Journal IV

Jose Solano de la Sala

At that time, the end of the course, I had learn a lot of things about the correct use of some idiomatic expressions and vocabulary, or at least that is what I believe, also I think I had learned the correct use of punctuation, maybe not the correct use but I began to learning more about that, until this course I didn’t know anything about the use of punctuations like dashes, commas, etc.
I expect learn more about that in the other courses, I think this an important part of the English, because the correct use of the punctuations can help you to improve your writing and help you to express in a better way the things you want to say.
From now, I would make more formal letters, I would do speak, essays with a better grammar and with more clear ideas. I don’t know if the way I am writing know is good but I expect is better than the time when I began the course. The only thing that I want is pass this course and know that it learn something until this time.

Journal III

Jose Solano de la Sala

In this third part of the course, I think that I learned more vocabulary; I didn’t learn all the vocabulary that we had but a big part of this.
I began to speak more, I lost the fear of speak in public, sometimes I put very nervous and I began to say some crazy thing, and my brain stop working, but it is changing. I think the oral presentation about the movie help me for this, because I speak long time and answer the questions that my classmates made about the movie, it gave my more secure about my speak.
I don’t know, how myself can hear when I speak English, but I think that the time when I had to do my oral presentation I do very well, I weren’t very nervous, and also didn’t say crazy things that is a miracle.
My expectations for the end of the course are that I learn all the new vocabulary that we have, learn more about the correct form of writing an essay and improve my speech.

JOURNAL 4

JOURNAL 4
Gabriela Moreta Vinueza
7th LEVEL

In these weeks, I learned past unreal conditionals, and adjective clauses or restrictive relative clauses.
We watched a video, and it was very interesting because it talks about global warming and changing conditions around the world. Al Gore has some true things, but I disagree with some things that he said.
Unit 4 in reading and listening books are very interesting, because they talk about natural disasters like: flood, earthquake, hurricanes, and heat wave.
These kinds of topics are very important due to that people are attacked and affected by the different disasters.
I think that these topics have some importance, because they help us to understand the world and, in addition, I can practice my English skills.
In each unit I learned some new vocabulary, and it can increase my knowledge, and I have reinforced all the things that I have learned in all the levels.

JOURNAL III

PONTIFICIA UNIVERIDAD CATOLICA DEL ECUADOR
RAQUEL LOPEZ SOLORZANO
SEVENTH LEVEL
ENGLISH

JOURNAL WRITING III
In these last two weeks we have seen the third unit of the book North Star in class.
I personally have learned more vocabulary and more grammar. The rules about
punctuation were very important too.
The theme that we saw in this unit was really very interesting and my personal opinion is: That everybody has the right to choose the treatment that we consider the best for our health. And as parents our responsibility is to look out for the well-being of our children.
It’s important to believe in somebody or something, but not get blinded to reality. Personally, I believe that parents are the ones who have the power to choose the best for their sons, there is no one better to take a decision that is going to affect the rest of their lives.
It’s true that a lack of education and fanaticism to a certain religion can cause a lot of harm to us but unfortunately I think this situation is out of our hands.
Finally, I think that there is no treatment that is 100% effective. The human mind and faith sometimes are more powerful.

Journal Entry IV

by Mauro Vargas C

This is the last entry we have to do, I think this method is a good for know our advance and troubles and try to get better our skills.

I had my presentation, my discuss theme was about alternative in cars, I think was a good theme, but when I started to talk I was nervous and something I forgot, but I try to stay calm.

This last weeks we learned about natural disasters and we found a lot of words that are common but I do not the meaning. We also saw a movie and the movie was to easy of understand because we learned previously the words. I think the movie opened my eyes in come things which I never thought and sometime we don’t have conscience in our acts.

At the end of our course I see how is important not only know talking also it's important know writing, but I think this level was so fast and sometimes I was lost, but If we want something we have to do every in us for obtain our goals.

diary...

at the end of this course, wehave finished to study all the unit in the book, eventhough its to much theory we have learned and a lot of vocabulary also we have lost the fear of speaking between us .

This course have been really interesting because the teacher tough us how to write and pronunciate correctly. thats to important for me because of my career due to I must have good speaking so the tourist would understand me and take with them a good image of me.

diary...

In this level we put emphasis in cheacking every single unit but we do this very fast, therefore we need to pay more attention because there are to many topics and wedont have enough time also we dont do pronunciation exercises neither watch movies or do more dinamic things for this issue.

Although the exposition have helped us because whith listening we can learn the correct pronunciation of the words and correcting the text helped me to realized the mistakes thati have made.
the class discussion are useful to everyone.

diary...

in this time that we have seem more english and the different kinds of time for the sentences and conectors there are more that I expected them to be.
Thanks to the exercises we can practice more.
I believe that the unit test should be similar to the mid term test.
we should have more exercises because all my classmate and me are having problems whit english.

JOURNAL IV

PONTIFICIA UNIVERIDAD CATOLICA DEL ECUADOR
RAQUEL LOPEZ SOLORZANO
SEVENTH LEVEL
ENGLISH
JOURNAL WRITING IV
In this last week I did my oral presentation about anorexia nervosa. I chose this article
Because, I believe that Anorexia is a very dangerous eating disorder and it should be
treated as soon as the family detects it, because it can lead the person to death.

This presentation was something difficult for me, because I get nervous when I talk in
public.

I think that I am not an excellent English student but I believe that when I make an essay or I develop a written work or when I have to understand a lecture I can do it in a right way. But, my main problem is when I have to talk not only in the language I’m learning in this moment.
I am very shy and very nervous and it affect me when I talk in my native language and it affect me more when I talk in English.

Journal Entry III

by Mauro Vargas C.

We finish this weekend learned about Unreal Conditional, and also we practiced punctuation like comma, dashes, semi-colons, colon, that help me a lot, because I have a lot troubles in my essays. Well I think everybody know about that, but with the exercise and the help of Maya, she is American, and she was helping me and others partners talking and sometimes she read our essays and proof read our essays. I think, I improve my skills, because after the class of punctuation I try to use more punctuation in my essays, but I know it’s important punctuation but also too understand the structures of phrases, because sometimes I translate my thinks but hardly ever it’s fine my “translation”.

Finally, the last weeks I try to write more, and develop my skills. I hope my grades begin to improve in my essays.

Journal Entry II

by Mauro Vargas C.

This second week we started learned about the use of gerunds, infinitives and how is the structure of an essay-topic sentence, supporting sentence and concluding ideas-.

I started to read more because it’s difficult to me write well, because I’m confuse when use some times at the same paragraph, but I have to pass this level for two reasons, the first one I need pass this level for my career and the second one I want to travel to others countries.

The second unit of the North Star book we learned many new words. I think when we know more words we have the possibility of communicate the best way our sense.
Sometimes when I’m reading The Eye of childhood, I was confused, because the book have a lot of new word, I think is good for us know new vocabulary, but also it’s annoying when we have to find those words every three words.

Finally, I think the main topic in the book was really interesting, because not only learned about use of structures, gerunds or infinitives, we learned how other people who had big problems, they overcome theirs problems with encourage and brave behavior.

THIRD ENTRY DIARY

By Fausto Llamuca

I gave the middle exam and I think that have to study very much. I have problem with pronunciation. In this part the teacher taught us past unreal conditional in grammar structure. I think that this part is very important because I can use or write hypotetical situations or uncertainly about what happened. I have been made a lot of exercises about listening and speaking. The teacher contact foreigner students for help me, this was a good idea because this is a great aid for me. In the book there are a lot of expressions that I learned like: Excuse me? What was that you said?; Pardon me?; I am sorry, I didn't catch that. Could you say that again?
Also I learned new vocabulary about natural medicine, alternative medicene and laws, and sleep deprivations.

SECOND ENTRY DIARY

By Fausto Llamuca

In these two weeks, I sew a new unit - The Achilles Heel- in Listening and Speaking Book. Here I learned lots of new vocabulary about overcoming and goals. We continued with summarize main ideas and listening for details in some listening. Also I learned about gerunds and infinitives, I think that this part was very important for writting our essays. Each class the teacher taught us how we have to pronounce new vocabulary and other words. In the Reading Book I learned to compare and contrast two life histories. I could write a paragraph using the three parts that have a paragraph: topic sentence, supporting sentences and concluding sentence. I gave mi presentation in this week about Toyota Motor Company.

Journal Entry #4

Cristian Mogollon

The part of vocabulary has been the most difficult part to learn in this seventh english level. Vocabulary from the reading and writing book and from the stories "The Eye of the Childhood" was very hard to understand. There were many words that I couldn't catch their meaning at the beginning. For example, Although I read the whole paragraph, I couldn't understand the exactly meaning of a word. I thought it was easy to catch the meaning of a word when you read something because the meaning is involved in the sentence. In this story book it was completely different.
Vocabulary from grammar and listening book was more comprehensive than the other one because you could relation the new words.
We are now in Unit4 studying more vocabulary about natural disaster like hurricanes. Conditionals with the past unreal is again the main topic of the unit. The last listening that I heard was very difficult to me because it took much time. I couldn't get all the ideas because there were three parts in the same exercise.
The next topic is about adjective clauses so I think it is for sure that it will be in the final written exam.

Journal Entry #3

Cristian Mogollon

We are going to finish this english course next week, then day by day we have to give the best of ourselves. This month and a half, we have study a little of reading and writing; however, we have done a lot of listening and speaking exercises. Past Unreal Conditional was one of the grammar structures these last two weeks. It was interesting to study this topic because you can create hypothetical situations or express possibility or uncertainly about what really happened.
Futhermore, Interrpting Politely to Ask Questions was the next topic. It was excellent because most of people speak informally. Expressions like Excuse me? What was that you said?; Pardon me?; I am sorry, I didn't catch that. Could you say that again? help people to speak politely.
Moreoever, teacher explain us how to use like, as and how in sentences. New vocabulary about natural medicine and laws was given to us by the teacher.
Words like surge, cranky, subtle, to be bound, and assess were complicated at the beginning of the Unit 3.

JOURNAL 3

Gabriela Moreta Vinueza
VII Level

JOURNAL 3
In those two weeks I practiced more my grammar, vocabulary and expression troubles. In each new week I have learned some new vocabulary.
Day by day I practice more vocabulary and phonetics skills, because I need improve my grade in oral exam.
Phonetics strategies are very interesting and important; I have practiced those strategies to try to improve my knowledge.
I reinforced and learned past unreal conditionals and the way that I can use this kind of expressions in my essays and when I talk with somebody.
Finally, in those two weeks the most difficult part was the reading, in each tale have most structures and new vocabulary and we read The open window, it was the most interesting that I had read in that level.

JOURNAL II

PONTIFICIA UNIVERIDAD CATOLICA DEL ECUADOR
RAQUEL LOPEZ SOLORZANO
SEVENTH LEVEL
ENGLISH

JOURNAL WRITING II
In these last two weeks we have seen the second unit of the book North Star in class.
This second unit has been very interesting because it has many new words that are very helpful for our learning.
I also think that it was very important to know more about the grammatical rules and the use of gerunds and infinitives.
Something very important that I learned in this unit and that has been helpful for the written exam was the three parts of an essay: the topic sentence, the supporting sentences and the concluding sentence.
In every class of this new level I learn something new like vocabulary and new grammatical structures.
Finally, I would like to say that I think that the topic that we talked in this unit about people with disabilities was very interesting and the way how these people overcame their problems is really admirable.

Journal Entry #2

Cristian Mogollon

It has passed one month of classes and it was really hard to me to follow the rhythm. I have to give the best of myself to learn more and try to get the level. There was something good and interesting when we did the excercise of watching movies and then talk about it. These kind of practices help us to learn most vocabulary, expressions, and listening.
During these four weeks we have read five stories from the book "The Eye of Childhood". These stories have been difficult to understand to me because there is a lot of new vocabulary, and expressions. In addition, these are really hard to get involve in the stories because they have some abstraction content. That abstraction has helped me to improve my imagination.
It is excellent that we have to give presentations in class about a topic because we could lose the scenic panic. As often as we will do these presentations we are going to speak more. These presentations are interesting because someone could explain their thoughts or simply something about their major to everyvody.
Talking about grammar we have been remembering how to use properly gerunds & infinitives, adjectives, contrastive stress, and present unreal conditionals in the english lannguage.
Recently we have the oral and written midterm exam, I thought the written exam was going to be easier than the oral exam but it was difficult to do it. It was hard to resolve it because there was almost the whole new vocabulary included.
In fact, the most difficult part to me was the reading. There is something that I like when the teacher said if we do not something even in spanish, we will lose part of our lives or we will unplug from the world. I hope to learn more things and improve everyday.

JOURNAL 2

Gabriela Moreta Vinueza
VII Level

JOURNAL 2
In that two weeks I practiced new skills in grammar structures also I learned new vocabulary. In the last week I did my oral presentation about March 1st attack in Ecuadorian border, this kind of presentations are very important because I practiced more vocabulary, grammatical structures, and this practice is complete and help me for my preparation to oral exam.
In oral test I was afraid, and I made more mistakes but I was preparing some days ago. My main problem in oral test was that the topics of the tails aren’t interesting for me.
Phonetics strategies are very interesting and important, I have practiced that strategies to try to improve my knowledge.
I reinforced and learned new gerunds and infinitives. In addition, I learned the different uses of that.
However, I think that the most important for me in that two weeks were the parts of a essay, we learned to write topic sentence, supporting sentences and concluding sentences, and the importance of transitions.The eye of childhood in my point of view is complicated because this hind of tales I don’t like.

Journal writing

José Solano de la Sala M
Level 7

I think vocabulary is the most interesting thing that I learned in this course because I learned a lot of synonyms and expressions that I can use in many sentences.
The big advantage of know many words I think is that you can express the things you want in a different way or with other words that in some case are more elegant or more appropriate for the main idea or from the context of the sentences. Other advantage of know many words and vocabulary is that you can talk with more secure and it will help you to be understand by the other persons who are hearing you.
The vocabulary are going to help you more in your writing if you know vocabulary and have in your head a long list of words and their meaning you can use this words in the way you want , you can write all the things that you imagine without problem. This list of words maybe are going to help you when you need to write a letter to an important international company because you are going to know the correct words and you can change some informal expressions from others more according to the letter.

JOURNAL WRITING

PONTIFICIA UNIVERIDAD CATOLICA DEL ECUADOR
RAQUEL LOPEZ SOLORZANO
SEVENTH LEVEL
ENGLISH

JOURNAL WRITING
Personally I have learned a lot in this new level. This level has many new and interesting things than the past levels. In the other levels I only saw grammar, but now the classes are more didactic. In this moment I can speak, write, listen and read much more than the past levels.
In class I have seen very interesting topics and these topics are very real. Also, the book is totally different than the other books that I have used in the past levels; the general context of the book is really good.
The topics that we manage in this course are really excellent For example; In the first unit I think that the topic of the news was very interesting.
The advices that the doctor gave to people in the story were very healthy for me, because I’ve always seem news; but it is true that you get stressed by so many problems that they focus.
Now I think that 3 to 4 hours per week is enough for watching news it´s very important to be informed of everything that happens every day in our country and the world but sometimes there is nothing we can do and this only generates us a stress day and we are worried all day long.
The second unit was very interesting too; to know that many people with physical limitations are excellent athletes, they overcome their problems and keep achieving their goals. It is a great lesson for the rest of people who have excellent health and we do not do anything that inspires the rest of people.
All this and much more is what I have learned in this new course.
Finally the vocabulary in this level is more advanced than the past levels.

what we learn in the in the class

Well, we were talking about news, specially the place that we can find news. How the news are affecting us. How we can know about the live of the artist, pops star, president, also about some thinks that are happen in the word, in the country. How the news can impact to the people. What news are the people more interested, like for example, they are more interesting in information about politician, because the people are more interested in the economy of their country, for me hat is important, because when we are looking for some news, we need to find some words that we can’t understand, for example: unfaithful, witness, we can know the main idea, topic sentences, controlling idea. How we can answer some questions. Also when we read, we follow some sentences in active And the was changing to passive, and also we can learn more about a lot of structure the past, because all the events was happened a long time ago. The future also, because. When they are talking about climate. They prognostic what is going to happen the next day or these day with that, and that’s way I said that I learn in these time in the course.

Journal Writing

José Solano de la Sala
Level 7

In this English course the first thing that I learn is vocabulary, y learn some new Word that I didn’t know that exist, I think it is good because I can talk with other people in a different kind of conversation, this new word help me to express the things that I want to transmit to other people more clear. Another advantage that I could say about learning new vocabulary is that I can understand more serious conversations or in a more common situation, I could understand in a better way the English movies.

On the other hand, I think that this course is helping me to create a different prospect about English, it means that I have another perspective of English now because always I took English classes to the slight one, I never practice and pass always I use the English that I learn in the school to pass my other English course but now I have to put more attention because I have some difficulties with the new vocabulary that I never heard. Another advantage of the speaking form of this level is that you began to familiarize with the sounds and for this reason you can understand more quickly the conversation, and you began to improve your pronunciation to.

For the writing I think these class of homework’s are going to help us to correct our mistakes, because in my case I have a very big and bad problem, I write some words like it sounds and it is incorrect because if you don’t put a letter in a word you are changing the meaning of the sentences and the person who is reading your composition isn’t going to understand the main idea that you want to transmit.

Finally, I think that the histories that we have to read are going to help us to improve our grammar, it is like Spanish if you read a lot you began to improve your grammar, punctuations, use of prepositions and articles, etc. and this histories are not bored so I think we can read one a week like we are doing at the moment without problem.

First entry of diary

During this two weeks I have learned how I must make an essay with all parts and each of this in the correct place. Also I'm learning new things that I haven't learned in previous levels, for example I'm learning about some rules to improve my pronunciation.

I'm also a little confused about the vocabulary, because in this course we have to learn a lot of new words and phrases, but I'm secure that I will learn all this with some time.

Also we're reminding some structures learned in previous levels, for example passive voice. I think this is very good because we are learning new things and at the same time we are revising and practicing structures and grammar that we must to know.

diary

My Diary:
Ana Gabriela Imbaquingo.
I believe that in this English class I have tried to improve my english and this includes that I have tried to stop being afraid to talk in public, because this could get really hard, I m also trying to speak fast and fluid so I can have a coherent conversation.

The writing was getting kind of difficult, because the last time I practice was 2 years ago, when I took and English course, but with the assignments and classes that I m taking know, I m being able to remember what I re learve and writing and speaking is getting easier and easier every time and that’s a good thing.

Even though in listening they talk very fast when I hear it replay is easier for me. But I always have to listen again to fully understand the conversation.
I think that I m in an intermediate level in this class and I feel good because we have just started and we have more things to learn.
In class you can learn a lot because I hear the students when they interact and when the teacher corrects us that s a way of improvement.
This is the first time that we learn speaking, listening and the exact pronunciation of the words and with exercises, the pronunciation gets easier and accurate.

First Entry of Diary

FIRST ENTRY OF DIARY

So far, in these two weeks I learned to interpret photographs. Also I learned to predice what will happen. For exmple in our course we discussed a princess Diana’s picture.

In focus on ready I learned to make predictions, interpret quotation and analize the purpose of text. In this part I reviewed vocabulary for comprehension next reading. After that I understand the text very well, identify main idea and some details about the text. In focus on vocabulary I practice vocabulary , definitions of words and use adecuate vocabulry and ideomatic expressions.

In focus on writing, I wrote a letter to a newpaper aditor explain how our life has changed for the media.

Also I wrote a paragraph about a response to reporter using words for example: keep something to oneself, around the clock, fair game, etc using vocbulary, grammar that I learned in this unit.

In grammar, I learned passive voice, also I made exercises of passive voice , for exaple:

This english couse is being taught by techer Uquillas.

In focus on listening I listened some audio records, but I had a litte of difficulty for listening, it was very confused.

First entry of diary

Mauro Vargas C.

When we started this new level I have a new view of leraning english, because at the moment we had to practiced founded topic sentence and controlling idea in some paragraphs that hel us understand better not only words but also all the text.
It's difficult record the new vocabulary in some expression what I never use before, I think I need more practice; the most difficult to my is Passive and Active Voice because I can't recognixe what I have to put in the gaps.
When I write I have some mistakes with my puntiation but I try to be better in my different essays and the teacher and the book Nort Start help us with his examples and exercices to practice new vocabulary.
I need practice my skills when I listen because when for first time I heard the CD's of listening of this course I could hearded a few words but I couldn't undertand big parts of the conversation because they talk faster for me, and the unique solution is more and more practice because the second listening I did recognize more text.
When we talk, we practiced using contarctions and we have to differ the sound in "same words" but with different pronunciation and meaning, and we practiced the pronunciation of words with "th" specially because there are need an special form of use of the tonge.

Journal Entry #1

Cristian Mogollon

During these two weeks in the seventh level english course, Ihave learned and remind many things. For example, to myself it has really hard to learns how to pronounce some words. In most of the cases we just pronounce the word without hearing the difference between one word and other. Words like eat and it, these and this, and sheep and ship have a different sound context. For Northamericans is difficult to understand what latinamericans want to express. So that it is needed to improve our pronunciation.
In addition, I have reminded grammar structures like active and passive voice. The passive voice structure is very important and useful to people because anyone can tells stories, tales, news reports, and express better ideas.
Futhermore, I have improved my vocabulary with this new teacher. That has been excellent because with more vocabulary everyone could modify the language that is learning.
I think it is good to read an english because we could develop our imagination and learn new vocabulary, grammar structures, expressions of the foreign language. The eye of the childhood is the book that we are readin right now. It has been hard to urderstand because has methaphors and english expressions.

Diary

These two weeks of English have been a little difficult for me. The books are different but better. I think I am learning a lot, especially I am improving my vocabulary and pronunciation. The teacher is demanding, which is good for the level at which we are. I have really enjoyed the discussions we had in class. These debates help us learn the rest of peers and to practise the language. I have always had trouble with grammar, that is why I want to try to learn more grammar.

JOURNAL 1

Gabriela Moreta Vinueza
VII Level

JOURNAL 1

In that two weeks I have realized NorthStar books are different that other books because they are more complete, I think that that is main reason for my interest in English increase.
I learned some new vocabulary and some ways that helped me to pay more attention when I read or listen someone chapter or exercise.
I have learned and reinforced grammar structures, and listening, grammar and reading skills. I am interested in learn more listening and speaking skills because I have more difficult in speak faster without mistakes.
Phonetic exercises are very difficult but they are interesting and necessary for improve my knowledge.
In my opinion phonetic strategies have been the most important in this time because those strategies are necessary for oral presentations and mainly in oral exams.
When I read first tale in The eye of childhood I learned more vocabulary and we made exercises that help me in read and comprehension.
I think the most important skill that I learned in that two weeks is phonetic because of is really important that I learn and practice different sounds and I need to practice more for I can differentiate the words.