Mitos sobre o aprendizado da lingua inglesa

Muitos mitos cercam o aprendizado de uma lingua estrangeira. Encontrei no blog da English Expert uma matéria sobre o assunto que divido com vocês pois é muito elucidativa e interessante. O texto é de Rafael Lanzetti, mestre em Linguística Aplicada.

MITO: Posso aprender inglês em 3 meses

Não há fórmula mágica para se aprender inglês. O segredo é estudo, experiência e paciência. Toda vez que alguém me pergunta quanto tempo se leva para aprender uma língua, respondo que por volta de 1000 horas. E quanto tempo isso leva? Depende de quanto tempo por dia você dedicar ao idioma. Dedicando 1 hora de estudo diário (descontando os finais de semana), você vai demorar por volta de 3 anos para aprender inglês. Essas 1000 horas podem ser dividas entre as habilidades de que você necessita e muitas delas podem ser “gastas” de maneira prazerosa ou inconsciente – assistindo à TV americana/inglesa, a filmes, jogando RPGs, lendo sua revista preferida, num chat com gringos(as), entre muitos outros. Esta última atividade pode inclusive lhe render uma viagem gratuita ao exterior para um “intensivao".
Sendo o inglês uma língua natural, orgânica, que se altera com o tempo, com o local e de acordo com as necessidades dos falantes, é impossível criar fórmulas matemáticas milagrosas para se aprender a estrutura, a pronúncia ou o uso da língua inglesa. A estrutura da língua inglesa é repleta de regras e igualmente de exceções – basta observar o uso, por exemplo, das preposições para denotar as partes do dia: “in the morning”, “in the afternoon”, “at night”. Os usos de uma língua têm uma lógica inerente, mas não perfeita. No que diz respeito à pronúncia, em especial, a barra fica mais pesada ainda.

Por volta do séc. XV ocorreu, na Inglaterra, um fenômeno que conhecemos hoje por “The Great Vowel Shift”. Por razões que ainda estão sendo estudadas, as pronúncias das vogais se alteraram. O que era pronunciado [‘na.me] passou a ser pronunciado [neym]; o que era pronunciado [‘wi.fe] passou a ser pronunciado [wayf] e o que era pronunciado [how.ze] passou a ser pronunciado [haws]. Portanto, a pronúncia do inglês se desenvolveu, mudou, mas a ortografia continuou a mesma. O linguista irlandês David Crystal costuma dizer que a ortografia do inglês denota “five hundred years of a linguistic mess”, pois é repleta de exceções e inconsistências fonéticas. Compilar, hoje, uma tabela que proponha uma fórmula para a pronúncia de qualquer palavra em inglês e que parta do princípio que a escrita é a representação da fala e que não se altera no tempo é absurdo. Para aprender a pronúncia de uma língua como o inglês, a maneira mais prática é ouvir a pronúncia por um nativo (ou alguém que as pronuncie corretamente) e imitá-la.
Hope you liked it. See you next Friday. Cleo.

Seventh Art : Cinema

Thank God. It’s Friday.
Let's talk a bit about the Seventh Art: Cinema.
Since our goal is to learn and practice the English language, Cinema is also a great resource of learning once you can practice it while you're having fun.
First of all, you have to choose a movie you like very much.(You are going to watch it several times).
Second step: Watch the film in order to take a general Idea about the subject and about the whole story. Here you are allowed to use the subtitles.
In a third moment forget about the subtitles and focus on rhythm and sound of words , dialogues and on the body language as well.
Another tip is to put the subtitles in English and if any word that you don’t understand appears many times you can either write it down to check it out later or dare to infer it’s meaning in the context .
For the people who are crazy about old movies , attached you are going to find a video with the most beautiful and talented women movie stars.
Hope you enjoy. Have a nice weekend.

Sobre Organização/Tempo/Espaço para o aprendizado da lingua estrangeira

Hello, you.
Sempre questionamos nossa capacidade de multiplicar nosso tempo. Queríamos mesmo que o dia tivesse as tão sonhadas 48 hrs. Mais tempo para o trabalho, para o aprendizado,para a familia, para o lazer, ...
Existe, porém, uma maneira de fazer com que as tarefas que priorizamos caibam de maneira mais adequada e tranquila em nossa agenda diária. Isso envolve organização e disciplina. Isso se aplica a todos os departamentos de nossas vidas e faz toda a diferença quando o assunto é estudar.
No blog da tecla Sap encontrei um comentário que traduz bem essa minha linha de raciocínio, que é o seguinte:
"Assim como quando você vai fazer uma dieta as primeiras providências são encher a geladeira de verduras, frutas e legumes e se livrar de todas as guloseimas da casa, antes de começar a estudar inglês é necessário organizar um espaço para isso. Para poder se concentrar nos estudos é fundamental dispor de um espaço adequado, silencioso, iluminado e agradável. Uma mesa, que esteja sempre arrumada e um computador com os equipamentos necessários, como fones de ouvido ou caixas de som, microfone, dicionários em papel e/ou online, livros para consulta etc. Essas ferramentas permitirão que você se dedique aos estudos e possa aproveitar ao máximo seu tempo disponível."
E então, concordam?
Então mãos à obra e ótimos estudos para você. Abraços, Cleo.

When you can’t find a job…do you forget how good you are?

Ronnie Ann, from Coach Work Cafe wrote once something very interesting that I couldn't agree more. Below,his opinnion about the hard task of searching for a job.
"I often hear from readers who have been looking for a job for months and even years. And I can’t help thinking that no matter how talented you are, when you can’t find a job and that continues far longer than you ever imagined, you start to edit your own memories of how good you are.

If no one wants you (or so it seems) then maybe they know something you don’t. At least that’s the kind of self-doubt that begins to creep in. Even normally confident people start to question their value – and wonder if they’ll EVER get a job again. (You will.
Have I been there at some point in my own career? Absolutely. (More than once in fact. ) And I’ll bet most of you have too.

A prolonged job search starts to eat at you. The longer you go without getting an actual offer, the harder it is to walk into that next interview brimming with self-confidence and an aura of success. And if you are feeling any of this, please just know you are not alone.

The other thing I want you to know is you are just as talented and capable and job-worthy as you were before all this began. Maybe even more so now because you’ve learned tremendous patience and how to cope with ridiculous business processes.

No matter how many “nos” you get, you only need one YES…and it’s coming. It just likes to take its own sweet time getting here.
Hope you liked it . See you next week, Cleo.

"English Proverbs and Sayings"

Trazer para a sala de aula a linguagem usualmente utilizada no cotidiano é interessante para o aluno que espera lidar com acontecimentos reais no processo de aprendizagem.
Uma sugestão é o uso dos provérbios e ditos populares que podem ser comentados, expandidos e interpretados pelos alunos provocando a conversação de maneira natural.
É necessário que haja sempre uma explicação do que se pretende trabalhar e de seu propósito na aprendizagem. Lets start? :
What is a proverb? A proverb is a short well-known expression that states a general truth or gives advice.
What is a saying? A saying is a well-known expression, or a remark often made, also known as a proverb, like:
Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise.
(It is better to go to bed early at night and to get up early in the morning.)
Easier said than done.
(What is suggested sounds easy, but it is more difficult to actually do it.)
Man proposes, God disposes.
(Our destiny depends on God's will.)
Money doesn't grow on trees.
(You shouldn't waste money because it is not plentiful.), and o son. Hope you liked it. See you.Cleo.

Exploding texts

Hi everyone. Here Iam again. Today Iam gonna give you an idea to make your english improved. This is a hint also to my colleagues, devoted teachers, always concerned by being creative in class. Its called exploding texts, a creative writing.For example: Use one of the following sentences and 'explode' the text to make more and more complex sentences. Try to write five sentences that build on the previous sentence.
Example
I have a book.
I have an interesting book.
I have an interesting book about frogs.
I bought an interesting book about frogs last week.
I bought an interesting, but expensive book about frogs at The Book Shoppe last Monday.
Choose from one of these sentences and do the same:She lives alone/They have a house/
John works in town/I am young/School is important.
You'll have fun while you are learning. Have a worderful day. Cléo.
(From the book 100 aulas, sem tédio).

How to be a good leader

Still on career. Browsing the internet I found an interesting text by Roger Darlington that I would like to share with you.
HOW TO BE A GOOD LEADER
Remember: leadership skills and techniques can be learned. You don't have to be a natural leader. Very few people are.

Care for your team. That means knowing what matters to each member: their health, their partner, their children, their relatives, their interests, their hopes, their fears.

Stay close to your team. At some point, every day, walk around the office and say "Hi" to everyone who works for you. If you're not in the office that day, call and see how people are. This gives you a chance to enquire or encourage and gives them an opportunity to raise issues or make suggestions.

Meet your team. Regularly - daily, weekly or monthly, depending on your place and type of work - have meetings of all the members of the team. Keep these meetings short, focused and action-orientated. Make sure every member of the team contributes in some way and acknowledge that.

Train your team. Every team member should have at least two days training a year. Newer and more senior colleagues should have more. If they don't ask to go on training sessions, suggest some suitable courses.

Grow your team. Through varied experience and regular training, you should be developing each team member to be more and more confident and more skilled.

Inspire your team. Consider making available a motivational quote or story every week or month [for lots of good quotes click here].

Celebrate with your team. This might be a personal event, such as a member's birthday or anniversary, or a professional occasion, such as completing a project or winning oa contract.

Socialise with your team. Have lunch or an after-work drink with them, especially when a member has a birthday or there's another reason to celebrate.

Set objectives for each team member. As far as possible, these objective such be SMART - Specific Measurable Achievable Resourced Timed.

Review the performance of each team member. At least once a year - at least quarterly for the first year of a new team member - have a review session where you assess performance, give feed-back and agree future objectives and training.

Thank constantly. The words "Thank you" take seconds to say, but mean so much.

Praise constantly. The words "Well done" take seconds to say, but will be long remembered and appreciated.

Communicate constantly. Don't assume that people know what you're doing, still less what you are planning or thinking. Tell them, using all the communication tools to hand: team briefings, electronic newsletters, organisational newspapers.

Eliminate. Too often we do things because they've always been done. Life changes. Consider whether you could stop doing certain things altogether.

Delegate. You don't have to do everything. Develop your team members by training them to do more and trusting them to take over some of the things you've been doing.

Empower. A really effective leader sets clear objectives for his team members, but leaves detailed implementation of these objectives to the discretion and judgement of individual members of the team. As Second World War U.S. General George S. Patton put it: "Don't tell people how to do things. Tell them what to do and let them surprise you with their results”.

Facilitate. A confident leader does not try to micro-manage his team, but makes it clear that, if team members need advice or assistance, he is always there to facilitate and support.

Be on time. Always start meetings on time and finish them on time. Natural breaks keep people fresh. Short meetings concentrate the mind.

Be seen. Don't just talk the talk, but walk the walk. So visit each unit or department for which you are responsible on a regular basis. Don't do this unannounced - you are not out to undermine other leaders or catch out staff. So arrange with the unit leader or departmental head when you'll visit and ask him or her to walk round with you.

Make time. Managers are often very busy and this can deter people from approaching you, so make time for people and be approachable. People will appreciate you taking five minutes out of your busy schedule, especially if you act on/listen to what they say.

Really listen. Many of us - especially those who think they are important - don't really listen, but instead think about what they're going to say next. Give the person speaking to you your full attention and really take on board what they are saying. [For more detailed advice on listening click here]

Accept honest criticism. Criticism is hard to take, particularly from a relative, a friend, an acquaintance or a stranger - but it's a powerful tool of learning. Above all, assess criticism on merit, without regard to its originator.

Think strategically. The doers cut a path through the jungle; the managers are behind them sharpening the machetes; the leaders find time to think, climb the nearest tree, and shout "Wrong jungle!" Find time to climb the trees.

Have a mentor or buddy, someone doing similar work in the same or a similar organisation with whom you can regularly and frankly discuss your progress and your problems as a leader.

Have a role model, someone who can inspire you to be a truly great leader. If you can't find one, study Jed Bartlet as the American President in any episode of the television series "The West Wing".

Constantly revisit and review these tips. In his seminal work, "The Seven Habits Of Highly Effective People", Stephen Covey puts it this way: "Sharpen the saw".

Plan your succession. You won't be there forever and you may not be in control of the timing and circumstances of your departure. So start now to mentor and train at least one colleague who could take over from you.

I hope you have enjoyed it. Have a great Weekend.