Looking For An English Teacher

Nowadays, the new information and comunication technologies give us the possibility of finding allmost everything on the Internet. It includes language teachers. In my personal experience I should say that this way of learning is as good as others: you can learn at home, on a one-on-one way and normally at a very affordable price.

There are a lot of options on the Internet. I started by browsing for teachers on this two sites:

1. Italki
2. El blog para aprender inglés

A couple of thoughts about your search:

1. I have found it helpful to have lessons at a fixed time, some teachers cannot offer this. 
2. The italki list seems to change slightly nearly every day and I have no idea why. Some days, one or two teachers disappear and new ones appear. Then on occasions, the ones who disappeared come back, so it is worth checking the list every day until you find one who suits you.
3. Some teachers have a poor or intermittent Internet connection, which makes it hard to communicate properly.

"Every student has different learning goals and learning styles. Some students may prefer more formal lessons, while other students prefer to learn in an unstructured way. Some students are under time pressure, while some students can learn in a more relaxed way."

So, it's important to take into account a couple of things in your search:

1. Setting your expectations
2. Make sure the teachers understand your goals
3. Try a few different teachers.

That's for now. I hope this post may help you to find your English teacher. 


Please, If you find any mistake or you have another point of view about the information that I have posted, please leave a comment. We can all learn together! This blog feeds on your coments!!

A Time When I Overslept And Missed My Own Birthday Party

Esther, a friend of mine, was born the third of April on 1979. I was born only one day after than her, indeed only a few hours later. We met at University time, and we had a group of friends in which we used to give surprise birthday parties to everyone. It was so funny because we even made T-shirts with pictures and had a treasure hunt for the birthday person to find the presents. 

Unfortunately, our birthdays were always during the holidays. So, we had never had a surprise party. Owing to that, one year Esther and I decided to celebrate together our birthdays twice. Thereafter we celebrated one time by ourselves - going out together and giving a little surprise or present to each other - and a second time with our friends as usual.

Ten years ago, the night between the third and fourth of April, when we became 23 years old, we went to have dinner at our favourite Japanese restaurant. That night was one of the most amazing nights I've ever had. It was a really especial night, but it is not our bussiness in this post, so I'll only say that I arrived home the next day at 2 pm.

I was so happy and tired... So, I went directly to bed forgetting to set the alarm clock. We was going to go out again that night. We had an appoitment at 10 pm to have dinner at another friend's house and to watch a film.

I woke up at 12 midnight. It was so late but I thought they would be still together and as I didn't want to stay at home in my birthday, I took a shower, got dressed quickly and went to my friend's house. I had a lot of missed calls in my mobile phone, but I didn't want to call back because I knew they were going to be very angry with me for the delay. Maybe they had been waiting for me to dinner!

I arrived at in my friend's house nearly at 2 am and I found all my friends dancing and drinking at my own birthday party. There was no dinner nor cinema session. It was my first surprise birthday party and I had missed it. 

To make matters worse, a neighbour had called the police because my friends had been making a lot of noise not allowing his family to sleep. So, the police came and the party finished only ten minutes after I arrived.

At least, I had a great night with Esther the day before. ;-)

Please, If you find any mistake or you have another point of view about the information that I have posted, please leave a comment. We can all learn together! This blog feeds on your coments!!

A Family Holiday I Didn't Enjoy

I was born in Cádiz, like my brother. However, I only lived there for 10 years. My father is a building services Engineer, and he have had to travel so much for job. Consequently, my family moved many times with him. 

When I was sixteen, we were living in Alcalá de Henares (Madrid) and I was studying at secondary school. The family's summer holidays were always the same. My brother and I spent one month in Carcabuey with our grandparents while my parents remained working in Alcalá. My parents took holidays the second month of the summer and we all went together for a couple of weeks to Cádiz.

The beaches in Cádiz were still very unspoiled and natural. They were calm, unoccupied and pleasant,... There weren't buildings closer to them neither restaurants or shopping centers. They were simply a place to relax.

That year I convinced my parents to change the beach. "Let's go to Torrevieja beach this time!" - I told them over and over. I had been trying to persuade them since September and finally my parents had given in. My friends of school went every summer to the same beach and they enjoyed the holidays all together. I wanted to join them. My parents asked me why I wanted to go there, and I gave them a lot of reasons except for the real one.

I knew I was wrong as soon as we arrived there. Torrevieja was overpopulated. There were enormeous buildings everywhere and the people who lived there were always around. The beach had so manuy people that it was difficult to lie down or even to go for a swim. We missed so much our calm and natural beach in Cádiz.

I felt so bad that I told my family why I had told to go to Torrevieja. My parents were very angry with me and they punished me with the worst of all possible punishments: I only could see my friends a couple of days during the holidays.


PS: You could find more vocabulary about holidays and other topics (and its pronuntiation) here. 


Please, If you find any mistake or you have another point of view about the information that I have posted, please leave a comment. We can all learn together! This blog feeds on your coments!!  

A Time When I Lost Something Important

I have never had closeness to material things. There was only one thing that I always had with me and witch - owing to events in my family (I came to consider a good-luck charm). However, in my opinion, most  material things are only a burden that constrain and limit your freedom in some way. The important things in life are those that can not be bought with money... I know, it sounds like an advertising slogan, but in my view it is so. Love, health, affection, happiness,... these non-material goods are the ones I think everybody should seek, wish for and fight for. Nevertheless, I would be lying if I didn't say that I felt terribly sad when I lost my bangle.

I had had the bangle with me since I was 18 years old. It was a present from my parents for my cum-laude at high school. I can remember now that I thought at the time that it was a little ugly: "Gold and silver together? My parents haven't any taste in bracelets...". But I didn't say anything about this. I put it on and I have had it with me thereafter. Initially I wore it as a courtesy, but some years later (after my parents separated) it became the symbol of my united family that I missed so much...

Two autumns ago, I was working in Fuente Obejuna as a mathematics teacher. A workmate was going to retire in a couple of days, so we all went to have lunch together. We were talking about school, students, parents,... (you know how boring people that talk about the job can be) when, suddenly, I realized that my wrist didn't weigh the same as usual. I had lost my bangle, the one that was inscribed "Mamá y Papá". The one thing I still kept from my united family. I really felt apart.

I was searching for it all evening. I went to every place I had been that day. I even made posters and hung them in the school and the main streets of the village.In the days that followed, I was telling everybody about my loss, but it never appeared.

I should admit that I cried and was scared... I had strange bad feelings... It was my charm... It protected me... My parents protected me... I never imagined that I would feel so bad!! Even today tears flow freely down my face when I think about the meaning my bangle had for me and that I lost it...


And what about you? Have you ever had a material charm? 

Please, If you find any mistake or you have another point of view about the information that I have posted, please leave a comment. We can all learn together! This blog feeds on your coments!!