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At the Restaurant
In our Saturday kinder class, we are currently learning all about foods and drinks with Kinka and Pinka at the restaurant.
Today I used this rather excellent video, from the folks at Happy Valley, to great effect in the class.
Join Kinka and Pinka as they order their meals in the restaurant. What does Pinka want to eat and drink?
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Wet Paint
I was painting the exterior of our cafe, The Thre Little Pigs, when I remembered this short story from the Oxford Reading Tree series.
Join me, as I read about dad's problems trying to paint the Robinsons' back door.
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How Much Wood Would a Woodchuck Chuck ....
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Scary Story Time
Take a virtual tour of englishpool at halloween time and listen to a scary story.
So proud of me elementary aged students for throwing themselves into the challenge of recording a story.
Happy halloween!
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How to Build a 'Da Vinci' Bridge from Chopsticks
Frustrated by the failure of my attempt to have my students build a Da Vinci Bridge from chopsticks in Wednesday's Junior High School class, I made this video to show that it is possible!
And it seems that the probelm was that I'd set them an impossible challenge! The chopsticks have to be the flat sided type!!!
Even them it takes me a few attempts to get it right!
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I have a pen, I have a pineapple ...
Thank you Pikotaro for making my students progress that little bit easier! In the Elementary B class (小学生B) we are currently learning/reviewing "I have ...", "He/she has ...", "They have ..." etc.
Thankfully Pikotaro's efforts from 2016!! (yes really) are still paying dividends...all the students can recite the whole routine even though they would have been only 4 or 5 years old!
For those who have no idea what I'm talking about, Pikotaro's video is below.
BONUS: It's also one of the answers to this quiz from 2017, Name Five Tropical Fruits Starting with 'P'
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Where is Mother?
In our Elementary A classes (小学生A) we have just started learning about rooms in the house. I found this very useful activity to practice family members and room names. Enjoy!
liveworksheets.com
Leonardo da Vinci
Used this video in our Junior High class (中学生クラス) tonight. I'd prepared a theme based around Leonardo da Vinci, with the students required to answer and make questions about the Mona Lisa, watch and listen to this video and answer questions related to it. Such as 'Where was he from?' 'What jobs titles did he have?' 'What did he invent?' etc.
A lot of fun, and a chance for them to use English without opening a textbook!
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Spiderman & the Avengers
Some new books for our library. These four titles from the ever popular Pearson English Kids Readers (formerly Penguin Kids) series are sure to be a hit with our students.
The titles are:
Happy reading!
Happy Families!
As part of our family them in the Elementary A class (小学生A) we asked the children to draw their families and make a short presentation:
"This is my mother, this is my father, this is my big brother and this is me."
I was so impressed by this drawing that I thought I'd share it with you.
More...
Ozobot helps with bingo
We had a lot of fun using Ozobot (オゾボット) to help with games of bingo in our Elementary A (小学生A) classes.
The children had been learning vocabulary linked to the theme of family, as part of Unit 3 of their Explore Our World books, and I saw an opportunity to introduce Ozobot, with its line following and color code reading abilities, to help us complete the bingo activity.
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世界最大のタコは何センチですか？
Today in our Elementary A class (小学生A) one of the children, keen to show his knowledge, came out with this question, "世界最大のタコは何センチですか？"
Rather than telling him to be quiet, I decided to use his outburst of Japanese and turn it into useful English. So I got him to ask again, this time in English, "How big is the biggest octopus in the world?"
The answer is 900cm (30ft)!!!
You learn something new everyday!
The frog on the rock
Last week in our elementary A classes (小学生クラスA) the children completed unit 2 of the Explore Our World text by cutting, glueing, drawing and coloring these wonderful collages. As well as learning a whole bunch of nature vocabulary such as river, tree, frog, rock, mountain, flower, bush, grass etc they also learned how to describe the location of the items, for exmaple , "A rock is in the river", "The butterfly is on the flower" and "The frog is on the rock".
They all did really well, and I'm very proud of them. If you want to see all their pictures, you can find them over on the englishpool gallery page: https://www.englishpool.net/gallery
As seen in JAF Mate
Well done to a keen eyed mother who noticed something of interest in this month's JAF Mate (ジャフメイト) a monthly magazine from JAF (Japan Automobile Federation).
On page 29, as part of a safe driving quiz, the view from the driver's seat clearly shows englishpool! Well almost, as we are hidden behind various bits of street furniture!
Thanks to Y's mum, for sharing the magazine with us!
And safe driving everybody!
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