Balance your life and work

I just read this article and I thought that it would be a good idea to share it, this is in www.lifehacker.com:

It's commonplace to feel we need to find a balance between our work and our lives, but sometimes that just isn't possible. Instead, you may be better off aiming to keep a healthy body and mind.

Many of us feel a bit overwhelmed by work, to the point where we're underperforming in our lives outside of the office. If you fall into this category, you've probably made a few attempts to gain greater balance—and probably failed, too. When we like what we do and get a little obsessed, this isn't necessarily a bad. The problem is, sometimes work can wear us out and balance is harder because we're just too mentally and physically exhausted to maintain it. Psychologist Marcia Reynolds recommends the following:

• Keep your body healthy - Eating healthy and exercising makes any added stress easier to handle. Studies have found that exercise helps to prepare our bodies to handle stressful situations.
• Maintain social bonds - Thought you may feel like you don't have time or don't need help, often times a very brief social encounter is enough to keep you energized and happy. If you have to work, consider working with someone else in the room. Being around people you like, even when you feel that you want to be alone, can often be a big help.
• Regularly notice the world around you - Even if it doesn't feel like it, you have five or ten minutes to go take a walk and appreciate what's around you. When you're in a hurry, don't forget to stop and look around. Actually paying attention to the world around you not only will make a major difference in the little annoyances in life (e.g. almost walking into people, losing/forgetting things, etc.) but it will frequently feel like a breath of fresh air. Appreciate the world around you and you (as well as everyone else) will be better of for it

Reynolds mentions that the best part about these easy suggestions is that you can combine them:

For example, plan on regular walks with family and friends to enjoy them while you absorb the sun and nature. Then if you work into the night to catch up on the emails that came in while you were walking, make sure you get enough sleep so you wake up excited about the work you will do next.

It's worth noting that if your life is being overtaken by a job that you hate, anything you do short of quitting that job is probably not going to help you too much, but devoting a little of your free time towards a balanced mind could certainly help make things a little easier.

Forget About Work/Life Balance [Psychology Today]

Rosseta Stone

The Rosetta Stone is part of an Ancient Egyptian granodiorite stele with engraved text that provided the key to modern understanding of Egyptian hieroglyphs. The inscription records a decree that was issued at Memphis in 196 BCE on behalf of King Ptolemy V. The decree appears in three texts: the upper one is in ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs, the middle one in Egyptian demotic script, and the lower text in ancient Greek.

Originally displayed within a temple, the stele was probably moved during the early Christian or medieval period, and eventually used as building material in the construction of a fort at the town of Rashid (Rosetta) in the Nile delta. It was rediscovered there in 1799 by a soldier of the French expedition to Egypt. As the first known bilingual text, the Rosetta Stone aroused wide public interest with its potential to decipher the hitherto untranslated ancient Egyptian languages. Lithographic copies and plaster casts began circulating amongst European museums and scholars. Meanwhile, British troops defeated the French in Egypt in 1801, and the original stone came into British possession under the Capitulation of Alexandria. Transported to London, it has been on public display at the British Museum since 1802. It is the most-visited object in the British Museum.

Link to file:

http://cid-e57ad46b7956f5a2.office.live.com/self.aspx/Class%20Files/The%20Rosetta%20Stone.pdf

Methodology 1

I am teaching this subject called "Metodología de la Enseñanza del Ingles 1" which is giving me the chance to be the guide of possible future teachers, this is a great opportunity to refresh my approach to teaching, the students' fresh ideas and innovative thinking will enrich my experience as a teacher, some of the topics we are going to cover are:

1. Knowing your students.
2. How long does a class last?
3. What topics can be covered in the class?
4. How can students learn and how should teachers teach?
5. Teaching strategies

So, as you can see there are good topics than will be covered and will be better because we are going to use POL

Download Manual and related files:

http://cid-e57ad46b7956f5a2.office.live.com/self.aspx/POL%202009/UANE%20Meto%201.rar

Macmillan Children's Dictionary

Macmillan Children's Dictionary
By Carolyn Barraclough | Macmillan ELT (2001) | ISBN: 0333953037
PDF | English | 14.1 MB | 96 pages

I know that a lot of teachers are working with kids right know, so, I will share with you this eBook, even if you are not working with children but you want to learn in a graphical way more vocabulary. A greatly illustrated photographic dictionary with over 800 words and pictures. It includes British and American vocabulary and spelling, as well as a range of graded reading, writing and speaking activities.

Enjoy it and send me your comments.

Link:
http://cid-e57ad46b7956f5a2.office.live.com/self.aspx/eBooks/Macmillan%20Children^4s%20Dictionary.pdf

Organize your classes (pt 1) Technology

The people that know me, know that I love teaching, but I hate paperwork, administrative tasks and non-teaching things in general, but sadly all paperwork comes with the territory, therefore, I have tried to organized my classes to have fewer problems when the administrative work comes, so here are my tips:

1. Use technology, when technology is used properly nothing can go wrong:

a) Plan you classes using a computer and make your own format with all the necessary information required in the class

b) Use USBs and spaces like skydrive or google documents to store important files

c) Scan documents or activities with pictures, drawings or similar characteristics or re-do them if they are only words (using a new and fresh format)

d) If you have some topics or subjects that you use frequently, do a powerpoint presentation and if you don't have a projector the day you will use it, you can easily print it to be handed out.

e) Always innovate, with today's technologies many things can be different, better, improved, just worry a little more to learn new ways.

NOTE: DO NOT forget the rule # 1, BACK UP everything, find a good portable HD, USB or DVDs, but BACK UP CONSTANTLY!! losing your ALL your files is like being in hell, time is money and lost files is like losing time, money and a piece of your mind!!!

Procrastination

I found some very good tips about avoiding procrastination, and the summary is this:

If you want to actually succeed in life, stop relying on your future self to take care of things. Now.

If you’re in debt and want to fix it, start fixing it now.

If you’re overweight, start eating better and exercising now.

If you’re not saving for retirement, set up retirement savings now.

If you want to get household tasks done, do them now.

Don’t find excuses to not do them because you want to do something “fun” today. There will always be something fun to do, which means there will always be a reason to avoid making the hard changes.

If you won’t make the change, your future self certainly won’t, either. By skipping out now, you’re telling your future self that not doing it is just fine.

Are you going to do something today, or are you going to give you and your future self permission to never actually get around to it?

LI 2nd Generation

Ok, so, another year has passed and the second LI generation is about to graduate, and I have mixed feelings about it, because I'm happy for each one of them, I saw them struggling with UANE, with coordinators, with teachers and among themselves, now they are in the summit of their studies, they are about to become Licenciad@s, but at the same time, I'm sad because they will leave a huge void in the school, I will not see them walking in the school anymore, 4 years in my life are a lot, so they will be missed, and they will always be in my mind and in my heart, cheers my Muchachas and Mr Neto¡¡ Be all you can be, and do all you can do

Atte.

Memo

Teachers Day

We had a little dinner at UANE yesterday, congratulation to my fellow teachers, not only Languages teachers, but also to the ones in other careers, great effort we do, sweat and sleepless nights, but the rewards we have are also great, hugs to all my peeps¡¡

Legion (homework)

After some problems, the file is finally uploaded, well, here you have the link to download it:

http://cid-e57ad46b7956f5a2.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/Activities/Legion.docx

If you need more info about the movie, you can go to the imdb link to get it:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1038686/

Atte.

Memo

Cambridge Course in UANE

Last Saturday April 17th we had a course from Cambridge University Press given by Patricia Quintana, this course was related to some existing teaching methods and approaches, we tackle some of them really quick:

Grammar-Translation Approach
Direct Approach
Reading Approach
Audiolingual Method
Community Language Learning
The Silent Way
Communicative Approach--Functional-Notional
Total Physical Response

If you want to find more about them, go to this link (very basic explanation):

http://edweb.sdsu.edu/people/jmora/almmethods.htm

POL Presentation 2010

This is the introduction translated by Lex and Dany, both students of Licenciatura de Idiomas in their 8th, and final, semester, they did a great job, they soon will be great Licenciadas, so I guess that in coming days I will upload some more videos from that presentation.

This POL was presented by 4th and 6th semester of LI, you will see some good performances, some performances that could be better, but they will improve with the years and practice.

Manual Practicas Docentes

This the link where you can download the manual for Practicas docentes, if you have a problem downloading it, please write a comment. Read it and tomorrow we will clarify doubts.

Copy.paste it in your browser:

http://cid-e57ad46b7956f5a2.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/2010/POL%20Practicas%20didacticas2%20Manual.docx

Manual Metodologia

Ok, this is it, here you have a link, just copy-paste it so you can download it, remember to read it so you can ask any questions tomorrow, if you have any problems just write a comment on the right side of this blog:

http://cid-e57ad46b7956f5a2.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/2010/POL%20Metodologia3%20Manual.docx

Metodologia

Guys, I am having some technical difficulties, the manual will be uploaded within 2 hours, sorry, but don't worry, you'll have it a.s.a.p.