What do you know about “Human Wonders”? - Block IV - UNIT 3

China: A Legendary Country

China is a fascinating country, with a rich cultural history of ingenuity, natural and human wonders, traditions and legends, art, festivals, and technological and industrial advancement. Use the stories below to immerse your students in some wonderful Chinese legends. Reinforce their understanding of each legend with creative activities such as:

• a dramatic class interpretation of the story
• an art project which retells the story or gives a visual description of one of the characters or a setting
• composing musical accompaniments using drums, cymbals or string instruments to accompany an oral retelling or dramatic interpretation of the story
• an oral retelling of each legend by students
• creating a Chinese opera mask for one of the characters or costume designs for one of the characters

THE GREAT WALL OF CHINA 

Great Wall of China, well who does not know this wall? This wall must have been widely known to people all over the world. Great Wall is located in one of the world’s most populous country, China, not only known for the large size of this wall, but also the longest wall in the world and had become 7 wonders of the world.

Another greatness of this long wall is that, it is the only men built place that can be clearly seen from the moon. Incredible! Isn’t it? Certainly the greatness of this architect has made many people curious with a direct view. Therefore it is not surprising that the Great Wall has become one of the attractions owned by china. Certainly many visitors and tourists who come have made huge benefits for the country.

History Of The Great Wall

History of the establishment of this great wall began in several kingdoms china, attacking each other. One of the royal which became the winner, try combining his kingdom, with areas in the win. For manufacturing this wall took hundred of years, as it’s not complete in just one or two decade.

The purposes was as well as to protect themselves from attacks and also prevent other regions rise another kingdom that can rival kingdom. Besides it is also said that according to some historical reasons and downs of this wall is to make travel to the city or the countryside there. The construction of the Great Wall is believed to occur during the Ming Dynasty.

How much time do you spend a day on the news? - Block III - UNIT 12

In some opportunities different people have told me that it is an obligation to read or watch news at the TV. When I was a kid, I used to hate news because my parents always wanted to watch that kind of programs and I couldn’t watch cartoons because of them. But now, I perfectly know that news inform you about important things that have happened during the day

There are different kinds of news, such these ones:

Business news: interprets the economic changes that take place in a society. It could include anything from personal finance, to business at the local market and shopping malls, to the performance of well-known and not-so-well-known companies.

This form of journalism covers news and features articles about people, places and issues related to the field of business.

Environment news: This news includes issues and people that are associated with the non-human world with which humans necessarily interact.

Entertainment news: focuses on the entertainment business and its products. Like fashion, entertainment journalism covers industry-specific news while targeting general audiences beyond those working in the industry itself. 

Political news: includes coverage of all aspects of politics and political science, although the term usually refers specifically to coverage of civil governments and political power.

Sports news:  is an essential element of any news media organization. Sports journalism includes organizations devoted entirely to sports reporting — newspapers such as L'Equipe in France, La Gazzetta dello Sport in Italy, Marca in Spain, and the defunct Sporting Life in Britain, American magazines such as Sports Illustrated and the Sporting News, all-sports talk radio stations, and television networks such as Eurosport, Fox Sports 1, ESPN and The Sports Network (TSN).

Technological news:  includes journalists genres such as news, reports, analysis about a wide variety of topics, including communications technologies, the Internet, social media, scientific research, robotics, and laws and policy regarding the digital world.

World news: is the news media-jargon for news from abroad, about a foreign country or a global subject. For journalism, it is a branch that deals with news either sent by foreign correspondents or news agencies, or — more recently — information that is gathered or researched through distance communication technologies, such as telephone, satellite TV or the internet.

According to this block, in my personal case I use to watch news at TV all the morning. When I wake up, I turn on the TV and watch the news at the “America Television” (channel 4). In some way, it is useful for me when they inform me about local news, as the weather, traffic, universities, etc.

The kind of news I like most is sports news. I am a football lover so I always want to be informed about the teams of my city or also the best teams of the world. Sometimes I watch programs at night to see news about my favorite team which is Alianza Lima. Despite this, I used to check the news of Depor which is a newspaper, but I check the news on the Internet, because it is better for me, as I am always in the street I do not like to hold a newspaper on my backpack so I prefer to read the news in the web page instead of buying the newspaper.

Expectations about the future - Block II - UNIT 6

What is an "expectation"?
To be able to respond this interrogant, we should know what is the exactly meaning of this word. As far as I concerned, my concept is based on the description I have found in one of the most known world web page: Wikipedia.

Expectation
In the case of uncertainty, expectation is what is considered the most likely to happen. An expectation, which is a belief that is centered on the future, may or may not be realistic. A less advantageous result gives rise to the emotion of disappointment. If something happens that is not at all expected it is a surprise. An expectation about the behavior or performance of another person, expressed to that person, may have the nature of a strong request, or an order.

Now, that I know what is the meaning of this word, I am able to answer the typical question that usually people ask themselves in their life.

What are you expecting for your future?
Sailing in the sun, you can ask yourself this… what are your expectations when it comes to your future?

Are you expecting to be…
- Financially secure?
- Successful?
- In fit, happy and healthy?
Do you expect to be living your ideal lifestyle 5 years from now?

Well if you aren’t strategically planning, making yourself accountable for your life and taking the necessary steps to achieve your goals then the only thing you should be expecting for your future is more of what you already have.

So what are my expectations for the future then?

Firstly, as a personal opinion, money does not make happiness. You can be such a millionaire gentleman, but having a lot of things does not mean that you are certainly going to be happy. Probably it is a part of being happy for some people, but in my case it is not a total satisfaction. I think that being succesfull is more related with the idea of fulfill your goals, not with the idea of having plenty of money. 

Secondly, to feel fulfilled is needed to be happy. If you comply your goals, you will fill your life with satisfaction, which is an issue that goes beyond a mere whim. A clear example of whim is those people who is always buying unnecessary things like: an ultimate model car, jewelry, the best clothes, and so on. The personal satisfaction comes to your life only when you feel yourself a person able to say, I walked all that difficult way on my own, and now I am who I am. When you are able to have a look at your past and recognize that whatever you are now, is only because your own effort. 

Thirdly, and after I have given to you my point of view I can answer the main question of this article. I consider that my top expectation about the future is to be a high professional. That is what I really have been dreaming all my life, is my principal goal to achieve. Besides, I have some others goals that I would like to accomplish, for example, I want to learn many languages apart from Portuguese and English. Also I want to have a good job where I would be able to develop my career of International Business Management and why not, to have an important charge in this enterprise.

Finally, despite the idea I have, I would like to be financially secure, because it is important to establish a personal account to save some money. As I said before, I say again: money does not make happiness. But it is an important part, nowadays we cannot live if we do not have a well-paid job. Prices are higher than they used to be before and the cost of life is in constant increase. Therefore, to be able to have a family I would like to have some money, for my family livelihood.

These are my personal expectations about the future, I hope you have good expectations too. I would like to share a video with you, that I watched before, as a way of reflection.