An Auctioneer

Elderly Animals--p. 131 in RC

Read about BrightHaven and Saints for your Reading Log or just for fun!

A Slice of Life

Watch the videos in the "A Slice of Life" competition and vote for the video that you like!

The Girl with No Hands

Read about the little girl with no hands who won a penmanship award!

The King's Wife: A Superb Second Language Learner

Holland will soon crown a new king.  His wife, Princess Maxima, is from Argentina but speaks Dutch fluently.  Read the fascinating story of this royal couple.

The Situation in Vietnam: True?

Read an article about contemporary issues in Vietnam from today's Orange County Register.

The Great Escape from the Bombers

The carjacking victim in Boston was a young man who had been an international student in Boston and was now an entrepreneur.  Read the incredible story of how the man escaped.

Disabled Surfers

From VOA Learning English, read about disabled surfers.  You can also listen to the story as you read along.

The Bomber's Hiding Place

The owner of the boat where the second bomber was hiding says that he does not want people to buy him a new boat.  What should people do with their money?  Read his answer here .

Pet Therapy

Read about pet therapy from National Public Radio.  You can also listen to the story and read the transcript for the spoken story.  This is a wonderful way to improve your reading and listening skills!

Color

Do you want to test yourself for color blindness?  This website has two tests that you can try just for fun.  Be prepared, men, because color blindness is an inherited condition that mostly affects males, including your teacher.

Or you can explore the world of color through Color Matters . 

"Midget" or "Little Person"?

Read about the language that we should use when we talk about people with disabilities.

Crowdsourcing the Boston Bombing

Amateur detectives are working together on the internet, trying to find the criminal(s):
"Amateur sleuths from across the Internet are piecing together images from the Boston Marathon bombing and weighing in on Reddit with their ideas about the devices and potential suspects. (April 17, 2012)"--Reuters News

Chinese Student Killed in the Boston Marathon Bombings

An international student from China was one of the three fatalities (dead people).
Read about her here . 

Wealthy, business-savvy Mexican immigrants transform Texas city

Read about the new immigrants settling in San Antonia, Texas.

A Vietnamese Refugee Who Made It

David Tran founded Huy Fong Sriracha.  Read his story from the Los Angeles Times.

 

 

"Blur the Line"

These photographs blur the line between fantasy and reality.

Motion Capture Technology

In your reading text, you read about motion capture technology on p. 100.  This video features a character from The Lord of the Rings.  You can see how the filmmaker created Gollum, using motion capture technology. 

Do you want $2500?

One of the textbook publishers is staging a contest for students.  Take a look!

Topics for Comparison Paragraph

Topics with differences:

two teachers (not R)/classes (similar)/schools/friends/relatives

two products (such as two phones or two cameras from different companies)

two supermarkets/restaurants/parks

shopping online and shopping in stores

eating a special meal at home or in a restaurant

your life in your home country and your life here (must be narrowed)

“life” = entertainment/school/relationships with friends and acquaintances/living
conditions/pace of life/transportation/ ?????

expectations of life in US and the realities

people in (city) and  people in the countryside

living with your family and living here with your homestay family

two attitudes toward money/clothes

friendship in your home country and friendship here

life as a single person and life as a married person

love of father and love of mother

married life before children and with children

social attitudes toward dating and marriage in your home country and in another country

social attitudes toward dating and marriage held by older and younger people of the

same culture

your home country in the past and now (must be narrowed to a more specific topic,

such as prisons in the past and now or elementary schools in the past and now)

study at the library or study at home

raising a boy and raising a girl

the young generation in Vietnam (/Korea/Mexico/China) and the young generation of

Vietnamese here

the perception toward their children of parents in Vietnam and Vietnamese parents in the

US

two majors/careers, such as nursing and ultrasound (technician?)

watching a movie at home or in a movie theater

 

A Very Deep Dive by a Famous Movie Director

 

Explorer-Filmmaker James Cameron

Remember Avatar?  The director of this movie is also interested in deep-sea exploration.  Last year he made a dive that only three men in history have made.  Read about it on the National Geographic website.

Shipwreck Exploration

Published on Jul 20, 2012

An American company has made what is being called the heaviest and deepest recovery of precious metals from a shipwreck.

The Tampa, Fla.-based Odyssey Marine Exploration, Inc. announced Wednesday that it had recovered 48 tons of silver bullion from the SS Gairsoppa, a sunken British cargo ship in three miles of water off the coast of Ireland. Between the Gairsoppa, torpedoed by a German U-boat during World War II, and the SS Mantola, sunk by a German submarine during World War I, Odyssey said in a press release that about 240 tons of silver may be recovered by the end of the operation. 

The recovery is being made under a contract awarded by the U.K. government, which will keep 20 percent of the cargo's value, estimated to be in the tens of millions of dollars. The Gairsoppa became U.K. property after the government paid the owners of the ship an insurance sum of £325,000 in 1941. Records indicate the silver was valued at £600,000 in 1941.

The initial recovery of 48 tons consists of 1,203 silver bars and has been transported to a secure facility in the United Kingdom, according to the company.

"With the shipwreck lying approximately three miles below the surface of the North Atlantic, this was a complex operation," Odyssey CEO Greg Stemm said in Odyssey's release.

Five-Star Readers

These readers from my spring class did an outstanding job on the peer reviews for draft two of the persuasive paragraph:

Rachel, Mr. Le, Zhi Gang, Alex, Uyen, Tam, Mr. Ngo, Yen Thi, Chien, Wendy, Tu, Ngoc Kim, Hai, Thai Phan, Minjae, Dai, Nhu Nguyen, and Le Quyen, the star of stars.

A Trip to China

Read about an area in China which is a favorite tourist destination.

"not for all the tea in China"

--not even if you rewarded me with all the tea in China; not for anything at all.
"No I won't do it—not for all the tea in China."


The Oxford English Dictionary declares the phrase to be of Australian origin and reprints Eric Partridge's 1890s date for the phrase but unfortunately doesn't provide any supporting evidence for either assertion. The nearest one man can come to verifying the date, and to an Australian origin, is J. J. Mann's travelogue Round the world in a motor car, 1914.

Easter Tuesday

Luke 24:36-48

Easter Monday

Luke 24:13-35