Wonders of Nature_Red Radish...

Late this afternoon around 5, on impulse, George and I went to Yangmingshan for cherry blossoms. We stopped by a vegetable stall and bought some vegetables and tangerines for my mom and mom-in-law. Having never seen red radish, I bought two for them respectively, picturing their surprised look.

Long Time No See...

This morning, when I was cleaning out the inbox of an email account, which had exceeded the storage quota, I came across an old FB message notifying that Spencer mentioned me on his FB page. Going to the page, I found this photo, which was taken at a gathering before Spencer was going to the States for further studies. Along with it is a message by Spencer:

Dinner with Diego and Taco

A selfie I took

Time: 6:30pm~8:45pm

Place: solo pasta, Taipei

The Revenant, the Movie

This past Sunday, a chilly day, George and I took my mother-in-law to watch the movie The Revenant. It just won this year's multiple Golden Globe awards, including the best drama, best director, and best actor. (See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/73rd_Golden_Globe_Awards)   The movie is about how the protagonist Hugh Glass, played by Leonardo DiCaprio, suffered and endured adversity in severe weather to survive and revenge. What he goes through is almost impossible for ordinary people, which makes the movie inspiring. Whoever has watched it  will find their problems or hardship dwarfed by Hugh Glass's if they are going to be confronted by any.

P.S. I covered my eyes with my hands at several brutal scenes.

********

Here is a review by the TIME magazine:

Good 2015 SAT Chinese & English Essays

It occurred to me that I seemed to forget to post good SAT essays for the year 2015. Here they are. There are 14 for Chinese and 15 for English.

http://www.ceec.edu.tw/GoodWritingPieces/104SatGoodWritingPieces/104%E5%AD%B8%E6%B8%AC%E5%9C%8B%E8%8B%B1%E4%BD%B3%E4%BD%9C.htm

The writing task:

二、英文作文（占20分）

說明︰1.依提示在「答案卷」上寫一篇英文作文。

2.文長至少120個單詞（words）。

提示︰下面兩本書是學校建議的暑假閱讀書籍，請依書名想想看該書的內容，並思考你會選擇哪一本書閱讀，為什麼？請在第一段說明你會選哪一本書及你認為該書的內容大概會是什麼，第二段提出你選擇該書的理由。

2016 SAT English Test

The test items of this year's SAT:

http://www.ceec.edu.tw/AbilityExam/AbilityExamPaper/105SAT_Paper/105SAT_PaperIndex.htm

This year's SAT English test:

http://www.ceec.edu.tw/AbilityExam/AbilityExamPaper/105SAT_Paper/02-105學測英文科_定稿.pdf

Comments:

http://www.cna.com.tw/news/firstnews/201601235005-1.aspx

學測英文閱讀測驗內容冷僻 考生恐卡關

發稿時間：2016/01/23 12:05  最新更新：2016/01/23 13:00

（中央社記者許秩維台北23日電）今天是學測第二天，首節考英文。高中教師認為，今年閱讀測驗內容冷僻，必須注意文章細節，且選項誘答力高，考生應該會在閱讀測驗卡關。

On Admission to High School--"全面免試…為何偏鄉孩子就這麼倒楣？"--from UDN

http://udn.com/news/story/7339/1464369-%E5%85%A8%E9%9D%A2%E5%85%8D%E8%A9%A6%E2%80%A6%E7%82%BA%E4%BD%95%E5%81%8F%E9%84%89%E5%AD%A9%E5%AD%90%E5%B0%B1%E9%80%99%E9%BA%BC%E5%80%92%E6%A5%A3%EF%BC%9F

全面免試…為何偏鄉孩子就這麼倒楣？

2016-01-25 01:59 聯合報 李家同／清華大學榮譽教授（新竹市）

全面免試不是新的口號，很早以前就有人提出這個觀念，而且也得到很多學者的贊同。這些學者最痛恨考試，他們認為考試使得教育變得很僵硬，學生因為準備考試而失去了創造力，所以他們贊成全面免試。可是這種想法其實是絕不不可行的。

My comments: In fact, tests are not that bad. It depends on how they are given. An article I read years ago pointed out that in India, the entrance exam gave essay questions. That's very different from what we have here in Taiwan. Multiple choice questions account for more than three quarters of the test.

It Is Snowng in the Taipei Area!

From my high school classmate. This is where she lives, in Xindian, around 500 m.a.s.l (500 meters above the sea level).

For the first time in the Taipei Area except for Yangmingshan, it snows. The temperature in Taipei dropped to 6°C, hiting the lowest in 44 years.

 

"Kind customer leaves mother of autistic son in tears"--from CNN

http://edition.cnn.com/2016/01/20/us/customer-letter-autistic-son-irpt/index.html

Kind customer leaves mother of autistic son in tears

By Jareen Imam, CNN

Updated 2311 GMT (0711 HKT) January 20, 2016

(CNN) Managing the meltdowns of a 6-year-old was something Lauren Nordberg had down to a science.

She carried headphones around if it got noisy for her son. And she kept an iPad on hand to distract him if there was too much stimuli. But as they settled into their seats in a busy diner filled with people off from work for Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, she realized she had none of those things.

NTNU Class Reunion

Time: 11:30am~3pm; 3:40pm~5:10pm

Place: Skylark, Taipei; Ting-fang's home

Participants: 李秋霞, 吳碧玲, 彭玉霞 & her husband 陳家榮, 張璧君, 黎文靜, 劉豔雲, 陳允華, 鄭淑華, & me

I went to our first NTNU class reunion in 2016. As usual, we talked and laughed to our hearts' content. It seemed that our gathering could go on and on.

Gathering with Solo

Time: 12pm~5pm, Jan. 21, 2016

Place: MoonRiver

Cool English Video Project Meeting

Time: 2pm, Jan. 20, 2016

Place: NTNU

Attendees: 賴淑麗教授, 楊小慧教授, 盧貞穎老師, 林玉姬老師, 莊玉玫老師, 吳湘妮老師, 何齊心老師, 李欣諭 (研究助理), and me

http://www.coolenglish.edu.tw/moodle/

Please visit the interactive learning video section at the above website, and you know what we are doing. I was recruited last November. This was my second time to attend such meeting and I am  going to share some test item writing tasks. What do we do? We watch videos and write comprehension questions and other types of test items.

The More We Get Together, the Happier We'll Be

(from Shu-yuan)

 



It was cold and rainy, but our hearts were warm and sunny.

Chatting with Students from Abroad

Today I spent around four hours chatting with students.  One in the morning on the phone from Texas, the other in the evening via Skype from New York State.

Hungren reminded me to explore the world instead of doing the same thing all my life. Brian, with whom I chatted in English for 2 and a half hours, raised a thought-provoking issue. Are we Taiwanese losing our cultural identity? Can you say any Taiwnese proverbs? Can you sing any Taiwanese songs? Can you tell a Taiwnese folktale?

"Tsai Ing-wen Elected President of Taiwan, First Woman to Hold Office"--from NYT

It's interesting to read the same news reported by different news agencies.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/17/world/asia/taiwan-elections.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=first-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=1

Tsai Ing-wen Elected President of Taiwan, First Woman to Hold Office

By AUSTIN RAMZYJAN. 16, 2016

TAIPEI, Taiwan —  Tsai Ing-wen was elected Taiwan’s president on Saturday, becoming the first woman to win the office. Voters gave her Democratic Progressive Party, which is skeptical of closer ties with China, control of Taiwan’s legislature for the first time, giving her broad authority to enact her policies in office.

My comments: For the elected, challenges just began.

Globish Words Explained in English--a Good Website

I posted an entry about Globish on Jan. 4, 2013.

http://june.ettachou.com/2013/01/04/globish-%e5%8f%aa%e8%a6%81%e6%9c%831500%e5%80%8b%e5%96%ae%e5%ad%97-%e5%b0%b1%e8%83%bd%e6%ba%9c%e8%8b%b1%e6%96%87/

Recently, my friend Annie introduced a website "Globish Words Explained in English" in a book we co-wrote for 9th graders.

"Tsai Ing-wen elected Taiwan's first female president"--from BBC; "Taiwan Nationalist concedes defeat, congratulates Tsai Ing-wen as President"--from CNN

Let's see how the BBC and the CNN reported Taiwan's presidential election result.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-35333647

Tsai Ing-wen elected Taiwan's first female president

Tsai Ing-wen has been elected Taiwan's first female president.

Ms Tsai, 59, leads the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) that wants independence from China.

In her victory speech, she vowed to preserve the status quo in relations with China, adding Beijing must respect Taiwan's democracy and both sides must ensure there are no provocations.

GEPT Learning Website--"全民英檢上線 課程、資料庫免費用"--from UDN

http://udn.com/news/story/6904/1440345-%E5%85%A8%E6%B0%91%E8%8B%B1%E6%AA%A2%E4%B8%8A%E7%B7%9A-%E8%AA%B2%E7%A8%8B%E3%80%81%E8%B3%87%E6%96%99%E5%BA%AB%E5%85%8D%E8%B2%BB%E7%94%A8

全民英檢上線 課程、資料庫免費用

2016-01-14 07:43 聯合報 記者林秀姿、張錦弘／台北報導

因應新世代的數位英語學習趨勢，主辦全民英檢的財團法人語言訓練測驗中心（LTTC），本月起推出3項線上資源，免費提供教師與研究人員免費使用。網址：https://www.lttc.ntu.edu.tw/LTTCe-learning.htm

My comments: I don't think it is just for teachers and researchers. It's also for English learners.

語測中心表示，免費線上資源包括「LTTC英檢學苑」線上課程，針對個人學習者設計。還有「LTTC英檢練習平台」，提供初級、中級及中高級（相當於CEFR A2至B2）的模擬考題庫與試題詳解。該平台目前先推出聽讀測驗，預計4月將再增口說及寫作測驗的人工批閱服務。

On Reading--"洪蘭／翻轉偏鄉 不一樣的親子共讀"--from UDN

http://udn.com/news/story/7340/1443225

洪蘭／翻轉偏鄉 不一樣的親子共讀

2016-01-15 02:07 聯合報 洪蘭（中央大學認知神經科學研究所教授）

最近去美國參加了一個閱讀的世界高峰會議，使我對閱讀的推動有了不一樣的看法。

Happy B'day, Annie!