About my country

The first time I came to England was about twelve years ago and I remember how uncomfortable for me it was when I mentioned my nationality, because people immediately associated it with narcotrafic. I did not blame them as they only heard of Colombia when there was news about assassinations, bombs and kidnappings among other manifestations of crime. It was very surprising for me when I heard last Monday that a famous singer, who had been in the news for expending huge amounts of money on Cocaine, had been invited to Colombia to see what is the reality behind that fancy drug and there he was reporting his experience in Panorama, a BBC News television programme.

I would like to share with you some positive things about my country. We have the privilege of having two coasts (Caribbean and Pacific) and an island called San Andres. The variety of climates allows us to grow different kind of vegetables, fruits, cereals, coffee, cotton. Most important of all, Colombian people are friendly, outgoing, hardworking, there are a lot of talented artists such as Fernando Botero (sculptor and painter), Juanes and Shakira (pop singers), footballers and writers among others. People who come and visit us have a good time and fall in love with my country.

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Have you ever experienced bad publicity of your country?

Technorati Tags: EFL

Wasting precious time on line? RSS solves that problem

The first time I came across RSS, I thought it was just one more in the huge list of terminology related to computers that you never manage to really understand, but just manipulate. But after watching the video "RSS in Plain English" produced by The Common Craft Show. I can certainly state that the Rich Site Summary is a very useful tool that allows you to use your time effectively, because it tells you when new content has been added to the sites of your interest that you previously selected. It is also of great value in the blogging classroom as it helps you develop scanning sub-skills in your students, avoid the risk of your students feeling overwhelmed with the large quantity of information available, makes them approach the information more critically so that they can decide if something is worth reading or not and consequently favours writing skills as the continuous reading practice exposes them the elements of how on line audience should be addressed. The following article very clearly illustrates the importance of RSS in blogging.
The Technology of Reading and Writing in the Digital Space: Why RSS is crucial for a Blogging Classroom

Do you agree that it is worth using it?

Growing on line

Going through the mails and following links inside this blogging for educators community I´ve just joined and from which I am learning a lot, has taken me to very interesting places. The following is one I want to share with you, because it deals with an issue that concerns us not only as educators, but also as parents. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/kidsonline/

I hope you find it interesting and why not starting a little discussion about it?

Why am I doing this?

I am creating this blog as part of a course. And I am doing the course, because I am convinced of the advantages of using technology in the classroom. I consider this learning experience as an adventure, because I am not very good at using computers, but the best way of facing it, is trying things out. If they work I will be glad if they don't I will try a different way until I succeed. I also hope to get in contact with fellow teachers who have had experience in working with blogs in the English classroom so that me and my readers can learn a lot from them.