Absence Oct. 16th

I will be absent for a training program all day on Tuesday, October 16, 2012. No classes!

What can you do with an IPad?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&v=GLnmpOE3B6g&feature=endscreen

It's simply amazing... See if you know how to describe all the features and applications used here...

Oral report grading form

Oral reports will begin this week. This is how I will grade your work:

Oral Report Subject: _________________ Name: ____________ Class: ____________

Grammar            5             10           15           20           25           30           35           40

_____________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________

Content               2          4          6          8          10        12        14        16        18        20

_____________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________

Knowledge (connaissance) about the subject matter  

2             4             6             8             10           12           14           16           18           20

_____________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________

Pronunciation   1          2          3          4          5          6          7          8          9          10  

(Use www.dictionary.com for pronunciation, or ask me in advance.)        

_____________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________

Presentation (looking at the audience, good visuals)            

1             2             3             4             5             6             7             8             9             10

_____________________________________________________________________________

Final score: ________÷ 5 = ________/20

In the spaces, I will make notes and give you comments...

Laptop Dad

In February 2012, North Carolina parent Tommy Jordan tried to teach his daughter a lesson. When his "lesson" went viral, he learned some difficult things himself...

This is from a major TV network in the United States.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W47b9B_V5OA

One month later, Jordan, his daughter and his wife (the girl's stepmom) appeared on another major TV network:

http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/26184891/vp/46651886#46651927  

It was amazing to me that so many Americans supported him -- seventy-three percent in one poll (sondage)!

Hmmmmm.......

Would you eat here?

The media are...

Media, like data, is the plural form of a word borrowed directly from Latin. The singular, medium, early developed the meaning “an intervening agency, means, or instrument” and was first applied to newspapers two centuries ago. In the 1920s media  began to appear as a singular collective noun, sometimes with the plural medias.

A Vast Wasteland?

From Wikipedia:

The Wasteland Speech was a speech given by Federal Communications Commission (FCC) chairman Newton N. Minow to the convention of the National Association of Broadcasters on May 9, 1961. The speech was Minow's first major speech after he was appointed chairman of the FCC by President John F Kennedy. In the speech, Minow referred to American commercial television programming as a "vast wasteland" and advocated for programming in the public interest.

"When television is good, nothing — not the theater, not the magazines or newspapers — nothing is better.

But when television is bad, nothing is worse. I invite each of you to sit down in front of your own television set when your station goes on the air and stay there, for a day, without a book, without a magazine, without a newspaper, without a profit and loss sheet or a rating book to distract you. Keep your eyes glued to that set until the station signs off. I can assure you that what you will observe is a vast wasteland.

You will see a procession of game shows, formula comedies about totally unbelievable families, blood and thunder, mayhem, violence, sadism, murder, western bad men, western good men, private eyes, gangsters, more violence, and cartoons. And endlessly commercials — many screaming, cajoling, and offending. And most of all, boredom. True, you'll see a few things you will enjoy. But they will be very, very few. And if you think I exaggerate, I only ask you to try it."

Do you believe it or not?

An Australian man says he saw a UFO (OVNI) over the skies of Melbourne this past weekend. What do you think?

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/ufo-sighted-over-carlton-gardens-in-central-melbourne/story-e6frf7kx-1226479683210

Free university in Finland?

Take a look at the details:

http://www.studyinfinland.fi/tuition_and_scholarships/tuition_fees

Saturday morning funny...

I am grading homework this weekend. Look for your grades in the next class!

How much do British universities cost?

UNIVERSITY	PUBLIC OR PRIVATE ?	COST PER YEAR
University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom	Public	11,229 euros
Queen’s University, Belfast, Northern Ireland	Public	4,323 euros (Northern Ireland residents)
New College of the Humanities	Private	12,228 euros

NYC's 'Soda Ban' Explained in Viral Video

Subway fight disarmed with potato chips

University debt isn't funny...

Chapter eleven is a form of bankruptcy (faillite) in the United States.

Read this story about a man who is $80,000 in debt from his schooling... He left a good job to go back to school and later earned LESS than before! This is all too common now in the United States.

http://economywatch.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/09/19/13965923-economy-leaves-many-returning-students-disappointed-deep-in-debt?lite

Are you nuts for Nutella?

Do you know it's NOT French?

It's Italian.



tags: seconde, food

The Burden of Student Debt

What's Your Opinion?

http://www.connexionfrance.com/auction-eBay-topless-Kate-Closer-police-14096-view-article.html

Les Notes

Grille pour l’évaluation de l’expression personnelle

Réalisation de l’exercice et traitement du sujet 8 points	Recevabilité linguistique 12 points
0,5 - 1,5 points - consignes non respectées - hors sujet - contresens	0,5 - 2,5 points - inintelligible - lexique indigent - erreurs récurrentes de grammaire élémentaire
1,5 – 3,5 points - recopiage du support - hors sujet partiel - sujet compris mais traitement plat et superficiel - construction vague	3 – 6 points - compréhension possible malgré des erreurs fréquentes - lexique limité - syntaxe peu élaborée
4 – 6,5 points - existence d’une problématique - effort de construction	6,5 - 10 points - erreurs occasionnelles - vocabulaire adapté - syntaxe adéquate
7 – 8 points - enchaînement des idées - développement organisé - références culturelles - conviction, humour	10,5 – 12 points - erreurs rares - vocabulaire riche - syntaxe élaborée - capacité à nuancer

tags, seconde, premier, terminale

The Importance of Correct Punctuation

War of the Worlds

Check out this site for War of the Worlds...

http://mercurytheatre.info/

The Mercury Theatre on the Air

---

The finest radio drama of the 1930’s was The Mercury Theatre on the Air, a show featuring the acclaimed New York drama company founded by Orson Welles and John Houseman. In its brief run, it featured an impressive array of talents, including Agnes Moorehead, Bernard Herrmann, and George Coulouris. The show is famous for its notorious War of the Worlds broadcast, but the other shows in the series are relatively unknown. This site has many of the surviving shows, and will eventually have all of them.

Ball Toss - SAP Corporate commercial

Put Your Money $$$...

"Put your money where your mouth is."

Definition: to support something that you believe in, especially by giving money. If people are really interested in helping the homeless they should put their money where their mouth is.

Definition: to do something rather than to just talk about it. I finally realized that I should stop complaining about the people who run our town, put my money where my mouth is, and run for office.

Source: http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com 

How much does an American university cost?

UNIVERSITY (click name for details)	PUBLIC OR PRIVATE?	COST PER YEAR
Sam Houston State University, Huntsville, Texas	Public	$8,120 for tuition and fees, 15 hours ($9,592 for 18 hours)
Texas A&M University, College Station, Texas	Public	$8,506 for tuition and fees for 12-18 hours
Texas Christian University, Fort Worth, Texas	Private	$34,500 for tuition and fees, for 12-18 hours
University of California at Berkeley, Berkeley, California	Public	$14,984 for tuition and fees
Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts	Private	$40,866 for tuition and fees

  
These figures are for the current school year, for in-state, resident undergraduate students.


Do these schools cost what you would imagine for American universities?

What do you think about the American system for financing universities?

Look at the site www.fastweb.com. Why is it so popular? See ranking information here.