Friday, July 30,2010

กลาง:
วันนี้ก็เหมือนทุกๆวัน
ต่างกันตรงที่ มันเป็นวันสุดท้ายของการเรียน Speech เย้! จบสักที
กลับบ้านมาก็นั่งฝึกทำเลขไปเรื่อย แล้วเพื่อนเวียดนามที่ชื่อ Anne ก็ติดต่อมา
บอกว่า จะขอมาติวเลขที่บ้าน หนูเลยบอกโอเค ติวกันจนดึกอะ ง่วงมาก เหนื่อยมาก นี้ก็เพิ่งอาบน้ำเสร็จนะเนี้ย ปีนี้หนูมีเพื่อนเยอะมากกก นิสัยดีหมดเลยทุกคน หนูรักเพื่อนหนูทุกคนเลย อิอิ

อะเดี่ยวหนูลงรูปให้ดูแล้วกัน วันนี้เจ๊กิ๊ฟทำ Grill cheese ให้กินตอนเที่ยงก่อนไปเรียน

โอเค หนูไปนอนแล้ว คิกๆๆๆ

Thursday hanging out

Ok everyone, we have been decided to meet each other at the clock tower on Thursday at 2 PM. If someone know where the Thai restaurant (Happy Chang)is and want to go by yourself, please feel free to do so. People who want to go, please comment on this post, so I know how many people will be there. If you guys want to bring other friends with you, please do it. I might bring some of my friends with me too. I hope to see you guys there. Also, this is my phone number 760-658-4990. If you guys have any question, please call me.

Going to Thai restaurant (Happy Chang)

Hey ! guys !!
This is Gift. After we hung out at Dixon lake, I had a lot of fun with you guys. Therefore, I plan to take you guys out either lunch or dinner at Thai restaurant (Happy Chang). It is closed to Palomar college. I plan for this coming Thursday (May 21). We can meet each other at the clock tower at Palomar college at a certain time, depend on lunch or dinner time. Therefore, I need a vote from you guys about who want to do it for dinner or lunch. Please comment and vote for either lunch or dinner, so I can set a specific time. Also, please tell me who want to go, so I can talk to the Thai restaurant owner before hand. Here is the address to get to Happy Chang: 1450 W Mission Rd San Marcos, CA 92069. From Palomar college, you just drive toward Buena creek for about half a mile. It should be on the right side. You will see a bus stop and West Gin Bakery, just drive into that area. What I want you guys to do now is just vote for either lunch or dinner time and tell me who want to come. This is my e-mail address if you guys have any questions : g_gang_gamer@hotmail.com.

PS. You can get a free Thai tea at Happy Chang if you are Palomar students ^o^.

Picnic at Dixon Lake May 15,2009 @1pm

Here is the list of what you guys are bringing for friday May 15.Make sure you guys bring enough for evryone and bring any games you guys have to play.Thanks and see you there!



Food:

Mr.Lawson
Kosanovic Dejan
Elizabeth Molina
David Cruz
Gulzhan Walker

Fruit:

Jude Song

Guillermina Rodriguez

Soda/Juice:
Kitzia Vega
Silvia Villalobos

Elma Vasquez

Chips:

Julio Aguayo

Luis Garcia

Desserts:

Abby Villanueva

Gift

Me

Plus I will also be briging plates,napkins, cups, spoons, forks etc...

Making New Friends

Communicating with my classmates was fun and interesting. I learned many things by their posts. Having friends from everywhere give us the opportunity to know different place that maybe we will never have the chance to know by traveling. Sometimes we think that the world is just how we see it but it is not. There are others places that are so interesting. When the semester started, we did not know each other, but with the past of the time we began to know each other and that help the class to be more interesting and fun. I think that having a blog just for the ESL 102 class is so creatively and helpful for some students whose shyness are more stronger than anything. I strongly recommend this methods to all the teachers, I know that they will see an improvement in their students. Thanks to all my ESL 102 classmates for sharing those wonderful stories!!!!

FUN ACTIVITY

The first day of the semester, I felt strange because I just knew some classmates, but I had new classmates too. I wanted to be with my friends with the people who I knew. Later we did work group, and I met some other classmates. It was interesting because in the class there were people from different culture, when we began to talk; we shared some of our culture. Later, we began the activity to write on a blog about our culture. When I began to write about our culture on the blog, we got to know each other. It was good to know how our culture is different, but that it is not a barrier to get to know each other. I think that this activity help me a lot to know my classmates. Also, it is helpful when we meet other people with the same culture. It will help us to understand and talk with others. Sometimes it is difficult to talk with people from a different culture because of their language. We do not if she/he wants to talk with a person from another culture. Also, other teacher could do this activity, because it will let their students to get to know each other. It will be easier for students to have friends from different culture. The class will be more fun, and it will be easy to work in groups. I think that more classes need to do an activity like to write on a blog about our culture.

COMMUNICATION

Communicating with my classmates has been an enriching experience for me because I learned a lot of new things that I did not know before. Knowing new things about my classmates’ culture has been really interesting. We are not able to go to every single place in the world, so having friends from different places could be very helpful to know more about different cultures. They can share each other about what they use to do. For example, they can talk about their festivals, holidays, customs, legends, food, believes, clothing, etc. Sharing new things with other people could be really interesting.
I think is important to know about different cultures because sometimes people talk about their culture, but you don’t understand anything because you don’t know anything about that topic. On the other hand, if you already know what they are talking about, you can get into a conversation with them and make new friends. Then, they can share with you some other things that you don’t know.
I encourage other teachers to create a blog for their students because it is a really good way to know about other’s cultures, especially when students don’t talk each other. Creating a blog, students can get curiosity about a culture and ask the writer about it. They can get to have a good friendship with their other classmates besides just talk with their s mall group of friends.
Also, creating a blog is important because teachers can know more about their students and create a good relationship with them. Having a good relationship with teachers is important because it can help students to feel comfortable with the teacher and ask whenever they have questions.

At first, I thought that writing on the blog was just a homework I had to do, until I realized that communicating with other students is a great way to know each other culture. I really started to like writing on the blog because every time I logged in and read some of my classmates writing I learned a lot of new things about their culture. This activity is a perfect way to get to know more about other people cultures and practice on the writing. By doing this activity I learned things that I didn’t imagine that they exist. For example, the “Shinkansen” in Japan is the fastest transportation that exists in the world and the bending machines in Japan; I never thought that they would be selling milk, eggs, etc. Another thing that got my attention was how girls in Japan decorated their cell phones, I-pods and pens. They really make them look pretty. I really enjoyed writing on the blog and communicate my culture with my classmates. Many teachers should use the blog technique to communicate with each of their students and get to know more about each other culture.

OUR-COMMUNITY BLOG

Throughout the semester, it was hard for everyone to get to know each other. We are from different cultures and we were afraid to communicate one another in the class. However, by communicating with other students in the blog it was great way of knowing each other better. We were posting blogs about our cultures and I bet everyone liked about writing his/hers culture. I learned a lot from other cultures during the blog activities. Learning about other cultures was a good experience not only for me but for the rest of the class as well. It was a great idea of Mr. Lawson to create this community blog because it’s a really good and new way to communicate with others. Well, I think that It is very important to know about other cultures.
I also think that its was good way to bring people closer together because usually most of the students are shy and they don't like to get involved in class, they don’t participate. However, now a days everybody is involve with computer and having to communicate online is very exacting. Many students will become more involve and comfortable in talking about themselves and his/her culture but also in sharing ideas about any subject. So yea, the bloggin activity was a great idea. At the end our community blog activity turned out to be a place where we go an express what we think and comment what the others classmates think...PEAce!!

A Great Discovery

At first, I did not like blogging because I am bad at using a computer, and the blog post was just homework to do. However, this blog post got more interesting and valuable for me to learn my classmates' cultures and also my own culture too. Knowing and understanding a different culture is not that easy because we have already had a prejudice or stereotyped images toward one's culture. Also, we do not have many opportunities to communicate with foreigners to know a foreign culture. Nevertheless, our ESL teacher, Mr. Lawson and our classmates provided a great opportunity to share each own cultures. Through the blog spot, I could learn not only foreign cultures but also my own culture. To make a blog post, I researched honorable things about my culture. As my classmates added a comment to my blog, I have been surprised and happy because the thing that I thought as normal was incredible to my classmates. As I introduced many interesting things about my culture, I could be proud of being the one who could tell the world how wonderful my country is. Also, by reading my classmates’ blogs, I learned many differences and also similarities between their cultures and my culture. Especially, it became a big surprise when I learned that my culture and my classmates’ cultures share many commons because it is authentic to know people who speak a different language and live so differently have similar holidays or food. As one can see, knowing foreign cultures and understanding each others can let us show respect to the others, and also we can see how we are one of the citizens in the small planet, the earth. We still have prejudice or discrimination toward people who are different from us, but understanding each own cultures can be a help to solve these problems because we can see how similar we are. Therefore, teachers should let students do this blog post as Mr. Lawson did. The blog post can be a great writing activity, and also a great discovery all over the world.

Blogging rules!!!

The blog that my classmates and I did is about our cultures, and I think it is just an amazing experience. Just reading about difference between cultures makes persons wonder and maybe even explore more about these cultures. I see this type of writing as a pure fun, where person can learn something very interesting and at the same time something different from his or her own culture. In addition, I don’t consider blogging like a rest of the school work. I consider it is an interaction with the other cultures, my friends’ cultures. Through reading the blog I am getting a feeling that I know my classmates for a long time.

Also, by learning about their different cultures I started to understand their behaviors, opinions, and reaction on the different things. For example, for some people from the ESL class it is just normal not greeting a professor’s entrance into a classroom. For me, however, it was cultural shock because I am used to stand up and greet professors when they are entering a classroom.

Moreover, the importance of the blog is that the cultural things that my peers and I posted are not common in every day conversation. It is deeper, and I would say more personal because a culture is a part of persons’ identity. For example, Gulzhan’s name means “soulflower”, but if I just talked to her I don’t think we would touch that topic, and I would not know such an interesting detail from her life.

The blogging is definitely one of the activities I like the most in my ESL class. It is too bad that more professors don’t do the same activity in their classes.

The Chance

During this semester, I, myself realized that when I get to know other classmates and communicate with them, I could learn much more experiences. It was really wonderful to know about my classmates’ cultures. I feel very close to them when understanding their cultures. I also amazed about their cultures and countries. Each country has its own feature that other people should get to know. However, it really surprised me when I found out that in some of countries’ cultures are similar with my country. For example, the Thai’s food and Vietnamese’s food is almost the same. Also, the traffic in Iran is the same as the traffic in Vietnam. I didn’t travel around the world, though I could know a little bit about the nations in the world. I was so touch when having a chance to get to know about my classmates and their countries. Our community blog has brought us closer together. Although we come from different countries around the world, we are now as brothers, sisters and as a family. I would like to give thanks to my teacher, Mr. Lawson who had an idea for writing about this blog. He gave us an opportunity to get to know each other, and other teachers should use this project to help their students to be closer to each other.

Communicating with other students in the bloog is a grate way of knowing eachother. posting bloogs about culture has been probably the most fun activity in the class. I have learned a lot about other cultures in the bloog. I have learned things that i didn't even imagine that they would exist for example, vending machines in Japan. I knew about vending machines but, they sold snacks, but this ones in Japan they sale eggs, milk and other kind of groceries. I never imagine this existed. Learning about other cultures in the bloog has been a realy good experiance. I am sure it hasn't been a realy good experience only for me but for a lot of students in my class and for other people who visit the blogg. puting coments in other peoples bloog is good also because you can get to tell who ever posted the blogg about any thing new or any question someone might have. Other teachers should use the blogg and get their students to know more about their friends culture. It is very important to know about other cultures because someone might be doing something that a student from other culture doesn't practise and could be rude or disrespectfull for them. This activity is very nice if any teacher trys it i am shure he or she wont regreat it. They will be realy hapy about it, and their students will learn a lot about different cultures.

Why Every Teacher Should Use Such Project as the Blog?

     I have been living in California for about four years.  Adjusting to life in a new country is

an  ongoing and long process that needs a lot of time and work.  When I came here, I felt confused, unsure, uncomfortable since all was new for me.  First I tried to keep in touch with my family and friends in Kazakhstan through e-mail.  Then, I began to find friends who live here with the same background and language as I speak.  When I started my ESL classes, I discovered that I was not alone in this situation since my classmates were from different countries with different backgrounds.  Also, some of my classmates wanted to make friends too.  I know that it is very hard to make new friends because some of the students are not open and outgoing.  I think that communicating with my classmates about our cultures has been an enriching experience not only in improving our writing skills but also in making a good relationship.  We could share our cultures, traditions and learn other cultures.   I think that every teacher should use such projects as the blog to get students communicating with each other.  It is a very good oppotunity to know each other better by sharing some subjects that is very interesting for everybody in the class.  Also, we students have to work to get new friends because our teacher cannot do some things that are dependent only on us.  If I liked somebody's post, I tried to send my comment with encouragement and warm words.  I discovered that the next day my classmate's face who got my comment was happy and was smiling.  Then, we usually began to talk about this posting, and it is was a very good opportunity to get new friends.  Also, I tried to pay attention to my classmates who regularly sent comments on my posts.  It is not a secret that little things can make a real difference.  Thanks to this blog, I learned about different cultures, and know my classmattes better than when I met them in the begining of this semester. I think that learning only through books is boring.  Therefore, we have blogging where we can share comments.  In my opinion, it is very fun and interesting.  This blogging helped me to improve my writing skills, make new friends, and learn different cultures, and traditions.

Our Blogs

Throughout the semester, it was hard for everyone in getting to know each other and since everyone was from a different culture their were many people that didn't know each other and were afraid to talk to one another in the class. By being introduced to a online blogging website, everyone had the chance to share something about their culture and because of that many were learning about peoples cultures and had a really good experience with it. Taking the time to write a blog about our culture has made communication with others in the class much better, and many of us have learned so much from each other. I think that all teachers should provide a blog website that can make their students communicate with each other in some way.I think that its a good way to bring people closer together because usually many students are shy and don't like to get involved in having to communicate with others. By having to communicate online, many students will become more involved and comfortable talking about themselves and sharing their ideas to one another.