Second Blog Entry (26-09) Post 5: My Future Job

Post 5- 

My Future Job 

- What kind of job would you like to have? How do you imagine it?

- In an office?

- Outdoors /indoors?

- Would you like to travel a lot in your job?

- What major are you studying / are you thinking of taking?    Explain why

- Add any other related ideas.

- Make comments on 3 of your classmates’ posts

- Word Count: 210 words

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I studied English Linguistics, and I always thought "what would my future job be?". And here I am!!

I wanted to have a fun, light, easy going and not too hard to do job, but always wanted to be with people.

From all the many areas I could work in, I always wanted something neither too-much outdoors nor indoors, furthermore I wanted something that would produce some kind of social change, a good important and deep change.

In other matters, I wanted to travel, to see the world, to meet strange people, well... strange meaning, different than me and my friends and family. With teaching languages, I have been able to do all the former, which leads me to think it was the right choice.

I tried working in an office once, in a job that was not as stressful as a teacher's job but after a year, and after missing the classrooms a lot, I decided to go back to stressful, challenging but rewarding teaching.

Nowadays, I am thinking on taking up on PHD studies in the field of Applied Linguistics, I would like to do it either in the Netherlands, Switzerland and/or England. 

I would like to do it in those countries, well, in the two first ones because they have a long history of successful multilingualism and because they are definitely good at languages. England on the other hand, would be my last choice, and this is because of a fact that gave birth to a joke, that is, - and please, no offense-, but the joke says: "how do you call a person who speaks only one language? […] you call them British"...LOL

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DO NOT FORGET: NEXT WEEK IS DUE THE VIDEO TASK NUMBER 2, SEE THE BLOG ENTIRES FOR DETAILS.

Topic change, Two Blog Entries Session (26-09): Movie Review: Inside Job

Guys,
Firstly:
- For those of you who did not attend: given our revision regarding Coherence and Cohesion, and as an extension of the class activiy (we watched the trailer and part of the movie "Inside Job", we have decided to change the first post of today's 26-09 blog session. We will post a movie review of the film watched in class. In order to do this, focus on the following questions and extend your arguments as far as 200 words. Remember the objective of a movie review, linking devices and C&C (including grammar, semantics and structure of the text).

•Does the film reflect on a current event or contemporary issue? Look for ways to relate the content of the film to the "real" world.

•Does the film seem to have a message, or does it attempt to elicit a specific response or emotion from the audience? You could discuss whether or not it achieves its own goals.

•Does the film connect with you on a personal level? You could write a review stemming from your own feelings and weave in some personal stories to make it interesting for your readers.

- Secondly, the second post of today's session is related to your future job.I will upload an example of it in the next entry.

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Movie Review: Inside Job

Last weekend I finally watched the film: Inside Job, by Charles Ferguson. It was an excellent documentary for people who don’t want to understand the financial crisis but for those of us who enjoy the "Michael Moore"-type of films. I say this because the movie has an angry tone towards American Financial system and consequent meltdown in 2007.

It depicts the late-twentieth-century American economic policy in an effort to reveal and unfold the roots of the recent crisis – which is attributed to alliance between politics, academics and big business. The film received an Oscar for Best Documentary Feature, and is both a careful exposition of the causes and effects of the crisis that shook the world in September 2008, when 20 trillion dollars were lost.

The movie is a documentary narrated by Matt Damon who seems to be the journalist behind the extensive interviews, however, the piece bases all its research on Michael Lewis’ “The Big Short,”. The documentary looks at all the people who made mistakes and asks how they possibly could have overlooked a crisis so obvious

There are many facts and areas that the movie analyses, ranging from the impact of America’s influence in Iceland’s economy, to the changes suffered in American and World society after the break.

The director’s style is to allow his interviewees do the talking, with a sober voiceover from Matt Damon, but later in the movie, the strategy gets really aggressive, and even there’s a touch of Michael Moore in the later scenes, when he (Damon) insists on hard questioning an economic adviser under Bush, who is currently the Dean of the Columbia University Business School, on the cosy relationship between academia and government.

Particularly, it’s parts four and five of the film (“Accountability” and “Where are we now?”) that are the most devastating. By exposing debatable facts and figures, Ferguson makes it clear that the individual men and women behind the decisions that caused the crisis not only benefited from what happened, but are still running the financial services sector; also, the director briefly comments on the more sordid side of the crisis – the cocaine and prostitutes paid for with money from the people because bankers competed for bigger deals and better bonuses. He also cross examines the academic world– exposing the role that business school economists played in creating the chaos, by giving arguments that supported the financial bubble.

It’s an insightful and very eloquent story of the worst kind of greed, and with the deliberate lack of a resolution, the film – which requires some concentration – will almost certainly leave you feeling that heads must roll.

The Worst Book Ever.

There are certainly many books I have been obliged to read, including the compulsory readings at school and at uni, but, also, the books I've had to read due to my students' interests.

At the present moment, I am running a reading course for a group of adults, all related to CORFO.and given that theory says that reading comprehension skills are best developed when grounding the teaching objectives to the student's inner motivation, we have decided that each person would select a different book, and read at least 20 pages of it, and then I have got to produce reading comprehension questions for each one.... Well, guess.!

To make a long story short, now I have to read as many as 15 different books, well, I don't have to read them comprehensibly, but I have to get an understanding of them, so I can help my students with the understanding of their readings.

The topics they selected are very varied, some of them very interesting and my reading-type, but some others....let's say, ... I love my job!


There is one particular book, which I have not been able to read because I think is corny, shallow, intolerant and I believe is intended to convice weak-minded people that the road to hapiness is only one and that one only.

The book is called: "Start Where You Are: A Guide to Compassionate Living" by Pema Chödrön, an American figure in "Tibetan Buddhism". The piece deals, in a rather humorous way, with the topics of happiness and misery in human spiritual and material life, and it intends to persuade the reader to embrace rather than deny the painful aspects of our lives.

Even though I do really agree with everything that can stimulate a better life quality and spiritual betterment, I believe that the book deepens little on the aspects of people's lives, this is because the author at all times, puts forward his suppossedly wondefully-full-of-expereinces life as a true example of someone who has succeeded in the pursuit of happiness and mental-quieteness.

I would have preferred him to show other lives' stories, I would have liked it to be a portrait of many people, with very distant backgrounds and in such way, I think it would have been a lot more relevant and prone to consideration. For me it is just another "try-helping-yourself" populist book.

At any rate, I am going to be forced to finish it, not for myself, but for my student's reading comprehension development, and in doing so, I am sure I'll try to enjoy it (though I'm not sure I'll like it)


http://www.dailygood.org/pdf/ij.php?tid=268

The best Holiday/Concert I’ve had                        

This topic complicates me a bit, because, believe it or not: I have NEVER been to a concert!; I’ve always been reluctant to big crowds, adding the fact that I am always part of the group of the shortest people in a crowd. I have never dared going to a big venue, thinking I am preventing myself from not being able to see anything on stage, and/or being smashed by the attendees.

Giving all the former, I will tell you about my best holiday ever, and even though I haven’t had many superb holidays, because most of time I prefer visiting my family more tan anything else, I have had some memorable ones.

It was the year 2009, if I don’t remember incorrectly; and I was under big stress because I had had several problems at my job. Anyway, to make a long story short, I dropped by the place I used to work for and they told me: “here you are”… it was a NICE, FAT Christmas bonus.

That day, I was with a friend of mine who was leaving on a tour that same afternoon, and after hearing that I had received my present, she shouted at me, from the entrance: “Man!!!! Let’s go together!!!”….

Two hours later, we were travelling around 3 regions, we meant to tour as much as posible, getting to see idilic landscapes and also, both being teachers, we wanted to share with the locals and not visiting the typical touristic places.

The tour went over the 8th, 9th, 10th, and partly, 11th regions, we spent nearly 3 weeks travelling, and from that improvised adventure, there are many stories we can tell, and another thousand anecdotes, I cannot let you know in this blog entry’s extension.

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My Life as a Playlist

Music is without any doubt, one of one's life important aspect, especially in the sense that by listening, even just by chance, to a sound-music-tune that is engraved in your memory, you can go back in time and live memories and feelings, once again.

When thinking about this new blog session, I came accross with this very interesting website: http://www.abc.net.au/arts/playlist/#!/home .In there, by posing a set of questions (perhaps a bit too many for my taste), the author helps you to identify the key songs of your life. In doing so, I had many memories coming back again, some of them, really happy, some others, well.... you know happiness is best valued when not feeling it...LOL

I remembered the 90's, when TV was opening up to new tendencies; nationwise, there was a time of trying to relief old tensions, and I remember there was a soapy that marked my life.
I was starting5th grade in primary school and some of my earliest, school-years memories are joint with these old tracks.

I also remember that year was the year I fell in love for the first time and by listening to some of those songs, I remember my childhood intensity...It definetely makes feel somewhat nostalgic, but happy.

The soap opera was called "Adrenalina", it was a group of high-school girls in the new santiago, they all used to go the this disco, where all the characters came together, and the name of this disco was "Adrenalina" (the facilities used in the soapy were the same that of today's Broadway Disco)

Here, I give you some videos from music of the time, I hope you enjoy:

INTRO:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJIf6kJ0Urk

De Kiruza: Bakan: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jvP0AmlY3Jo

VENUS: ESTAS BORRACHO: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FNEVNVq3voo

More:............

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tqzGNAs3h6c

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CmWDhT-eAW8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cCbgktso6OQ&list=PL3B02C81865427FD7

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hCjM-3KlHgY