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Educational channel devoted to learning English language. Channel in Russian: @violaschool VK: https://vk.com/violaschool Our chat: @violachat Feedback: @tonyprots
Do you know what languages are spoken in the world of Star Wars? We are trying to make you go into Eng, but could you speak this language?:)
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Looks terrifying, right? Don't worry, it's just a cut from a famous "Killing joke" comics. Moreover, it illustrates the second conditional:)
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COMICS/STARWARS/NEWYEAR STUFF! More hilarious jokes, cool pictures and educational readings are coming!
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Just a couple of book jokes and we will turn to a new geek topic. More educational content is on the move!
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Is it possible to read a 400-page book in one day? David Raudenbush Jr., educator and journalist, shares his experience:
As an English major, I often had read long novels in a very short amount of time. While reading a 400-page book in one day is not always ideal, it is possible.
There are actually several factors that will determine if you can accomplish this. Your reading speed is only one of them.
Remember a few years ago when the Harry Potter books were extremely popular. Adults and children would line up to get the latest book and they would read it in a day. Comments would show up all over the internet in less than 24 hours.
Those books were 700 pages long, or more.
However, the readers had three factors in their favor: motivation, purpose and level of difficulty. First, the were highly motivated to read the novels. Secondly, the purpose was to read for entertainment. Finally, the reading level of the books wasn't that high. If you can read at a fourth-grade level or higher, JK Rowlings isn't going to trip you up with her vocabulary and sentence structure.
Now, imagine attempting the same thing with an assignment to read Invisible Man for an English class. Your motivation might be strong, getting a good grade in the class. However, your purpose, reading for class, will likely require deeper knowledge of the text. That's going to slow you down. Finally, the text is much more complex demanding a higher reading level. If you know you have a test to take or a paper write, your reading will naturally, and inevitably slow down.
So, the answer to the question depends on three factors:
How motivated are you to read the book?
What is your purpose for reading?
How difficult is the reading level of the text?
This week is the week of reading.
Wait a secund, we have already had this topic...
However, reading never ends!
Enjoy it with us.
Offtop, but we simply can't miss this joke.
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Have you ever thought about what three colors look best together? Then we found an answer for you. Liselle Coker, Architectural/Interior designer with Diploma in Fashion design, from Quora is ready to tell you:
"This question can be answered several ways. There are several approaches to finding colors that look best together.
1. You can consult the color wheel, and try combinations of colors that appear immediately next to each other in the color sequence (analogous colors) . These will go well together because they are in the same color family
2. You can also consult the color wheel and choose two colors opposite each other in the wheel (complementary colors ), and then add a third color that can be a neutral tone, or a color that is analogous to one of the two. Complementary colors offer the most contrast. Neutrals anchor the color combination
3. You can consult nature and identify colors that emerge within a scene that you find calming. Our bodies respond positively to nature , so color combinations from nature tend to look best to us
4. When combining colors, consider tone and intensity. Match colors of similar tone and intensity for the most cohesive effect. For example, match deep jewel tones with other jewel tones (eg. gold with emerald green and indigo) or pastels with pastels. Also, consider "warm" and "cool" tonalities when choosing your colors.
5. Remember, when breaking color rules, or crossing tonal and intensity boundaries, allow two of the tones to support each other, and hold the third for contrast.
6. Colors don't have to "match" they have to "go". This means that even color combinations that seem atypical can look best together. To achieve this successfully, train your aesthetic eye by studying unusual color combinations in nature, and also color combinations that have been used by fashion, architectural and graphic designers.
I know I did not TELL YOU which 3 colors look best, because there are many color triads that are good, but I trust that the above selection methods help you to make a suitable choice for your purposes".
How do you like Australia? Now we are turning to a new topic.
It's COLOURS!
Or colors. It depends on what language you like more.
It was an irresistable temptation to post it. We did, as you see.
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Australia is "a bit" dangerous for newbees. Some jokes related to this "fact"...
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We know that the week of comics is turning into something really long. Till the very end of the year, we will treat you with some STAR WARS jokes, facts and figures - as well as English idioms, grammar and vocabulary.
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Well, opinions differ. With which statements do you agree? (and yes, we know that there are no comments yet; just think it over :) )
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Marvel Comics: Who is more intelligent: Tony Stark or Bruce Banner?
Andrew Wolff on Quora answers this question the following way:
I have to point out that the question asked for a binary choice. Reed Richards and Doctor Doom are both extremely smart, arguably smarter than Tony Stark or Bruce Banner, but the question was: which of the two is more intelligent.
The definition of intelligence is tricky here. Both are commonly classified as "geniuses." Yet I would argue that one cannot measure their intelligence on the same scale.
Tony Stark has a genius for gadgets and engineering. His mind shakes hands and chats with conductors, insulators, composites, and alloys.
Bruce Banner tends toward the biological. DNA, RNA, cytochromes, mitochondria, these are the things his mind finds comfortable rearranging.
Give both of them a dying girl in a hospital bed and Bruce will come up with a serum that will put her back on her feet in a day. Tony will come up with an electromechanical prosthesis that will assume the function of her failing biological system and get her back on her feet in a day.
You see? Both smart, but different smarts.
Hey! We have not forgotten about you. We were preparing something really captivating. The last two weeks of December will be packed with...
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It looks like a sad truth. In fact, it is...
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Here is the answer:
...Yes, I read a lot.
My mother made me a member of a library when I was just 12. Since then, I have been an avid reader.
Reading makes you an amazing person from a normal person. It brings the joy and thrill of transporting you to a world which has completely different set of events oblivious of the present world. Reading is a process which requires your full attention and if done properly, triggers a series of electrochemical reactions on encountering disparate events in the book. It makes you a better person. You may not have experienced a lot of things in your life first handedly but it gives you the advantage of experiencing them-in different modes.
Based on what you read, reading will always make you a better person. It will improve your vocabulary, embellish your narration and strengthen your skills of analyzing people and situations.
Reading is an integral part of my life and it's difficult imagining life without it.
Read a lot, read whenever you can and wherever you can.
I am an Indian and 21 in age but because of reading, I know so much about different people, places, feelings, customs, traditions and human behavior. I would have been a lot less knowledgeable if it weren't for reading.
It's never too late to start reading. Grab a book today!
That awkward moment when due to the Internet connection the photo to the post is published four hours later than the post itself ;)
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So, what's it like to live in Australia?
On Quora.com Peter Baskerville, Australian citizen who lived there for over 50 years, answered it in this way:
"In my opinion, as a descendant of the European colonists, Australia today is a paradox that in isolation and due to the 'tyranny of distance' has created in the past 200+ years, a world of strange harmonious conflicts. Modern Australia is often misunderstood by the rest of the world but it makes perfect sense to us Aussies that live there.
Here what Australia is like to me ...
YOUNG yet OLD - for starters, while we are one of the youngest declared nations on earth, yet we inhabit its oldest land form and imbibe a heritage that is recognized as containing the world's oldest living cultural history
LARGE yet SMALL - also, while Australia is earth's largest island it is also the world's smallest continent
FLOOD yet DROUGHT - at the exact same time, a state of emergency can exist for raging floods in one part of the country and debilitating drought in another
SPACE yet CONGESTED - we have a huge land of 8 million sq km on which to build our homes, yet 85% of us huddle together in the south-east corner of the map and live in urban areas located less than 50 km from the coast with development only covering 0.3% of the land mass
CHAMPIONS yet UNDERDOG - we love our champions and world-winning sport teams and individuals yet we have a genuine soft spot for the 'underdog' and will support them in every contest
PROUD yet SUSPICIOUS - we are extremely proud to be Aussies yet we are inherently anti-authority, can't understand rampant nationalism nor patriotism and are suspicious of politician's motives who promote it zealously
RESPECT yet 'BOO' - we respect and honor our politicians when they are on the world stage yet 'boo' them as a tradition, when they choose to show their face at our sacred sporting events
VICTORY yet DEFEAT - our armed forced have won many gallant victories in global conflicts, yet we choose to celebrate and honor our greatest defeat - the ANZACs at Gallipoli
BUSH yet CITY - our identity is indelibly linked with the legends of the bush, yet 90% of us actually live in the cities and have never lived in the bush
MANY yet FEW - we call everyone mate even though we each only have a few
SINGLE yet MULTI - we consider Australians a single nationality, yet 20% of us were born overseas and 40% of us have mixed cultural origins
SERIOUS yet LAUGH - while we take ourselves seriously, it is each Aussie's 'god-given' job (or his best mate's) to declare with great merriment their own stupid acts
DEMOCRACY yet MONARCHY - 'we the people' democratically elect our government, yet we accept the fact that the Australian Head of State is a birth determined monarch who lives in another country
ENGLISH yet STRINE - we were blessed with an inherited global 'lingua franca' in the English language, yet we chose to develop our own peculiar 100,000 word lexicon in Strine that can only really be understood by people from this land down-under
LOSS yet WIN - two remembrance days at either end of the emotional spectrum stop the nation of Australia (1) honoring the loss of 8,000 young Australians on the beaches of Gallipoli on ANZAC day 25th April 1914 and (2) honoring the winner of a 150 year old horse race known as the Melbourne Cup which is run on the first Tuesday in November
DELICACY yet UNEATABLE - our national culinary delicacy and icon (Vegemite) is uneatable to most everyone else on the planet".
We have been thinking over a new topic for quite a while. There already have been such themes as music, films and reading. We are fed up with leisures and open the week of Australia!
Frankly speaking, Australians don't speak English - they speak Australian English.
Luckily, we have found a vocabulary list for you. Enjoy, and never mess those phrases up!
http://www.englisch-hilfen.de/en/words/british_australian_english.htm