THE POPE @ GAUDI'S "SAGRADA FAMILIA", BARCELONA

The Pope Leon XIV visited Barcelona's Sagrada Familia today on the 100º anniversary of Antoni Gaudi's death to bless the newest of its geometric spires that makes the structure the world's tallest church.

Videos

Video "100 YEARS AFTER GAUDI'S DEATH":

GALICIAN IS ALSO SPOKEN HERE

 "GALICIAN IS ALSO SPOKEN HERE" ("AQUÍ TAMEN SE FALA GALEGO") is a campaign that started off at our school one year ago to promote and show that Galician is also spoken in cities, breaking the prejudices that intend to give a distorted image. This campaign, which spread throughout the shops and businesses of our neighbourhood and city centre, in the immediate environment of each of our students, has now expanded all over Galicia with more than 200 schools taking part, so you can find these poscards or posters in many places around Galicia. The campaign is also promoting Galician music and culture on social media networks. 

Everything about this campaign can be checked out on their website aquitamensefala.com: the videos with Viggo Mortensen, James Rhodes, Tanxugueiras, María Vázquez, football clubs... and many more, who all speak Galician and are proud to show off. The campaign has also reached Germany with our German exchange students.

The image on this post shows the many languages spoken by students of the Rafael Dieste, which proves the diverse linguistic heritage our school holds. It's a fortune to have such a live culture and to drink water from so many fountains. Proud of our diversity!

QUEEN ELIZABETH II HAS DIED

 

This evening the death of Queen Elizabeth II has been announced. She was 96 years old. Elizabeth II (born Elizabeth Alexandra Mary; 21 April 1926 – 8 September 2022) was Queen of the United Kingdom from 6 February 1952 until her death. Her reign of 70 years and 214 days was the longest of any British monarch and the second longest recorded of any monarch of a sovereign country. At the time of her death, Elizabeth was Queen of 14 other Commonwealth realms apart from the UK. More info about her on Wikipedia.

The last time we talked about her on this blog was to talk about the celebration of her Platinum Jubilee commemorating 70 years of her reign, showing the video she shot with Paddington, the popular character of books and films. You can watch it again clicking here.

The picture in this posts shows her walking away with Paddington, and the photo was taken two days ago during her last public appearance in Balmoral Castle in Scotland, where she had received Britain's new Prime Minister Lizz Truss. 

Below is the video of the announcement of her death this evening on the BBC.

QUEEN ELIZABETH'S PLATINUM JUBILEE: 70 YEARS

This weekend sees the celebration of Queen Elizabeth II Platinum Jubilee, which commemorates the 70th anniversary of her reign. Elizabeth, who is 96, has attended some of the celebrations.

She's even had time to do a funny video with Paddington.

Video:

THE STORY OF ALFRED NOBEL AND THE NOBEL PRIZE

December 10th is 'Nobeldagen' in Sweden, that is, Nobel Day, the day when the Nobel prizes are awarded in Stockholm. Here's a video that tells the story of Alfred Nobel and his prizes.

Video:

"RAFAEL DIESTE" 4ºESO STUDENTS' TRIP TO LONDON

We're glad to announce that this afternoon, a group of twelve 4ºESO students from our school will be boarding on a plane in Alvedro on a 5-day trip to London.

They'll be visiting important landmarks in the capital* and they'll also be visiting a school in the village of Waddesdon, 95kms away. There, they'll also go to visit Waddesdon Manor, which belonged to the Rothschild family.

Have a good trip! Enjoy!

+ info: Waddesdon Manor
* BREAKING NEWS: TERROR ATTACK @ WESTMINSTER.
Unfortunately, as they were boarding on the plane, we've learnt that there has been a terrorist attack on Westminter Bridge by the Big Ben & Houses of Parliament.
Link to LATEST UPDATES OF THE NEWS.
Info on the attack:

QUEEN ELIZABETH II SAPPHIRE JUBILEE: A 65-YEAR REIGN

Today, February 6th, the Queen of England, Elizabeth II, has become the first British monarch to reach the Sapphire Jubilee. 65 years reigning. She has only been surpassed by 3 other kings as you can see in the chart above.

+ info:

- Queen Elizabeth II @ Wikipedia

- The Queen's Sapphire Jubilee celebrations @ BBC.

TRADITIONAL AMERICAN SQUARE DANCING @ "RAFAEL DIESTE" [7th CW]

Last Friday, 29th April, to end up our VII Cultural Week on Pioneers, another activity organized from our English Department took place.

One of our English teachers together with a group of her students performed a traditional American Square Dance. Originally from England, this dance was taken to America by the first settlers, and spread throughout North America thanks to the American pioneers.

We're including in this post links to more info about:

- American Pioneers.

- Traditional Square Dance.

Also including videos of the Square Dance performance at our school, an original American video of how to dance it and the karaoke video of the song "SHE'LL BE COMING ROUND THE MOUNTAINS"

Video of our school performance:

American video explaining how to dance:


Video "SHE'LL BE COMING ROUND THE MOUNTAINS":


Galician version of this post @ ArquivosDoTrasno.

THE SCHOOL OF ATHENS @ "RAFAEL DIESTE" [7th CW]

Last Monday, 25th Abril, as an activity of our VII Cultural Week, students from 1ºBAC-A, (my tutoring class) performed "The School of Athens" together with their Philosophy teacher. This performance was a live recreation of the famous Italian Renaissance painting of the same name by Raphael, which now decorates the Stanza de la Segnatura in the Apostolic Palace in the Vatican.

The original painting is shown below:

And below, even another noted version with proposed identifications (according to the Wikipedia):

1: Zeno of Citium 2: Epicurus Possibly, the image of two philosophers, who were typically shown in pairs during the Renaissance: Heraclitus, the "weeping" philosopher, and Democritus, the "laughing" philosopher. 3: unknown (believed to be Raphael)4: Boethiusor Anaximander or Empedocles? 5: Averroes 6: Pythagoras 7: Alcibiades or Alexander the Great? 8: Antisthenes or Xenophon or Timon? 9: Raphael, Fornarina as a personification of Love or Francesco Maria della Rovere? 10: Aeschines or Xenophon? 11: Parmenides? (Leonardo da Vinci) 12: Socrates 13: Heraclitus (Michelangelo) 14: Plato (Leonardo da Vinci) 15: Aristotle (Giuliano da Sangallo) 16: Diogenes of Sinope 17: Plotinus (Donatello?) 18: Euclid or Archimedes with students (Bramante?) 19: Strabo or Zoroaster? (Baldassare Castiglione) 20: Ptolemy? R: Apelles (Raphael) 21: Protogenes (Il Sodoma, Perugino, or Timoteo Viti)

Including a video which guides you through the painting with a detailed description in English.

Video about "The School of Athens"! painting:

Galician version of this post @ ArquivosDoTrasno. (+video of the performance at our school assembly hall, last Monday)

THE QUEEN IS 90

Above, the official 90th anniversary photograph, Queen Elizabeth and the three heirs to the British thrown: Prince Charles, Prince William & Prince George.

Today one of the symbols of what's British becomes 90 years old. Queen Elizabeth II's birthday is today and here's a link to her 90 years of life in pictures, a photo for each of her years. 90 years old and 64 of them as the Queen: living history of the XXth century.

In pictures: Queen Elizabeth II at 90 in 90 images [BBC]

BRITISH ROYAL FAMILY TREE

The Royal British Family is an important part of British culture and tradition. With a new baby girl just born into the family yesterday, here's the British Royal Family Tree to see who's who in this family. By the way, the new member is called Princess Charlotte Elizabeth Diana. She's fourth in line to the thrown.

Video of the news:
.

LEFT DRIVING COUNTRIES

If you travel to Britain, you'll have to be very careful when you're about to cross the street, because the British drive on the left. But they're not the only ones, as you can see in the map above, other countries drive on the same side: Australia, New Zealand, Indonesia, India, South Africa, Japan, Kenia, among others.

But it's not due to an impulse, it has some historical reasons. Historically, most traffic drove on the left side in most of the civilised world, thanks mostly to the Roman Empire. Archaeologists found that deeper marks or grooves on the roads are seen on their left side.

Bt medieval times, driving on the left is related to knights. Since most people were right-handed, knights held their swords in their right hands and their lances under the right arms.So, on the road, knights walked on the left to make sure that their sword was between them and a stranger, while passing on the right when on horseback. In the 18th century, driving on the left became law to drive on the London Bridge. The General Highways Act of 1773 recommended to drive on the left in the whole of the UK and it 1835 it became compulsory by the Highway Act.
[Based on article from Anglotopia]

Video "LEFT vs RIGHT DRIVING":

We also include a chart with phrasal verbs related with DRIVING.

Remember there's a separate page in this blog where you can find phrasal verbs listed alphabetically.

GALICIA: THE SEVENTH CELTIC NATION

While Scotland and Ireland are most commonly associated with the Celtic people, the roots of the culture are spread throughout Europe. More than a millennium ago, a Celtic tribe known as the Gallaeci settled in an area north of the Douro River. The region became modern day Galicia, which is in northwest Spain and is today considered the seventh of the original Celtic nations, along with Eire (Ireland), Kernow (Cornwall), Mannin (Isle of Mann), Breizh (Brittany), Alba (Scotland) and Cymru (Wales).

The evidence is everywhere, from the Galician language – which contains a significant amount of words of Celtic origin and is spoken by more than three million people – to the pagan festivals and rituals that continue to flourish in the region. The pallozas, or round stone huts (pictured), date back 2,500 years and are believed to be of Celtic origin.

Thanks to Jim Richardson from National Geographic Creative, if you want to know more, continue reading in BBC travel.

EVERYTHING ABOUT THE UK

To end up with the series of posts with information about different aspects of the United Kingdom, after the Scottish referendum for independence has been held, here's a new post (2nd part of this previous one here) where you'll find information about government, customs, geography, history, politics and government via different links.

Link to a Glogster digital poster about the UK.

Link to a post about the UK @ The Travelling Teachers Blog.

BRITAIN'S LOST EMPIRE

Scotland voted in a referendum for independence. They voted not to be independent, but they could have become another of the many countries that have had the British rule throughout history. In this post, we show every country that has left the United Kingdom's rule in maps (taken from the British newspaper "The Guardian") of different times. Above, the oldest, below the most recent. All these countries now still belong to the Commonwealth.

Since the Act of Union in 1707 the United Kingdom has ruled vast extensions of land across the world, a lot of countries have since then left the UK's rule. Scotland could have become the last one to do so, but is hasn't.

Australia, Canada & New Zealand were independent  much before the 1980s, but until then they hadn't officially removed all their ties with the UK.

THE UNION JACK

Today, in the previous post, and as a consquence of the Scottish referendum for independence, we wondered what would happen to the Union Jack, the national flag, which represents the United Kingdom, if Scotland was to become independent.

But do you know about the origin of the Union Jack?

In this post we explain how it was made up. The Union Jack is the combination of the three heraldic crosses which represent the four countries which form the United Kingdom, as explained in the graphic on the left.

So if Scotland had become an independent country, the Union Jack could have been something like this:

THE PROTO-INDO-EUROPEAN LANGUAGE: HOW IT COULD HAVE SOUNDED

What did our European ancestors sound like?
Professor linguist Dr. Andrew Byrd has recently reconstructed his own recordings of Proto-Indo-European language, the language which our ancestors in Europe would have been speaking between 4,500 and 2,500 B.C. 
All the information in this link from The Huffington Post.

Here take a listen of what it could have sounded like:

Here's the phonetic transcription:

Here's the passage translated into English:
A sheep that had no wool saw horses, one of them pulling a heavy wagon, one carrying a big load, and one carrying a man quickly. The sheep said to the horses: "My heart pains me, seeing a man driving horses." The horses said: "Listen, sheep, our hearts pain us when we see this: a man, the master, makes the wool of the sheep into a warm garment for himself. And the sheep has no wool." Having heard this, the sheep fled into the plain.

Galician version of this post @ ArquivosDoTrasno.

"RAFAEL DIESTE" IV CULTURAL WEEK: GALICIAN HERITAGE, THE SLIDE

"You say: Galicia is really small.

I say to you: Galicia is a world in itself"

(Vicente Risco)

This week, from Monday 29th April till Friday 3rd May, we'll be celebrating our IV Cultural Week at IES "Rafael Dieste". This activity organized by the school's library together with the different departments and the students of our school is devoted this year to Galician artistic and natural heritage.

This year once again, there will be exhibitions of 
- Galician typical costumes, 
- typical Galician pottery,
- student's works on our different monuments, 
- photos of the different school-trips to visit them.
Performances of:
- traditional music,
- choirs, 
- traditional dance, 
- theatre plays 
and the projection of the film "The Way" devoted to St. James' pilgrimage route.

As you already know, the English Department has contributed with an exhibition based on posters from the local newspaper with short descriptions in English and Galician, which has been on display at our school since the German student exchange arrived a month ago. Now it's shown again as part of the Cultural Week. The different places shown in the exhibition have already been posted in this blog, together with a quiz.

Enjoy the week and take care of our heritage!

A CORUÑA: A PLACE TO LOOK FORWARD TO

Here's a video tourist-guide of our home city, A Coruña, in English to enjoy the spectacular sights we can offer to any tourist who comes around.

Video "A CORUÑA: A PLACE TO LOOK FORWARD TO":

GALICIAN HERITAGE: THE QUIZ

Once you've read the descriptions of the selected Galician heritage sites on a previous post in this blog, see here. You can have a try with this quiz to check if you've learnt things. 

QUESTIONS ABOUT GALICIAN HERITAGE

1- Complete the chart with the correct monument name:

Year	Monument	Award
1980		Nature Reserve
1985		World Heritage
1987		European Cultural Route
1993		World Heritage
1993		UNESCO Biosphere Reserve
1997		Natural Park
2000		World Heritage
2002		Natural Park
2007		Best beach in the world, “The Guardian”
2009		World Heritage

2- What's special about the Tower of Hercules?

3- What was the Lugo Roman Wall built for?

4- Why has Santiago de Compostela become one of the most important pilgrimage sites in Europe?

5- How many different alternatives has the St James' Way got?

6- When is Holy Year?

7- Where is the Caaveiro Monastery? When was it founded?

8- What is said about going to St Andrew of Teixido dead or alive?

9- How many ruins of houses are kept at the Baroña Castro?

10- Which sea washes the Cathedrals Beach?

11- On what border is the Serra do Xurés natural park?

12- At the mouth of which “ria” are the Cies Islands?

13- What's a “palloza”?

14- How long is the Carnota horreo?