READ AND TALK - Creation

Have you ever heard of Biomimetics?

Biomimetics or biomimicry is the imitation of the models, systems, and elements of nature for the purpose of solving complex human problems.

Humans have looked at nature for answers to problems throughout our existence. Nature has solved engineering problems such as self-healing abilities, environmental exposure tolerance and resistance, hydrophobicity, self-assembly, and harnessing solar energy…(Wikipedia)

WAS IT DESIGNED?

The Upturned Wing Tip of Soaring Birds

A JET plane in flight creates rapidly spiraling swirls of air at the tips of its wings. These vortices cause drag, increasing fuel consumption. They also buffet planes that may be following closely. Thus, flights departing from the same runway must be sufficiently spaced to allow time for the vortices to dissipate.

Airplane engineers have discovered a way to reduce these problems. Their solution? Winglets, inspired by the upturned wing-tip feathers of soaring birds, such as buzzards, eagles, and storks.

Consider: During flight, the feathers on the wing tips of those large birds bend upward until they are almost vertical. This configuration balances maximum lift with minimum wing length. It also improves performance. Engineers have designed airplane wings with a similar shape. Using innovative wind-tunnel testing, they found that if the modified wings were precisely curved at the tip and properly aligned with the airflow, they improved aircraft performance—nowadays by up to 10 percent or more. The reason? Winglets minimize drag by reducing the size of the vortices. Moreover, winglets also create a form of thrust that “counteracts some of the normal drag of the airplane,” says the Encyclopedia of Flight.

Winglets thus enable airplanes to fly farther, carry a greater load, have shorter wings—which also facilitates parking—and save fuel. In 2010, for example, airlines “saved 2 billion gallons [7,600 million L] of jet fuel worldwide” and contributed to large reductions in aircraft emissions, says a NASA news release.

What do you think? Did the upturned wing tip of soaring birds come about by evolution? Or was it designed?

Read more: http://www.jw.org/en/publications/magazines/g201502/birds-upturned-wing-tip/

Questions:

1. What is Biomimetics or Biomimicry?
2. What have airplane engineers discovered?
3. What have engineers designed?
4. Why was the new design needed?
5. What were the results?

 

Divide the class into two groups, those who beleive in Evolution and those who beleive in Creation.

Ask the students to write down the reasons for their beleif.

Pairwork: they need to discuss the topic with each other. The aim is that they can express their opinion with their own words in a polite way.

Use expressions such as:

• I agree because
• I agree with you because
• I don’t agree/I disagree because
• I don’t agree with you/I disagree with you because
• In my opinion...
• I think
• I don’t think etc.

LET'S TALK - Cooking

Cooking

1. Can you cook?
2. Who does the cooking in your family?
3. Did you learn to cook when you were a child?
4. Did you know how to cook when you got married?
5. Do you use recipes or not?
6. What recipes do you like to use?
7. Have you ever tried Jamie Oliver recipes?
8. What do you think about Jamie Oliver?
9. Have you every heard of Julia Child?
10. Have you tried her recipes?
11. Have you ever seen the film - Julie & Julia?
12. What do you think about this film?
13. Do you think it is a good idea to write a blog about cooking?

 

The perfect pancake recipe

I have tried several pancake recipes but this one seems the best. I found it on my husband’s tablet app. With this recipe you won’t lose a single pancake!

250 g plain flour (or mixed)

2 eggs

2 pinches of salt

600 ml skimmed milk

2 table spoon of oil

Mix the ingredients. Then leave the batter to rest for 20-30 minutes.

Use a brush to oil the pan sligthly before starting to fry each pancake.

This recipe gives you about 8 big pancakes.

You can double the ingredients or half it depending on how many you would like to make.

LET'S TALK - Handling setbacks

You don’t go through a problem,
you GROW through a problem!

 

9 Quotes about how to handle setbacks

1.     "You build on failure. You use it as a stepping stone. Close the door on the past. You don't try to forget the mistakes, but you don't dwell on it. You don't let it have any of your energy, or any of your time, or any of your space." Johnny Cash

2.      "Failures are finger posts on the road to achievement." C. S. Lewis

3.      "I knew that if I failed I wouldn't regret that, but I knew the one thing I might regret is not trying." Jeff Bezos

4.      "How many people are completely successful in every department of life? Not one. The most successful people are the ones who learn from their mistakes and turn their failures into opportunities." Zig Ziglar

5.      "Don't limit yourself. Many people limit themselves to what they think they can do. You can go as far as your mind lets you. What you believe, remember, you can achieve." Mary Kay Ash

6.     "Losers quit when they fail. Winners fail until they succeed." Robert Kiyosaki

7.     "Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm." Winston Churchill

8.     ."A man must be big enough to admit his mistakes, smart enough to profit from them, and strong enough to correct them." John C. Maxwell

9.     "Each bruise is a lesson. Each lesson makes us better." Syrio Forel, a Game of Thrones character.

Read more: http://www.inc.com/john-brandon/35-quotes-on-turning-setbacks-into-successes.html

 

Discuss:

1.     Which quote do you like the most and why?

2.     How do you usually react when you fail at something?

3.     Do you usually quit or do you usually try until you succeed?

4.     Would you say you are an optimistic person?

5.     What do you think the key is to success?

6.     What areas have you successfully worked on?

7.     What obstacles have you encountered and how did you successfully overcome them?

8.     What are your goals for the future?

READ AND TALK - Drink and drive?

Tube driver suspended after arrest for ‘being drunk at the controls of a Jubilee line train’

 

 

A Tube driver has been suspended from duty after he was arrested on suspicion of being drunk in charge of a train, it has emerged.

 

 

The 50-year-old London Underground worker had been at the controls of a northbound Jubilee line train when he was arrested on Saturday afternoon.

According to sources, the man failed to stop the train to take his break and allow a replacement driver board at Wembley Park, it is reported.

When he got off the train several stops later, a colleague allegedly smelled alcohol on this breath and police were called, the Evening Standard reports.

It is claimed he was arrested after refusing to give a breath sample. The driver has since been suspended from duty while the matter is investigated.

A British Transport Police (BTP) spokeswoman said: ‘I can confirm that officers were called to Queensbury London Underground (LU) station shortly after 3pm on Saturday, 22 March.

‘A 50-year-old man has been arrested under the Transport and Works Act and has been released on police bail until Wednesday, 2 April pending further enquiries.’

A TfL spokesman added: ‘On Saturday afternoon a train operator was relieved from duty after concerns were raised about his conduct.

‘The train operator was subsequently taken into custody by British Transport Police. The member of staff is suspended while investigations by ourselves and the BTP are continuing.’

 

 

Read more:

http://metro.co.uk/2014/03/24/tube-driver-suspended-after-arrest-for-being-drunk-at-the-controls-of-a-jubilee-line-train-4676895/

 

 

Has anything similar ever happened in your country?

What are the laws in your country about consuming alcohol before driving?

Do you agree with them? Why or why not?

(Use expressions such as: I think… I don`t think… I agree because… I disagree because… In my opinion… According to my point of view… etc.)

 

 

READ AND TALK - A trip to Asia :-)

 

 

A backpacker found a 3in (7.5cm) leech that had been living up her nose for a month after a trip to South East Asia.

 

1.                 First listen to the story to see how much you can understand. You can find the audio recording at http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-29601086

2.                 Afterwards read the whole story to see how much you understood.

3.                 Then discuss these questions:

a, Sum up the story with your own words

b, Practise present perfect:

Have you ever had anything similar or strange happen to you?

c, Practise past simple and past continuous:

Tell your story.

d, If nobody has any strange or unusual stories to tell, then give you opinions:

What should you do to prevent such things to happen to you?

What precautions should you take?

 

Woman finds three-inch leech in nose after South East Asia trip

 

Daniela Liverani, 24, from Edinburgh, had been having nosebleeds for weeks but put them down to a burst blood vessel from a motorbike crash.

Ms Liverani was having a shower last Thursday when she was realised the dark shape wriggling in her nose was actually an animal.

Hospital staff used forceps and tweezers to remove the parasite.

Ms Liverani believes she picked up the leech in Vietnam or Cambodia, but even when she felt it moving up and down her nostril, she thought it was a blood clot.

She told BBC Radio Scotland: "Your initial reaction isn't to start thinking, oh God, there's obviously a leech in my face."

It was when Ms Liverani was in the shower that the leech's presence was most noticeable.

She said: "Obviously my nasal passages would open up because of the steam and the heat and the water, and it would come out quite far, about as far as my lip.

"So I could kind of see it out of the corner of my eye but still didn't think it was a worm because it just looked like a blood clot.

"On Thursday I jumped out the shower and I unsteamed the mirror and I had a proper good look, and I could see little ridges on him."

That was the moment when Ms Liverani realised she was housing a parasite.

She went to accident and emergency where doctors removed "Mr Curly" - as Ms Liverani nicknamed the leech - with forceps and tweezers.

"The doctors did a great job, hats off to them, because obviously they don't see something like that every day", she added.

"They did what they could in a strange situation while trying to keep their cool."

Ms Liverani then took the leech home for the night, at the doctors' suggestion. However, Mr Curly did not live to see another day.

"He's in an Edinburgh City Council bin," said Ms Liverani. "He's probably long gone by now. I boiled him first."

Read more and listen:

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-29595164?ocid=socialflow_facebook

 

 

Shorter version of the story:

Glasgow woman:

Leech used my nose 'as a nest'

A Glasgow woman was horrified to discover that her persistent nosebleeds had been caused by a leech living in her nostril.

Daniela Liverani started having nosebleeds after a backpacking trip around South-East Asia, and believed it was a "congealed blood clot".

She sought medical assistance when she noticed the nosebleed "had ridges" and had started "poking out" of her nose.

Ms Liverani told BBC Radio 5 live's Breakfast that when NHS staff pulled the leech out with nose forceps, they were "equally horrified and intrigued".

The leech, nicknamed "Mr Curly" by Ms Liverani, has since been destroyed.

Read more and listen:

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-29601086

 

 

 

READ AND TALK - How not to propose

Dutch man`s proposal

 

 

Listen to the audio recording:

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-30462825

Then read the whole story to see how much you understood.

Then discuss the following questions:

 

1.     Tell your opinion about it. Was it a good idea? If not, why not?

2.     If you are a man: How will you propose your girlfriend in the future? Do you have any good ideas planned?

3.     If you are a woman how would you like your boyfriend to propose you? What are your dreams? How do you imagine it?

4.     Do you know of any funny or interesting proposal in your family or among your friends? Tell the class.

  

13 December 2014 Last updated at 15:47 GMT

Dutch marriage proposal sees crane smash IJsselstein house

 

The marriage proposal went dramatically wrong, but the woman in question did at least say yes

A Dutchman's plan to propose to his girlfriend has ended with a mobile crane smashing the roof of a house and forcing the evacuation of two others.

The man had wanted to surprise his partner by descending in front of her bedroom in the town of IJsselstein to sing her a song and pop the question.

But the unsecured crane he used instead toppled into a neighbour's house.

The woman still said yes, Dutch media report, and the couple are now said to be celebrating in Paris.

Following the initial impact, more damage was done when the crane fell again during an attempt to right it.

Residents in nearby properties were evacuated but no one was injured.

 

 

The crane which fell into the roof of a house in the Netherlands.

No one was hurt in the accident.