Pukman @ WinK: the community that time didn't forget

Natchan found a video of U2 (and Green Day?) singing The Saints are Coming. Check out her blog later!

Do you like U2 or Green Day? I came across their song "The Saints are Coming" on the iTunes Store. (I recommend that you download iTunes for your home computer and check out the store!) The 1st verse of the song goes like this:

I cried to my daddy on the telephone, how long now?
Until the clouds unroll and you come home, the line went.
But the shadows still remain since your descent, your descent.

How many total posts?
How many words? (Calculate this last.)

How many posts
in October:
in November:
in December:
in January:

(use labels for the following)
How many posts
about books:
with links:
with pictures/photos:

Sidebar: Do you have:
a labels section: YES / NO
a Kumamoto links section: YES / NO
other blogs: YES / NO
(including at least 2 blogs from other classes in the WinK community: YES / NO )

Comments (look in your dashboard):
How many comments are there on your blog?

Here are two more sites where you can practice reading online. Remember to copy the text and paste it into rikai.com Also, it's a good idea to paste the text into Spreeder and read it through once very fast, before reading more slowly.

Here are the sites: 410 Reading Exercises, and Classic Fairy Tales.

For students who want to improve their vocabulary, there are two main ways:

1. Extensive reading
2. Learning from your own wordcards (or an online flashcard service such as V-Flash or iKnow)
3. Working through vocabulary textbooks

Each has its own special characteristics and advantages. Learning through extensive reading may not feel very satisfying, because we don't know exactly what we are learning, and learning may seem very slow. On the other hand, extensive reading allows us to meet the same words many times, and we can pick up vocabulary without much effort. Also, words that we have picked up through extensive reading are not easily forgotten.

Learning from wordcards takes some determination, and for many people it seems very troublesome. However, it has the big advantage that it allows us to learn many words in a short time. Because we notice that our vocabulary is growing, this way of learning can be very satisfying. The most important thing to remember with this way of learning is that it works best if you do lots of repetitions at the beginning.

There are lots of good vocabulary books available. For serious students who want to build their vocabulary to 6000 words and beyond, however, the Vocabulary in Use series is generally recommended. The two chief attractions of this series are that the words are carefully chosen and the ways the words are used are also taught thoroughly.

For students who want to improve their vocabulary, there are two main ways:

1. Extensive reading
2. Learning from your own wordcards (or an online flashcard service such as V-Flash or iKnow)
3. Working through vocabulary textbooks

Each has its own special characteristics and advantages. Learning through extensive reading may not feel very satisfying, because we don't know exactly what we are learning, and learning may seem very slow. On the other hand, extensive reading allows us to meet the same words many times, and we can pick up vocabulary without much effort. Also, words that we have picked up through extensive reading are not easily forgotten.

Learning from wordcards takes some determination, and for many people it seems very troublesome. However, it has the big advantage that it allows us to learn many words in a short time. Because we notice that our vocabulary is growing, this way of learning can be very satisfying. The most important thing to remember with this way of learning is that it works best if you do lots of repetitions at the beginning.

There are lots of good vocabulary books available. For serious students who want to build their vocabulary to 6000 words and beyond, however, the Vocabulary in Use series is generally recommended. The two chief attractions of this series are that the words are carefully chosen and the books also teach thoroughly the ways the words are used.

I just found a nice site for children's books like Harry Potter, Lemony Snickett, etc.

Have you ever read Usborne books? Usborne is perhaps my favourite publisher for children and young people, so over the last 2-3 years I've been trying to find as many of their books as possible for the PUK library, and now we have quite a collection.

Most recently I got some books in the Totally Lucy series. I read one of them in about an hour last week. It was kind of similar to Jacqueline Wilson or Meg Cabot in style. I don't think I'll be reading all of them, but I recommend them to English dept students and more advanced students in science.

But people probably know Usborne's Young Reading series best. Most of the books in the series have 1000-2500 words, so it's easy to read them in a short time, but they're more satisfying than most other books of similar length. And the illustrations and binding are always excellent.


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When we read books in English it's good to read a wide variety, so that we can find various types of book that we like, and get a wide range of information and ideas.
But it's also good to read "narrowly". That means that we read many similar books. When we do this, we find that many of the same words and expressions, and also themes, are repeated. That means that with each book we can read a little more fluently and maybe go deeper.
There are several ways to read narrowly. We could read a famous story, such as Goldilocks and the 3 Bears, in various editions. Another way is to read books by the same author, preferably in the same series. This is what Yu seems to be doing. Look at her reviews of Take a Good Look, Lizzie Zipmouth, The Suitcase Kid, and Sleepovers, all by Jacqueline Wilson. This is a great way to get to know an author. Each book is also quite long, so Yu is doing a lot of work and getting lots of valuable input!

Today I read the Fox and the Crow, one of Aesop's fables. A fox was out for a walk, when he saw a crow sitting in a tree, with a piece of cheese in his mouth. The fox thought: "That cheese looks delicious. I want to eat it." So he hatched a cunning plan. He stood below the tree and spoke to the crow: "You are so beautiful!" The crow was very happy. Then the fox said: "And I'm sure you must have a great singing voice." So the crow started to sing, and as she did so the cheese fell into the fox's mouth. The moral of the story is: "Don't be fooled by flattery".

As usual, I'd like you to read an English book and write about it this week. But instead of working on an essay, I'd like you to read 2 extra books and write about them. In other words, you should read 3 books and write about them.

As usual, I leave the choice of books up to you. If you have lots of time, you might want to read a long book. If you are very busy, you should read very short and easy books. Please write a separate short post for each one. If possible, please take a photo and insert a link to information about the book (e.g. on amazon.co.jp).

How was the V-Check test? I recommend you take it twice a year until you graduate, to see how much your vocabulary is growing. As a guideline, you should aim for a vocabulary of at least 6000 words before you graduate.

Many people have quite a big vocabulary, but they have gaps at the lower levels, usually the second thousand words. These are the most important words so you should try to fill this gap as soon as possible. Take a look at the LDV list!

In my classes of November 21st and 22nd, let's all take the V-Check vocabulary diagnostic test. Diagnostic test means that it helps you to check your own vocabulary size. I will get the average result for each class, but I won't know who got what score. This is not used for assessment, but for research and for planning teaching.

Please use your GMail address to register. And please be sure to enter the correct class code when you take the test.

Do you like cats? If so, please take a look at this post! (Please write a comment if you have time.) And please post your own cat pictures, linking to any other interesting cat posts!

A friend of mine who's a professor at Aoyama Gakuin University has made a company that makes software to help Japanese students test and learn vocabulary. So today let's take a short test to estimate our vocabulary size (students only please, not class auditors). Please visit Lexxica and register, then take the V-Check test. When you take the test you need to enter the class code that I will give you in class.

Related to the previous post introducing websites related to chocolate, don't forget that there are some interesting books about it too.

My favourite is the Usborne book, The Story of Chocolate. We have this in the PUK library. There are also two other books with the same title, one from Dorling Kindersley, and the other from Black Cats.

Another book, Does Chocolate Grow on Trees?, features chocolate but also talks about other things. And, of course, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is always interesting!

I've just found some interesting links related to chocolate. If you're interested take a look!

First, the Cadbury chocolate site. Cadbury is Britain's most famous chocolate company. I recommend the "Make chocolate in our virtual factory" game.

The biggest chocolate company in the USA is Hershey's. Take a look at some of the recipes.

Oxfam has a site called Chokky Central that tells us about how chocolate and chocolate biscuits ("chokky bikkies") are made, introduces fair trade, and has interesting quizzes.

A good site for interesting short passages for reading is Penguin Dossiers. It has articles about, for example, Christmas, Chinese New Year, soccer, James Bond, Christina Ricci, Arnold Schwarzenegger, etc. They are quite short and reasonably easy to read.

It's difficult to read quickly if you don't know most of the words. Rikai can help you with that. To use rikai, it is best to open 2 tabs in Firefox. In one tab, open an article from Penguin Dossiers that looks interesting. Select and copy the text. In the other tab, open rikai, and paste the text into the window. Then press Go. Move your mouse over any words that look difficult.

Most people read slowly out of habit. Spreeder ("speed reader") can help you do that. Paste the text from the Penguin Dossiers article into Spreeder, and change the settings to about 240 words per minute and chunks of 3 words. Then concentrate as the words appear on the screen. Don't worry if you cannot read all of them.

If 240 words seemed too fast, move the speed UP to 300, and read again. Then go down to 200, and finally back up to 240. Probably it won't seem too fast. Remember you can read 3 times at 300 wpm in the same time it takes to read once at 100 wpm.

After sending your attendance email and writing your 十分は十分 post, it's time to try to finish your collaborative essays. Work together. Call me to your desk for help with grammar and comments, etc. Remember you should correct as many grammar and spelling mistakes as possible before the deadline. Check out the Orangoo spellchecker.
For phrases, check out the Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English Online.

Checklist:
spelling
grammar: subject, verb, 3rd person singular present "s", past/present
paragraph: does each paragraph have a clear topic? at least 3 sentences?; no returns in the paragraph?; 2 returns after each paragraph?
links
pictures

Ai likes pineapples. I like mango.

I went to the shops and bought some apples and some bananas.