SIS Recruitment

Almost everyone in my Saturday class rushed off without taking a copy of the SIS handout. So here is the link to the SIS Recruitment Website.

The advice on writing an application is from the Guardian, here.

Good luck with writing your applications. Letters from candidates thought suitable for a career in spying will be secretly passed to SIS HQ, from where you will be contacted directly.

M

Links from Recent Classes

Due to a technical hitch (I got sick), the blog hasn't been updated for a couple of weeks, and so links that I've promised haven't been put up. Here they are at last!

We did a listening about a guy who came from a very rough background, whose brothers shot at him (accidentally) while he was doing the laundry, and who almost killed someone before he went on to become a successful history teacher and Buddhist Monk. The interview is here 'The Tibet Connection'. It's the first main item on the show for September 28th, 2008.

The materials for Francesca Beard's 'Chinese Whispers', including the listening texts, are here on Brit Lit. Do take a look at Francesca on YouTube, and link from her own webpage, too.

During our discussions about Ethical Consumerism, the 'Sustainable Living Foundation' was mentioned. Link here.

Finally, someone asked me for a site which looked at collocations. Here's the excellent Collins Concordance and Collocation Sampler.

Happy Linking!

CAE DECEMBER CANDIDATES!

Quite a few of my AC2.1 students are taking the CAE exam this December, and have been asking for guidance and information on the new format of the exam. In response to this, Lucy Bravo, our resident Cambridge Exams Expert, will be giving a session on the changes to the CAE exam on Saturday December 6^th at 11.00 am in the auditorium in ECP, Rua do Rosario 174-176 (just around the corner from Breiner). This session is specifically aimed at AC2.1 students who are taking the CAE exam this December, and all such students are invited to attend.

You can also go to the Cambridge Exams website, where you can create a candidate profile, and also download the CAE teachers’ handbook, which has a full exam in the new format, including listenings, and all with answers, so you can at least do one full exam on their own and self-correct.

Hope this is helpful. Thanks a lot to Lucy for agreeing to do this session for us.

FLUP British Culture Week

Next week is British Culture Week at FLUP. See HERE for details. Lunchtime films, talks and presentations. Be there or be square!

Foz AC2.1 / CPE1 FAC2.1-19W

To remind you (if you were there last class) or to inform you (if you weren't) that our class on November 12th will take place at British Council in Rua do Breiner and not in Foz. The reason for this is we will be participating in a visit from Francesca Beard. This is really a wonderful opportunity for us to both enjoy a performance by Francesca and to work with her, and I'm extremely pleased that we've been invited to go along.
We will be doing some BritLit work anticipating Francesca's visit in our class (in Foz as usual) on November 5th. Meanwhile, here are a couple of links if you'd like to find out a bit more about Francesca Beard.

http://www.francescabeard.com/

http://www.contemporarywriters.com/

HOMEWORK - IMPORTANT!

Homework is beginning to roll in, which is a good sign... FOR YOUR OWN GOOD, can people who email homework to me PLEASE:
i) Include your name in the document title. eg Joao_Silva_Report.doc
ii) Include your name in the document itself - either at the top or at the bottom, as you would if you wrote it by hand.
iii) Include a subject heading in your email
iv) If you're using Windows Vista, save and send your document in an earlier format. (Use 'Save as...' ['Guardar como...'])

Reasons why below if you want to know!

People who have already emailed me, don't resend unless you sent me a Vista .docx homework - I will rename documents and add names for homework received up until now.

Thanks,

Mark

Why these four rules?

i) If you just call your document 'homework.doc' or something similar, it is quite likely that I'll receive another document with the same name, and the new document will be saved on top of yours!
ii) If you don't include your name in the document, I won't know whose it is when I print it out to correct it.
iii) Messages with no subject heading sometimes get sent to my junk mail folder and are ultimately deleted!I DO check my junk mail from time to time, but better safe than sorry.
iv) I don't have access to Vista and can't open .docx documents!