Thursday 8th
January, 2015
Happy 2015!!!
Welcome back to
classes!!!
Yesterday it was our
first class. We started the class talking about our last Christmas holidays and
commenting on the news.
We have just started the year and there has been some
worrying news. First, there was the bomb scare at Atocha’s train station. And
on Wednesday, there was this terrible assault to a magazine redaction in
France.
Train passengers were evacuated from Atocha station in Madrid, Spain, after a man threatened to commit a suicide bombing.
According to the filmer Xander Gonzales, a train was arriving at the station when a man started saying he was going to commit suicide.
He said: "the supposed suicidal man was in the same carriage as me and my wife Ester Perez. The train was about to call at Atocha when a man started saying that he was going to commit suicide. Given the fact that it was at the same place as the bomb attack on the 11 March 2004, commuters started ring emergency alarms.
"The man who was in the same coach as me approached me and I asked him why he was doing this. He replied he was not going to harm anyone and that his bag did not contain any explosives."
Police evacuated the station but later learnt the threat had been a false claim.
European journalists are working in increasingly dangerous conditions amid growing incidents of terrorism and anti-media sentiment. Wednesday’s armed attack on the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo that left at least 12 people dead was only the most recent assault against the European media. The death toll raised the number of journalists killed while working in Europe since 2014 to at least 18. Across the globe, there were 66 journalists killed in 2014 and 119 kidnapped worldwide, up by 35 percent from 2013.
Ossigeno per l’Informazione, an Italian journalism-monitoring group, recorded 38 physical attacks on Italian journalists in 2014, an increase from previous years, according to Reporters Without Borders. Some of those attacks were suspected by Italian mafia elements seeking to intimidate journalists. One journalist’s two dogs were hanged and his car torched, while another was blatantly rammed in his vehiclealong with his accompanying police guards after a televised interview he gave about his investigations into Italian organized crime.
In Greece, the country’s most wanted militant Marxist fugitive released videos early in 2014 threatening journalists, according to the Associated Press. Other journalists were arrested or injured while reporting on contentious Greek protests, which periodically devolve into riots and violence.
A German journalist reporting on the growing neo-Nazi and anti-Muslim movement in Germany had his car torched last month. It was the second attack on the journalist. A militant neo-Nazi German group called National Resistance Berlin, or NWB, published a list of individuals the group said is opposed to NWB. A number of journalists are included on the list.
Polish journalists covering political protests were the target of police late last year. Two journalists in particular were arrested while covering a group of protesters who occupied the State Electoral Commission headquarters, despite showing press badges. Their families were kept in the dark about their detention. They were ultimately acquitted.
Simon Ostrovsky, a correspondent for VICE News who received critical acclaim for his work covering the evolving war in Ukraine, was kidnapped by pro-Russian separatists while reporting in eastern Ukraine in April. He was held in a basement and interrogated for four days before being released. Ostrovsky is one of dozens of journalists kidnapped and in some cases killed by both pro-government and separatist forces in Ukraine in 2014. Ukraine is the third deadliest country in the world for journalists, behind Palestine and Syria.
The Danish media group that owns Jyllands-Posten, a similar satirical magazine that received threats and international attention after publishing pictures of the Muslim Prophet Muhammad in 2005,increased its security following the attack on Charlie Hebdo, although no threats have been levied on them as of 12:00 p.m. EST. LInk to video
Then, we got into
business. We listened to a couple talking about their sightseeing tour of
London. Mónica hasn’t been to London. Daniel has. He showed us a photo of the famous ‘Big Ben’
from the London Eye. Great view!
This listening helped us to
understand how present simple and present continuous are used and to check
their different uses.
This week we learnt
the difference between present simple and present continuous.
v
We use present simple to talk
about habits, customs, facts and routines. We use adverbs or expressions of frequency.
Remember the position
of adverbs of frequency:
Before the main verb
|
Sam hardly
ever does housework.
|
James never goes to the dentist.
|
Mary usually does sport or exercise.
|
After the verb “to
be”
|
Cristina is never
at home in the morning.
|
||
In questions, after
the subject.
|
Is Isabel often late for work?
|
Do you often buy flowers?
|
|
Expressions of
frequency, at the end of the sentence.
|
Mark goes to the hairdresser’s twice a year.
|
Christian goes on holiday three times a
year.
|
Alex sees his best friend every weekend.
|
v
We use present continuous to
talk about actions happening at the moment of speaking or temporary situations.
I’m writing the
report. (now)
She’s sharing a flat until she finds a
house to rent. (Temporary situation)
We described what the people are doing
in our pictures so as to find the differences with our partner’s picture.
v
We can also use the
present continuous to talk about future
arrangements.
Click here Link to exercises
See you on Monday!
Have a nice weekend!
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