ESL Blogs

Why I write?

There are number of reasons why I write. First, I want to learn English. It's one way to practice myself in the language. Second, I wanted to make friends with other people throughout the globe. Since English is the Universal Language, I need to write and practice it to make friends with them. It's sad to say English is my weakest subject. I don't like this during my elementary and highschool. I don't remember any English topic from my elementary grades maybe because I don't understa

Listen To News: Polio Outbreak Feared in Syria - 22 October 2013

Discussion Question: A director from WHO referred to the "duck test" in a response about this possible outbreak. Why would he use this expression, and what do you think he meant by it? (The duck test expression goes as follows: "If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it probably is a duck.")

  I suppose this director has intended to say  the polio case in Syria is a real situation, proven fact, only

How does writing on MyEC help you to  connect with people? 

    First, I have to say that my particular  finding of writing as a delightful way to learn and connect to other people from all around the world is a  recent find, because for anyone who wants to write nicely it's demanding it has a satisfactory reading level, what I  really didn't have sometime ago. How can we intend to write something if we have nothing in mind to base on? For me, It's just unthinkable you write with no reading backg

October 20th is a special day for writers! Writers around the world, including English teachers and students, will be sharing how they use writing to connect with others.

I would like to invite all MyEC bloggers to join this month's writing challenge. Let's show the world how we write to connect with other learners and teachers from around the world.  

Your Task

1. Create a new blog post. Use the title: Writing Challenge: Write 2 Connect

2. Write a few paragraphs to answer this question: How does wr

This story is somewhat late in it's posting because my own thoughts and emotions needed to compose it properly. Honestly, It should have written it more than a few days ago. At least it's still September.

Our good EC friend (Helen) inspired me to finally write it.

On the morning of September 11, 2001, I was awakening to a fresh cup of coffee and simply watching the news before the day's work began here in California. Suddenly, it was interuppted by breaking reports that New York City was exploding

It was happened to my neighbor. She is in Chennai. She has a daughter of 4 years old. The girl is so cute. The accident took place at her when she was one year old. She (the mother) cooked rice using pressure cooker and kept it in the kitchen self. Baby was walking to the kitchen and pulled the cooker. It opened and the heat rice poured to the child top to bottom. Then she started crying. The mother took her and rushed to the hospital. The girl was severely injured but saved. She recovered after

I am sure you have known IQ, EQ and FQ, but do you also know SQ? Giggling, let me tell you the secret.

SQ is short for Shape Quotient. Shape Quotient? I will explain it in Mickey's way.

The so-called SQ means your ability to control your body and your health. I'm healthy therefore I am; I am shaped therefore I am. There goes a Chinese saying, the body is the capital of revolution. It's the most primitive capital.

Nowadays, with the rapid development of human society, there are more and more people

After writing blogs about dogs and cats, it seems unfair not to write a blog dedicated to a mouse. You have to admit that Mickey Mouse is cute too. LOL

Did You Know?

1. Mickey Mouse

Did you know that the most popular mouse is the Mickey Mouse? LOL. I think our ⊱ Mickey ⊰ will become the second most popular 'mouse' after this. There are few selected fun facts about Mickey Mouse that I want to share with you guys.

a. When the late Walt Disney drew a mouse, he wanted to call it as Mortimer Mouse. Howev

Welcome to Chongqing and visit the love ladder

This touching and uplifting story of the couple who lived happily in a cave for fifty years after they ran off together due to criticism from their family and community is a true story.

His name is Liu Guojiang[刘国江]while her name is Xu Chaoqing[徐朝清]. He was born in 1930s in Chongqing, China and died in 2007. The cave the couple eloped to and lived in is in Jiangjin County, Southern ChongQing Municipality.

Liu Guojiang carved over 6000 steps up the mou

Here's a fun Halloween activity that we can do online. Grab a partner and some colouring utensils. Let's draw!

1) Draw a monster. Use as much detail as you can! 

2) Pick an online partner from MyEC.

3) Record (or write) instructions about how to draw your monster/alien, and send it to your partner. Don't show your picture to your partner (yet!). You can also give instructions via the chat room or Skype/Facetime. Describe your picture to your partner. Be specific!

4) Take a photograph of your pict

I just realised that there are a lot of idioms relating to dogs after I had written a blog about dogs. It does not seem fair, right? LOL. So I make my mission to write things about cats, and of course, only the great and wonderful things. LOL

Did You Know?

1. Fun Facts about Cats

Did you know that there are many fun facts about cats that most of us did not know. I would like to share some of them, and the rest you can search them yourselves. LOL. Well, maybe you can click this link to read some of

I want to dedicate this blog to 'man's best friend' which is a dog and sometimes the natural 'enemy' of a cat and which always bullies and chases cat. Just to show no hard feeling for a dog. 

Did You Know?

1. Man's best friend

This is one of the best term describing a dog, however, that reference is basically can refer to any animal that performs valuable service to humans. The affection for dogs as pets is pretty recent trend. Previously, dogs were mostly used as hunting dogs and defense dogs rath

Writing Challenge - From the News Archive

Cruise Ship Disaster in Italy: 17 January 2012

Discussion Question: Should a crew wait for all of passengers to be safely off board a damaged vehicle before abandoning it? What about "survival instincts"?

 In order to answer the question I'll try to be reasonable , because this question faces complex human issues: right to life, right to security, right to protection to name a few.

 I notice when it comes to the wreckage of the cruise ship "Costa Concordia"

You bring light to EC with your presence

Your perfect views on imperfect world make these tired eyes see differently

No matter how much we are going to miss you

Your Mom and your sister are going to miss you more

My dear Grand daughter, Noorany

I don't have a single bone of a poet in my body

But how I wish I can write a beautiful poem for you

I know EC had brought you joy

and EC had brought you pain

But what I know for sure

EC was brighten for a while with your joy

with your blogs

with your poems

Now purple

This writing challenge is based from an article Organic Foods Have Same Nutritional Value in Listen to News : dateline September 4, 2012

Discussion Question: Do you choose organic food over non-organic food at the grocery store? Which types of food are you most careful about buying?

I believed in order to answer the discussion question, first we really need to fully understand the meaning of 'organic'. In this term, 'organic' means the way that agricultural products are farmed and processed. In or

International Translation Day is celebrated every year on 30 September on the feast of St.Jerome , the Bible translator who is considered the patron saint of Translators.The celebrations have been promoted by FIT (the International Federation of Translators ) ever since it was set up in 1953. In 1991 FIT launched the idea of an officially recognised International Translation Day to show solidarity of the worldwide translation community in an effort to promote the translation  profession in diffe

In this blog, I just want to share with you some of more familiar and often used expressions. 

Did You Know?

1. October baby

When a person is said to be an October baby, it means that she/he was born prematurely; to be exact, she/he was born on her/his eight month. The origin of this expression was based on the meaning of October. October is the 'eight month' in the Ancient Roman calender. In the Ancient Roman, March; or it is called Martius back then, is the beginning of the year. Therefore, Octob

Hi everyone! This month I am going to ask a big favour of all of you! In a few weeks, I am going to be doing a presentation about EnglishClub's Listen To News resource. I am going to show teachers how their learners can use this resource to practise listening, reading, writing, and speaking. During my presentation, I will show some examples of how MyEC members use this resource. We have some very creative learners and teachers, and I can't wait to show off your work! Teachers from around the wor

Writing Prompt: The first conditional is used to talk or write about real possibilities in the future. Review the rules for using first conditionals. Then pretend you are a parent who wants his or her kids to be behave for their grandparents on the weekend. Write a note to your kids. Offer some bribes for good behaviour.

Dear Baobao and Beibei,

Be good for your grandparents this weekend. If you are obedient to them, I'll continue my last story which you want to know the end for a long while. When

Do you like reading news or making audio recordings for MyEC? Why don't you join our latest video challenge?

For our new activity, I would like to invite you to make a video of yourself reading one of the news from MyEC feed. The news are recorded by our admin, Tara Benwell. You can listen in the way she pronounced and narrated the news. This would help you to be familiar with tone and inflection.

Practicing reading in front of the camera would help us gain self-confidence and improve our speaking