Thanksgiving Day is a day set aside in the United States and Canada for giving thanks. People give thanks with feasting and prayer for the blessings that they have received during the year. The first Thanksgivings were harvest festivals, or days for thanking God for plentiful crops. For this reason, the holiday is associated with fall – a time of harvesting the crops.

We learnt a lot of things on Thanksgiving, and it was all thanks to Kathryn Vanney, our language assistant.

We talked about religious prosecution in England,

about the Mayflower and its 102 pilgrims crossing the Ocean,

about Plymouth and Massachusetts,…

and we obviously remembered that hard winter and the generosity of the Indians (or, as Kathryn always reminds us, Native Americans).

We were able to name nearly all the food that people have in this celebration:

 potatoes (mashed ), turkey (with stuffing), veggies, gravy, raspberry sauce, cranberry sauce, sweet potatoes, corn, … and of course PUMPKIN PIE. 

Kathryn told us that American people love pumpkin pie, so she offered herself to cook one for us and we decided to try it! Some of us found it delicious,  others … not so much, but we all enjoyed the experience, and we had a good laugh!

CLICK on the  pumpkin pie image on the right, if you want to see Kathryn at her best making the pie at the school canteen.

And here we are having our yummy yummy pumpkin pie!

CLICK on the jolly pumpkin to see it all

We celebrated Halloween in Tineo once again and we all had a great time, didn´t we?

It was a time to remember, wasn´t it?

We had KATHRYN VANNEY this time with us to help us.

She told us frightening stories and created a dark and stormy night by making body sounds; we all got very scared.

We did a lot of things to put on display: skeletons, scary bats and spiders, banners, candy bags, Jack o´Lanterns, projects, Halloween cookies and cakes.(Yummy, yummy!!!).

CLICK on the cupcake to see

Some also dressed up for the occassion

Check all this out for yourself by CLICKING on the Jack o´ Lantern

And not only this, we also did some dancing and rapping; we had a competition mummifying some of the students and we did a bit of APPLE BOBBING.

CLICK on the picture below to have a look

And what´s more, it´s all recorded

SEE YOU NEXT HALLOWEEN!

We celebrated a party on Friday, May 27th,

because Conor Patrick Riley   , our cool language assistant, was leaving us.

He left us to go to PARADISE (as he says),to ILKESTON - his home village, in  England, for his summer holidays.

He promised to come back to pay a visit to us and he will!!!

We wish him all the best.

He will never be forgotten.

We learnt a lot of things from him; thanks to him, now, we know a bit more about his country, his hobbies (football) and the way he dances.

On the day of the party we did a lot of things.

We drank coke and we had lots of crisps, nuts and cookies.

(it was all yummy)

We also sang and danced to some music.

 YES , YES, WE DID IT…

And we did well and had a great time, didn´t we?

IT WAS A DAY TO REMEMBER!

He was also given lots of presents to take home. Lucky him!

In exchange for all that, he wrote a POEM in Spanish to us all, as a token of his gratitude.

It was brilliant!!!

Click here   if you want to have a look at the whole of the poem.

We were also offered the possiblity of practising our English by writing to him there in England.

Click on the BALLONS if you want to see some of the photos taken on that day

Good bye CONOR! We will all miss you a lot!

THANK YOU FOR THE MOMENTS WE SHARED!!!

We’ve spent a wonderful week in Margate (Kent) and its surroundings … again!!

This year, however, the trip was a bit different. We decided to focus on the figure of Charles Dickens, who lived and placed many of his works and characters in the area. Do you want to know what we’ve seen?

• • In Broadstairs we went to the “Dickens House Museum”, which has been adapted as a museum to commemorate the writer’s association with Broadstairs.
  • In Chatham we went to “Dickens World of Adventures”, where we learned about his life, his works,…, we saw a play on “Oliver Twist”, we learned about Victorian times and clothes,…
  • In Rochester we could see some of the houses where Dickens placed his settings, as in “Great Expectations”, or which gave him ideas to write his stories, as in “The Seven Poor Travellers”.

CHARLES DICKENS WRITING

And we visited many more things, as well!

We went to Brighton, and we were impressed by the “Royal Pavilion” !

We also had a great time at Britain’s oldest aquarium, the “Sea Life Center”,

and of course had a delightful walk along Brighton’s beautiful Pier!!

We spent a fantastic day at “Chessington World of Adventures”, going up and down the rides

(some of us “suffered” Ramses Revenge after the 5th or 6th ride !)

In Canterbury we felt … and smelled as medieval pilgrims did in the “Canterbury Tales Museum”,

and we really admired Chaucer’s wit!! We had a great time going on a boat trip

(and some of us were really impressed by the rowers !!).

And we visited Canterbury’s crowded Cathedral!

In London we had a horrifying and thrilling time at “The London Dungeon”,

where they told us about London’s criminals and assassins in a too-convincing-way!!

Thankfully, we relaxed at the “Hard Rock Café”  afterwards…

and relaxed even more shopping at Piccadilly and Oxford Street later !!

And the best of all was… that we had Conor, our great language assistant, with us all the trip!!

And he made us laugh and laugh, believe us!! Thank you, Conor!!

As usual, we took trillions of photos! Click on this one to see some of them!

Here you have some of our videos!

Were you thinking we hadn’t gone on our London - Paris trip this year??   But of course we have!! And we’ve had a great time!!

We were boiling hot most of the time, with  really sunny  and marvelous weather , (amazing, isn’t it?), but we did enjoy ourselves!

We’ve seen the usual things we visit every year (The Tower of London, Westminster , Buckingham, The London Eye,…).

But this year we’ve also been to Chessington World of Adventures and it was good fun going on all the rides  !! We certainly had a good laugh and some of us got a bit wet, didn’t we?

Click on the image to see a few of our photos!!

And here you have some of our videos!!

Do you want to know what we did for St Patrick´s day? Read and you will be amazed.

We tasted GREEN NON-ALCOHOLIC beer, prepared by LAURA (Conor´s cousin) and using ”green dye” . YES, YES, WE DID THAT,

Could you believe it?

Some of us really liked it…

Click on the “drinking shamrock” below to check

We listened to a very famous Irish song called “MOLLY MALONE”. This song has become the unofficial anthem of Dublin City.  

You can find the Molly Malone Statue in Grafton Street in Dublin.

This song tells the tale of a beautiul fishmonger. She plied her trade on the streets of Dublin, but she died young, of a fever.  

We also did a bit of Irish dancing; that was CRACKING GOOD!

(It was great to have Conor and her cousin Laura with us lending us a hand: THANK YOU!!!)

Didn´t we all enjoy it???

Do you remember what it was about?:

Bob´s Broadcasting Company was founded in 1921, (a year before the BBC that we all know and love), and has been 90 years fighting for its place amongst the best radio and TV stations, in spite of the coincidence in the initials with its unstoppable rival.

Through the years, the presenters, reporters and stars have drifted away to the “authentic” BBC in search of more money and prestige. Now Bob, the granddaughter of the founder, finds herself with her studio ready to broadcast, a studio audience ready to applaud, but hardly has the strength, or the personnel to continue.

Harry is a failed actor who arrives at Bob´s Studio to present his CV. He considers himself an “all round Performer” and hopes to find his place amongst the best in the BBC.

Together we joined Bob and Harry as they tried to fulfill their dreams, clear up their misunderstandings and convince the audience that it is always better to try and fail than to never try at all…whatever the challenge. After all, this is the BBC.

Now, have a look at these pictures, by clicking ON THE BBC GLOBE ICON

New Zealand became the first country in the world to give

women the right to vote in 1893, but in Spain

women weren’t allowed to vote until … 1977!!!

And it has been only in 2005 that women in Kuwait have been given this right!

Incredible, isn’t it? But this was not the only discrimination that women have been suffering.

During the last part of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century,

working conditions became a controversial issue in society.

They were really bad for men … and just terrible for women.

In 1908, 15,000 women marched through New York

demanding shorter hours, better pay and voting rights.

The first International Women’s Day was held in 1911.

The previous year, in a Conference, Clara Zetkin had proposed March 8th.

as the International Day of the Working Woman, meeting therefore working-class values with feminist values.

Since then, International Women’s Day has celebrated the economic, political and social achievements of women past, present and future. Quite a lot to celebrate, don’t you agree?

Click here to learn more on this interesting topic:

• International Women’s Day 2011
• Women’s Day: March 8th commemorates women’s rights and peace
  
• Biographies of Notable Women

W e liked the love theme so much, that we played a bit of “Romeo and Juliet”, by Shakespeare.

We found the English spoken at the time quite old-fashioned,

and difficult to pronounce , but it was great fun anyway!