THE PRESENT PERFECT

Sometimes we, Spanish speakers, don't find it easy to use the present perfect in English because their use and ours sometimes differs. Surfing youtube I came into this video which I find to be a good one to learn how to form the present perfect in English and how to use it. I hope it helps!

BLACK FRIDAY

Today, 25th November 2016, is Black Friday, but what's Black Friday?

Black Friday is the day following Thanksgiving Day in the United States, traditionally the beginning of the Christmas shopping season. On this day, most major retailers open extremely early, often at 4 a.m., or earlier, and offer promotional sales to kick off the shopping season, similar to Boxing Day sales in many British Commonwealth countries. Black Friday is not actually a holiday, but many non-retail employers give their employees the day off, increasing the number of potential shoppers. It has routinely been the busiest shopping day of the year since 2005, although news reports, which at that time were inaccurate, have described it as the busiest shopping day of the year for a much longer period of time.

The day's name originated in Philadelphia, where it originally was used to describe the heavy and disruptive pedestrian and vehicle traffic which would occur on the day after Thanksgiving. Use of the term started before 1966 and began to see broader use outside Philadelphia around 1975. Later an alternative explanation began to be offered: that "Black Friday" indicates the point at which retailers begin to turn a profit, or are "in the black".

For many years, it was common for retailers to open at 6:00, but in the late 2000s, many had crept to 5:00 or even 4:00. This has been taken to a new extreme in 2011, when several retailers (including Target, Kohls, Macy's, Best Buy, and Bealls) opened at midnight for the first time.

THANKSGIVING DAY

Thanksgiving is celebrated on the fourth Thrusday in November, so today 22 November is Thanksgiving Day. It's a tradition in the United States. Families gather together for a large meal or dinner and the main dish is turkey. But what are its origins?




This video also explains the history of Thanksgiving day but with subtitles.


If you want to know more about Thanksgiving click here

THE PRESENT PERFECT SIMPLE

This is the PowerPoint we used in class. Now you can go through the slides again. And if you want a document to overview when to use the Present Perfect or the Past Simple, just go to Grammar to see, print or download a PDF document.

INGLES CON OXFORD

Oxford has just developed a ‘skill’ called inglés con Oxford, the first official skill by Oxford University Press launched in Spain to improve your English. It consists of five-minute episodes and it is updated daily from Monday to Friday. Each one of these episodes cover a different area (e.g. in a restaurant, giving advice, what's the weather like...). In each one of them you are given vocabulary, grammar and useful expressions.

To activate the skill you need to have an amazon account and Alexa installed on your device.

Amazon Alexa, known simply as Alexa, is a virtual assistant developed by Amazon.
It is capable of voice interaction, music playback, making to-do lists, setting alarms, streaming podcasts, playing audiobooks, and providing weather, traffic, sports, and other real-time information, such as news. Users are able to extend the Alexa capabilities by installing "skills" (additional functionality developed by third-party vendors, in other settings more commonly called apps such as weather programs and audio features).

You can download Alexa from the Google Play Store if you are an Android user or from the iTunes Store if you are an iOS user.

To start the skill once you have already installed Alexa and activated it for your device (Amazon will send a code to your mobile) you only have to open Alexa and say the words:

"Alexa, abre inglés con Oxford" 

Once the episode finishes, if you want to listen to another episode, you only have to say:

"Alexa, siguiente"

and if you want to listen to it again, say:

"Alexa, repite el último episodio"


Both, Alexa and inglés con Oxford are free! And the skill is intended for intermediate-level users so, what are you waiting for to improve your English? These are the links you need:

Download Alexa for Android

Download Alexa for iOS

Activate the skill 

MONEY VOCABULARY

Watch the videos below to revise and / or learn vocabulary related to money. Apart from enriching your vocabulary you will improve your listening skills! Remember you can activate the subtitles if you get lost!

VOCABULARY: Money

VOCABULARY: Prepositions related to money

KA-CHING!

Ka-ching! An imitation of the sound made by a cash register;  expression used when someone's action will result in more money; and also a song by Canadian singer Shania Twain.  

Here you have some facts about the song: 

- The song deals with America's consumer culture through the boom years of the 1990s and early 2000s. The line "all we ever want is more" is the general theme of the song.

- The music video for "Ka-Ching!" was shot in Mexico City and Madrid in January 2003.

This is one of five official videos of the song. Why don't you follow the video with the lyrics?  It's good practice for money vocabulary!



We live in a greedy little world,
That teaches every little boy and girl
To earn as much as they can possibly,
Then turn around and
Spend it foolishly
We've created us a credit card mess
We spend the money that we don't possess
Our religion is to go and blow it all
So it's shopping every Sunday at the mall
All we ever want is more
A lot more than we had before
So take me to the nearest store
Can you hear it ring
It makes you want to sing
It's such a beautiful thing, ka-ching!
Lots of diamond rings
The happiness it brings
You'll live like a king
With lots of money and things
When you're broke go and get a loan
Take out another mortgage on your home
Consolidate so you can afford
To go and spend some more when
You get bored
All we ever want is more
...