Saturday, 3 July 2010

Listen to some avatars talking about London

I suggest listening to these avatars and trying to fill in the gaps with only one word in the given sentences. You can listen to the avatars as many times as you need and later,you can also read the sentences aloud in order to practise your pronunciation skill. Another idea: you can do a dictation task and then check your spelling. You will hear different voices in these video-clips. And finally, you can have lots of fun creating your own avatars and messages and then, if you fancy doing so, you can include them on your blog. For that, visit: http://www.voki.com/create.php

Sugerencia (muy útil para alumnos que no entienden aún los símbolos fonéticos o para esas palabras que no encuentres en ningún diccionario de fonética): En esa página puedes escribir en inglés la palabra o frase en inglés que quieras saber cómo se pronuncia y el avatar te la dirá.

Nota: A veces no se visualizan los video-clips. Paciencia y vuelve a intentarlo en otro momento. A mi me ha pasado y, por eso, he creado el archivo que puedes escuchar aquí si volviera a ocurrir:



*** You have all the gaps in a whole text here, in case you want to print it: http://www.scribd.com/doc/33930830/London-Gaps

About London


1. Most londoners are still (1)_______ when work begins in the city’s ancient markets.


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2.The streets are empty in the early morning so it’s the best time to make (2)_____________.


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3. It’s an hour or two later and office workers are arriving from the (3)_________. More than 3,000,000 people travel into london every day.


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4. Tourists soon appear, (4)________ to take a ride on the London Eye or visit museums and famous sights like the Tower of London before they become too (5)_________.


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5. You always know what time it is if you are near Westminster. The clock tower (6)_____ , called Big Ben, (7)________ every quarter hour.


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6. By ten o’clock in the morning the shops along Oxford Street are open for (8)________. You can find some of London’s most famous shops along this street.


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7. Nearby it’s Covent Garden, a lively (9)_____________ with (10)_________ boutiques and market (11)_________.


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8.It’s now 11:30 in the morning and (12)__________ are waiting outside Buckingham Palace for the (13)__________ of the guard. It’s a tradition that goes back hundreds of years.


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9. Londoners stop for lunch at about one o’clock. You might want to sit down to a traditional roast (14)________ dinner at London’s oldest restaurant.


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10. The river is like a (15)__________. Tourist boats run up and down the (16)__________, passing landmarks like the Houses of Parliament and Saint Paul’s cathedral.


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11.It can rain any day of the year in London, so be prepared for (17)_______ weather. If you are lucky, you might see Tower Bridge opening to let a large boat pass (18)__________.


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12.People visit London’s green parks in the afternoon to walk or just sit for a (19)________ and relax. The famous (20)________ clock on Leicester Square tells you that it’s five o’clock. This is the time that London’s evening (21)______ hour begins.


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13. Theatres open in the West End at about 7:30. Many of the world’s best (22)_______ plays and musicals were first (23)_________ here. Restaurants are busy at this time of night.


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14.And so are the cinemas. Londoners don’t stop (24)________ fun when the pubs and restaurants close. From about 11 o’clock people start (25)_________ outside the clubs.


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15. London is a city that never (26)_________.


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***KEY:
1.asleep 2.deliveries 3.suburbs 4.keen 5.busy 6.bell 7.chimes 8.business 9.neighbourhood 10.trendy 11.stores 12.crowds 13.changing 14.beef 15.highway 16.Thames 17.wet 18.through 19.while 20.Swiss 21.rush 22.love 23.staged 24.having 25.queuing 26.sleeps

*** Transcript
También puedes leer la transcripción aquí:

London and other transcripts (by Total English)

*** Sugerencia: Echa un vistazo a la página de Total English, hay ejercicios de todos los niveles:
http://www.pearsonlongman.com/totalenglish/resources/resources.html

SOURCES: Activity created thanks to:
**** Video-clips and avatars: http://www.voki.com/create.php
**** Tapescript extracted when listening to a video about London. Thanks a lot to Total Preintermediate Video, where the extracted words come from. ... And after all the hard work, I just found the transcript on the net!
**** Audacity and archive.org will help you when the avatars are resting!
**** Scribd also cooperates.
**** Also thanks to the page on C.R.I.E. , where I found the way to go to http://www.voki.com/ and find out how to create my voki avatars.
**** By the way, did you recognize my voice in one of the avatars? You can also have your own avatar, why not trying it? It's fun! (And you could try to send it to me through the public email above!)

**** Useful tools for teachers:
Now, if you fancy learning about other teachers' experiences, you can watch a video, on http://www.teachers.tv/, about how to use this and other tools in class: Click on the following link:http://www.teachers.tv/videos/online-communities-in-the-classroom

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