Comment 16- Speechless

                                               Comment 16

           "Speechless" comes from the word "speech" to which you add the suffix "-less". Its meaning in Spanish is "sin palabras". This noun comes from the verb "to speak". The opposite of the suffix "-less" is "-ful". Examples of words enging in "-less": hopeless, friendless, breathless, careless, cheerless, faithless, harmless, painless, etc. 

"Reported Speech" is called like this because it is used to communicate what someone else said, but without using the exact words. A few changes are necessary; often a pronoun has to be changed and the verb is usually moved back a tense, where possible. It is also called Indirect Speech. The opposite of the Reported Speech is the Direct Speech, which is used to give the exact words used by another speaker. The words are given between quotation marks (" ").

One of the things that left me speechless was visiting the Cathedral of Milan (in Italian Duomo di Milano) last summer. The magnitude of this building left me speechless. It is the most famous church in Milan, the third largest Catholic Cathedral in Europe and the fourth largest in the world.. It has over 3,500 statues, thousands of individual spires, and 5 bronze doors. It´s a construction with a Gothic exterior style and it took six centuries to build. I was amazed by its height and its beauty!

Writing 11- Persuading someone to do something

Writing 11

Mike: I´m going to sign uo to a 7-a-side football club. Why don´t you sign up with me?

Bob: Me? I´m not good at football.

Mike: That´s no problem. If you train hard, you´ll be good at it.

Bob: I see, but I don´t have any time to go training, I´m very busy studying.

Mike: You only have to train twice a week and there´s a match every Saturday. Go on!

Bob: Maybe you´re right. It would do me good to do some exercise.

Mike: Of course! You´ll see that soon you´ll become a very good football player.

Bob: Ok, why not? Where do we sign up?

Mike: We have to go to the sports centre and pay €20 a month.

Bob: Great! When shall we sign up?

Mike: I was thinking about tomorrow afternoon.

Bob: Ok then, see you tomorrow!

Mike: Bye!

Comment 15- Still searching for a heart to love?

Comment 15

     ¨You are the reason¨- by Calum Scott, is definitely my favourite love song. 

The song is about a man who broke up with his girlfriend and realises that she is the love of his life and he wants her back. He´s saying that she is the reason he´s losing his sleep, she is the reason he´s still breathing and she is the reason his hands start to shake. He´d climb every mountain and swim every ocean just to be with her again and fix what he had broken. 

In my opinion, it´s a sad love song because it is about a separation but I love the lyrics. We should always fight for the person we love!

Comment 14- Trying to make ends meet

Comment 14

     

     ¨To make ends meet¨ in Spanish means ¨llegar a fin de mes¨.
Many families struggle to make ends meet these days. 

Valentine's Day, also called Saint Valentine's Day or the Feast of Saint Valentine, is celebrated annually on 14th February. It originated as a Western Christian feast day honoring one or two early saints named Valentinus. It is a festival of romantic love and many people give cards, letters, flowers or presents to their spouse or partner. They may also arrange a romantic meal in a restaurant or night in a hotel. Common symbols of Valentine's Day are hearts, red roses and Cupid.

My Valentine´s Day was really sad, because I spent it alone seeing lots of people making nice presents to each other. I haven´t found my Valentine yet.

Comment 13- Mating, sexual harassment, flirtation... and love. Beware of misunderstandings!!!

Comment 13

           Nowadays, we see lots of sexual harrasment cases on the news. Women are being screamed at, pursued, groped, licked, touched, appraised, scared and frustrated by street harassers. There are lots of harrasments in the workplace, too.

People who are flirting should be very carreful with their words and acts to the other person. The difference between sexual harassment and flirting is really fairly clear. If you want to meet someone, you have to flirt but you must do it in the right environment and being always friendly and respectful. Sending a flirty text message, a hand resting on the knee, or telling a person that you feel attracted are some examples of flirting always when it comes from the right person at the right time. Sexual harrasment is when a man goes too far - whether through what he says or what he does - when a woman clearly doesn't want it.

In my opinion, the reason of sexual harrasment is because young people have access to porn, or because of the music videos they watch where the vocabulary and the dance are very sexual, also because they send a lot of sexual images with their mobile phones,etc. Children at school should be more informed about the difference between flirting and sexual harrasment!

Writing 10- Describing a local dish

Writing 10

     I live in Granada, south Spain, and we have lots of delicious food. One of our most famous dish is the Spanish omelette! It´s very easy to make and everybody likes it because of its taste.

A traditional Spanish omelette consists of a round thick omelette filled with chopped potatoes and onion. It´s a dish which you can eat for both lunch and dinner. To cook it, you´ll need four eggs, some oil, salt, two big potatoes and one onion. Take my advice: if you cut the onion under running water, the gas won´t get into your eyes.

Firts of all, you need to mix the eggs in a bowl and put some salt. Next, you chop the onion and the potatoes. After that, you add the potatoes and the onion to the frying pan and you fry them for a few minutes with moderate fire. Next, you pour the eggs all over the pan, covering the potatoes and the onion and you let it cook. You have to turn the omelette upside down to cook it on both sides. If you aren´t careful, you could burn yourself! If you don´t like cooking, you can buy it in any supermarket in your town. It´s very popular in restaurants as a starter, too. It´s usually served alone but you can eat it with ham, too. 

So, if you want to try an authentic omelette, come to Spain!

Writing 09- An opinion essay

Writing 09

Learning English is very important. Do you agree?

Nowadays, lots of students study English at school as a second language. Learning English is important because it will help them a lot in the future.

Firstly, speaking English helps us to find a job easily, to find information on the Internet or to travel, because English is spoken all around the world. In addition, you can also use English to learn about other cultures when you travel to other countries and if you don´t speak their language, you can always try to speak in English. Although it´s difficult to learn and pronounce, if you study a lot, you will learn it. Moreover, you have to be cautious, because while you are learning other languages, you can forget your mother tongue. It´s good to speak lots of languages, but you have to practise them, if not, you will forget them.

In conclusion, I think learning English is very important because it will be very useful for us in the future.

Writing 08- Dialogue (giving advice)

 Writing 08

Joe: Carla, we have to decide what to do on Tom´s surprise birthday party.

Carla: You´re right! Firstly, we should think about the date of the party.

Joe: I was thinking of doing it at the weekend.

Carla: Yeah, it sounds good. We should think of the place, too.

Joe: That´s true. I was thinking of ¨Western parties¨, which is in the centre of the town. What do you think?

Carla: I don´t think it would be a good idea, it´s very expensive. I was thinking of ¨Polly´s fun¨. It´s cheaper and it looks better.

Joe: Oh, I see. And, what about the food? Shall we order pizza or kebab? I know a place which serves delicious kebabs and isn´t very expensive. What do you think?

Carla: That´s true, but maybe Tom doesn´t like kebab, we should order both pizza and kebab, don´t you think so?

Joe: Yes, I think it´s better. And who should we invite?

Carla: If I were him, I would invite all my classmates! We could make a big party and have a lot of fun together.

Joe: So, what shall we do, then?

Carla: I think the best way is to ask some friends too, to see what their opinion is.

Joe: Ok, then, I´ll tell you tomorrow more details of the party. Bye for now!

Carla: Bye!