From 'fairy elephant' to 'ballroom princess'
Hello Cristina and everyone,
Thanks for your blog, Cris, and well done to everyone who completed the sentences for homework. Cris, the photo of you dancing is amazing! Did you really make the costume yourself? I can’t sew to save my life, so I am always impressed by people who can do it. Do you make clothes for yourself often, or was this just a one-off? My sister is a good seamstress and can quickly put something together. When I was 18, I was invited to a ball by my boyfriend at the time (I was in my last year of college, he was at university). I had nothing to wear, so Louise made me a beautiful ball dress in dark green taffeta. I felt like a princess! I still have it to this day and I can almost still squeeze into it.
I enjoyed your passage about dancing and sport, so I came up with a quick challenge for you (and everyone else). It’s just a game – try it and let me know if you like this type of thing, or not. You need a pen and a piece of paper. Ready? You have 2 minutes to make a list. I want you to write down the names of as many different types of dance as you can. For example, ballet is a type of dance, as is belly dancing (from the photo, I think this is what you mean by ‘Arabian’). Ok, 2 minutes…GO!
So, now you have a list of different types of dance. Now, can you think of at least one adjective that describes each type of dance? Think about each dance in turn and write the first adjective that comes to mind e.g. for ‘ballet’ I thought of ‘graceful’. Once you have done that, see if you can add any more words to your list associated with each dance. Continuing the ‘ballet’ example, I thought of ‘poise’ (noun and verb), which describes the elegant posture of ballerinas. I had a go at this last night – I have put my list at the end for reference.
Finally, can you write a short passage using the list of words you have generated, to talk about different types of dance? Think of different dances you have tried (you have already told us a bit about this), maybe dances you have seen or heard about, what you like / don’t like etc. This exercise uses quite specific vocabulary, but I thought you might enjoy it as you seem to be interested in dance and exercise.
Your story is a little similar to mine. When I was young, my mother wanted me to take up the piano. I was totally against this as I had dreams of being a ballerina and joining The Royal Ballet. Somehow, I persuaded my mum to let me take ballet lessons. I did it for some months, but I wasn’t any good. Why did I give it up? Well, I had no poise or grace and I was like a little fairy elephant. I had no real aptitude or ability for dancing to music so I decided to try out the piano lessons after all.
I also love going to the gym. I try to go at least 3 times a week, but don’t always make it. Unlike you, I am not lucky and do put on weight quite easily. I normally just use the treadmill and the cross-trainer. Aerobics is not good for me. I have a weak knee and anything that is high impact causes me problems.
(In these last 2 paragraphs, I have reworded some of the phrases that you used. Can you spot what I have reworded? I have changed at least 5 expressions)
OK, over to the corrections I gave you last time. You got most right, so I will only mention here those which need further correction.
I asked you to reword ** If it weren’t so cold as they are I would go and live there **. This should be, ‘I fell in love with these last places and if THEY weren’t so cold (as they are) I would go to live there. You need ‘they’ to agree with ‘these last places’. I personally would take out, ‘as they are’ as you rightly suggest, but you can leave it in if you want to.
**Hope you HAVE SPENT a wonderful weekend**. You are correct to suggest that you have used the present perfect because the weekend either hasn’t finished or has just finished recently. However, we don’t say **to spend a good weekend (no object)**, we say ‘to HAVE a good weekend’. So you could say, ‘hope you have had a good weekend’ or alternatively, ‘hope you are having a good weekend’. You can use 'to spend a weekend' if you have an object, e.g. 'I spent a nice weekend shopping, or 'I spent a nice weekend with my family'
**Japanese restaurants, actually “the sushi”, are in fashion now**. You are right to say that ‘are’ agrees with ‘Japanese restaurants’. The problem here is ‘sushi’ which does not take an article. And here is a good example of where you could use ‘especially’. You could say’ Japanese restaurants, and especially sushi, are in fashion now. This empasises that it is not just the restaurants but moreover the cuisine which is popular at the moment.
Now, here is something for next time. One of my passions is reading and I’ll tell you more soon. But what about you, Cris, are you a bookworm? One of the readers, Jura asked me about words to replace the verb ‘to read’. This is a tricky question, as ‘to read’ is quite specific’. If we say ‘to look at a book’ it does not mean exactly the same thing. It could mean ‘to read’, or it could mean ‘to stare at the book without necessarily picking it up’. So, this made me think about other ways of saying ‘read’. I came up with,
To browse
To scan
To flick through
To leaf through
To study
To pore over
To bury oneself in a book
I’ll let you know the exact meanings next time, but in the meantime if you are curious you can look them up.
Bye for now,
Anne.
PS – I made a really nice meal last night, pork steaks in blue cheese sauce. Really quick, really delicious. What did you have?
I can’t sew to save my life (expression, very informal) – used normally in the negative, means to not be able to do something at all. Other examples are, I can’t cook to save my life (I am a very bad cook); I can’t speak French to save my life (I cannot speak French)
A one-off (noun) – something that is done only once, as opposed to many times
Seamstress (noun) – old fashioned word to describe a lady who can sew. The male equivalent is probably ‘tailor’.
To put something together (verb) – to make things quickly, to create things almost from nothing. Another example is imagine someone comes round to your house and you need to feed them, but you have nothing planned. If you ‘put something together’ for them, it means you make something quickly, using the food that you have in the house at that time.
Taffeta (noun) – a type of dress material
To generate (verb) – to produce, to create
The Royal Ballet (noun) – one of the oldest ballet troupes (or companies) in the UK
Fairy elephant (noun, poetic usage!) – I was quite fat and was not graceful. That, combined with my pink ballet dress, made me look like an elephant dressed up as a fairy.
Cross-trainer (noun) – a type of exercise machine that exercises your arms and legs
High impact (adj) – causes a lot of impact, or pounding, to your body. Aerobics is a high impact exercise, because there is lots of jumping.
Bookworm (noun) – someone who loves to read
Here is my dancing and adjectives list: ballet – graceful; tap – loud; jazz – rhythmic; flamenco – liberating; rumba – groovy; ice-skating (is it a type of dance??) – smooth; belly dancing – wobbly; hip hop - funky; Indian – intricate; tango – passionate; ceroc – French; ballroom – old-fashioned.
Comments
Hi, Anne I love the expression of yourself as a littlie fairy elephant. When I was knee-high to a grasshopper I was chosen a represent of short distance runner in primary school Whenever I took park in races my schoolmates and family were supporting me and shouted, “ Black bean, go and get them”. The reason why I was called like it was I was so small and my skin was pitch dark but I ran as fast as a deer.I used to go the gym but since I was hurt my angcle I prefer to go swimming. My mum used to be a streamstress and made Korean traditional clothes and sold for the rich. I open woke up by sewing sound and saw my mum had been burring the midnight oil. Once she made me wonderful dress for my school performance. Thank you so much for your great letter and have a smashing day!
Hi dear Anne , What are you up to ? like you I can't sew to save my life ( unfortunately ) and I think it 's a big gift for whom that can do that . Sorry about the homework , I feel guilty about don't doing them yet . I promise to catch up them , very soon . But I want to say that there is Low impact aerobic , also . It's up to you and you can do the same movement which is suit to you . I think you hadn't good aerobics teacher in the past . Maybe it 's a good idea to try it again . I think going to Sport center and doing exercise all together give an extra energy to person , although doing exercise at home is useful , too . When I can't go to sport class , as I know aerobics before I try to do it at home and I extremely enjoy doing it . I have heard a lot about aerobics benefit and always they say that it 's a kind of sport from fetus time ( when the pregnant mother can do that , well as ) until to death time , it means that every one in each age can do it in every place . Sorry about my waffle on it's my favorite sport and I can’t avoid waffling on it .Please kiss your angles for me .( I have a five years , cheeky monkey , how it's like to have , two kids ? Have a nice time and byeeeee
Hello Anne. The last challenge was both interesting and illustrative for me. As for task to name as many dances as possible, I managed. The second part of the same task got me stuck. Due to a shortage of vocabulary I worked out only a few adjectives. My list contains a few more dances than yours such as: Quick step, Step, Foxtrot, Mamba, Cha-cha-cha. But it’s still difficult to me to fulfill names with sense of expression. To reach vocabulary I use all valuable sources including your blog. But in spite of all the efforts it’s still much to get acquainted. Thanks for teaching.
Hello dear Anne, here comes my story "While I'm quite awkward in dancing, I'm a great of fan all kinds of dancing. When I was younger, I enjoyed the hip-hop for its speed and originality; tango makes me so emotional as it reminds me of the first dance, I had with my husband years back and you can never enjoy dancing it unless you are so intimate with your parner; oh! Spanish, I can never watch it and see how they are proud of their dancing, and how they want to draw the attention of every body to themselves at the same time; Samba, it's so sexy and intricate, only for the professionals, it will be a disappointment otherwise; African dancing, is so bizzare, so close to the heart and so refreshing; gypsy dancing is so beautiful and sad in one go; and finally the break is so crazy, creative, and all youth and vibration..."
Hello Anne.This is the first time I've heard about blogging and its my first blog,it looks very interesting for me, even for other students who are new english learner, it will improve both our reading and writing. please if you have time, how to memrize the phonemic in enghlisg. bye have a good time. best wishes Mohammadullah
Hi Anne, This is my first chat. I'm frome afghanistan and. I came hear to learnenig english. I think your blog is good for learning english. I wish to do something for the english grammar because we don't know grammar. Please give me more information to learning english. best wishes zaher
Hi Anne, I'm an Afghan student coming here to study computer science, but first I'm doing an English course.I read your blogs it was so interesting. You are so lucky to visit many places in the world and enjoy it. This is my first trip and I've been here since last week. Please tell me how i can learn and memorize irregular verbs more quickly. I'll tell more about myself later, and I think I know a lot about you after reading your blogs, and of course I'll ask you somthing more.. I'll read your blogs and being in touch with you. best regards, Shukria
Hi Anne, Bharatha Natiyam is one of the classical Indian dances. Girls in the young age are trained to perform the dance. They wear lot of valuable jewels when they dance. Some parents make elaborate arrangements when their daughters perform in the public stage on the first time. Have you watched the dances in front of the funeral processions on the roads in Delhi any time? There will be no training, no dress, no rehearsal needed for this dance. You need drum especially meant for this kind of dance. Mourners will dance according to the tune of the drum. Some time they are nuisance for public and they don’t bother about traffic
Hi Anne,glad to see you again,and thanks for your blogs.They are really good.Maybe you don't know that I like your blogs better than the others.There are only a few new words in your blogs.And I think they are just my taste.I dislike the article who(right?) has too many new words.And at last,I wonder to know how much time you spend on the blogs everyday?
Hi Anne, Hope ur doing good. I condemn that i also cant sew to save my life but my mom can sew well:). Its good to know that you keep yourself superfit. Im also trying to learn different exercises to keep myself fit but my body is not flexible so im trying to make it by fits and starts. I too like to read but to find the meaning of difficult words in each sentence that makes me tiring and boring:(. Can u tell me is it a good practice to find the meaning simultaneously or one should read the book first without worrying about the meaning. I mean to say one look for the type of tenses and the reason for using that particular type or find the meanings too?. Which idea is appropriate?. Now its time for homework, I haven't done as i dont know much about dancing and types of dance, what a pity:(. Anyways goodbye and have a great time. Tata.
Hi anne i'm enjoing your entries and the kind of practises which you're offring to us. Now i was wondiring if you don't mind giving us some explanations about religions in thai, what is the main one?and the subordinates? How is the relations between them.Thank you and have courage and patience to answer eveyone.
Hi Anne! Oooh I´m a bookworm too! I love reading. In fact, whatever I go I always carry a book with me :-). Anne, what are your favourite books? Could you recommend some books to us? Anyway, it´s dinner time for me and I´ll have whole rice, a green salad and soy meat for dinner. For dessert I´ll have a delicious apple. Yummy :-)! Best wishes, Ana Paula.
Hi Cris, Your godson is very cute. I hope you would not mind to tell was his mother your friend or relative. Is he being bringing-up by his father or step-mother? Is he still studying and what he is doing at present. Your did wonder by sewing your dress yourself at one-off if not got any outside help (not matter what imperfection exist in it).
Hi Anne: One of the things that I enjoy myself very much is reading. Yes, I'm a bookworm too and I always have a book into my bag. I love bookshops and I can stay there for many time seeing new books. I read, at the same time, English and Spanish books. Where I live (Catalonia) we speak spanish and other language, catalan. In fact, it's my native language and, of course, I read books writen in catalan. What about your favourite books? How many time do you read during a day? I love historic novels and best-sellers. I read different styles of books. I think reading open your mind to the world and helps to be a better person. Are you agree? See you soon! Mercè
Hello Anne :-) Your grammar explanations are really good. I think that you've got a very good grammar book. Which grammar book would you suggest to follow. In different books and dictionaries you can find different examples. In Flo-Joe website I found the sentence: 'He'll be in hospital for an indefinite period of time.' and in Oxford dictionary I found: 'The money was lent for an undefined period of time.' How to work out which is correct 'an indefinite period of time' or 'an undefined period of time'? And one more thing, you don’t look like 'fairy elephant'. All best wishes!
Hi, At last I have my computer back. Thank you to answer to my little comment. The differences I see in the way of life are many, food, people of different races living in the same city, and because of that also different religions, etc. About the exercise, I only did the list: tango, samba, wals, rock and roll, hip hop, disco. I know there are more. I like very much reading. I think I wrote about that with another teacher. I admire people that like to cook. Till tomorrow.
What is a "Material Verb"?
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