30.12.15
Oxford Dictionaries Word of the Year 2015 is…
That’s right – for the first time ever, the Oxford Dictionaries Word of the Year is a pictograph:
officially called the ‘Face with Tears of Joy’ emoji, though you may know it by other names. There were other strong contenders from a range of fields, outlined below, but was chosen as the ‘word’ that best reflected the ethos, mood, and preoccupations of 2015.
Why was this chosen?
Emojis (the plural can be either emoji or emojis) have been around since the late 1990s, but 2015 saw their use, and use of the word emoji, increase hugely.
This year Oxford University Press have partnered with leading mobile technology businessSwiftKey to explore frequency and usage statistics for some of the most popular emoji across the world, and was chosen because it was the most used emoji globally in 2015. SwiftKey identified that made up 20% of all the emojis used in the UK in 2015, and 17% of those in the US: a sharp rise from 4% and 9% respectively in 2014. The word emoji has seen a similar surge: although it has been found in English since 1997, usage more than tripled in 2015 over the previous year according to data from the Oxford Dictionaries Corpus.
A brief history of emoji
An emoji is ‘a small digital image or icon used to express an idea or emotion in electronic communication’; the term emoji is a loanword from Japanese, and comes from e ‘picture’ +moji ‘letter, character’. The similarity to the English word emoticon has helped its memorability and rise in use, though the resemblance is actually entirely coincidental:emoticon (a facial expression composed of keyboard characters, such as ;), rather than a stylized image) comes from the English words emotion and icon.
Emojis are no longer the preserve of texting teens – instead, they have been embraced as a nuanced form of expression, and one which can cross language barriers. Even Hillary Clinton solicited feedback in the form of emojis, and has had notable use from celebrities and brands alongside everyone else – and even appeared as the caption to the Vine which apparently kicked off the popularity of the term on fleek, which appears on our WOTY shortlist.
Now that we’re all used to emojis being a shorthand method of communicating our thoughts, emotions, and responses, it made us wonder: what would it look like if you used emojis in real life? Our video imagines what exactly would happen.
The Word of the Year shortlist
ad blocker, noun: A piece of software designed to prevent advertisements from appearing on a web page.
Brexit, noun: A term for the potential or hypothetical departure of the United Kingdom from the European Union, from British + exit.
Dark Web, noun: The part of the World Wide Web that is only accessible by means of special software, allowing users and website operators to remain anonymous or untraceable.
on fleek, adjectival phrase: Extremely good, attractive, or stylish.
lumbersexual, noun: A young urban man who cultivates an appearance and style of dress (typified by a beard and check shirt) suggestive of a rugged outdoor lifestyle.
refugee, noun: A person who has been forced to leave their country in order to escape war, persecution, or natural disaster.
sharing economy, noun: An economic system in which assets or services are shared between private individuals, either for free or for a fee, typically by means of the Internet.
they (singular), pronoun: Used to refer to a person of unspecified sex.
Learn more about the Word of the Year shortlist, including the reasons they were chosen.
28.12.15
27.12.15
26.12.15
Everyday Vocabulary Anagrams
An anagram is a word made by using letters of another word in a different order.
Anagrams Sorted by Topic
Get 10 Anagrams Randomly Chosen
Over 600 Anagrams Sorted by the Number of Letters
Page 1 starts out with the shortest words. Page 16 has the longest words.- Anagrams - Page 1
Number of Letters: 2, 3 - Anagrams - Page 2
Number of Letters: 3 - Anagrams - Page 3
Number of Letters: 3, 4 - Anagrams - Page 4
Number of Letters: 4 - Anagrams - Page 5
Number of Letters: 4 - Anagrams - Page 6
Number of Letters: 4 - Anagrams - Page 7
Number of Letters: 4 - Anagrams - Page 8
Number of Letters: 4, 5 - Anagrams - Page 9
Number of Letters: 5 - Anagrams - Page 10
Number of Letters: 5 - Anagrams - Page 11
Number of Letters: 5 - Anagrams - Page 12
Number of Letters: 5, 6 - Anagrams - Page 13
Number of Letters: 6 - Anagrams - Page 14
Number of Letters: 6 - Anagrams - Page 15
Number of Letters: 6, 7 - Anagrams - Page 16
Number of Letters: 7, 8
http://www.manythings.org/anagrams/
24.12.15
22.12.15
Christmas Song: «100 Degrees» by Kylie Minogue | video and lyrics
All around the world
Anticipation
Cause here it comes again
(You see)
No matter where you are
It could be near or far
But it still feels like
Christmas time
To me
(I tell you what you already know
Forget and ready to let it go
The countdown has begun)
Whether you're in the mmh
North, South, it's all the same
Let your troubles fade away
Get ready to love everyone
Whether the sun beats down
Or there's a storm around
Whether the snow falls or
It’s 100 degrees
It’s still Christmas to me
Oh, we're gonna dance tonight
Oh, let the temperature rise
To 100 degrees
To a hundred, hundred, hundred degrees
Don't you know you just can't get enough?
Gonna keep heating it up
To 100 degrees
To a hundred, hundred, hundred degrees
Can you feel the heat on the floor?
(Really gets you wanting some more)
Let's make it neverending tonight
Whether the sun beats down
Or there's a storm around
Whether the snow falls or
It’s 100 degrees
It’s still Christmas to me
Oh, we're gonna dance tonight
Oh, let the temperature rise
To 100 degrees
To a hundred, hundred, hundred degrees
Don't you know you just can't get enough?
Gonna keep heating it up
To 100 degrees
To a hundred, hundred, hundred degrees
Oh, what a cocktail time
Oh, we're loving all the fairy lights
(Everyone's got a different way
But we all want the same
We want disco night)
Hundred, hundred, hundred
Hundred, hundred, hundred
Hundred, hundred, hundred degrees
It's still Christmas to me
Oh, we're gonna dance tonight
Oh, let the temperature rise
To 100 degrees
To a hundred, hundred, hundred degrees
Don't you know you just can't get enough?
Gonna keep heating it up
To 100 degrees
To a hundred, hundred, hundred degrees
21.12.15
20.12.15
Christmas Song: «Every Day's Like Christmas» by Kylie Minogue | video & lyrics
Thinking of you
Thinking of all that you do to me
Out of the blue
All that I hope
But live without it
Fell into fume
And put a light that moved right through me
It's all coming true
And now everyday's like Christmas
Until you, everyday was ordinary
It's true and now everyday's like Christmas
All 'cause of you
Oh now there's angels all around me
I was down and disused
And now I can't believe you found me
Thinking of you
Thinking of all the storms we weathered
Thanks for pulling me through
I hope we'll always be together
'Cause it's true
Everyday before was heavy, ooh
And now everyday's like Christmas
Oh, you're just extraordinary
And all before my hopes are wary
Now my dreams are coming very true
I'm falling, I'm falling
I'm falling into you
Oh, you're just extraordinary
It's true, you make everyday like Christmas
Oh everyday
Everyday's like Christmas
19.12.15
The Christmas Song with BLAKE and Dame Shirley Bassey - video & lyrics
Chestnuts roasting on an open fire
Jack Frost nipping at your nose
Yuletide carols being sung by a choir
And folks dressed up like Eskimos
Everybody knows a turkey and some
Mistletoe help to make the season bright
Tiny tots with their eyes all aglow
Will find it hard to sleep tonight
They know that Santa’s on his way
He's loaded lots of toys and goodies
On his sleigh
And every mother's
Child is gonna spy to see if
Reindeer really know how to fly
And so, I'm offering this
Simple phrase to kids from
One to ninety-two
Altho' it's been said many times
Many ways
“Merry Christmas to you”
17.12.15
Gingerbread Fun - lots, lots and lots of interactive fun and educational activities for Christmas
This Gingerbread Man Storyboarder is a great way for students to re-tell or re-write a story, creating a sequence of scenes. They can select backgrounds, add characters and props, change the position and size of characters, add text in the form of captions, speech, and thought bubbles or write the story narrative below the scene on the timeline.
This Gingerbread Man activity is a great way to have students practice adding punctuation to sentences based around the Gingerbread Man story. The punctuation has been stripped out for students to add back in with two levels of activity.
Here is a great simple version for little ones at Starfall
Here is another online version that reads the story to students.
Here is a great Gingerbread Man story to read along with
Here is a version of the story from TopMarks
The Gingerbread Man Game to practice counting, matching and ordering can be found here.
Gingerbread Math:
Here are some great Gingerbread Math Interactives
Mathwire has some great Gingerbread Man Math ideas including:
This Gingerbread Man game allows students to punctuate simple or complex sentences.
16.12.15
DIY Christmas Decorations with Jamie Oliver's Food Team - with subtitles in English
Deck the Halls with three fantastic homemade Christmas decorations -- Popcorn Tinsel, Dried Fruit Garlands and Handmade Napkin Rings. Charlie, from Jamie Oliver's food team, will show you how. Simple, cheap to make, and really beautiful.
15.12.15
Lots, lots and lots of Christmas interactive activities that are educational and fun!!
These following bunch of sites are all from TESiboard and they are FABULOUS!
Christmas Bell Ringing (sequencing)
Elf Finger Game (angles)
Santa's Village has a new game to play every day!
Factory Balls- Christmas Edition is a fun site where you try to create the patterns and colors of the ball on the tree! It sounds much easier than it is!
Sugar, Sugar is a fun game that challenges you to click and drag to draw lines before
sugar starts to pour. Get sugar to the cups.
Civiballs Christmas Pack is a another fun game. Click to cut a chain and release a ball.
Move all colored balls to their matching goals.
Santa's Little Helper is a fun game where you have 1 minute to collect
as many presents as you can using the up and down keys.
The Christmas Tree Puzzle is a fabulous online site for problem solving and critical thinking. The goal is to light up the Christmas tree by connecting all the wires to the light source. It's lots of fun but it is definitely a challenge that requires lots of problem solving.
The Christmas Tree Maze is another fun tree puzzle. To complete this task, you must drag the bar of lights at the bottom of the tree along the maze of white wires until one of the end bulbs lights up the star at the top. Any move is legal, as long as all three bulbs stay in contact with the white wires at all times.
Santa's Sleigh is a fun and challenging game. The object is to put sleighs so that each Santa has one sleigh & each sleigh only belongs to one Santa. It's fun & much harder than it sounds!
Christmas Memory is a game is a basic concentration game with a twist.
If you aren't fast enough, the rows move and you are timed.
It has levels that range from EASY to VERY HARD.
On the site Santa Claus's Trip, students view a map of the world, are shown the route that Santa will take to deliver toys, and then they have to touch the countries to recreate his route. When the correct country is touched students even magically travel to that country to see the gifts delivered. What a great way to review the world map and have fun all at the same time!
Holiday Practice is a fun game of multiplication practice. For each multiplication question you answer correctly, your gingerbread house gets a new decoration. There are three levels of multiplication to practice: 0-3, 0-6, or 0-9. At the end of the game, if you've done well, you get to decorate your very own gingerbread house. What a fun way to practice multiplication facts during the holiday season!
Christmas Lights: Math Fact Fun is a a fun fact game that allows students to put up Christmas lights after practicing math facts (addition, subtraction, multiplication, or division facts) for one minute. Students will want to work quickly because the more math problems you solve correctly, the more lights you will be given to decorate your house!
Christmas Lights: This game is the same as the Christmas Lights: Math Fun Facts game but without the math facts. A great and fun game for younger students who need to practice their mouse skills! The lights in both games are animated and look beautiful with the overhead lights turned off. Both of these games would be wonderful to use as a whole class on your Smart Board or individually with students at their own computers.
