Marcela's E-Portfolio

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Stressing Situations

Nowadays, most of people are stressed, and there are many situations that cause this problem. Sometimes, it can be something very usual, like traffic jam. Some situations are stressful just for us, like giving presentations. For students, there is a very tense situation: tests, and about all exams, because our continuity depends of them, wherever we study. Although there’re situations more complicated, as difficult neighbours. For example, they can make party all night long every weekend, and they not let you sleep, that’s horrible. However, I really think that the most stressful situation is to have financial problems, if you don’t have an early solution, you can even lose your house, so that is really stressing. Finally, I think that it all depends on us; we have to control ourselves, because stressing situations will always be there, waiting for us.

The System Education in Chile

In recent years the system education in Chile has changed, used to be different. For example, years ago it was very difficult go to University, and just rich students used to go University. Nowadays, there are lots of students who enter to colleges or institutes, because now there are many scholarships that help. Years back, there was not system for evaluating students, now we have the SIMCE, created in Pinochet’s government. Also, in a few years ago, there was a change in the compulsory education, now it became 12 years, although experts suggest two years more. Chile has advanced, but all we know that System Education in Chile needs many more changes.

Copán

Copán is an archeological place lies to the west of Honduras, close to Guatemala for the western. The ruins of Copán are located in the valley of Copán in the west of Honduras. Also, this city has a river, that years ago changed its course, destroying part of Copán. For this reason Copán’s river had to be redirected to save the archaeological site. The Copán’s ruins are between hills with more than 2,300 ft above mean sea level. Every year, many tourists visit Copán to walk into the main archaeological park, which is the greatest Maya archaeological site in the country of Honduras.

Copán is a city of Honduras and one of the richest archeological sites in the American continent. The ruins of Copan were discovered in 1570 by Diego Garcia de Palacio, a Spanish sailor and scientist. Copán has a historical record since the Classic period and was the capital city between the 5th to 9th centuries AD. Copán was a powerful city with a Maya kingdom in the west of Honduras. This city has many pyramids, squares and palaces, but the most famous monument in the ruins, is the Altar Q, that it was dedicated to the king Yax Pasaj Chan. Besides of be an archeological place, Copán is nowadays is a famous tourist place in Honduras.

Now I can . . .

Hello.

It has passed six months since my first class at University, and there are many things I’ve learned, I’ve improved my skills. For example, in “Listening” now I can understand social conversations on different topics, opinions and a short interview. Also I can understand general and specific information in phone conversations. I can understand numbers, although it’s kind of difficult for me to understand big numbers, like years, but now I’m getting better.

For me is “Speaking” is a kind of difficult. I don’t why, maybe it’s because I’m kind of shy, but I really need to improving this, I’m going to be a English teacher, so I try to speak better. In the high school, teachers never spoke in English, and at the University I’ve spoken a lot. At the beginning of the semesters, teachers always make introduce us to the classroom, and to say things as our likes and dislikes and our favorite activities, so I think I’m improving in that. Also I can ask and answer questions about nationality and age. In the speaking skill, I need to improve many things, It’s hard for me describe someone, my vocabulary to describing people is very poor, and to ask for things in a shop is not easy.

In the high school, I read a lot. There was a thing called “reading comprehension”, so almost every week we read an article in English. For this reason, I feel that “Reading” is the best skill in me. So now I can understand the sequence of events and the main ideas in a short article. Also I can find the information I need, and guess the meaning of words in an article. There’re some things I have to improve, of course, like understanding the main idea of each paragraph in an article, and give my opinion about ideas in a text.

And I can forget the competence “Writing”, that is very important too, we need to know grammar for developing this skill. Maybe this paragraph is not so good, but I really believe that I’m improving this skill. Now I can give personal information about myself in an email, I can write a phone conversation and to give someone advice in a letter, or to write about my city, but I cannot write an invitation or a thank you note, and to write about my future plans.

Saturday, 25 August 2012