Friday, June 26, 2009

Choosing a different place

After trying to find the best place to live, I decided to live in Edinburgh. The reason is that, although the weather is not as favorable as I would like to, this place is considered one of the most picturesque cities you can find in Europe, and that sounds really interesting for me.
Now, if you ask me about a place that I do not like to live in, that place is Canada. Even though Edinburgh is not a warm place, I think you can deal with it, but Canada is too much for me. I really hate cold because you cannot do all the things you’d like to when is cold, and I am a person that likes to have fun and go out with their friends.

Well, that is my choice. However, I have to think more about it.

See you!!

Monday, May 25, 2009

motivation in schools

Sometimes teachers think they are motivating their students just because they are doing what is suppose to be done (thinking that they are teachers) but they don’t realize they are working with children, with different minds and more important, different lives. Teachers care about teaching contents and not helping children to grow like persons to make their life easier in the future. This means to face up their future life.
Teaching’s methods are not always the best ones… why?... because professors every so often do not realize they are working badly with some children, and because of that, they can change the perspective of them in terms of learning and the importance of that. Teachers need to know that one method can be pretty good for some children, but what about the other ones?.. this is very important to consider, since in class educators use to motivate in a badly way. Instead of helping everybody to have confidence about the things they are doing, sometimes they provoke in the children a feeling of distrust regarding themselves. Teachers cannot put all their attention on just a group of students; all of them need the teacher’s feed-back because that can help them in relation to their self-esteem and also their confidence.
Nowadays children are being more motivated in a way, but I think that the government’s politics do not help to contribute with it. We are living in competence day a day as well as schools do, and they care about doing well in the national (and international) tests instead of concerning about the children.

Saturday, May 23, 2009

where is your mind??

It was really interesting to see that video, that man can catch everybody’s attention… his speech is absolutely awesome, and all the audience was kind of eager about the things and also the jokes hi was saying.
But obviously the most important thing was the topics that he was trying to express. This man talks about “creativity” like an important gift for humans, and how it is disappearing day a day… and… the worst thing is that this is happening because of our fault. We are not letting children think, being originals, or just being themselves.
Children are not being encouraged to use or to stimulate their creativity; they just do what others tell them to do. I think that if this keeps this way, it can block our society in terms of discovering new things to improve the world. We cannot expect everybody to think the same way. Everybody knows we have different ways of seeing the world, and those differences can make the world special for everybody … why? Because if we use our minds without any intervention we would be ourselves… and I think that anybody has the right to make us different or to take part of our minds.

Robinson, Ken. "Schools kill creativity", TED. Filmed February 2006, posted June 2006.

Friday, May 15, 2009

Alcohol price controls would save lives...

I have read a new about reducing the alcohol’s price, because it is suppose that in the case of doing that, the alcohol would turn unpopular. What would be excellent is that the hospital’s admission would be also affected in terms of reducing it too. Most people spend a big percentage of their salary to drink and that cause health problems, accidents, families are affected with their problem and so on.
Something that concerned while reading the article at the first time was that supermarkets do not agree about increasing the alcohol’s prices and their argument was that reducing prices won’t change their situation. Although I think that they just care about earning money, I think that they are right in a way. Alcoholic people have a problem that I believe that this solution is not the best one. They have a problem which consist in an addiction.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2009/may/15/alcohol-price-control-save-lives

Sunday, April 26, 2009

mistakes!!

Hi everyone!!

While I was reading the different posts, I have realized that most of my classmates use a vocabulary that is not very appropriate for the assignments, because they are used to write with simple words, instead of using a most advanced vocabulary. In that case, I consider that it would be hard to improve our English in terms of learning new words, and it is also more important when we think that we are supposed to be English teachers very soon. Therefore, we cannot express ourselves in our daily life with a poor language. Nevertheless, I do believe that in the posts you can recognize that in my classmates` blogs the topics have been taken with interest, I mean, I think they are concerned about the things that they are writing, in that case they are doing pretty well.

have a good week!!

Sunday, April 19, 2009

…Getting a job…

hi everyone!!

I have seen an interesting video, which shows some good tips for getting a job, or perhaps, for getting the job that you want to.
For instance, when you are looking for a job, you have to consider the experiences that you have had during your life, this could help you think regarding which is the next job that you deserve. at that moment, when you already have chosen it, the best think is to go to the web site and look at what are going to be your next challenges in there, therefore you will prepare the next points to follow, such as: how to project your image, how to look appropriate for the job you chose, how you are going to deal with the first opportunity that people will give you to get that job, and also, if you do not know the place of the job, you ought to prepare your route for the day of the interview, and so on.
If you did well in those points, the next step is that you have to remind yourself you did a good job and also, that you did a impression you are qualified, now the next step is being relaxed!!... After finishing the steps I have already mentioned, remind that for the interview you’d better look confident, make eye contact and obviously shake their hands… this was a very good video that it is very useful for everyone, not just for teachers, this can help you in the future to make your life easier than before, and furthermore, for having a feeling of satisfaction in terms of yourself in an important topic of your life.

…Now take a look at it!!
http://www.teachers.tv/video/27146

Sunday, April 12, 2009

scholarships... where are they??

Dear Minister Monica Jimenez:

My name is Marcela Cabañas Gac, and this is my third year as a student of English Pedagogy. This year, when I started my classes at the university, I realized that my economic situation had changed in terms of economic problems, so I went to the “JUNAEB” to try to get a scholarship, and people that I had to talk to, do not even hear my arguments, instead of that they just ignored me saying that I was not able to get anything just for the reason that I was studying my third year. Obviously I could not stand that situation, and perhaps someone thinks that I shouldn’t have said something, nevertheless I do not regret my reaction. So, showing to them that I was angry, but in a relaxed way at the same time, I told them that sometimes could be possible that people at the beginning of their studies do not have the necessities to ask for a scholarship, but that their institution must be aware that the situation of the people in general is always changing, so they should be more conscious about it, which means that if their job is trying to help students to study, they have to offer a solution or a response for everyone at least. The thing is that I was upset since they did not do anything regarding my circumstances and until today, I have not received any help or reply.

I wanted you to now about this, because I thought that you should be aware of how the “JUNAEB” is working and if they are doing a good job or if they are not. I strongly expect that you or possibly the government can do something to not let this situation to happen again. I hope you can understand my situation.

Best regards


Marcela Cabañas Gac
Student of English Pedagogy
Universidad Alberto Hurtado

Monday, March 30, 2009

Standing poor manners...

Poor manners come every day in everyone’s life, we are always complaining about things that we do, and things that other people usually do. But one thing that constantly drives me crazy is when someone throws litter in the streets; I think that this is too annoying to me for the reason that when I was in Scouts I’d learnt to keep the environment so, I usually put the garbage in the bins and so on...
Another thing that is too annoying, it’s when you are trying to get to the bus or the subway and people don`t let you get in… that`s always happening to me I think that it is for the reason that I am too short, although I say excuse me to the others, it’s really hard to get out of it, and they usually ignore me…(that sounds sad hahaha)
Something that I cannot ignore is that I really hate when you are walking and people don`t let you walk, so you have to move. Usually senior citizens take advantage of that and young people have to deal with it… I’m not saying that they have to move to let you walk, but the thing is that sometime you can notice that they just do that because of they are rude …
.... but what are we doing to change this??
I just think that we must try to put ourselves in the others shoes… in that way you are going to be able to think regarding how you feel when you live those situations, and how they feel when YOU make them live those situations too…

just think about it...

Tuesday, March 24, 2009

bullyin... bullying... bullying... what about us?!!

I was happy when I read that schools are implementing anti-bullying strategy to start solving that problem, but I strongly think that this strategy may help with it, but not in terms of everything, because this comes not just in school, what is worst, sometimes this problem comes from home. I think that not only the child who is attacked is going to need medical help, since the one who is bothering has problems too, and actually in that case, their parents need advice as well as their children do (as I said)…

So if we start from them this can be solved from the root of the problem and may help in a better way… don’t you think??

It´s too tragic when someone receives reprimand, for the reason that this is not a joke, in the future… and it depends on the person… you could be aware (or not) of the result that this produces… so this can affect the future life of many people if we don’t stop with it…

Let’s change the world!!!...
Seriously!!

We can wait seeing how this is increasing day a day. and waiting to others start changing this, we must start by ourselves …from now!!… Above all if we are going to be teachers, we should be strict about that…

I don’t what my children to deal with this… and if they have to, I want them to know how

Well, I suppose this was enough for today… perhaps I was too enthusiastic XD… don’t you prefer that?? Just try and think about it…

See you!!!


Ceri, Barry. Experts look to reduce bullying, BBC News, Friday, 20th March 2009, Online, Monday, 23rd March 2009. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/childhood/7951347.stm






Saturday, March 21, 2009

Let’s start… well, actually it is hard to me when you have to write things that everybody are supposed to read… why?… because I am not into writing, specially for those ones who don’t really know me pretty well and that are going to read (I am not sure if you get the idea, I hope so). The thing is that you don`t know what to write…specially now, because this is my first blog

Well, I`am Marcela I live in Rengo but when studying I live with my aunt and uncle here in Santiago. They are very nice with me, so living with them has been pleasing enough.

To make this easier, I would like to write about the things that I usually do during vacations, or just during my free time (that I used to have… :P). The things that I most enjoy doing are (as some of you have heard before) seeing movies and obviously, listening to music (most of the time) and I draw at times in fact, other than that request too much time, therefore I can’t do that very often, and I would like to. To continue, those ones make my life great and enjoyable, I love to see some series to, such as “One Tree Hill”, “Friends” and “Lost” …. Ohhhhh lost! That one makes me crazy!! It is too weird!! I just don’t know how to explain, maybe this can help in a way “XD” *O*!!!

Nevertheless now I am completely nervous and anxious, for the reason that
this Friday I´m going to Radiohead`s concert!!!!!!!!! I`ve been waiting for this incredible experience since I was 10, so… can you imagine how I feel?!! I think so…

I hope to know something about you…. And you know… questions are welcome!!

See you during the week
Take care.

“Marce”