Straining every nerve - American Accent Training

Heeey guys! :-)
I hope you're all doing well considering how many exams we're having this month. This is the very last week of this semester, guys, so let's keep up and get it over with.

Since the title of this blogpost is called "American Accent Training" you're probably expecting some of my strategies on how to improve my American pronunciation. If you want to know my general approach to a better pronunciation, feel free to read through my first blog post on pronunciation.

I must admit I am very late with this blogpost. The reason why is simply because I haven't found a third source on American Accent Training which I could recommend. I mean, there were many useful links which provided a handful of exercises and stuff, but none of them really got me hanging on. But after having tried out Rachel's and Amy Walker's English tutorials, I finally found a third source which I found worth sharing with you.

1. Rachel's English

Rachel clearly is a professional when it comes to (teaching) pronunciation. What I really like about her YouTube channel is that she has very specific topics, like "the TH Consonants" or "Contractions". She even has a few videos about Homophones.
As I mentioned in my first blog post about pronunciation, I really like doing Minimal Pairs, because it's not only a very effective but also a funny way to deal with pronunciation. And Rachel even has a playlist containing five videos about minimal pairs. I loooove these.
Another thing I like about her very professional videos is that the IPA sounds are displayed on the screen while she's pronouncing them. Also, the words she is talking about are displayed, so you can read them and repeat after her. The repeating is a very essential part of the pronunciation training. How are you going to improve your pronunciation without trying it out yourself? So that's why I like it a lot that she always pauses after a word so you can repeat it. Another advantage of such video tutorials is that you see how a native - in this case Rachel - moves her mouth. She (and Amy Walker as well) also explains which muscle movement is necessary for a certain sound. So far, I have benefited a loot from her tutorials.

2. Amy Walker

To be honest, I was a bit sceptical in the first place. Amy Walker seemed to me like a very friendly, but almost too friendly person. She smiles as if - well I don't know, but definitely too much, as it it was a fake smile. Anyways, I watched her tutorials since it is my goal to acquire an American accent. This is the link to her tutorials, by the way. Although I wasn't sure if she is the right person to teach me pronunciation (because of her exaggerated smile which I initally almost couldn't stand), I must say I really enjoyed it and I think she is doing a good job when explaining the differences between two siminar sounds. What I really like about her tutorials is that she provides a worksheet. I like having a sheet of paper right next to me so I can take notes if necessary. Her example words and sentences are really good, and there are many words which I use every day but have never really paid attention to their correct pronunciation.

She also has a video where she speaks 21 different accents. That's a really funny one, alhough I must say that the German accent is not 100% authentic. It's a good effort, though.

3. "Simple English Videos"

So the third source I want to share with you is different from the ones I was talking above. "Different" as in a bit unusual, but really funny. I like these kind of funny videos because if you find something amusing then it's more likely that you remember them.

 If I remember correctly, we watched one of the "Simple English Videos" in SUK I. I think it was this video we watched. But let me show you another one, of which you can see a screenshot on the right. He is American and the woman is British, and that's what makes their videos interesting. And yes, that's Rachel sitting inbetween the two.
What I like about their videos is that they provide a pronunciation, both an American and a British one. They do not explain the pronunciation in detail like Rachel or Amy would, but they tell you the meanings of a set of words which sound very similar or are even homophones. In the video you can see on the screenshot, they focus on the words fall, fell, fallen, feel and felt. They mention collocations and try to explain in a very humorous way what the words mean and how you use them. So, their videos are not telling you how to pronounce them according to the IPA - that's rather Rachel's and Amy's job - but they show you the differences between these similar words.
As I said, the videos are really amusing. And I think that's really important, because we as language learners study like crazy, and sometimes studying all day becomes really tedious. Am I right? But when watching the "Simple English Videos",  studying becomes definitely more funny, more interesting and more varied - at least for me. Give it a try, guys, it's brilliant!

- - -

That's it. I really hope you enjoyed the read. Two days to go and then we've finally mastered the 3rd semester. Since this is going to be the last post this semester, I'd like to say a few words about it.

I think we (English students) all agree that the 3rd semester was not exactly a walk in the park. We all struggled hard and did the best we could. And even though, our grades were not always the best. Teachers kept on telling us "you can do better" meaning that you should work harder. But what if I you simply can't do more because you have a second foreign laguage and you have seminaries and tutorials to attend. And yeah, there are about three papers to hand in by the end of semester; almost forgot to mention them. So sometimes a student just can't do more and simply needs a break. And here it is. So I think we can be proud of ourselves to have survived this constant struggle and we should enjoy the semester break to the fullest. So I wish everyone of you a relaxing and looong semester break. Have fun. Go crazy. Or do whatever you always do. And I'm looking forward already to seeing you next semester. ¡Adiós, amigos!

Sparing no effort to survive the Exam

Hey guys.
Welcome to my second blogpost on strategies how to improve my vocab and survive PC2. I've been reading a handful of blogposts of fellow classmates and I decided to try out a new dictionary. Also, I am going to tell you how I will master studying the words of the Porter book. So first of all: the new dictionary.

New Dictionary

The Collins Dictionary

So far, I have been using the dictionaries of Merriam Webster and Cambridge a lot as well as the vocabulary.com website. Now that I've tried out a few more online dictionaries, I'd like to share one with you that I found very helpful.
The Collins Dictionary allows you to decide whether you want to look up a word in a British or in an American dictionary. It provides a very short, but useful explanation of a word. I like this because sometimes, when a dictionary provides too many explanations, it gets even more complicated than it already is. Right next to the explanation, there are strong collocations provided, which also comes in very handy. If you are interested in the origins of the word, you can see those beneath the definitions. The Collins dictionary also shows synonyms and a direct link to the website's thesaurus. In addition to that, they offer translations in various languages. In some cases, it is helpful to not only look up a word in a monolingual, but also in a bilingual dictionary. Aaand what's the icing on the cake is that you can also see example sentences, very similar to the ones on vocabulary.com.
I highly recommend the Collins Dictionary as it has proven itself as very useful to me.

The two most important strategies how to study the Porter words

1. Repetition is the key

Vocabulary.com App

Using the vocabulary.com app was actually not a suggestion from a colleague, but from one of my English teachers. At first, I wasn't sure if I want to spend two euros on an application I will probably either not like or not use - or even both. I know that two euros is not a lot of money. But considering it is exactly the same like the website vocabulary.com, two euros are actually a lot. Why buying an app for my mobile phone while I can use the website for free?
In the end, I decided to download the app and just give it a try. And guess what. I LOVE IT <3
The app provides the exact same information squeezed on a mobile phone screen. I use it whenever I am on the bus, on the train or even when I am doing a shift as a paramedic, waiting for a call. I'm sure my colleagues think I am a total nerd studying vocabulary during a night shift. If only they knew that a lot of nights look the same in a Translation student's life. Sorry, I am going off on a tangent...
So about the disadvantages of this app. I'd like to mention two: First, the costs of course. Not everyone is willing to pay for an app since almost every app we use is free. And second, sometimes the speaker-button where you can listen to the word's pronunciation is not always working. But I don't know if this is the app's fault or it's just my crappy phone. Do you have any experiences with the app?

Anki App

When I first installed the Anki software on my laptop a few months ago, it didn't exactly work well. I think there was some kind of a bug so I couldn't use it properly. After reading through some blogposts of my student colleagues, I felt like installing and trying it again. They all said that it works perfectly and that they benefit from using it, so I downloaded the mobile app AnkiDroid Flashcards. And it worked! Woohooo. So that's how I became an Anki user. Why I benefit from using it?
I like that the app gives you the possibility to choose on your own what you want to put on the back of a flashcard. I am saying put because you can either write a definition, a translation, add an image or even an audio file. So you could add a voice note where you yourself pronounce the word - correctly of course.

What I do most of the time, however, is adding an English definition including synonyms and collocations. That's what helps me the most to learn a word. In rare cases, I also add a German translation.

Sooo, I recommend this app as well as the vocabulary.com app. The good thing about Anki is that it's free and you can either use the mobile app or the software.  In general, I'd say that using a mobile app to learn vocabulary is very practical. You can do it wherever and whenever you want: on the bus, on the train or, like I do, even during night shifts.

2. A spoonful at a time

Another important thing when it comes to mastering such a huge amount of words is to study the words in pieces - to somehow classify or cateogrize them. It's up to you how you like to classify them. I don't have a particular way of classifying them, but I study the Porter words unit per unit. Not bearing in mind how many words need to be learned in total helps a lot not to go bonkers. What is more is that it's a good feeling to complete a unit and be able to say that you've just learned a bundle of new words.

Also, I make use of the vocabulary sheets at the end of every unit. Not only do I highlight words I don't know, but also write them and their meaning down. I also add collocations and synonyms in order to remember the words more easily. On the second photo you can see the vocabulary sheet of the fourth unit. Let's take the word "sphere" as an example. I wrote "closed surface of round shape" and "area/sector/field" as short explanations and added "social sphere" as a collocation. Of course, this way of writing down vocab is not everyone's cup of tea. For me, however, it works quite well.

Thaat's it. I hope you enjoyed reading this blog post. You'll hear from me very soon as I still need to write a second post on pronunciation ;-) CU!

Summary of the Credit Crisis - Before and After

Helloo guys.

This blog post is going to be a bit different than my preceding ones. We, my fellow students and myself, were asked by one of our English teachers to blog about a summary we recently wrote. There is a first version of the summary and a corrected one. I marked the mistakes corrected by my teacher in different colors. I hope it doesn't look too confusing. If so, feel free to ask questions any time. Here we gooo.

First Version

 

The video The Crisis of Credit Visualized covers the origins of 2008’s credit crisis and its impact on the economy. The crisis is defined as a “worldwide financial fiasco” which caused the credit market to freeze in 2008.

A homeowner mortgages their house, i.e. they borrow money and pay back a monthly mortgage payment. This payment is received from investors who are seeking for investments where they can make more money. Investors borrow money in order to amplify potential gains. This is called leverage. The investor can choose between risky and safe mortgages. Safe mortgages have a low rate of return, while risky ones have a higher one.  This is called a collateralized debt obligation. In order to make safe mortgages even safer, banks insure the mortgages with a fee called the credit default swap.

When a homeowner defaults, the house comes into the lender’s possession. The lender then gives the house to less solvent people or sells it again. Putting more houses on sale creates more supply than demand. Consequently, housing prices fall. The investors invest in worthless houses and cannot pay back their loans. This leads to a frozen credit market where no one buys or sells anymore.

Author is missing
Not only does it cover its origins, but explains the crisis as a whole
It's not really a definition
Too wordy
Preposition
Wordy - use an adjective that describes "investments"
Wordy - there is a shorter way to say this
Wrong word
Delete
Focus a bit more on sub-prime mortgages
Tense

 

Corrected Version

The video The Crisis of Credit Visualized by Jonathan Jarvis explains the 2008’s credit crisis and its impact on the economy. The crisis is called a “worldwide financial fiasco” which caused the credit market to freeze in 2008.

When a house is mortgaged, its homeowner pays back a monthly mortgage payment. The investors receiving these payments can choose between mortgages of a lower or higher rate of return. This is called a collateralized debt obligation. In order to make low-return mortgages safer for investors, the mortgages are insured with a fee called the credit default swap.

When a homeowner defaults, the house comes into the lender’s possession. Normally, the lender sells it to another responsible homeowner. These are called prime mortgages. What occurred ahead of the credit crisis, however, was the divestment of mortgages to less solvent people, not requiring down payments or a proof of income. These are called sub-prime mortgages. If more sub-prime mortgages default, more houses are on sale. The abundant supply of houses causes their prices to fall. The investors invest in worthless houses and cannot pay back their loans, which they need to do to amplify potential gains. This lead to 2008’s frozen credit market.

How I improve my Pronunciation

Hey guys!
I hope you're having a fun and peaceful christmas break. I found some time to finally work on my pronunciation. I've learned that I have some problems with the th-sound, which is why I have been spending and will continue spending time on this topic. In addition to that, I devoted some time to minimal pairs. Let me explain to you in detail how I tackled these topics.

The Two TH Sounds

First of all, I had a look at Rachel's video about the two th sounds. She briefly explains the difference between the th-sounds which is very useful. The exercise at the end of the video didn't help me a lot as it's explained in a rather complicated way (that's what I think at least). So I searched for other sources on the internet and I stumbled upon this website: ESL Gold - Pronunciation - The Voiced TH sound. It provides a list of minimal pairs, challening words, common phrases and an oral reading exercise containing the voiced th sound. I recommend listening to the audio file and reading the words at the same time, because in my view it doesn't make a lot of sense to just listen to the audio without knowing how a word is spelled. For that I would open the audio file in a new tab so you can still see the list of words. BTW, the link to the audio file is on the top right corner, beneath the heading. It's a bit tricky because the link doesn't exactly catch one's eye.
What I like about this website is that the two speakers pause between the words and phrases. It makes it possible to repeat the word, although I must say you could also pause the video manually of course.
I must admit that I found these words quite challenging and that I never paid much attention to the difference between the voiced and unvoiced th sound. But this will be different from now on! ;-)

Minimal Pairs

One source I recently found and would definitely recommend is this website. You can find many many examples of minimal pairs and they even provide a short description of what is important about certain minimal pairs and what the main differences are between to miniml pairs.
What I like most about this website is that it is devided into the different sounds: vowel sounds, consonant sounds, initial consonant sounds and final consonant sounds. Also, the minimal pairs are categorized by elementary, pre-intermediate, intermediate, upper-intermediate and advanced words. I am familiar with most words and their pronunciation of the categories elementary and pre-intermediate, but some of the categories intermediate, upper-intermediate and advanced are really challenging.
Let me give you examples of the category advanced consontant sounds s - θ.
Symbol - thimble
Sawn - thorn
Suds - thuds
Do you think these are difficult?

Practice, Practice, Practice

If you read my previous blog post about vocab learning strategies, you might have realized that I am a great fan of Merriam Webster's dictionaries. On their website, they provide interactive exercises. When doing such an exercise, you first listen to a couple of words and then repeat them. At the end of the exercise, you do a short quiz where you hear a word and must decide to which sound category it belongs to. You can do the quiz a second or a third time.
On the screenshot on the right you can see that I did an exercise on f and v sounds.

I find these exercises really useful. They provide a combination of listening to a word, reading and repeating a word. And there are so many exercises! I just love Merriam Webster! :-D


That's about it so far. Most of these websites do not provide videos where you can watch how natives move their mouth and tongue. But next time I will focus more on sources like this (e.g. Rachel's English). I'll also give you more general hints on how I tackle pronunciation. CU soon, guys!

How to go the extra mile

Long time no see, guys. Or shall I say "long time no read"? Welcome back to the 3rd round of Sophie's blogging. A good girl who one day went online and has been crazy about blogging ever since.
I hope your summer break was as fantastic as mine. I will tell you some details about my vacation soon. But for now, let's get back to business. I've spent some time thinking about ways how to efficiently expand my vocabulary. Here is what I came up with.

Books & Mind Maps

I like to work with books where I can highlight things and add comments. That is why I never just borrow books but buy them if they seem to be reliable sources. The Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary of Synonyms and Antonyms, for example, helps me to expand my vocab. and avoid always using words like "good", "bad" or "interesting". It not only provides me with synonyms and antonyms of a certain word, but also with an exact distinction between to words which are believed to be synonyms. Let me give you an example: According to the book, the verbs to devote and to dedicate are not exactly the same. To devote is likely to "imply a giving up [...] because of compelling motives" and to dedicate means "solemn [...] devotion to a sacred or serious use or purpose". So devote is more likely to be used with [to devote] one's free time/evening/etc to studying, whilst one would dedicate one's life to medical research, for instance.
Another Merriam-Webster’s book called Vocabulary Builder is very useful when it comes to learning an entire word family. The words are grouped by family, so for example benefit, beneficent, beneficiary, benevolence, benevolent and benefactor. By remembering the commong root bene, it is easier to memorize the words. At the end of every other unit, there's a short quiz so you can test yourself. As you can see on the picture, I like to create mind maps for those word families.

Another book I would like to mention is the Merriam-Webster’s Guide to Punctuation and Style. This book not only gives me hints and tips about punctuation, but copyediting, quotation, proofreading, word usage and many other topics as well. In spite of all the advantages of such books, and I am also including the Porter Book here, they all have one major drawback: They do not tell you how to pronounce a word. Therefore you need to have an online dictionary handy in order to listen to the correct pronunciation. If I am studying in the train, for instance, and I don't have a laptop with me, learning new vocabulary is almost impossible since I can't listen to the pronunciation properly. This can be quite tiring sometimes.

Online Platforms

When I am online I use online platforms like vocabulary.com or thesaurus.com. On vocabulary.com, in particular, I like to check the use of the word within a sentence. What I also like about the site is that I can create my own vocabulary lists and take vocabulary quizzes.

Even though I benefit a lot from these two websites, I still like to write down words in a small note book which I can take with me anywhere. Just going through a list on vocabulary.com is not enough for me to memorize a word. I always need to write it down by hand. Another website I would highly recommend is the Merriam-Webster's Visual Dictionary Online. Since I am more the visual type when it comes to studying vocabulary and I like to connect words with pictures or symbols, I use this website very often.

Corpora

So far, I haven't used various corpora often enough to be able tell which one is my absolute favorite one and which ones I don't like. One corpus I have used a few times, though, is just-the-word.com. This website has a simple and clear structure and the search results are listed in a very neat way. The user is shown a handful of collocations and how frequently a word or phrase occurs in that corpus. Another website I found very useful is the Oxford Learner’s Dictionary and its Academic Word List. This alphabetically ordered list is linked to the definitions of the words which comes in very handy.

 

Books and Newspapers

Whenever I read a book and I come across an unknown word, I try to remember it within its context. So for example, when reading one of my favorite books The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafón, I found this very interesting word "meekly". This is the sentence in which it occurs: "We could only nod meekly." To nod meekly means "to nod in a humble manner" (source: vocabulary.com). So I assume the person is being embarrassed or even humiliated at that moment. Or the person is simply being a very modest or humble person. Another example sentence of the word meekly is "[...] she was just meekly doing what mother told her to do" (source: Seattle Times). I am more likely to remember this word or the phrase "to nod meekly" because a) I found it in one of my favorite books, b) I remember it with its sentence and c) with the verb to nod.

Another one of my favorites is The Art of Thinking Clearly by Rolf Dobelli. The Swiss author analyses phenomenons of our daily lives which we aren't always aware of. Every once in a while I buy newspapers as they contain loads of vocabulary of a higher register.

Movies and Series

When I watch documentaries or series and I don't understand a word, then I simply guess the meaning of it. So first, I would write down the word, guess what it could mean from the context, and then I look it up in a monolingual dictionary. For example, as I am attending Henry Briscoe's lecture about the Culture of the U.K., I watch a documentary about Great Britain every now and then.
Of course, like almost every student, I watch series. My favorite one is "Pretty Little Liars", although there are currently no new episodes available. I also like watching Game of Thrones (even though I never thought I would ever like this series; I was forced to watch it and then all of a sudden I wanted to watch even more). Anyways... watching (American) series not only helps me a lot to expand my vocabulary, but also to practice my American English pronunciation.

---

This is already the corrected version of the blog post I handed in.
I hope you enjoyed the read. Stay tuned! :)

Culture Days

Since our Culture Days took place on Monday and Tuesday last week, it is high time for me to write about the presentations I watched and, more importantly, which topics I'd like to be tested on at the KGP.

Presentations I watched

Woodstock (US): Of course I've known before what Woodstock. What I didn't know, though, was in how many ways Woodstock had influenced not only music, but also the counterculture movement. The presentation provided a clear outline about the Woodstock's impact on American culture.

San Francisco

San Francisco's rise into popularity (US): Daniela gave a well-structured overview about the evolution of San Francisco. Since I have always loved San Francisco for its exceptional characteristics such as the Painted Ladies, the Lombard Street, the Golden Gate Bridge or the Cable Cars, I couldn't resist watching Daniela's presentation.

Homeland (US): Even though I haven't watched a single episode of Homeland before, I was curious to hear what it is about. had heard a lot about the series and how my friends became addicted to it. What I certainly didn't know about the series is how close to reality the series were.

Arab-Americans after 9/11 (US): I have never really thought about how the 9/11 incident affected Arab-Americans regarding their everyday life. Andreas did a really good job on illustrating the difficulties Arabs in America have to deal with. Thumbs up!

American Indian boarding schools (US): Although I knew beforehand what Judith would be talking about in her presentation, I found the presentation even more interesting than reading the paper. By adding appropriate photos to her presentation, she got across her message perfectly.

The Boston Tea Party

The Boston Tea Party (US): Not only did I love Lucinda's accent, but also her topic and her remarkable Prezi. The Boston Tea Party is an event I've heard of several times, but never really known what it is about. What I liked a lot about her presentation was that she pointed out today's opinion of both Americans and British.

Ernest Hemingway (US): Jerneja gave a short but clear overview of Hemingway's life and his most remarkable works. For me, it was great to hear what is typical for Hemingway's style of writing, as I wasn't aware of that before. Well done!

Native American Languages (US): Both intriguing and funny at the same time, Sara talked about some native American languages and how they influenced America's culture. What sounded really interesting to me was that some words or even name of states such as Oklahoma or Mississippi derived from a native American language - I didn't know that before.

Undocumented: Illegal Immigrants in the (US): Valeriya's Prezi was really good as she included statistcs and infographics to illustrate her points. In general, I enjoyed her presentation a lot. The topic is really intriguing and still relevant for Americans.

Health problems of the Irish Travellers (IE): Before watching this presentation, I had no clue that a minority group called "the Irish Travellers" even existed. Aside from telling us who the Irish Travellers are and where they live, Nina focused on the the health problems they have to deal with, such as deafness or asthma. Hearing about those people made me sad, but I liked Nina's presentation a lot!!

The Race Around Ireland (IE): I have never heard about the Race Around Ireland before, but Roman did a great job on telling us the most important facts about it. His presentation was both informative and funny and I could tell that Roman is an insider.

Leprechaun

The popularised Leprechaun (IE): Of course I've seen and heard a lot about Leprechauns before, but not about its history. So I was curious to hear where the tales originally come from. Linda did not only provide a clear overview over the Leprechaun's history, but also an explanation why the Leprechaun is actually called Leprechaun.

Irish as an official EU language (IE): To be honest, I've heard a lot about the Irish language before, so there were some points I already knew when Dolores talked about them. Nevertheless, she did a good job on putting everything important in a nutshell!

David Norris' contribution to the LGBT Rights in the Republic of Ireland (IE): Before watching Katharina's presentation, I didn't even know what LGBT stands for. Besides explaining this acronym, she told us how these rights were introduced in Ireland and that David Norris as definitely a person worth knowing.

Top five presentations

I would like to be asked about the following topics at the KGP (US):

Arab-Americans after 9/11

American Indian boarding schools

The Boston Tea Party

Undocumented: Illegal Immigrants in the USA

San Francisco's rise into popularity

Image Sources:

(1) http://staysf.com/upload/attraction/20080519164232_san%20francisco%20cable%20car.jpg

(2) http://www.crareacatholic.com/LaSalle/Resources/8th%20Websites%202013/MeLeah,%20Tanya,%20Hannah,%20Becca/Becca%20Fields%20Rev%20War/images/Boston%20Tea%20Party%201.jpg

(3) http://mkalty.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/Leprechaun.jpg

What the Health!

Did you know?
A number of American companies make their employees' day at work not only a happier, but also healthier place. They provide them with healthy meals, open office spaces, fitness classes or even child care centers. As an example, I would like to tell you about an American company in the heart of Silicon Valley: Google.

Google Headquarters, Mountain View, CA

 

"Let's face it," says Eric Schmidt, "programmers want to program, they don't want to do their laundry. So we make it easy for them to do both." Google's 44,777 employees seem to be damn lucky. Not only is it possible for them to get their laundry done, but also can they go to the hairdresser or even have a doctor's appointment on the 26-acre Google campus in Mountain View, California.


Food, Snacks and Haircuts?

After enjoying a free gourmet meal in the cafeteria, Google employees can spend the rest of their break playing Ping-Pong, pool or even volleyball. Some of them might even want to go to the on-site hairdresser - for free. Provided by a company called Onsite Haircuts, its mobile homes are travelling around cutting the hair of  "Silicon Valley's tech army."

Back to food and snacks: Throughout the day, the cafeteria offers healthy snacks like dried fruit, nuts or coconut water. Before they decided to offer nuts such as pistachios, some employees "had a serious M&M addiction", Google admits. By the way, all the snacks are available for free. Although, there is one thing Google charges its employees for: machine food. What is that? Machine food is food inside an automat. So you'd have to insert money in order to get food. Google set their prices quite high so as to avoid its employees to buy those rather unhealthy foods and gain weight.

By having about 20 cafeterias on the Google campus, employees can decide on where to go for lunch.

Leisure Activities

As mentioned above, there are various possibilities how Google employees can spend their breaks. What seemed most intriguing to me was that just recently, Google invented a lap pool. What is a lap pool? It's a very(!) small outdoor pool that is "equipped" with a strong current that allows one to swim and swim and swim - and go basically nowhere! Of course, Google arranged lifeguards in case someone drowns.

On the entire campus there are numerous lounges where Googlers can just hang out and talk. They're even allowed to bring their dogs to work: "The presence of dogs at Google has been a unique and to some, a treasured part of our workplace culture. Dogs can be a valued and important part of employees' lives, and their ability to keep a dog in their workplace may enhance the quality of their work life."

BTW: In order to make sure that employees make it to meetings in time, they are provided with scooters and, what is even more exceptional, the campus has a slide (yes, a slide!) which can be used instead of taking the stairs.





Health Care

In case Google employees don't have time for a doctor's appointment, they can go for a checkup to an on-site doctor instead. There are even chiropractors and massage therapists on the Google campus. What would you say about a nice massage during lunch break?
I'd like to stop at this point and recommend watching this video as it gives some more insight on how working at Google Headquarters is like. It's worth watching, I promise. Have fun!

Image Sources

(1) www.whereverwriter.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/IMG_5682.jpg
(2) http://m.c.lnkd.licdn.com/mpr/mpr/p/3/000/249/1e6/06c0a31.jpg
(3) http://img.timeinc.net/time/photoessays/2006/inside_google/google/05.jpg
(4) http://www.whereverwriter.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/IMG_5693.jpg
(5) http://i.huffpost.com/gadgets/slideshows/250533/slide_250533_1519698_free.jpg?1347647456000

Sources

http://greatist.com/health/healthiest-companies
http://content.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,1947844_2013328,00.html

How the Cardiovascular System Works

Hey guys.
Since I have learned a lot about how our heart works within my paramedic courses in 2012, I'd like to share some drawings I made during these courses. I labelled them in English in order to broaden my language skills. I really hope you can learn something from it. By the way, it might be a good idea to look at the drawings every once in a while while you're reading. Otherwise it might be a little confusing as there are LOADS of foreign words (of which some of them are explained below).

How the Heart Pumps Blood

(c) Sophie Schaffner

Our heart is a fist-sized muscle situated behind the rib cage and between the lungs. Since it is placed slightly to the left of the sternum (breastbone), the left part of the lungs is a little smaller than the right one. The heart contracts in order to pump oxygen- and nutrient-rich blood to the rest of your body.

The heart is divided into the right pumping system and the left pumping system. The right atrium (blue color) receives oxygen-poor blood from the superior vena cava and pumps it to the right ventricle (also in blue color). Following that, the right ventricle pumps the blood to the lungs through the pulmonary artery. In the lungs, the blood picks up oxygen and gets rid of carbon dioxide. The left atrium (red color), however, receives oxygen-rich blood from the pulmonary veins and pumps it to the left ventricle. Through the aorta, the left ventricle pumps the oxygen-rich blood to the rest of the body. The aorta (Aorta, Hauptschlagader) is the biggest artery and has millions of smaller arteries branching off. By passing through chest and abdomen, the aorta is responsible for "carrying" oxygen-rich blood to all your organs and cells.

Arteries are blood vessels that deliver oxygen-rich blood from the heart to the cells of your body. They are thick-walled and elastic and their smaller branches are called arterioles and capillaries.

Veins are thin-walled blood vessels delivering oxygen-poor blood to the lungs. Have you ever been wondering why blood in the veins of your feet flows upwards, although, locigally, gravity would keep it down below? Well, some veins have venous valves that set the direction where the blood moves. Thank God! Because otherwise all your blood would be stuck in your feet and ... yeah, you can imagine how your feet would look like.

The Cardiac Conduction System

(c) Sophie Schaffner

The cardiac conduction system generates and controls the heart rate. Have a look at the drawing first and search for the sinoatrial node (sinus node). This is where we start: The sinus node is the heart's natural pacemaker. The electrical impulses are generated here. This electrical signal moves from cell to cell down through the heart until it reaches the atrioventricular node (AV node). The AV node somehow slows the electrical current down. By doing so, the node ensures that the two atria (plural of atrium) can fully contract and pump out blood. After passing the AV node, the electrical current "travels" to the ventricels until it reaches the purkinje fibers (special cardiac muscles). These fibers kind of "tell" the cardiac muscles to contract.

Normally, a sinus node produces a heart rate of 60 to 80 per minute. In case the sinus node is not functioning anymore, the AV node takes over, but can only produce a heart rate of 40 to 60. By the way, the heart rate is the pulse you can feel at your wrist. The blood pressure, however, is something completely different and cannot be explained in just one sentence. If time allows, I will write another blog post and tell you what blood pressure actually is about.

Vocabulary

right atrium (rechter Vorhof) = the right upper chamber of the heart that receives blood from the vena cava
left atrium (linker Vorhof) = the left upper chamber of the heart that receives blood from the pulmonary veins
right ventricle (rechte Herzkammer) = the right lower chamber of the heart that receives blood from the right atrium and pumps the blood into the arteries
left ventricle (linke Herzkammer) = the left lower chamber of the heart that receives blood from the left atrium and pumps blood into the aorta
pulmonary artery (Lungenarterie) = an artery which carries blood from the heart to the lungs
venous valves (Venenklappen) = a structure that prevents blood from flowing backwards and therefore ensures a one-way flow
sinus node (Sinusknoten) = special part of the heart that controls the heart beat and heart rate
av node (AV-Knoten) = a node that receives impulses from the sinoatrial node
electric current (elektrischer Strom) = a flow of electricity 

Sources

Sanitätshilfe - "Ausbildung", Auflage Februar 2012, Herausgeber: Österreichisches Rotes Kreuz
http://flexikon.doccheck.com/de/Herz#Anatomie
http://www.webmd.com/heart-disease/guide/how-heart-works 

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Any questions? Feel free to add a comment! :-)

Apple - A History of Advertising

When someone mentions the words "Apple" and "foundation", one might immediately think of Steve Jobs. However, Steve Jobs didn't launch this company all on his own. Together with Steve Wozniak and Ronald Wayne, Jobs established Apple Inc. on April Fool's Day in 1976. They named the company Apple because Jobs was just coming back from working on an apple farm and he thought the name was "fun, spirited and not intimidating".

The Evolution of Apple's Logo

Unlike other companies like Coca Cola, Apple Inc. has had only three logos since the company's foundation.
The first logo was designed in 1976 by co-founder Ronald Wayne and shows Sir Isaac Newton sitting under an apple tree and an apple hanging down a branch. On the outside border of the logo, there is a phrase saying: "Newton... A Mind Forever Voyaging Through Strange Seas of Thought ...Alone". Since the first logo was poorly recognizable, it was replaced by the second logo only a few months later. Designed by Rob Janoff, who became quite famous for designing the "rainbow Apple", the logo shows a colorful apple with a bite taken out of it. Steve Jobs and his designer Rob Janoff didn't want people to confuse the apple with a cherry or a tomato, which is why they added the bite to the apple. Additionally, Job suggested to put the green color on top to make it look more like an apple. The third logo was introduced in 1998 as some said the colorfully striped apple would look ridiculous on the new iMac. Jobs wanted to keep the Apple, so they simply changed the color to grey.

If Jobs & Co. hadn't decided on changing the color to grey in 1998, the MacBook would probably look like this today. I guess Apple made the right choice.

 

Apple's History of Advertising

 

Apple I

Back in 1976, when Apple was just getting off the starting blocks, its founders introduced the Apple I, a personal computer, and sold it for $666.66. When you have a look at the advertising on the left hand side, you can see that there is a lot of text, one low-quality picture and Apple's first logo. What do you think about this advertising? Does it look appealing to you? Well, to me, it doesn't look attractive at all. You can't even make out what's on the picture on the top right corner. At least I can't. For me, there is way too much text on this ad. Imagine this advertisement as a poster next to a sidewalk. Would you stop walking in order to read it? Would you be able to tell at a glance what this ad is about?

Apple II

Only one year after Apple's foundation, Wozniak invented another computer called Apple II. Although it had the same processor in and run at the same speed like Apple I, the Apple II was way more popular than the first one.
The advertisement on the right hand side looks a lot more concise, don't you think? There is very little text and just one photo of a specific fruit. Guess what, it's an apple! Still, I believe that the apple is photoshopped. Just look at its colors! It looks like the apple from Snow White. That's at least what I think.

Apple III

Although Apple II was quite a success, they decided to invent a new model with an even better system. The Apple III was proudly introduced in 1980, but it soon became apparent that the system wasn't as good as expected. Jobs didn't want the computer to have a cooling fan since it was "too noisy and inelegant". Therefore the motherboard of the computer got really hot after a while which resulted in system malfunctions. In addition to that, there were some other softwares that didn't work properly. So Apple replaced these "bad" Apple IIIs and introduced another version of Appe III, which, unfortunately, still had some problems.

What do you think about the advertisements? There was a series of these posters and each of them was dedicated to an American entrepreneur. Even though the ad contains a lot of text, I really like the idea of referring to notable inventors like Edison or Ford. When reading the heading, one might think: Ok, so what makes Apple so exceptional to even compare themselves with Edison or Ford?
 

Apple Lisa

The Apple Lisa is not only named after a girl (Steve Jobs' daughter's name was Lisa), but also stood for "Local Integrated Software Architecture". What made Apple Lisa so special? It was the very first Apple computer to have Graphical User Interface (GUI). That means that you were able to point and click with a rolling device called "mouse". Before that, the computers were text-based, which means that one had to type in commands in order to make the system respond.
Have a look at the video-ad below. I don't know about you, but I think this video is creepy! Just see for yourself.

Macintosh

Introduced in 1984, Macintosh was a line of personal computers developed by Steve Jobs. Like the Apple Lisa, Macintosh had GUI and a mouse.
Have a look at the advertisement. On the bottom left corner, there is a picture of someone using a mouse. The text in the pic says "If you can point, you can use Macintosh." Also, on the bottom right corner, where you can see the colorfully striped Apple logo, it says "Soon there'll just be two kinds of people. Those who use computers and those who use Apples." Well, this is quite a self-assured statement, don't you think?

"Think Different"

The advertising campaign "Think Different" was introduced in 1997 and mainly used for TV commercials and print ads.

The commercial as well as the ad show several personalities of the 20th century who, according to Jobs, "thought different" and "changed things": Albert Einstein, Martin Luther King, Jr., Thomas Edison, Mahatma Gandhi or Pablo Picasso. Have you ever seen this ad before? What do you think about it?

"Get a Mac"

Another campaign created by Apple's advertising agency was "Get a Mac". The TV campaign, which ran from 2006 to 2009, tells the story of a PC and a Mac being compared to each other. One guy dressed in casual clothes and personifies a Mac and the other one is dressed more formally and represents the (Windows) PC. The commercial was broadcasted in almost every English speaking country as well as in Japan. It was even dubbed into Spanish, German and Italian.
The actual ad lasts about an hour or so, so it gets a bit boring after a while. However, here's a shorter version that shows the ten most humorous statements. If you haven't seen it before, you should definitely watch it. It's hilarious.

Sources:
http://www.adweek.com/adfreak/story-behind-apple-logos-evolution-11672
http://webexpedition18.com/articles/evolution-apple-ads/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Apple_Inc.#Apple_IPO 
http://oldcomputers.net/ 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Get_a_Mac

Image Sources:
(1) http://famouslogos.net/images/apple-logo-evolution.jpg
(2) http://edibleapple.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/maacbookcolor.jpg 
(3) http://webexpedition18.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/1976apple01.jpg
(4) http://webexpedition18.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/1977apple05.jpg
(5) http://cdn.theatlantic.com/newsroom/img/posts/Apple-II-III-ads.jpg
(6) http://webexpedition18.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/1984apple34.jpg
(7) https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvBw6zNAMTDPkFhumJfHhHwmHNK0lGPFKyVey9Iyh2oSyJr4-9AeYdK3KWsnixXxQyowce5NlB10sJxEU9I4-VG7Df_ClWhEzyqb_XKLaHTvLg_UjYxKnQeKNwzJrXPSErLweAPu0YMiw/s1600/Think_Different_Apple-1998-771623.jpg

Capitalization 101 - Part One

Since the writing parts of the Progress Checks have always been the ones I had to struggle most with, I am currently reading a lot about Punctuation and Style. Today, however, I'd like to talk about Capitalization and its abundant rules about beginning a sentence. I hope the following information and tips are helpful to you.

Beginnings

1. Surprise, surprise: The first word of a sentence is capitalized.
   Example: Blogging is a great opportunity to practice writing.
   
   
2. If a sentence is placed in parentheses, the first word of the sentence is capitalized.
   Example: Blogging is a great opportunity to practice writing. (There are a lot of other possibilities, of course.)
   
   
3. If a sentence inside another sentence is in parentheses, the (inner) sentence is not capitalized.
   Example: Blogging is (among lots of other possibilities) a great opportunity to practice writing.
   
   
4. The first word of a quotation is capitalized.
   Example: "Blogging is a great opportunity to practice writing," my teacher says.
   
   
5. If a quotation is interrupted in the middle, the second part of the quotation is not capitalized.
   Example: "Blogging is a great opportunity to practice writing," my teacher says, "but there are loads of other possibilities."
   
   
6. If a quotation is dependent on the sentence in which it appears, the quotation is not capitalized.
   Example: Blogging is "a great opportunity to practice writing."
   Or: My teacher said that "blogging is a great opportunity to practice writing."
   
   
7. If a motto, rule or direct question, whether a quotation or not, appears in another sentence, it is capitalized.
   Example: The question is, How many blog posts do we need to have by the end of the semester?
   Or: You know the saying "Practice makes the master."
   
   
8. The first word following a colon is usually lowercased when it begins a list or even a complete sentence. When the sentence, however, is longer and seperate from the preceding one, the first word is capitalized.
   Example: A good language learner practices these four language skills: reading, writing, listening and speaking.
   Or: A good language learner has the following characteristics: he is open-minded, communicative and eager to learn.
   But: One more thing: A good language learner must neither be idle nor biased, but curious about different countries and cultures.
   
   
9. The first word in an outline heading begins with a capital.
   Example:
1. Introduction
2. Body Paragraph
1. Thesis I
2. Thesis II
3. Thesis III
3. Conclusion
   
   
10. The first word and some particular words of a salutation of a letter are capitalized. As far as the complimentary close is concerned, the very first word begins with a capital.
    Example: Dear Sir or Madam; Ladies and Gentlemen
    Or: Sincerely yours; Truly yours
    

Source: Merriam-Webster's Guide to Punctuation and Style, Second Edition