Letter 1

Dear Hania,

Enjoy listening to the Russian version of Jingle Bells!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=CvotXtBCxyY

Sincerely,
Zaure

Letter 2

Hello there my good subscribers!

I hope that you are enjoying/enjoyed the weekend. I just got back from a trip which started with a conference in Belgrade and ended with a 4-day tour of Austria. It was kind of exhausting but I am happy to say that I survived it.

The highlights of the trip were being reunited with my lost iPad (see here), finding a ridiculously fat wallet on a train and returning it to its ecstatically relieved owner, and finding a lost cat which turned out not to be lost at all (see here). It’s funny how things happen in threes!

For a while, I’ve been thinking about the best way to work with my mailing list(s). Since you have been good enough to subscribe to one of my sites (Lessonstream, Videotelling or jamiekeddiedotcom), I want to be able to offer you something in return. So I have an idea.

Every Sunday, I’m going to send out a dispatch. This could be an exclusive lesson plan, a video, a story or an article. You can expect to get it in your inbox some time in the evening – not too late I hope.

The next few weeks are going to be quite an interesting time for me. I have some exciting events coming up. And most importantly, I’ll be launching my new book (Videotelling) so I think that this is a good time to try this experiment.

Anyway, that’s all for now. I’m going to get back to my proofreading and then I’m having fish for tea.*

Thanks for being a subscriber!
Jamie :)

* In Scotland, your tea is your dinner. I don’t really know why we refer to it in that way, but I remember that it used to confuse me when I was a wee boy (wee = little).

Letter 3

Good morning,

I hope you are well. I’m writing to let you know about a new free service for language learners called Write & Improve, where learners can submit their written work and receive almost instant detailed feedback, which I hope your readers will be interested in.
https://writeandimprove.com/workbooks#/wi-workbooks

A full press release is below, and a screenshot indicating what the feedback looks like is attached. Please do get in touch with any questions.

Best,
Louisa

Write & Improve – ELiT launch free new service for language learners

A simple new tool is making learning English a whole lot easier. Write & Improve, a new service from a joint venture between Cambridge University Press, ILexIR, and Cambridge English - who together form English Language iTutoring Ltd (ELiT) - enables learners to submit their written work online and receive detailed feedback almost instantly.

Spelling, vocabulary, grammar and some aspects on style such as register and punctuation are all taken into account, with users receiving feedback in around 15 seconds. All feedback is automated, delivered across beginner, intermediate and advanced levels, and offered at word, sentence and essay level.

Learners’ work is continually saved to enable students to track their own progress and be motivated by seeing a clear progression journey. Hundreds of topics are on offer for writing practice, and learners can also create their own topics, and personalise their learning by including themes they need to master for their exams.

Write & Improve also awards learners a Common European Framework of Reference (CEFR) level, so they can immediately see what level their writing is at. Every piece of writing they submit will receive an individual CEFR level allocated so they can check their progress.

Alba Higgins from Cambridge University Press said: “Learners won't find a more dependable, user-friendly way to improve their written English. The feedback is almost instant, encouraging learners to keep trying to continuously learn and quickly understand the mistakes that keep recurring so they can eradicate them. They can choose from a range of interesting writing tasks or work with others online to set their own. They will also know instantly what CEFR level their writing is at and watch their progress through the levels.”

“The tool gives learners a pressure-free environment in which to produce language without having to perform in front of their peers or having to wait until next lesson to hear their teacher's feedback about a piece of writing.”

“We're delighted to be able to offer this to learners and we’ve already received some fantastic feedback. We know this is something learners are looking for and we are looking forward to see how it grows over the coming months.”

Write & Improve is available to use free from writeandimprove.com

Letter 4

Unique jug

The history of every single person on the Earth is literally connected with history of his own people. You may read about history and culture from books, at the same time it is curious to see some real things of the past. For sure you could see ancient items in museums.

I had the opportunity to be a part of Atyrau historical museum (Western Kazakhstan). History of Kazakh people attracted me and I was amazed by story of one unique exhibit (on photos). It is a story about unique jug (a large vessel for storage grains). It was found in 1909 in Saraichik, the village of Atyrau region, one of the cities of Golden Horde, the trade hub of the Silk road and one of the most important medieval centers.

There was an inscription at the top of the jug:
         Beauty of a person is a face,
         Beauty of this face are the eyes,
         Beauty of a mouth is a tongue,
         Beauty of this tongue is a word.
It was written at the top of the broken part of the jug:
         Also beauty of a person is his knowledge and skills
         To sacrifice for knowledge a person should give his soul
It was written in the middle of the jug:
         You may pour your tears in the jug.
The wise words were taken from the poem of Yusuf Balasaguni "Kutadgu bilig". It was made in Turkish language in the 13th century. These words are still impressive.

Sofya Kulchikenova, Kazakhstan

Letter 5

How can we communicate peacefully ? An open-ended Checklist by Francisco Gomes de Matos, a peace linguist, Recife,Brazil .President of the Board, ABA Global Education

How can we communicate peacefully ? By...

harmonizing, instead of antagonizing
proposing , instead of imposing
edifying,instead of vilifying
compromising,instead of radicalizing
integrating,instead of disintegrating
mending,instead of offending
inspiring, instead of conspiring
cementing,instead of tormenting
respecting,instead of affecting
elevating,instead of allienating
illuminating, instead of obfuscating

Letter 6

Dear Professor Kryszewska,

First of all, I want to wish you all the good for the New Year!

I am writing this message because I want to thank you for the HLT link. I have recently had to evaluate an academic article for one of my courses (I am a BA student at Didactics and Applied Linguistics).

David Heathfield's article "Storytelling and Creative Response Tasks" was very interesting and it helped me accomplish my task.

I have also sent the link to my colleagues.

Thank you!

Kind regards,
Ramona Calugaru

Letter 7

Adilkhair the Artist

Adilkhair Zhantasov was born in the village of Inder Atyrau oblast, in 1958y. He graduated from Almaty Arts college named after N. V. Gogol, then Almaty State Theater and Art Institute named after T. Zhurgenov(1986). Adilkhair is a member of the Union of Artists and the Union of Designers of Kazakhstan, more than 41 years is an artist in professional education and teaching, created more than 300 pictures. Now he works in Atyrau Maly Academy of Art named after N. Tlendiev as a teacher of painting for gifted schoolchildren, turned out more than hundred bright talented artists. In his pictures one can see several genres, as surrealism, portraiture, abstraction (process of thought or idea), avant-garde, he focuses more on Kazakh culture, history, traditions, nature, philosophical problems . Every day Adilkhair takes up painting 6-7 hours with young schoolchildren, he tries to explain them how to create mental image of the picture, how to paint in watercolours, in oil, which paint brush, paint remover or roller is better, so creates a calm friendly atmosphere in the workshop. In his work he finds new ideas, that touch on global questions. He was invited to many international excursions, competitions, every year he shows masterclasses for young artists and guests. Adilkhair was rewarded with letter of thanks from President RK N. Nazarbayev, award " the best in profession". Among his paintings we can observe three pictures for three wonderful kuis melodies of famous Kazakh compositors Kurmangazy " Adai", N. Tlendiev " Makhambet", and S. Turisbekov " Konil tolkini". Eight years ago he chose and kept a piece of strong tree zhede, when it became dry as a bone, he handmade during two months surprising dombra -national Kazakh musical instrument."You are not Kazakh, if you have no dombra"- here you can see this in the picture, and in the video a teacher of music Ainur Zainullina plays this dombra S. Turisbekov's melody "Konil tolkini". One of his last pictures was devoted to the 25th of Kazakhstan's independence " 5 arys", " 5 thinkers", so he painted Kazakh famous intelligent people of 1932-38 years, great writers, philosophes, as Akhmet Baitursynov, Shakarim Kudaiberdi uly, Magzhan Zhumabaev, Zhusupbek Aimautov and Nurzhakhyp Dulatov. All these people fought against injustice, lack of rights, illiterate and inaction.

Zaure Kulchikenova, Kazakhstan