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Imotaki September 3rd「英会話・英語 アミック」

This past Monday Andrew-sensei and I went to an imotaki event at Goshikihama in Iyo-shi with my father-in-law and another friend from the States. It was a beautiful late-summer-not-quite-fall night, and the large pots of imotaki went great with the tall cans of Asahi as the sun set. There was also some entertainment: a group of taiko players! It was an ideal transition into my favorite season.

-Joe

投稿日:2018年9月6日

The Day Wikipedia Went Dark 英会話・英語 アミック

When I’m looking for a topic for my weekly blog post, the first place I head to is *drum roll*… Wikipedia! I know Wikipedia gets a lot of negativity because it can be user edited, (and not always with correctly sourced information), but Wikipedia is truly a wealth of information. I, for one, love their homepage, because it’s the news and history, condensed. It’s up to me to see what piques my interest at that moment. If nothing does, fear not! I can always click “On This Day” and be whirled away to a list of birthdays, deaths, and other anniversaries. I love a good list and usually I can find an interesting read from either the homepage or the “On This Day” feature. I know I’m not the only one who loves Wikipedia. I haven’t gone so far as to create an account and edit articles, after all, I am but a mere plebe when it comes to research. That being said, I’ve used Wikipedia to write these blogs, to do research for essays in high school and college, to win arguments, to check spelling…the list goes on and on. I wondered, what would happen if Wikipedia just went away?

Once upon a time, Wikipedia tested this alternate timeline while protesting SOPA and PIPA, American bills that would censor websites, in 2012.  Instead of its usual blue and white theme, the following image was displayed on the homepage:

 

Jan. 18, 2012: Online encyclopedia Wikipedia has begun a 24-hour "blackout," a dramatic response to proposed legislation that many top websites claim will reshape the web.

 

While I applaud the website for shutting down (aka losing revenue) in response to an unjust bill, a different part of me says, a whole 24 hours without Wikipedia!? What about students who procrastinated and needed to get projects finished? What about people who always have to be right? What about people like me who check the Wikipedia homepage for fun? I suppose without net neutrality, using the internet for personal enjoyment would become a thing of the past anyway. I wish I could find reactions from Wikipedia-users in 2012 to Wikipedia’s black out, but alas, I don’t know how to optimize that search. My reaction? :

 

 

Image result for drool face

投稿日:2018年9月4日

英会話・英語 アミック - Five uses of ‘get’

Five uses of ‘get’

Buy / obtain
Get
 can mean buy or obtain. 

  • I got myself a new phone last weekend.
  • I need to get some new clothes. 

Receive
Get 
can mean receive.

  • I just got a message.
  • I got a bike for my birthday!

Become
Get 
with an adjective can mean become.

  • I’m getting annoyed.
  • It’s got quite hot in here suddenly.

Understand
Get can mean understand.

  • I don’t get this joke.
  • I don’t often meet people who get this type of movie.

Arrive
Get can mean arrive.

  • I need to get home early so I’m off!
  • What time will you get here?
投稿日:2018年9月1日

Umm-ing and like-ing your way to fluency – 英会話・英語 アミック

Recently at Amic, we did evaluations of our students’ progress with English. One of the criteria in which me measured our adult students on was their ability to ‘use hesitation mechanisms’ when speaking. In English, classic examples of these would be ‘um’, ‘uh’, ‘like’, ‘I mean’, ‘well’, and similar noises we make to show the other person we aren’t finished speaking and are thinking about what to say next.

Although it’s not something I’ve ever seen explicitly taught in an English textbook, I think using these filler sounds is an important step for any language learner wanting to sound like a native speaker. I may even start correcting my high-level students who fill their hesitation with etos and anos and see if it’s something that can be truly taught, or if they are something that just get ‘absorbed’ after listening to and interacting with enough native English speakers and media. 

All of this also made me curious as to what filler sounds are used in other languages, and Wikipedia did not disappoint with me with their thorough list. Here are some interesting ones I came across:

  • Chinese: en (um), zhège (“this”)
  • Dutch: ehm (um), dus (“thus”), eigenlijk (“actually”)
  • French: euh (um), bahben (“well”), tu saist’sais (“you know”)
  • Persian: eh (um), bebin (“you see”), yaʿni (“I mean”)
  • Polish: eee (um), no (“well”), wiesz (“you know”)
  • Swedish: öhm (um), asså/alltså (“therefore”, “thus”), liksom (similar to “like”)
  • Turkish: yani (“meaning…”), işte (“that is”), and falan (“so on”)
投稿日:2018年8月31日

the greatest and best #1 stream of consciousness English conversation blog post ever **READ NOW** 「英会話・英語 アミック」

Well, dear reader, as of now I have nothing to say. Really. Nothing. 

(silence)

**************

 

 

 

 

If I felt like this in an actual face-to-face social situation, I would perhaps feel obligated to make nervous small talk in the hope that it eased the tension of the silent room. But online, surrounded by Earth’s HIVE of BUZZING information peddlers and broke content creators (the information and “content” probably falling somewhere between dire and excruciatingly meaningless), I’ve found silence is golden. Shiny-soul-warming-morning-sunshine-on-your-face-after-a-good-sleep golden.

But do not fret, dear reader. I’ll have something to say next week. Something so unbearably important to tell everyone that I’ll practically race my own shadow to my laptop followed only by the hammering of my icy, air-conditioned fingers descending on the keyboard like a hailstorm in an attempt to convey everything as accurately as possible before it slips my mind forever.

Okay, no.

Not really.

Joe

投稿日:2018年8月30日

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愛媛県・松山市・東温市で最大規模の英会話スクール、アミック・イングリッシュセンター

アミック・イングリッシュセンターは、1998年に愛媛県重信町(現東温市)で英会話スクールとして創業して以来、愛媛県松山市と東温市を中心に、これまで20年以上にわたり誠実に英語を教えて参りました。
最近のグローバル化に伴い、英会話スクールの必要性はますます増加しております。特に、スピーキング・リスニング・ライティング・リーディングの4技能をバランスよく持つ人材が必要とされており、英検など4技能対応型の試験への期待も高まっております。小学校の英語必修化や資格試験を重視する大学入試の大幅な変更もすぐそこに迫って来ている中、 アミック・イングリッシュセンターとしては、英検やTOEICの対策にも力を入れており、優秀な外国人及び日本人講師を積極的に採用しております。

特にお伝えしたいアミック・イングリッシュセンターの魅力は、「英語を教える外国人講師及び日本人講師が極めて優秀である」「英語教授法により、効果的に英語力を向上させるカリキュラムが組まれている」「初心者にも優しく、かつ通訳という高い英語力が必要な指導も可能な英会話スクールである」という点です。

TOEICの点がなかなか伸びない、英検を取りたい、更に英語力を伸ばしたい、通訳者になりたい、これから英語を始めるので正しい勉強法を知りたいという方は、ぜひアミック・イングリッシュセンターにお越しください!

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