Nativity Scene in Fátima

Nativity Scene in Óbidos

Your Teacher's 2014 Reading Challenge

Joining Goodreads in Jan 2012 was one of the best things I have ever done to improve my reading standards. As you may know, this website was founded in 2006 and "allows individuals to freely search Goodreads' extensive user-populated database of books, annotations, and reviews. Users can sign up and register books to generate library catalogs and reading lists" (Wikipedia)
It's now the world's largest-site for readers and book recommendations and by allowing readers to set goals, I (certainly like so many others) do my best to achieve them!
For 2012 I had set my goal in reading 24 books and tough as it was juggling reading, schoolwork, housework, kids... I promised myself I would do it. And I did!!!For 2013, I was more modest and my Reading Challenge was 20 books - and so was the goal for the current year of 2014.

Besides the easiness with which all readers can keep track of their readings (or lack of them!), the visual reminders (or rather, the gadgets with the shelf and counting the books we can embed in our blogs / websites) have also worked for me either telling me I am one / two books ahead or behind and I become aware that I have to allocate more time to my reading (even if that means sleeping fewer hours ;) )
In the beginning of December, even before I had completed this year's reading goal, the nice folks at Goodreads sent me this:

- the list of books I have read throughout 2014

- the stats of those books

How pleased I was!!! This is another reason why I'm definitely joining their 2015 Reading Challenge!!!

What about you? Why don't you try it for 2015??? Challenge yourself and let me/us know!

One last thing...
Here's my top book recommendation from the ones I read in 2014 using a web 2.0 free tool we've tried before Vine (remember, João Carecho and Diogo Ricardo?)

Happy Reading(s) :)

Merry Christmas

I wish you all a Merry Christmas <3

Merry Christmas, by Carolina

Merry Christmas y'all!

In class I shared with you a Christmas song whose aim was to raise awareness and money for a world problem; this time I'm sharing a famous (and viral!) Christmas advertisement which also includes music and depicts real / historical events. But that's enough as far as I am concerned... as for you:
1. Where and When did the events take place?
2. What can be heard? How do you explain it?
3. What's the sequence of events in the advertisement?
4. If it's an advertisement, what's being advertised? ´
5. Why now? What is so special about Christmas 2014 in this context?
6. How would you describe Jim's act by coming out from the trenches?
7. Research a bit and share here what you find on "Sainsbury's", "No Man's Land", "Christmas Truce".
8. What's fictional? What's real?

If you are into Reading and / or wish to know more about this, do check

- a very short book / longer poem by Carol Ann Duffy called The Christmas Truce;

- a beautiful book with an even more beautiful message by Dr Seuss How The Grinch Stole Christmas.

- the classic tale by Charles Dickens with his famous Scrooge A Chrismas Carol; 

- another amazing book but on WW I, War Horse;

I'm sure you've already come across other books and movies on these events, so why don't you leave your suggestions here, too?

In the meantime,

Happy Reading and Happy Christmas!

Merry Christmas

Christmas is a celebration, which marks the birth of Jesus Christ.
People exchange gifts to remember the Three Wise Men (in Portuguese: Melchior, Gaspar and Baltazar) who offered gifts to the child after his birth.
The Santa character was inspired by a Roman bishop from the fifth century, "St. Nicholas", which offered, on 6 December, donations in secret, to the daughters of a very poor man. Gradually this day merged with the Christmas period and was immortalised by a Coca Cola advertisement some decades ago featuring an iconic Santa Claus.

Merry Christmas to all and many gifts in your (little) shoe!!!!

Merry Christmas

Christmas is a day on which we celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ. In ancient times, Christmas was celebrated on several different dates because they did not know exactly the date of Jesus' birth. It was only in the fourth century that December 25 was established as the official date of celebration. 
In ancient Rome, December 25 was the date on which the Romans celebrated the beginning of winter. Therefore, it is believed that there is a relationship of this fact with the institutionalization of the Christmas celebration.

The old Christmas celebrations used to last up to 12 days, as this was the time it took for the three Wise Men arrive to the city of Bethlehem and deliver gifts to the infant Jesus. Currently, people often put up their trees and other Christmas decorations in early December and dismantle them until 12 days after Christmas.

From a chronological point of view, Christmas / Jesus' birth is a date of great importance to the West as it marks the first year in our history.

                                             My new pet

   
                                                                  My puppy is Mimi

Christmas Concert in Sobral

Christmas Concert

              Today is our Christmas concert in Sobral - Soure

Santa Claus is coming !!!

Merry Christmas

Nobel Week 2014

Traditionally, the Nobel Prizes are presented to the Laureates at ceremonies on December 10, the date that marks Alfred Nobel's death. We've all heard about him already, but who exactly was Alfred Nobel? Well, you can look for further bio and biblio here, but, in short, he was a Swedish-born inventor and international industrialist who stipulated in his will that his fortune was to be used for prizes in Physics, Chemistry, Psysiology or Medicine, Literature and Peace.

We've already congratulated Malala Yousafzai and Kailash Satyarthi on their shared Nobel Peace Prize in this blogpost last October; today, that the award ceremonies are taking place in Oslo and Stockholm, let's meet the laureate for 2014 Nobel Prize in Literature: Patrick Modiano, a French writer, hardly known outside France, though translated into English.

If you check http://www.nobelprize.org/ you'll find all you can possibly imagine about the founder, about these prestigious awards, laureates and ceremonies throughout time.

Your fantastic teacher of French, Anita Duarte, has again generously contributed to this blogpost. Please read further, but now in the literature laureate's mother tongue:

Finally, has any Portuguese ever been awarded a Nobel Prize? Yes? How many? Who? In what area(s)? 

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas!!!!!!

CR7 cissé

Hello everyone!
I wanted to introduce you to my new team "VINHA DA RAINHA".
The team that has a yellow outfit was my old team "Sourense" and the team that has the white outfit is my new team "Vinha da Rainha".
This is the first time I play in this team, and I'm really enjoying it. This is going very well !! I am very proud !!
When I played in Sourense there was a proposal to play with sporting, but my father did not let me go because I was too young.
My dream is to be a professional soccer player. I love playing football.

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas, everyone !!!!

Welcome December!

Welcome December, the last month of the year and the one that brings us some days off as well as some presents - not all that matters but also contribute for a sense of joy, right?
Here you have a personalized calender for this December 2014 and below, if you click on the link, you'll have an Advent Calendar in which a new window pops up every single day :)

Click on...

http://pearsonelt.es/adventcalendar/