Verb Patterns and a Job Interview

Thursday 23^rd April

Hello, how are you?

Last Thursday was Saint George’s Day. Saint George is the patron saint of England. It was the World Book Day and the festivity of some communities (Spanish administrative divisions of the territory) e.g.Castilla and Leon, Aragon and Catalonia. And as Jorge said, it was the anniversary of both Cervantes and Shakespeare’s death.

We continued with verb patterns. Verbs followed by infinitive, infinitive without ‘to’ (bare infinitive) or ing.

After certain verbs we use to + infinitive and after other verbs we use “–ing”. And this is the most difficult part to remember because there are no rules for it. Read a lot. Do exercises and above all, learn the verbs in context with sample sentences.

·         What did they plan to do?

·         My friends agree to stay in the hotel closer to the beach.

·         She promised not to tell anybody.

·         I refuse to go by bus. It takes longer than the train!

·         I hope to finish my degree next year.

·         They seem to have forgotten what happened before.

·         I decided to take the job.

·         Avoid drinking tap water if you travel to India.

·         There’s no point warning him, he’ll go anyway.

·         He denied taking the money.

·         He confessed to killing the man.

·         They objected to having the shop open until 9pm.

·         We are looking forward to hearing from you.

More exercises on Verb Patterns

http://www.eltbase.com/quiz/385_01.htm

Then,we listened to a job interview.

This was the job advertisement:

Business journalist

This International business magazine, with 1,000,000 readers worldwide, is seeking a journalist, based in Geneva, to cover business news in Europe.

Requirements:

a master’s degree in journalism

at least two years’ experience in business journalism

fluent in French and German. If possible, some knowledge of Spanish

excellent communication skills

international travel experience is a plus

______________________________________________________

Please send CV and letter of application to:

David Benton, Worldwatch Europe IPA

56 Merritts Avenue, Overland Park, Reading RG2 6 HD

Visit us on the web: http://www.wep@ipc.co.uk

Nancy decided to apply for the job, so she submitted her CV and possibly a covering letter (The letter which accompanies the CV). And she had a job interview.

She was asked about her background (studies and experience) and some personal questions such as if she had lived abroad before or if she would mind travelling.

Do you think she got the job?

After this, you role-played your job interviews. 

Did you get the jobs you had applied for?

But …let’s talk about football, the Champions League, to be precise.

So far, the winners of our bet (‘porra’) for the semi-final draw lottery are Andrea and Alex. They both say the result would be Barcelona-Bayern de Munich and R.Madrid-Juventus.

GAME 1 (points for work in class and homework)

Player 1	7
Player 2	---
Player 3	8
Player 4	---
Player 5	7
Player 6	8
Player 7	8

Looking for a Job

Thursday 16^th April

Hi guys! How is it going?

So, what did we do last Thursday?

We started listening to Jorge and Pilar telling us about current news.

Pilar told us about the group ‘One Direction’ and the reasons of them breaking up. Jorge was more interested in boxing. He told us about the upcoming boxing combat in Las Vegas.

Then, we continued talking about the world of work.

We saw an advertisement for a job. The position is Assistant Accounts Manager. Responsibilities: in charge of the accounts department. Working hours are from 9.00 to 6.00. so, it’s a full-time job. There’s also the possibility of working overtime. Qualifications required: degree in accountancy. Employees will have some training at work. They could be promoted and could also have a permanent contract. Salary varies according to age and experience.

After that, we went through verbs followed by infinitive with to, bare infinitive, that is, without to and verbs followed by –ing

In other words, verb patterns.

·         I was so happy to receive your present. (After adjs, to +infinitive)

·         She was busy looking after her little sister. (Exception;after “busy”, ing)

·         He went to the sop to buy some bread. (To express purpose, why?)

·         Doing sport is healthy. (When the verb is the subject, ing)

·         The kid wasn’t tall enough to reach the door knob.(After too and enough)

·         Don’t leave the office without locking the door. (After prepositions)

·         They didn’t know where to run.(After question words, except “why”)

·         We went swimming last weekend. (After “go” for physical activities)

·         My niece would like to become a teacher when she grows up.(After would like, would love etc.)

                         Verb Patterns

And that was all! Don’t forget to do homework. Job Swap p.51 and Infinitive – Gerund p.85

      GAME 1 (points for work in class and homework) 

Player 1	5
Player 2	6
Player 3	8
Player 4	6
Player 5	6
Player 6	7
Player 7	7

See you on Thursday!

Hi Again!!!

Thursday 9^th April

Hi, we’re back! All of us except Paco!

We started the class talking about last Easter.

Then we talked about the news.

The news is that only Pilar and Óscar did homework!!!

Now, honestly…we commented on recent news. The most striking (surprising) items referred to the ‘German wings’ plane crash, the tragic death of two Spanish mountaineers in Morocco while they were potholing (exploring caves) and the terrorist attack on tourists at the Tunis museum.

Then, we read a really interesting news article, “Kangaroo saves farmer’s life.”

It was the story of a kangaroo that was adopted by an Australian farmer after the kangaroo’s mother had been run over by a car and was killed. Time went by (passed) and the kangaroo grew up (became an adult). One day there was a terrible storm that damaged the fence around the farm. The farmer was repairing it when a branch of a tree came off and hit him unconscious. The kangaroo was standing near him and started to make a loud noise (bark) to attract somebody’s attention. The kangaroo succeeded and the farmer’s family came to help him.

It was a nice story. Unfortunately most of the news is usually bad

Afterwards, we started a new topic: ‘The world of work’ I know it’s a bit too soon for you to start looking for a job because you are very young and you are supposed to finish your studies first but…Who knows? Maybe in a couple of years’ time you will search for a summer job so as to get some extra money for your driver’s license or to go on holiday with your friends or any other thing… and then, being able to speak English will become handy! (be useful).

Here is some useful vocabulary related to the topic.

And we finish the class doing a personality test in order to match our personalities to the right job for you!

There were questions such as:

·  Are you good at listening to people?

·  Don’t you mind not earning a very large salary?

·  Does taking risks stress you?

·  Is it important for you to be creative?

·  Are you able to calculate space and time?

Etc.

This test may not have helped to match the job to your personality but it helped to introduce the grammar topic of ‘gerunds and infinitive’ that we will try in depth (with attention), next week.

Enjoy the weekend! See you on Thursday!

This is the News!

Thursday 26^th March

Hi everybody! Easter holidays!!!

I hope you are enjoying your holidays!

How are you celebrating Easter? This is how Easter is celebrated in The U.S.A and in The U.K.

Do you remember what we did in our last class?

We talked about the news!

Heading head•ing /ˈhɛdɪŋ/n. [countable]

something that serves as a head, esp. a title or caption:The heading was: "Verb tenses in English.''

Headlines head•line /ˈhɛdˌlaɪn/n., v., -lined, -lin•ing. 

·  Journalisma statement printed in large letters at the beginning of a newspaper article, summarizing the subject of the article.

  Journalismheadlines, [plural] news stories important enough to appear on the front page of newspapers:The peace conference has been in the headlines all week.

Title  /ˈtaɪtl/

ti•tle /ˈtaɪtəl/n., adj., v., -tled, -tling.

  [countable]the name of an artistic work, as a book, painting, etc.

  [countable]a heading, as of a chapter of a book, that describes what is contained:The title was: "Chapter 4: Issues and Implications.''

Remember: we use present tense in headlines, (the “titles” in the news) so the item of news looks more interesting or shocking. After that we use a variety of tenses, past simple, continuous or present to report the piece of news.

Look out! News is uncountable in English and takes the singular form of the verb.

I’ve got two news. I’ve got some news. 

The news are bad.  The news is bad.

First we listened to some headlines and tried to get the key words (the words that carry important information). After that we tried to make up (to arrange, to compose) the actual (finished) news item. And this is your homework for Easter: write the four pieces of news we talked about in class. And, download or get a cut-out from a newspaper with a news item. You’ll have to tell the class about it.

This was the news we listened to in class and some of the key words:

·         “Murder Mystery of Dolphin Lover” swim-with-dolphin centres, found dead in her car, shot twice, British animal rights activist, Santa Lucia’s island, the Caribbean.

·         “Workmen steal Van Gogh” dress as gas inspector, luxury Manhattan apartment block, private collection, gas leak, break into, worth over $20 million.

·         “Police and Protesters Clash at World Trade Conference” they tried to stop cars arriving, protesters, demonstrators, over 40 arrests, sitting on the road, prevent cars from getting to the Conference Hall, European leaders, Frankfurt, casualties, nearby hospitals.

·         “Tea can stop cancer” American doctors, cream, skin cancer, test all new products, at least two years, great Britain, available.

We didn’t take part in the ‘flea market’ because only Jorge brought something.

We ended the class playing a board game called “Around the world in 100 days!” No, not this.

The game consisted in throwing the dice and following the instructions we had on the square we had landed. Sometimes we had to make decisions, sometimes we didn’t. For example, you land in Berlin: “You’ve forgotten your traveller’s cheques! Go back to London and get them! So, you had to go back until the ‘London square’. Delhi: “you’ve started to feel ill, what do you do? a) Go straight to the doctor. b) Stay in your hotel room and wait. c) Push on with your journey.

One of the answers made you lose no time, another one meant to add four days to your journey time and another one made you add seven days.

Did you make the right choice? Did you consider the advantages and disadvantages of going to a doctor in India, keeping travelling despite your illness, going to an Indian hospital…?

The winners were the team who got to the end of the journey, that is, who got to the finish square making the journey in the fewer days. None of you were able to finish in 100 days! The boys started losing a lot of days but in the end they made up for (recuperate) them!

 That was all!

Enjoy your holidays!