Sukey Tawdry's Kettle Hole

A Photographer for Life

Sukey — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 23:37:30 +0000

You know, it isn’t easy to choose among all the many powerful pictures Margaret Bourke-White took throughout her lifetime. I decided upon this one because of the ironic message she delivers through a myriad of contrasts: black/white, cheerful/glum, well-off/hard up, on foot/by car, sideways/frontward, above/below, and so on. A True or False exercise for Advanced students.

m_bourke-white

m_bourke-white_key

Sukey — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 16:55:34 +0000

There goes another one down under. Sigh! We do grow old, don’t we? A gapped text for Advanced students adapted from TIME magazine.

ken_russell

ken_russell_key

Ho! Ho! Ho!

Sukey — Sat, 10 Dec 2011 01:39:03 +0000

And a very merry Christmas to you all. Listen to Amy Winehouse sing Tommie Connor’s Christmas song “I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus”.

Do the following matching exercise and check your answers.

mommy_kissing_santa_claus

mommy_kissing_santa_claus_key

Now sing along to this video clip.

Life is Beautiful

Sukey — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 16:11:05 +0000

La vita è bella, but only for the chosen few. Scene? Switzerland (of course). Period? The present (today as yesterday as tomorrow, per saecula saeculorum). Here’s a multiple choices test for Intermediate students.

institut_villa_pierrefeu

institut_villa_pierrefeu_answer_key

Loulou and Yves

Sukey — Sat, 26 Nov 2011 09:59:27 +0000

How lucky of her, not having much else to do in life other than get by! I can think of worse things than being dubbed Yves Saint-Laurent’s muse. A cloze test for Advanced students.

loulou_falaise

loulou_falaise_key

Alice in Wonderland: Caterpillar Sequence

Sukey — Wed, 19 Oct 2011 09:28:48 +0000

Common mistakes when Spanish and Latin American students learn English include confusing an A /eɪ/ with an I /ɑɪ /, an I /ɑɪ/ with an E /iː/, a C /siː/ with a Z /ziː/, and pronouncing R /er/ instead of /ɑː/. To help them with these MAJOR problems, for they are major problems whatever people may say, I make them watch the caterpillar sequence from Walt Disney’s adaptation of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. The transcript of the dialogues at the bottom of this post can be used to practice the vowel s A /eɪ/, E /iː/, I /ɑɪ/, O /əʊ/, U /ju:/, and the letter R /ɑː/, and Lewis Carroll’s poem How Doth the Little Crocodile, a parody of the moralistic poem Against Idleness And Mischief by Isaac Watts, to practice the diphthongs /ɑɪ/, as in ‘Nile’ and / eɪ /, as in ‘scales’.

alice_and_the_caterpillar

Pardon my French

Sukey — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 01:32:33 +0000

Tacita Dean’s Film as Seen by Richard Dorment

Sukey — Mon, 10 Oct 2011 23:26:37 +0000

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/art/art-reviews/8818298/FILM-by-Tacita-Dean-Turbine-Hall-Tate-Modern-review.html

Click on the link above. Watch the video and listen to the way Richard Dorment pronounces the words film, artist, hall, whole, ramp, staircase, level, escalator, up, behind, canvas, again, and dramatic. Do you recognize any of the following vowel sounds in them?

[ɑː] [æ] [e] [ə] [ɪ] [ɒ] [ʊ] [ʌ] [ɑɪ] [eɪ] [əe] [əʊ]

Check your answers by clicking below.

tacita_dean_film_answer_key

Comin’ out of the Kitchen

Sukey — Wed, 28 Sep 2011 13:00:49 +0000

On August 15, 2011 TIME magazine published an interview with feminist Gloria Steinem in which she speaks about the road feminism has taken in the 21st century. Here’s a questions and answers exercise for NI2 students adapted from Ms. Luscombe’s interview. There’s also a link in this post to The Guardian’s May 19, 2011 article on the Dominique Strauss-Kahn scandal, in case you haven’t heard about it (which I doubt), another link to HBO’s documentary trailer Gloria in her own Words, and a last one to TIME video 10 Questions for Gloria Steinem, which you may want to watch after doing the exercise. Both the article and the videos are above your level, so don’t panic: just read, listen, and learn to the best of your abilities.

gloria_steinem_10_questions

gloria_steinem_10_questions_answer_key

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/may/19/dominique-strauss-kahn-scandal-france

http://www.hbo.com/documentaries/gloria-in-her-own-words/interview/gloria-steinem.html#/documentaries/gloria-in-her-own-words/video/trailer.html/eNrjcmbOUM-PSXHMS8ypLMlMDkhMT-VLzE1lLtQsy0xJzYeJO+fnlaRWlDDnszGySSeWluQX5CRW2pYUlaayMXIyMgIAacUXOA==

http://www.time.com/time/video/player/0,32068,1094264687001_2086963,00.html

Follow the Leader

Sukey — Sun, 25 Sep 2011 14:41:01 +0000

Sometimes copying is not so bad as it seems. It can be a question of survival in certain cases. Sweden has set a good example, well-worth following, so let’s all get rid of that stale, encrusted prejudice and just follow the leader in matters green. A gapped text for NI2 students.

hammarby_sjöstad_gapped_text

hammarby_sjöstad_gapped_text_answer_key