Tuesday, December 3, 2013

TODAY'S ENGLISH CLASS
SHORT ABOUT THE MOVIE
"THE GREAT DEBATERS" 


Once again we were lucky enough to watch an American film in our English class. This is the third time we’ve watched a movie, and also the third time we’ve learned something from a film, because that’s basically all that matters when we watch a movie in our English class.
The title of the movie that we have watched today is “The Great Debaters”, and I really liked it. Personally I would say that this is one of the better movies that I have watched through my lifespan. I really liked the way how the debaters fought against their opponents with nothing more than words. There are some people who say that words are only words and that they can do no harm, but trust me, if you watch the movie that I’ve just watched, you’ll know that I’m speaking the truth when I say that words can do a lot of harm if they’re used in a correct way.
Nobody actually got hurt because of a bunch of words in the movie, but I hope you get my point.

The movie “The Great Debaters” is as you may have guessed about debaters. The plot takes place in 1935 primarily in Marshall, Texas, although the young debaters travel across the country to meet their opponents who attend other colleges.
The debaters, or the main characters in the movie, are black and go to Wiley College – a college for black students. The students that we meet here are Henry Lowe, James Farmer, Jr., Samantha Booke and Hamilton Burgess, and their teacher Melvin B. Tolson. All of the people that I’ve mentioned here have actually lived in real life. I don’t remember what each one of them became when they grew up, but I can certainly tell you that they became either lawyers, doctors or something else.

As mentioned before, the four students that I mentioned above are all a part of the debate team of Wiley College, who along with their professor travel to different colleges in the USA and debate with other students about different themes. They were very successful and had many victories, which is why Harvard students, a national debating champion, invited the students from Wiley over to Boston so that they could debate against each other.
I will not tell you who won, if you want to know that, I’m afraid you’ll have to watch the movie by yourself. I don’t see a reason why you shouldn’t watch it because it is after all a very good movie directed by Denzel Washington himself. He starred as Melvin B. Tolson, by the way.


Before we started watching the movie, we had to write two questions that we wanted answered after the movie. One of my own questions was “How was the Harvard University back in the 1930s?” I thought I would get a precise answer to this question since the three students from Wiley College went to Harvard to debate against the Harvard students.

All in all, I didn’t exactly get a precise answer to my question, and I’m not even sure I got an answer to it at all, because I think that not much has changed at Harvard from 1935 to present. The university has probably stayed more or less the same since it has been founded till today.

Well, even if I didn’t get my question answered, I certainly did learn a thing or two thanks to the movie. I would definitely recommend this movie for those who are into American history and how the Afro-Americans were treated in the southern states back then.


Tuesday, October 15, 2013

What did I learn in school today?

 Original date: 08.10.2013

As the title of this post says, our task for today was to write what we learned at school today, or to be more precise, what we learned during our English class.
A quick and short answer to this question would “Peace One Day” and Jeremy Gilley, but a longer and more detailed answer is that we have learned what the charity “Peace One Day” is and what it works for, and that Jeremy Gilley, who is (was) a British actor and a film maker, is the one who founded it. And believe it or not, we have also had a chance to speak with Jeremy via Skype. It was a very exiting experience because he is (was) after all an actor, and he is also known worldwide for his work and accomplishments with “Peace One Day”. I think that we are in fact the only ones at this school who have had the chance to speak with Jeremy on Skype.
So, now that you know that we have spoken with Jeremy Gilley, you’re probably wondering what we were talking about. We asked him some questions about his charity and their progress so far. He seemed very prepared for the conversation and he managed to answer our question with both precision and detail. And you could see that he was a professional actor because he seemed relaxed when we were having the Skype conversation with him.
I think that this is all I have and need to say about the day today. If you want to know more about “Peace One Day”, you can visit their website by clicking this link: http://peaceoneday.org/

Tuesday, October 8, 2013

Studying abroad - a good or a bad thing?


Studying abroad can be both fun and interesting for some people, while other people can find it boring and frustrating. I think that studying abroad is a great opportunity for you to meet people from all around the world. If you are a student from Norway, for example, and you wish to study in USA for a couple of years, I can guarantee you that American students aren’t the only ones that you will meet. In USA there are a lot of people from other countries, too, so there is a big chance that you’ll meet someone from e.g. Sweden or Russia while you are studying in the US.


Meeting new people isn’t the only thing that you’ll experience if you are studying abroad. Your English skills are most likely to be improved drastically if you’re studying in a country where classes at the school are in English. If you study good enough, you’ll probably be fluent in English by the time you come back to your homeland.

These are the positive sides of studying abroad, but, unfortunately, everything that has its up-sides also has to have its down-sides, too. As for this topic, one of the negative sides of studying abroad is that you can be miles away from your friends and family, but thanks to Skype, Facebook and various other communicating tools, you can get in touch with your old friends and family whenever and wherever you want to as long as you have an internet connection.
Another con with studying abroad, which probably is the most frightening one, is that it can be frustrating getting known with the students and the teachers at your new school. But  also this can simply be solved by getting to know those people by yourself and not waiting for them to get to know you.
I would personally recommend studying abroad, especially if you like traveling and exploring new countries. Many people that I know have been studying in the US and they said that it’s the best experience they have ever had. They also told me that they have improved their abilities in both writing and speaking English. So, again, if you are a student and you like traveling around the globe, studying abroad is definitely something for you.

Tuesday, September 24, 2013

Review of the website “THINKB4U”



Hello and welcome to a review of the site “THINKB4U”, which is basically a very helpful website of you are new to technical devices and if you are unsure what to do on the internet in different situations. This is my first review so I hope you don’t expect too much from it. :)

On the website “THINKB4U” we meet the Parkers which is a cheerful family that teaches us how to be tech-smart. There are many videos to be found that they have made to learn us about the pros and cons of the internet. The family consists of a five members: a mother, a father, a boy, a girl, and a grandma. These are the main characters, or actually the only ones that we get to meet on the website.

When you’re watching the videos that can be found there, you will need to answer some simple questions in the middle of it. The questions are quite easy and have only two answers, either a yes or a no. Since the site is about having the right knowledge and competency when you’re browsing the web, you have probably guessed that the questions are for instance if you should state your e-mail password to an unknown website. At the end of the video you can check if you’ve answered correctly, and if you didn’t, don’t worry, it’s not a big deal. You will not get anything else but knowledge when you answer correctly anyway.

First of all, let’s start with the design of the website, which suits every age group out there. It has a very well organized structure and a modern design that makes it possible to navigate through the web site without any issues. There are not any unnecessary things on the web page at all, so it’s quite user friendly, in other words perfect for kids who have just entered the world of internet and need to learn how to be careful on the world wide web.

Another thing that I personally find very interesting is that there are no ads on the page at all as far as I’ve experienced. Maybe there were some hidden ones, but I really can’t remember seeing a single ad on the webpage. Not having ads on a website means less worries when your child is browsing the web, because some ads can really make you do something stupid, while others can show some really disturbing images or material inappropriate for children.

I guess that’s everything that you have to know about the website “THINKB4U”. Feel free to comment this review if you think that something is missing, and remember to visit the site yourself  if you want to learn more about it, because this text is pretty much a summed version of what you can find there. I would recommend you to visit the site especially if you are not that familiar with the internet, and what evil can be found out there. ;)


Tuesday, September 10, 2013

A quite exciting visit indeed 



Last week we were so lucky to get Espen Barth Eide - the Norwegian minister of foreign affairs to our school. He was followed by two security guards into our gymnasium, and if you’re wondering if he came with a limo, I’m afraid I can’t answer that question because we were already at our seats when he came into the room. A splendid applause was given as soon as he entered the room, and when he came onto the stage, he started talking about what his job is all about. At the end we asked him some questions that we had on our minds. I didn’t bother to ask him a question because I didn’t know what to ask him, but I can tell you that some of our questions were about the situation in Syria and his opinion on it. He told us that he is not happy with it and hopes, like the rest of us, that something will be done as soon as possible. He also said something about the banned chemical weapons which I don’t quite remember. After he had answered all our questions we simply thanked him and he left our school. He is after all the minister of foreign affairs so he’s got a lot of work to do.

Monday, September 9, 2013

The situation in Syria



For those of you who don’t know, the conflict in Syria between the rebels and the regime started already in 2011, but the most shocking attack took place early hours on 21st of August this year. At 1:15AM, the Facebook pages of the Syrian opposition reported that there was heavy fighting going on in the rebel controlled areas of Ghouta, which is the agricultural belt of east of Damascus. An hour later, in the Ein Tarma and Zamalka districts of Ghouta, there have been reports that bombs with chemical containment have hit the ground. People were sleeping when this happen, so many were under extreme stress and shock when they heard the explosion. Syrian government stated that no chemical weapons have been taken in use, but that there was however a fight going on in the areas I mentioned above.

Now, even though the government itself claimed that they didn’t use chemical weapons, there are some clear proofs that there was in fact a bomb with toxic gas that hit the ground.
First of all, the bombs didn’t explode, they simply fell down from the sky and a poisonous gas started leaking from them. The people who were woke up when this happened noticed that something was wrong with the air they were breathing. Many of them were moved to hospitals because they got poisoned.

The main question now is how the world can handle this situation where banned chemical weapons have been used against Syria’s citizens? What and how can we solve this problem?
The UN Security Council is dealing with quite tough decisions; they don’t know if they should send troops to Syria in order to solve the problem, or find a peaceful way, if there is one, of course. I guess that we just have to wait and see for ourselves which decision will be made and hope for the best one. No need to panic, folks. Or at least not yet.

I've used BBC as my main source when I was writing this text. I saw a video of the bombing reports and chemical attacks in Syria on www.bbc.co.uk

Tuesday, September 3, 2013

Introduction


Hello and welcome to my new school blog! This year we will be working with International English, which requires higher English abilities and skills. As you can see we will be working with blogs and posts this year, too, and there will be occasions where we can write about anything we like to - in English, of course. So stay tuned because you are about to see some awesome posts in the upcoming weeks!