In 2005 the Clinton Foundation and the American Heart Association launched the Alliance for a Healthier Generation. Their mission is to eliminate childhood obesity and inspire all young people in the US to develop life long healthy habits of eating and exercises.

25 million young people are overweight or ceboming overweight in the US.

In this video you'll see Bill Clinton meeting Justin DeParis, a Youth Advisory Board member of the Alliance for a Healthier Generation, to discuss the growing number of overweight young people.

For more information go to Alliance for Healthier Generation

Acronym and Initialism

Acronyms and Initialism are abbreviations that are formed using the initial components in phrase or name. These components may be individual letters (as in CEO) or parts of words (as in Benelux). There is no universal agreement on the precise definition of the various terms, nor on written usage.

While the word abbreviation refers to any shortened form of a word or phrase, some have used initialism to refer to an abbreviation formed simply from a string of initials. In 1943, Bell Laboratories coined the term acronym as the name for a word created from the first letters of each word in aseries of words (such as sonar, created from sound navigation and ranging).

Examples

Pronounced as a word, containing only initial letters

AIDS: acquired immune deficiency syndrome
ASBO: anti-social behavior order
NATO: North Atlantic Treaty Organization
Scuba: self-contained underwater breathing apparatus

Pronounced as word, containing non-initial letters

amphetamine: alpha-methyl-phenethylamine
Gestapo: Geheime Staatspolizei (secret state police)
Interpol: International Criminal Police Organization
Radar: radio detection and ranging

Pronounced as a word or names of letters, dependind on speaker or context

FAQ: frequently asked questions
IRA: .(1) Irish Republican Army pronounced as separated letters
.(2) Individual Retirement Account pronounced as a word

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acronym_and_initialism

BBC Brasil - Aprenda Inglês

Hello Everyone!


Here is one more webpage you can use as a tool for your learning process.


BBC Brasil - Aprenda Inglês


Here you'll find:


* pronunciation tips

* news (audio and script)

and much more!



Enjoy it!

Forvo

A new pronunciation guide.
All the words in the world, pronounced.

forvo.com

Google Wave

What is a wave?

A wave is equal parts conversation and document. People can communicate and work together with richly formatted text, photos, videos, maps, and more.

A wave is shared. Any participant can reply anywhere in the message, edit the content and add participants at any point in the process. Then playback lets anyone rewind the wave to see who said what and when.

A wave is live. With live transmission as you type, participants on a wave can have faster conversations, see edits and interact with extensions in real-time.

Help end hunger

If you think you're doing not much to help people around you...
If you feel you should be doing more than just wake-eat-work-eat-watchTV-sleep....

Here is a way to help people around the world.

Free Rice

You can play many subjects: math, English, arts, French, etc...
Playing you help donating food for those who are hungry.

FreeRice began October 7th, 2007, donating just 830 grains of rice that day. Now totals surpassed 62 billion grains donated. Advertisers on the site pay for the rice while the United Nations World Food Program (WFP) delivers it.


Enjoy it!!!

The natural flow of English

by Maria Hruschak

When a Native English Speaker speaks, only select words are stressed, while others are spoken quickly, or glided over.

Why?

English is a stressed language. Unlike Chinese, French or Italian, which devotes equal attention to each word, English stresses only the content words and glides over the 'helpers'.

Nouns, principal verbs, adjectives and adverbs are all content words.

Pronouns, articles, auxiliary verbs, prepositions, and conjunctions are the 'helper' words.

Ex: They will come on Friday.
Emphasis is placed on the bold words.

This is a tricky concept for a Native English Teacher to get across to a new student in English.

Here is a quick way to see some results:

Read any paragraph in English. Stress each and every syllable. (You will notice that the sound is almost robotic).

Next, read the same paragraph, only this time stress only the content words, and glide over the others. If you need to, underline the content words first. Don't get too caught up in which is which if you are not sure.

The point is to become familiar with the flow of English.
Using this technique will make it easier for people to understand you.