CAN YOU TEACH AN OLD DOG NEW TRICKS?-by Iria Sánchez de Diego

If you were born before man first set foot on the moon, you would probably find today's new technologies that young people find easy to use as difficult as disarming a nuclear bomb.

How can we make it easier for older people to use mobile phones, tablets..

To make texts easier to read perhaps mobiles for old people should be set up with larger font size, for example.

We could even design apps to help them learn how to correctly use their devices.

So, if your grandparents have mobiles, tablets... Take five minutes to give them a crash course.

Iria Sanchez de Diego

FRIENDS-by María Pujol

Friends

Friends is an old series, but I still like it. The principal actors are: Jennifer Aniston, (Rachel Green); Courtney Cox, (Monica Geller); Lisa Kudrow (Phoebe Buffay); David Schwimmer (Ross Geller); Matt LeBlanc (Joey Tribbiani); and Mathew Perry (Chandler Bing). This series started in 1994 and finished in 2004 but it is still being shown on tv.

It is a comedy series, in which the six friends live in four different houses in New York, Ross and Monica are brothers, and Rachel was Monica’s best friend during their childhood. Ross and Chandler were also best friends.

The thing that I like about this series is that it’s very funny, not only because of what they say, but also because of the faces they make.

I can’t understand how the scriptwriters were able to write an episode every week and still made them very good episodes.

Maria Pujol

REAL MADRID vs CORDOBA-by Nacho Vallano

It was a great match. Not so good for Real Madrid because they finished the first half and Cordoba was ahead, but not for long. Because a great cross by James, touch by Bale, and score by Benzema made Real Madrid draw just when the second half started. At the 88th minute of the second half, a defender touches with his hand and causes a penalty and Bale scores. 2-1 for Real Madrid. A hard match for Real Madrid, but they got the 3 points and are still ahead in the league.

Nacho Vallano

LONDON TRIP-by Carmen Peña

I went to London on November 2014. I went with my sister, my mum, and my dad. We stayed there for five days, and six nights. The hotel was located in the center, near the Thames river. The first day we visited the city center and went on the London Eye. We also took a tourist river boat that brought us to the Tower, the Royal Palace, and Prision. We had lunch in a restaurant and we ate typical British food, fish and chips. Then, we returned to the hotel and we had a bit of relaxing time there. In the evening we went to the Apple Market to have dinner and we visited all the small places around the hotel. On the second day, we went to the M&M shop and we bought a lot of bags with M&M's. We also bought some souvenirs of the shop. We had lunch at Harvey Nicols, at a sushi bar and then we went shopping. We visited shops like Victoria's Secret, Harrods, Urban Outfitters, Topshop... Then we took a taxi and went back to the hotel to rest. The days which I liked best were the second and last days. On the last day we went to visit Candem Market. It is a market that has a lot of peculiar shops and also differents types of people. We returned to Madrid on a Monday with a lot of presents for ourselves and the rest of the family and friends! 

Carmen Peña

MY EXPERIENCE IN FRANCE-by Emilia Ruiz Manjón

My Experience in France

Last time I talked about my experience in Boston, but today i'm going to tell you about my time in France. Last year, I spent six months in a boarding school in France. 

I went to Poitiers, a small town in the middle west of France.    

I got there the 8th of January. I was really excited but at the same time I was truly nervous because i'm very shy. It was a really long trip it took like 8-9 hours to get there. The first day, I went to the school in which I was going to stay the following months. It was really small and there were lots of nuns because it was a catholic school. It's name is Saint Chaumond. A nun showed me my room, which there was called a "box": it had a wardrobe, a sink, a little table, and a bed. It wasn't really big. Then, I met the other Spanish girls that had been there since the first trimester. They were really nice. My parents left and I stayed there organizing my stuff. Around eight I went to have dinner with the other spanish girls and the french girls also. Everyone was staring at me because I was the new girl. After dinner we had free time, then a little bit of study and then we could go to bed. The second day, I met my class and all my teachers who were really nice even though I couldn't understand them a lot. I was in class with a girl my age named Lucia who is now one of my closest friends. There were five of us girls in my school year, one who was one year older than me, three who were one year younger than me, and the others who were two years younger than me but they were a lot because they came from the Saint Chaumond in Madrid where in sixth grade you can go to France. 

Poitiers was really small and very quiet. We could leave the school on saturdays and wednesdays for like three or four hours. We could not do many things because we didn't have much time but we had a lot of fun because we were all together. As I said before Poitiers was so calm that when we walked in the street it looked as if it were only us because we were the ones making all the noise. At school everyone said that you knew when spanish girls were coming because they made so much noise. Poitiers from my point of view looked like it was fake, in the sense that everything was so quiet and clean and everyone was really silent, that it took me time believe it was true because it's really different from Madrid.   

I had an unbelievable time there, I made lots of friends and I also made so many memories.

Emilia

FACEBOOK-by Juan Vidal

Facebook

Many people now use social network websites to keep in touch with friends. Facebook iss one of these websites. It wasn’t designed to be a global network, but it very quickly became one. Facebook was founded in 2004, when Mark Zuckerberg was a student at Harvard College. American students often receive year books (‘face books’) with information about other students. However, Zuckerberg and his friends weren’t given one, so he decided to create his own ‘face book’ online. The website was used only by students, and people outside schools and colleges weren’t invited to join at first. Then a businessman offered $500,000 to Zuckerberg to develop the site and he decided to leave Harvard. Soon, Facebook was sponsored by some very big companies. In 2008, more than 60 million users were registered on Facebook, and Mark Zuckerberg was ‘the world’s youngest billionaire’.

In my opinion these websites are very interesting, I can chat with my friends and swap news; everybody should join.

Juan Vidal

HAWKING-by Mr. Grumpy

Next week we are going to the cinema to watch the fascinating story of Stephen Hawking’s life so I have decided to take a look and read a Little bit of his interesting life before I see the movie . I am going to make a small summary of the most interesting facts of his life that made him the man he is today.

First of all he is from England and he is right know about 70 years old. When he was 21 the doctors discovered a disease which paralised him completely from head to toes, now he

can only move his eyes and his mouth and he comunicates with the people thanks to a really fascinating machine with his voice, by the way it is his own voice, no machine can duplicate the sound of his voice but for the movie Hawking has lend it,after of course paying a lot of money in rights because the voice of the machine has a copyright.

Another interesting fact is that he has an extraordinary intelectual coefficient. For most of you Albert Einstein was the most intelligent person in the history of mankind but Hawking and Einstein have the same coefficient  he has an amazing mind and he hasn’t received yet the nobel Prize in Physics but he doesn’t mind anyways.

He says that his life hasn't been easy for him and neither for his family, he has been divorced two times and he has three children.

When he was a kid his dad wanted him to be a doctor but he said that biology was uncertain,he had had terrible results primary school but in secondary school he had an extraordiary mark in Physics and that gave him the oportunity to enter in the Oxford university.

I hope that you enjoyed this few interesting facts as much as I did

THE MISUNDERSTOOD-by Laura Rodriguez

THE MISUNDERSTOOD

Valeria (Charlotte Vega) is a young woman who has just moved to Madrid after the separation of her parents. At her new school, Valeria is forced to attend a meeting with the counselor along with other classmates.One day the girl meets Elisabeth (she is the most popular at her school , her best friends are Valeria,Raul(funny and loving),Mery(she is lesbian but nobody knows it and she loves Ester),Ester(who loves Rodrigo),Rodrigo(he is 27 years old and he is the voleyball coach of Ester),César(he is a guitarist at the station of Bilbao(Madrid) and he loves Valeria and fights for their love),Bruno(he is the best friend of Ester and loves her in secret).

Valeria and Raul decide to have a relationship and when Elisabet finds out that Raul loves Valeria she wants to die because the other friends didn't know that they were together.Valeria speaks with the mother of Elisabet and she tells her the situation between her and Valeria, and says that Elisabet has a new friend,her name is Ana(it's not real because Elisabet has hallucination like it's the devil) and she decides to kill herself.At the end of the film Elisabet doesn't get to kill herself but her parents leave the city with her and the missunderstood club separates.

This film is very romantic and nice.It is my favorite and Blue Jeans is a good writer,the most popular of his novels are: GOOD MORNING PRINCESS,DON'T SMILE BECAUSE I AM FALLING IN LOVE,THE MISUNDERSTOOD CLUB,THE DIARY OF RAUL AND THE DIARY OF MERY.

TORRES IS BACK-by Jose de la Hoz

Torres is back!

Fernando Torres came from Milan to his favourite team, Atletico de Madrid. He's my idol, people think that he isn't going to be good anymore, but I'm sure Simeone will turn him into the player he used to be.

When he left Atletico he was just a young player that wanted to become a champion. He has won the Champion's League, the World Cup, the European Cup, the Europa League, the Golden Boot and the award for the third best player in the world, behind Cristiano and Messi and before great players as Xavi, Kaká or Iniesta.

He was injured for a few months and after that, he stopped being the player he used to be, but in my opinion he never played bad at all. In Torre's presentation the stadium was full, that shows how much we love Torres here.

Since he came he has scored two goals in three matches, two against Real Madrid and one against Barcelona (and the only played one half in each match). I am sure he will have a great season. 

IRELAND-by María Ramirez

I'm going to talk about Ireland, because I've been there twice.

The first time that I went to Ireland, I lived visiting Dublin.

That was because my brother was living with an Irish family for three months, so my parents and I spent four days there with him. Dublin is a very nice city and I really like it. In Dublin, you can visit so many places such as O'Conell River, Drundrum Scentre, O'Connor street, Phenix Park...etc. My favorite place probably was Phenix Park.
There you can see deers, squirrels, ducks, geese, and a lot of types of animals. I think it´s a very nice place where you can have a wonderfull day with your family and friends. The second time that I spent time in Ireland was last summer. I traveled to Galway, a city situated on the west coast of this beautiful country.
This time I traveled without my family. I went there with an agency and just to learn English. My experience was fascinating and maybe this was the best summer that I've ever had. I went there with a little group of Spanish people and we stayed in a place similar to a campus. On this campus there were lots of teenagers like us, but not Spanish teenagers, they were Italian, Russian, Portuguese, etc.
So we made lots of friends and of course, we needed to speak with them in English. Also, nowadays we chat in English.
There, we had English classes all day, at a university near the campus. In the afternoon, we practiced sports and on the weekends, we visited different places like Cliffs of Moher, Dublin, etc. I really want to return next year and I recommend you visit Ireland!

Regards, Maria Ramirez

AN AUSTRALIAN GIRL IN OUR CLASS-by Carlota de la Puente

An Australian girl in our class

This year, an Australian girl, named Caitlin, has arrived to our class. She is a shy and

sportive girl who loves cooking. She has been living with a family for five months, from September to January. At first, her Spanish level was a little bit low. We had to talk slowly to her and when

we were talking together, she didn´t understand us very well. The same as in class, all might sound Chinese to her!

But, as the months have passed, her Spanish level grew a lot and her marks were fantastic. She has made a big effort. It will give us much grief when she has to go but, every journey comes to an end.

Knowing and meeting Caitlin has taught me lots of things:

Firstly, she is the only Australin girl that I know, so she told us about her life and manners that she has in Australia. But, the most important thing that Caitlin had taught me is the enthusiasm that she has of learning and overcoming the bad moments that she usually had during those first weeks. She got over them satisfactorily and that´s something she can be very proud of. I hope that she has had a good time here in Spain and that she can take her good memories and friendships with her.

Good luck and lots of kisses, Caitlin!

Carlota 

TEJAS RECIPE-by Pablo Seco

Tejas (spanish name)> tiles:

This recepie is for 6 people, and we are going to cook 24 tiles.

If you want cook tejas you these ingredients:

-The first thing that you have to do when you enter in the kitchen is switch on the oven, and put it at 180° C.
-80g of butter.
-2 eggs.
-Flour.
-Flacked almonds.
-100g of sugar.
-100g of salt.
-20g of butter to spread into the tray.

Prepare:

-You have to put the butter in a bowl and then put it in the microwave, and take it out when the butter has melted.

-Take the eggs, and separate the yokes with rest of the egg white, next put the yoke in a bowl and put the rest of the egg whites in another bowl.

-Mix the egg whites to make "punto de nieve" and when it is a little bit white, mix in the salt, because with the salt you have to mix less time (you will know when the "punto de nieve" is clear when looks like the snow, and in this moment you have to put the sugar and mix two more minutes.
-Now you have to mix the butter with the yokes.

-Next you have to put the mix (with the egg whites, sugar, and salt) into the other mix (with the bud and butter), and when are mixed you have to put flour and continue mixing.

* Just put flour when the dough is gummy.*
-And when the mix is gummy you have to put the flacked almonds.

-Spread some butter (solid) onto the tray (because if you do not put it the tejas stick to the tray).

-When you finish preparing the dough, put some little pieces of dough into the tray, and next put into the oven, and take the tiles out when the edge of them are brown. And next put other tiles.

*if you want to have the form like a tile you can put in a glass, or another object with a similar form*

By Pablo Seco

MY SOUTH DARTMOOR EXPERIENCE-by Lucía Alonso

MY SOUTH DARTMOOR EXCHANGE EXPERIENCE

I’m going to talk about an amazing experience that I had two years ago…

"Come on guys we are going to lose the plane!" said my teacher.

All the people were in the airport looking at all the shops, chatting, and taking pictures.

We took our suitcases and finally entered the plane.

The trip was so fun! We were the only ones that were from Spain and we were singing and shouting the whole time!

When we arrived to Bristol we had to take a bus; it was very late and we were tired.

Finally, we met our exchange partner at South Dartmoor’s school.

My guest family was very kind. My partner exchange’s name was Maisie Freeman. She has a sister Megan, and a big dog named Betty! They showed me a lot of beautiful places, such as Totnes. We went there by train, and after we had a walk in the forest. I had a great time with them.

Their school was very big, they had a lot of different and interesting subjects too, like cooking and climbing!

One day we had to teach Spanish to the littlest students of the school, they were really cute!

I really enjoyed this experience. I met a lot of people, tried to “survive with my English”, learned new words and expressions and tasted different types of food.

This is a funny way to learn English or improve it, when you are there, you have to try to talk all that you can and not be shy or scared to make a mistake, just talk and be ready to learn new things!

1. When we visited the school, they were celebrating the red nose day, on this day all the students play games, wear funny costumes, and obviously a red nose!! They do this to save money for their school the 15th of March.

2. This is Totnes a beautiful small village on the countryside. Here I tested typical food like fudge or pasty.

3. This is South Dartmoor’s School. This picture shows the climbing wall activity. One day all the Spanish people climbed to the top; it was so fun! The school had seven buildings for different subjects!

I hope you have enjoyed with my story!!! Thank you for reading!

BY LUCÍA ALONSO DE MEDINA VIVAR 4ºESO C

DO YOU KNOW HOW IMPORTANT IT IS TO READ?-by Naila Pérez

 Do you know how important it is to read?

Reading is one of the most important and useful activities performed by human beings throughout their lives.

Don't you believe me?

First, reading, just as all other intellectual activities, is an exclusive activity of human beings, only living beings who have been able to develop an intelectual and rational system, evolve. This means that reading is one of those activities that define us by what we are against other living beings.

Incredible, right? Why should we waste a thing we are the only ones to have?

Furthermore, the importance of reading also resides on the fact that humans can start receiving knowledge through it.

I know, I know. Sometimes we get lazy to start a book when we can just sit in the sofa and watch TV.

But reading always involves attention, concentration, commitment, reflection, all elements that make a better performance and better results.

To sum up, I wanted to talk about something that is very important to me while reading.

It is essential to find a relaxing spot that invites to concentration, which allows you to forget your

surroundings and immerse yourself in the story you read.

- Naila Pérez.