Week 11, final presentations, plays, portfolios, etc

This week will be busy; Monday you'll be finishing presentations, and you'll receive your scripts with your roles for the plays you'll be performing. Tuesday we'll go over the Table of Contents for your Portfolios and how they'll be scored (Portfolio Presentations will be on the 6th & 7th of May) . Your final writing assignments will be given and we'll have some fun!

So this week I would like you to assess the blog... At least those of you who have actively particpated. This has been my first semester to use blogging, it came highly recommended by other teachers and in the U.S. all universities use it as a form of assessing student growth. 

I believe that in the end, this semester I will be giving Extra Credit points to each of you who have done the work here and for those of you who have blogged every week it will count as your final writing exam.

So please blog about blogging: was it helpful? Do you feel like you got to know your classmates better? Has it helped you to grow in your English skills?

Week 10 Presentations!!! AND Writing Exam III

I'm very excited to see and hear your Powerpoint presentations about your expository essays. Most of you fared very well on your essays. I'm quite proud that you have risen to the task and proven your overall abilities in mastering the English language.

Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday you will be presenting your expositions. Thursday will be the third (and for some of you-your final) writing exam. This will be a persuasive essay on the topic of "Abortion: for or against" you will use facts and statistics with citations to convince me why your point of view is correct.

In this week's forum here I would like to see your arguments for and against abortion. The idea is to help you clarify your own opinions and be able to state your case, before entering the exam and FREAKING OUT forgetting what your arguments are. If you can hold your own in this type of situation, then going into another culture to live, work or simply study you'll find yourself much more equiped to survive in any English speaking culture.

Week 9! Eeks! Busy, Busy, Busy!

I hope you all enjoyed your Spring vacation, but now we must get down to business! This week we must finish "The Harbinger" in class, we have NO CLASS on Monday April 8th, Tuesday and Wednesday we will be reading and Thursday we'll be playing games.

This week your homework will be a persuasive essay... Persuasive means that you are going to convince me why your opinion is correct. The topic of the essay will be Abortion (for or against?) you choose your side, to convince me you will use facts and statistics, law (earthly or heavenly), but you must use more than a simple opinion to convince me and you must do it in 350-500 words in Word. Due via email on or before Friday morning at 10am.

Here, I request that you discuss thoroughly the Harbinger. Answering the following questions:

1. Several of you have mentioned that you reject the idea of prophecy even being remotely possible. Do you reject the idea of God and the Bible or do you believe in a divine Supreme Being?

2. When I first read this book I read it as a novel and had no idea where it was going, BUT as I continued to read and began checking its claims I felt compelled to examine my beliefs about my nation and "the freedoms" (things which reject God's laws) which many liberals in my country have demanded and realize that all citizens are ultimately going to be judged on what we go along with. The US outlawed school prayer in 1962, legalized the murder of our unborn children also in 1973, and many many more things which our founders would not approve of... In Mexico these trends are about 30 years behind the US. Here's the question: Do you think its possible that Mexico will fall into judgment? 

3. Do you see a moral decay in Mexico?

4. Do you believe that the things discussed in the Harbinger are really God's judgments?

5. I have lived here for several years now there are so many wonderful things culturally and traditionally here in Mexico and I love that each little town, region, and state has its own culture, but the violence and crime in Mexico are extreme and getting worse. I see them as a symptom of a spiritual bankruptcy which is evident throughout Mexico. Corrupt politicians, government officials, police, let alone the people everyone refers to as criminals; none of whom exhibit even the slightest fear or respect of God. If the US is being judged for having fallen from God's laws and statutes; what do you foresee for Mexico?

6. Many of you are aware that I have spent a great deal of my life studying and that I believe in that science is a necessary part of everything in our world, but I have studied the Bible and believe it to be true and the inspired Word of God, not solely based on my studies, but also on 52 years of life-experience. The Harbinger frightened me, in part because I found much of it to be too true to ignore and in part because I think my country is too far gone to be redeemed. Did you feel anything when reading the book?

7. Has the Harbinger made you think of things differently, or have you remained untouched by it?