THE RADIO AD FOR THE LIBRARY

Hello,

Here is the radio advertisement of the University Pardubice's library. I have briefly mentioned about the facilities the library has ( e.g. scanning, printing, internet access ). This task was easy for me because I actively use all of these services of the library. One most useful things in an advertisement language is adjectives. You have to use exaggerated adjectives and you have to use high stress while articulating these adjectives. I tried to do that. An I tried to use fancy language to attract the audience. For example, Would you like to meet one of the most inclusive university library in Czech Republic?
It was a different experience for me. Actually I like this job :)

I WAS YOUR BOSS ONCE - Anchor vs. Reporter

Hello everyone,

This week, our task was reporting news. I worked with my colleague Aysun Erarslan to do the task. We found a funny video which is about a fight between an anchor and a reporter. My job was being the reporter. I said it is funny because the report also is concerning a fight which occurs between a landlord and his tenant. Before preparing my speech, I listened the reporter's speech carefully. It was hard to interpret his speech because although he was a reporter, he spoke in an informal way. I jotted his sentences down and tried to pronounce them like this reporter. This was the most enjoyable part for me but at the same time it was the hardest one. Many times, we had to stop the recording  because of  my pronunciation mistake. However, the task was useful for me in terms of both pronunciation and the linking speech. For example, I tried to say the question ' What do you like to know? ' in American accent at least hundred times.

Note: We also performed the tenant lady and the landlord.

Here is the original video : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AtzG3wdF_IU

INDIVIDUAL ASSIGNMENT - TALKING TO MYSELF

Hi!
I know, I am a prospective English teacher but still I have the fear of speaking English especially in public areas like classrooms. Specifically if I have to speak spontaneously, I feel more pressure on me. To me, the fear of making mistakes makes me so nervous that I just mumble in such a situation. So, I've made some research about this problem and I've found some tips to overcome this 'confidence' problem. There are 3 useful ( in my opinion ) tips that might help me in that issue:

1. Don't worry too much about grammar.
2. Keep a positive attitude.
3. Practice speaking English as much as possible in low-pressure situations ( e.g. talking to yourself ).

So, I took the third advice and record myself while speaking about the 'photography'. The choice of the topic is important because I've never spoken about the 'photography' although I am quite familiar with the topic in my own language. In the record, I tried to explain my interest in photography and gave some information about  my own camera.

While speaking on my own, I needed to check some vocabulary/collocations like 'portrait photography' and I needed to check the pronunciation of some words such as for 'portrait'/ˈpɔːtreɪt/.
I needed to check these things because I didn't know how to express/pronounce them in English.
Finally, talking to myself in English was a good idea because I really felt comfortable with my English. I hope it will be the same in public areas, as well.

HANSEL AND GRETEL

Hello,

This week, I told one of the most famous Grimms's tales : Hansel and Gretel. Actually it was a quite difficult task for me because there were various aspects to think about while telling a story. For example, I had to consider of my pronunciation,  my tone of voice, pitch etc. Furthermore, I had to think about different characters' voices. For example, while performing Gretel, I should speak like a naive and  an innocent child. But, while performing 'The Evil Witch',  my voice should be sharp and high. Finding appropriate background musics was the other drawback.

On the other hand, this task contributes me a lot in terms of fluency and connected speech. I learned to articulate the words/phrases according to the mood of the story. I had to practice a lot. But to be honest I am not happy with the result.

FRIENDS vs. HIMYM

Hello,
In our English Party, we had a debate about Friends and HIMYM . That was a pair work. I collaborated with Aysun Eraslan. There were a few challanges that we had to confront with before we began to do the task.  Our first challange was to find a debate topic but to be honest it was not a real challange for us. Because we had discussed this matter ( HIMYM vs Friends ) before that English Party assignment. After deciding on the topic, the other challenge came: ' What would we say about these super-popular sitcoms? ' We began to search for funny websites concerning Friends and HIMYM. We found some and then Aysun was on the F's side and I was on the HIM's side. Aysun came with a thesis that supports Friends and at each time she did this, I came up with a counter-attack. It was real fun for us. Because at the beginning our aim was to do the homework but then it turned into a real debate. One of the positive thing in this assignment was working in pair. Because, we had a lot of chance to brainstorm together and many times we supported each other when we needed help. The other good point was learning new vocabulary such as mysoginist/ic. To me there was another positive point in this debate which can be changed from person to person: I tried hard to pronounce the words correctly because there was a monitor ( Aysun ) beside me. We finished our debate mentioning about soundtrack of HIMYM.
If you want to listen the soundtrack of How I Met... Here are the 5 best songs : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fZula-nGg3E

TRYING TO LINK WORDS/SOUNDS

Hi everyone!
     This week, I have dwelled on linking the sounds or words of English as I really have difficulty in this issue. I cannot speak English fluently as it is my L2. I cannot connect words or sounds as if they are one word. On the contrary I utter the words separately as if they are 2 different poles. And this mistake results in an unnatural pronunciation. To solve this problem I've made some research about it. I've found a website which explains how we should lik the words/sounds while we are speaking. There are 6 different ways of linking words to the website. If you're interested in this issue, here is the link. On this website, 2 examples are given for each rule. I tried to pronounce/link  the words correctly in my recording.
     Also, I've found a video on youtube which stresses on this issue.The video directs you to practice few sentences/tongue twisters in a linked way. You can listen those sentences in my recording and also you can find more information about them from the video.
    In conclusion, after practising those sentences and words, I have become more aware of those linking rules. Let me give an example, ''She watched television.'' when we utter this sentence we can recognize that the verb 'watched' ends with the /t/ sound and the word 'television' begins with the /t/ sound. When we have a case like this, 2 same sounds together, we should pronounce one of the /t/ sounds.
   I hope this awareness of the rules helps my pronunciation as well.
   See you.

Gender Roles - JAC2 Assignment

Check out my audio recording about Gender Roles

REFLECTION  
Hello! I am a blogger again. Again for my homework assignments :) This time I have recorded my sound. It was like interviewing with myself. My topic was about Gender Roles as you can see on the headline. I think it was a quite useful activity for my speaking skills. Actually, I was very disappointed to see that I could not speak so fluently and I could not use the linking words
( moreover, in addition to etc. ) appropriately. I think, one of the reasons of this is my personality. I mean I am not the type who can speak about everything and everyone. In short, I am not such a talkative person that who can speak one hour about one issue even in my mother tongue. In this term, the questions really helped me in terms of speaking. This was one good point about the assignment. To improve myself, I should practice in speaking and I should not cut my words short. I should try to find more to speak. When it comes to pronunciation, I think it was not so terrible :) At least everyone can understand what I am talking about. But I noticed some mistakes in  'stress' of the words such as 'appropriate', 'issue', 'woman-women'. I should focus on these mistakes and next time I should pronounce them correctly.

See you next week :)