Christmas in Portugal. Wishing you a Merry Christmas!

My students have written about Christmas in Portugal. 

Read their texts:

Here in Portugal Christmas is a very important season. In the night of the 24th December we exchange gifts with our friends and family.

On the 24th I usually go to my grandmother's house and have dinner along with all my family. We eat codfish with boiled potatoes and on the next day, at lunch, we eat a dish called "Roupa Velha" which in English means "Old Clothes". It's a traditional dish and it's made using the remains from the codfish and kind of mixing everything. It's pretty good.

On December 24th we have dinner at our uncle’s house, where our whole family meets. Then we play games and wait for midnight to open the presents. Someone in the family usually dresses up as Santa Claus because children become very happy. The traditional Portuguese food is awesome.

Christmas is based on the catholic religion, but we have a bit of consumerism too! The streets are enchanted because of all the lights on the trees and balconies. There are pretty Christmas ornaments everywhere. At home, things aren't much different from the streets. In the last weekend we set up the Christmas tree, and decorated the entire house with ornaments. It is so beautiful;  my family and I had a blast of joy while doing this. We all love this season of the year!

Here in Portugal we put lights and we can listen to Christmas songs playing on the streets. The weather is cold but that's not a problem to us. It's a time of joy and share to all the people. And we have 15 days of school holidays!

Are you curious about the Portuguese language?

Try this site :
http://www.bbc.co.uk/languages/portuguese/talk/

The Spanish Residence and Spanglish (two films about multilinguism)

We have concluded the unit, a multilingual world, so we had time to watch some parts of the films: The Spanish Residence (an interesting film about students’ mobility within Europe) and Spanglish (a film which deals with the integration of a Mexican family in the American lifestyle).

This school term is about to end. I have been correcting students’ last tests and evaluating their oral skills and attitudes. They have recently presented the debate about the topic: should we defend the existence of a global language or should all languages be considered equal? I had students who prepared themselves very well for this activity, while others didn´t invest enough time and work to overcome their difficulties.

I wish some would work harder. There are so many temptations everwhere that many have difficulty in sorting out their piorities.

Nevertheless, it was a worthwhile school term. I had students who told me they liked their English lessons a lot.

Varieties of English ...

English is spoken and learned all over the world. It can be used as a first language, a second language or a foreign language. However, English is not the same everywhere. There are differences in spelling, vocabulary, pronunciation and grammar among the different varieties of English.

In Portugal we are exposed to different varieties of English, especially to British English and American English. TV programmes are all in their original audio form; consequently we have access to people’s real voices. It’s no wonder that Portuguese people have a natural aptitude for learning languages, at least, that’s what we hear....

Young people love listening to music and watching foreign films and series/serials. They learn much vocabulary by doing that. Most films and series are American ones, so American English has a strong influence on them. But there are those who prefer the English pronunciation, they find it so charming and chic ... Spelling is another problem for students because the books we use in the English classes have texts written in American English and in British English.

This year, they have been corresponding with American epals, so they are improving and learning new American English words.

My advices are :

• Use English a lot and don’t get too obsessed with these differences...

• Expose yourself to the English language (the maximum you can) by listening, reading, speaking....

• and  HAVE FUN

Now take this quiz - British English and American English

Due Date trailer

I saw this film yesterday and I found it really fun.

I was the therapy I needed then. My brain was (and still is) so much overloaded with work that it helped me relax for a while.

The 1st December is a holiday in Portugal

On December 1, 1640, Portugal regained its independence from Spain, after sixty years of dominance, and John IV of Portugal became king.