Showing posts with label Vocabulary. Show all posts

Review The Giver | Lois Lowry

The Giver's cover
Hello Blog Friends :), I hope you are doing well and working hard on your new year resolutions list.

Recently, Shizusan, Shishimesan, and I started reading Lois Lowry's books, and we have begun with the well-known novel 'The Giver'.

I got this book last year at a bookfair, I found the description on the cover intriguing, so I bought it. Later on when I told my teacher about it, she pointed out that it is the first novel of an exhilarating series followed by "Gathering Blue, Messenger, and Son" and she highly recommends us to read the whole set.

Anyway, three weeks ago we finished The Giver, and we really enjoyed going through its chapters despite how some paragraphs sounded funny and ridiculous, such as the telling of feelings ritual every night, and when someone makes a mistake or causes trouble they must apologise by using an customary formula.

 Like in my case: "I  apologise for making you read this useless post" and everyone must reply in unison "We accept your apology, Bassima!".

On the other hand,  the most shockingly gloomy part of the story was when Jonas (plus us for sure) found out what it really means to "release" someone out of the community, I remember when Jonas watched a recorded tape of  his father doing a release of one of a pair of identical twins, Shizusan and I couldn't read that section, so Shishimesan read that dreadful painful part, while we were sobbing and rubbing our eyes. (Women!)

However, if you are willing to improve your English vocabulary, and your level is between intermediate and advanced, I think this is a very useful novel to practise, it is well written and the language is straightforward.

It is not a heavy going book that forces you to check up almost every single word, it is interesting, catchy, fictional, and we went through the book swiftly without any difficulties.

I made notes for the new vocabulary I've learnt while reading, they're in a PDF document , organized chapter by chapter, with some examples, I will insert the link to download the file at the bottom of this post.

Of course the novel is not out of copyright, so I cannot provide any links to download the book.

If you wish to read more information about the setting, plot, and awards check out the giver article on Wikipedia HERE

I would like to send a special thank you to my reading mates from Japan, Shizusan, and Shishimesan -who joined us recently-, for lifting up the burden of boredom and making my Mondays the best ever in my life. Love you guys xoxo

 View and download The Giver Notes  (on Google drive)

Tags: Learn English, Reading, The giver, Lois Lowry, Vocabulary, Notes, Bassima

A tale of two cities vocabulary

     Today at 7am KSA time, Shizu and I finished reading the simplified version of A tale of two cities by Charles Dickens, published by Penguin Readers level five (classics/ British English).


     It is the second book we finished reading this year, we are so happy and eager to start reading the new book "Woman in White by William Wilkie Collins".  it is a simplified book from Oxford Bookworms library (level 6).


Here are the vocabulary I learnt from the book:


Download Word file of the vocabulary:

English Fairy Tales notes on PDF

     Hello World :)

I am so glad to tell you that Shizu and I have finish reading the delightful book English Fairy Tales by Joseph Jacobs, We had fun reading this book and laughed too much about some silly tales, the book was very useful for our English because it is written in old fashioned English style, at first it was hard and difficult but after few tales we had less difficulty with the book. We used to read the book every Monday, I usually make notes for the difficult vocabulary in the tales we are going to read and send them to Shizu, so when we've finished I realised that I've got useful information and I shall share them with the next readers of the book.
     I sorted all the notes in one PDF file, and put the contents on the first page. The file contains notes for these following tales:

Tom Tit Tot Tale

The three sillies Tale

Rose tree Tale

The old woman and her Tale

How jack went to seek his fortune Tale

Mr. Vinegar Tale

Nix Nought Nothing Tale

jack Hannaford

Binnorie Tale

Cap o’ rushes Tale

Teeny-tiny Tale

Jack and the beanstalk Tale

The story of the three pigs

The master and his pupil Tale

Titty mouse and tatty mouse tale

Jack and his golden snuff-box Tale

The story of the three bears tale

Jack the giant killer Tale

Childe Rowland Tale

Molly Whuppie Tale

The history of tom thumb

Mr.fox Tale

Lazy Jack Tale

The strange visitor Tale

Laidly worm of spindleston heugh


     Basically I put the words definition, its type, an example, and a photo for some words. Here is a snapshot for one of the pages:

Click on the picture to see its full size
 Now without any further delay here are the links:


Download The English Fairy Tales Book from HERE.


Download the Notes from HERE.


Alternative link for the notes is HERE.


 I hope you will find these notes helpful while you are reading the book.


Bye for now :) 


Tags: English fairy tales,notes,on PDF file, read,and,enjoy,the book,with better,understanding, for its,vocabulary,we love English,links,are on,google docs,BassimaAlansar

Nix Nought Nothing with notes

     Hello world.

again here is a post about one of the English Fairy Tales, this time I will put notes about the Tale of  Nix nought Nothing , I've read it with Shizusan on one of our reading dates.  
now without any delay here are the notes, I hope it will help you with your English learning.

-         Laddie (noun): Scottish informal  for LAD = a boy or young man.
-         Whirlpool (noun): a small area of the sea or other water in which there is a powerful, circular current of water which can pull objects down into its centre.
-         Giant (noun): an imaginary creature like a man but extremely tall, strong and usually very cruel, appearing especially in children's stories.
Also: giant (adjective): extremely large.
-         Dashed: To break or smash by striking violently.
-         Bonny (adjective): beautiful and healthy.
-         Fond (adjective): having a great liking for someone or something.
"She was very fond of horses."
-         Beast (noun): an animal, especially a large or wild one.
-         Drain (verb): f you drain something, you remove the liquid from it, usually by pouring it away or allowing it to flow away, and if something drains, liquid flows away or out of it.
"We drained the pond and filled it with fresh water."
"Drain (off) any liquid that is left in the rice."
Also: to make someone very tired.
          "The long journey completely drained me."
-         Prong (noun): one of two or more long sharp points on an object, especially a fork.

-         Sprung (verb): past participle of spring= to appear or start to exist suddenly.
"Thousands of new businesses have sprung up in the past couple of years."
informal "Where did you spring from? - I didn't see you come in!"
-         Briar (noun) also: brier: a wild rose bush with long stems and sharp thorns.
-          Hair dagger: 

-         Cautiously (adjective): in a cautious way = describes someone who avoids risks.
-         Fled (verb): past simple and past participle of flee = to escape by running away, especially because of danger or fear.
"She fled (from) the room in tears."
Also: flee the country = to quickly go to another country in order to escape from something or someone.
-         Lodging (noun): a temporary place to stay.
" The price includes board and lodging" (= meals and a room to sleep in).
lodgings  (UK informal  also digs): a room in someone's house that you pay money to live in.
-         in vain: unsuccessfully or uselessly.
" I tried in vain to start a conversation."
      - Wed (verb): (used especially in newspapers) to marry someone.

The Tale of binnorie with notes


Hello World Of English
 The tale of Binnorie is one of my favourite tales, I read it few weeks ago with my nice friend
Shizusan from Japan.
 click here to read the story.
 Here are the notes, I am sure they will help you to understand this English Fairy tale:






-         Woo, ing, ed (verb): to try to persuade someone to support you or to use your business.
"a political party trying to woo young voters"
-         plight your troth: to (promise to) marry.
-         Plot, ting, ted (verb): to plan to do something bad:
"They plotted to bring down the government."
Also means: to make marks on a map, picture, etc to show the position or development of something.
-         Heir (noun): a person who will have the legal right to someone's money and possessions when they die:
"He is the heir to a huge fortune."
-         Sink, sank, sunk (verb): to go down or make something go down below the surface of water and not come back up.
"During the first wave of attacks, they sank three enemy ships."
"My feet keep sinking into the sand."
"The sun sank below the horizon."
-         Hasten (verb): to make something happen faster than usual.
hasten to do sth: to hurry to do or say something
"I was not, I hasten to add, the only male there."
-         Hush (noun): a period of silence:
"A hush fell over the room."
-         Yonder (adverb): in that place or direction.
-         Snap (verb): BREAK: If something long and thin snaps, it breaks making a short, loud sound, and if you snap it, you break it, making a short, loud sound:
"The twigs snapped as we walked on them."
"She snapped the carrot in half"  (= into two pieces)
snap (sth) open/shut/together, etc: to suddenly move to a particular position, making a short, loud noise, or to make something do this:
"She snapped the book shut."
"The suitcase snapped open and everything fell out."
SPEAK ANGRILY: to say something suddenly in an angry way:
"I don't know what you mean," he snapped."
"I was snapping at the children because I was tired."
LOSE CONTROL: to suddenly be unable to control a strong feeling, especially anger:
"She asked me to do the work again and I just snapped."
ANIMAL: If an animal snaps, it tries to bite someone:
"The dog was barking and snapping at my ankles."



Keep an eye on my blog, I will add new notes very soon.
bye.

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