22 FEBRUARY 2011

MORNING

Today, we are going to do listening.

As students, we will have to listen to lectures in class and this can be done through effective listening. 

Effective listening is built on four basic aspects >> attitude

                                                                     >> attention

                                                                     >> comprehension

                                                                     >> evaluation

Besides these basic aspects, there are some general tips that can make listening not only effective but also meaningful. As student, you should ::

• Identify the purpose of listening. Try to distinguish between useful information and that which is not.
• Not look at the surface meaning of what is being said. Rather, you should look for feelings or the real intention of the speaker. This can be done through familiarising yourself with real spoken language such as the use of  in complete sentences, slang, repetitions and others.
• Try to guess the meanings of words which are not familiar to you by focusing on the context in which they appear.
• Understand that in real life, most of what you listen to is not repeated. In such cases, you are advised to just get the gist of the information and grasp the main ideas presented.
• Listen for details or specific information when you listen for the second time to any repeated information such as announcements.
• Refrain from immediately responding or answering question. Listen to everything that is being said without unnecessary interruptions.

We have 2 listening skill ::

1. Listening for main ideas- find out the general idea or the gist of a listening material

2.Listening for specific information- this requires us to listen for specific details related to certain incidents, situations or activities.

At the end of class, Miss Zu provide us with a game. "GUESS WHAT ?". In a group, consists of 4 members. One will be a guesser and the rest will give the main ideas or keyword based on the picture that given by Miss Zu.

NIGHT 

At night, we doing the reading part, that is distinguish fact from opinion

A FACT 

A fact is ::

= objective information that can be checked or proved to be true

= information that does not change

= not a statement about the future

Clues to identify fact ::

*the use of dates and year 

eg >> Walt Disney was born on 5th December 1901, and died on 15th December 1966.

*the use of  statistics/ figures/ precise numbers or quantities

eg >> Since Edmund Allary and Tenzing Norgay reached the summit of Mount Everest in 1953 more than 1000 climbers from 20 countries have also conquered the 8848 metre mountain.

*the use of definition

eg >> Adolescence can be defined as the stage in a person's life when one develops from a child  into an adult.

*when stating a geographical or scientific fact

eg >> The earth is round.

AN OPINION

An opinion is ::

= is a statement  that cannot be proved to be true or false.

= is one's personal belief , idea or feeling about a subject.

= can be a statement about the future.

Clues to identify opinions ::

*the use of adjectives which show your point of view or emotions ( exciting, fun, excellent, worst, ugly, pretty ) 

eg >> The climb up Gunung Ledang was exciting.

*the use of comparison words which show a comparison between two or more things (more, most, better, best, worst, least )

eg >> Siti Nurhaliza is the most talented singer in Malaysia.

*the use of other words which show frequency, possibility, advisability and necessity ( probably, likely, perhaps, may, should, must, always )

eg >> Sheela is probably still angry with her boyfriend for not remembering her birthday.

* the use of phrases which show a belief, a suggestion, a feeling or an opinion (it appears that, in my opinion, I believe, I suggest, I feel, I think )

eg >> It appears that, Jasmin and Ayu are both interested in the same.

Next, we do some activities. Miss Zu ask us to get in a form of group consisting of 5 members. Then, we were given a stuff. Different group get different stuff. My group get a pack of pen. What we gonna do is, we must became a promoter to promote that pen. The advertisement that we will use must contain fact and opinion. While a group promote their product, the rest will guess how many fact and opinion that have been used by the group. 

That's all for today ^_^