also determines subsequent choices until the conversation ends.

Conversations can reveal clues about how to solve immediate problems or puzzles and they can even have far-reaching consequences. Game characters may also be convinced to reveal their own secrets, either through conversation or negotiation -by giving them something that they want.

Since the meaning of the given sentences in a dialog tree is, of course, directly related to what the player has done or what the player is about to do, understanding the intentionality of each message is very important. In terms of communication, players have to be aware of the communicative problem in each case and they also have to employ a strategy to solve it. Communicative competence involves not only the knowledge of the language (grammar competence) but also the knowledge of how to use the language and express a message in a variety of circumstances (pragmatic and strategic competence). Thus, success in these games depends very much on the knowledge of the connotative meaning of the different options in a conversation tree.

In conclusion, adventure games can be a very useful -and also motivating- tool for ESL learning because of the:

• Semantic connection between written words and the pictures of the objects and elements displayed on the screen.
• Pragmatic competence required to choose the best branch of dialogue in each case in order to accomplish the goals of the game.

And now...

Take a look at the short video that we specially made for the occasion:

Bullying: a crime at school.

Being a teacher is not an easy task. Teachers aren´t only professionals who teach something, a teacher is a role model for their pupils, someone who inspires them to give of their best, as learners but mainly as people. The social responsibility of teachers requires a maximum of training and information in the social field. It´s for this reason that this post deals with a serious problem to such an extent than many children and teenagers are afraid of going to school: bullying.

This aggressive behavior which is intentional and which involves an imbalance of power or strength is likely to end in a disaster as in Spain happened a few months ago:

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/heartbroken-parents-publish-11-year-7218009

There is no single cause of bullying. There are lots of factors in a child´s environment that can contribute to bullying behavior, some of them could have links with family challenges, academic failure, lack of tolerance with others, lack of empathy, low self-steem, the need for power, etc.

Besides, bullying can take many forms. The most important are three: physical bullying, which involves kicking, hitting or stealing the victim´s belongings; verbal bullying, when words are used to hurt, name-calling or threat a victim; and relational bullying. This last one is more complex cause the bully will convince others to reject, abuse or exclude victims from a group activity or game. Likewise, cyberbullying is commented to be a recent kind of attack in which the bully uses text messages or social networks to hurt the victim. It does exist passive bullying as well, when some students turn a blind eye; I mean, they observe this behavior but they neither engage in the bullying nor help stop it, due to several reasons.

If we had known how to look for signs, this wouldn´t happen; so it´s important to know what to look out, to be able to spot when someone is being bullied. Although most victims keep it to themselves, a victim will usually display signs. First of all, we can notice the child´s refuse to go to school and unusual moodiness, as well as, a decline of grades, bruises…

The truth is that researches suggest that victims may suffer from mental health problems later in life, such as depression, low self-esteem and anxiety. If you wish to solve the problem, the first you should do is treading lightly it, because the victims may be scared to talk about it because of shame, annoyance or a sense of guilty. You had better assure them that you will work each other to make the bullying stop. To make them be aware of a possible solution, tell them some examples in which victims found a solution and how they´re successful people, for instance, Michael Phelps, who was bullied at school for his long arms. What nonsense!

Education is the key to change such attitudes and the only way to create a better and more peaceful society and, partly, this lies in our hands. 

Some links of interest when you can find more information:

http://nobullying.com/

http://www.stopbullying.gov/

http://stopbullyingnowfoundation.org/main/

Learn by playing

Since forever, children have to learn new languages. The English is one of the most important they have to learn. It’s for that reason that the teachers and the parents have to look for the best way to do it.

For us, playing is the best idea. The reason is because they have fun, participate, learn and memorize songs and rhyme easily.

They have to mix class and plays, and a good way to play is with traditional games.

Everybody, when they were children used to play typical games, like “I spy with my little eye…” (“Veo, veo”) or “1, 2, 3, plan”, so what we want is that the children play them, but in English.

It’s a good method to learn the language while they’re having fun.

There are a lot of traditional games, but we choose four.

I spy with my little eye

It’s like “veo, veo” in Spanish.

One child starts with the sentence: “I spy with my little eye…” and according with the age or school year it can be:

-          … something + the colour. For example: something pink. It’s easy to practice the colours.

-          … something + what it looks like. For example: something that looks like a square. It’s good to practice the shapes.

-          … something + the first letter of the word. For example: something that begins for the letter “b”. It’s good to practice the alphabet.

Here you can see a video of the game. It’s very visual. 

 

Video: I spy

Telephone

It’s a well-known game and very easy. The teacher and the pupils make a row. The first child says a question or a sentence to the classmate behind him/her. This pupil has to pass the message to the next child. And so on to the end. The last classmate has to say out loud what he/she heard.

This exercise is useful to practice the language and very funny.

Simon says

One pupil is “Simón” who manage the action and the rest have to obey his commands.

The magical sentence is “Simon says…”

If Simon says “Simon says, jump” everybody has to jump. If they don’t do it, they are eliminated. But if Simon just says “Jump” everybody who jumps, they will be eliminated.

Summarizing, players are eliminated from the game by either following instructions that are not immediately preceded by the phrase, or by failing to follow an instruction which does include the phrase "Simon says". It is the ability to distinguish between acceptable and invalid commands. And with this game the pupils can improve their knowledge about actions, parts of the body…

Who stole the cookie from the cookie jar?

It’s a well-known traditional game. They have to sing a song and move.

One child has the cookie and all the class say:

-          "Who stole the cookies from the cookie jar?”
“(The name of the child) stole the cookie from the cookie jar”

And he/she answers:

-          “Who? Me?”

Everyone:
- “Yes, you!!!”
He/she:
- “Not me!”
Everyone:
- “Then, who?”

Children close their eyes and the child put “the cookie jar” behind a classmate. When they open their eyes, the child who has the cookie jar has to purse him/her.

Children can learn the dialogue with this song:

Video: Who stole the cookie from the cookie jar?

These traditional games are good at school and at home too.

Finally, when we have to choose who starts a game, the best idea is to flip a coin to see it. It’s like “pito, pito"

Here, there is a song to choose who starts:

One, two buckle my shoe.

Three, four, knock on the door

Five, six, pick up sticks.

Seven, eight, let them straight.

Nine, ten, a big fat then.

What we want with all of these exercise is that the children have fun and learn in English something that they know in their own language.



Iria Álvarez Liz
Lara Conde Faría
Ana Fernández Custodio