ընտրության գործունեություն

• Do you know why Christmas is celebrated around the world?
• Do you know the history of Christmas?
• Do you remember when you found out that Santa Claus wasn’t real
• Do you see your relatives at Christmas time?
• Do you think we will have a white Christmas this year?
• Do you usually put up Christmas decorations in your house? (Do you usually decorate your home?)
  • Does you school have a Christmas play?
  • Does your family have any special Christmas traditions?
  • Does your town get decorated at Christmas?
    • What kind of decorations?
  • Have you already finished your Christmas shopping?
  • Have you ever celebrated Christmas in a foreign country?
  • Have you ever made your own Christmas cards?
    • If so, how did you make them?
  • How do you usually spend New Year’s Eve? How about New Year’s Day?
  • How long do you keep your Christmas tree up after Christmas?
  • How long is your Christmas vacation?
  • How many Christmas cards did you receive last year?
  • How many Christmas cards do you send?
  • How many presents do you usually give?
  • If you could go anywhere during Christmas vacation, where would you go?
  • In how many languages did you write Christmas cards?
  • Is there a holiday similar to Christmas in your home country?
  • Is your Christmas tree a real tree or an artificial tree?
  • What are some popular foods for the Christmas season?
  • What are you going to buy your boyfriend/girlfriend for their Christmas present?
  • What did you do last year on Christmas Day?
  • How did you celebrate Christmas last year?
  • What do you eat on Christmas Day?
  • What do you usually do for Christmas?
  • What do you want Santa to bring you for Christmas?
  • What does your family eat for Christmas dinner?
  • What is Christmas like in your hometown?
    • What is Christmas like in your country?
  • What is the most expensive Christmas present you plan to buy?
  • What is the typical menu for a Christmas meal in your family? (… in your country?)
  • What is the weather like in your country around Christmas time?
  • What is your favorite Christmas carol?
  • What is your favorite Christmas song?
  • What kind of presents do you expect to get this Christmas?
  • What time do you wake up on Christmas day?
  • What time does your family open the presents?
  • What traditions do you have during the Christmas season?
  • What was the best present your received last Christmas?
  • Do you ever think about the real meaning of Christmas?
  • Do you go skiing at Christmas time?
  • Whose birthday is celebrated on Christmas?
  • Which comes first, Christmas or New Year’s Day?

«THE GIFT OF THE MAGI» BY O. HENRY

The Gift of the Magi by O. Henry (intermediate). Listen online:

One dollar and eighty-seven cents. That was all. And sixty cents of it in the smallest pieces of money — pennies. Pennies saved one and two at a time by negotiating with the men at the market who sold vegetables and meat. Negotiating until one’s face burned with the silent knowledge of being poor. Three times Della counted it. One dollar and eighty-seven cents. And the next day would be Christmas.

There was clearly nothing to do but sit down and cry. So Della cried. Which led to the thought that life is made up of little cries and smiles, with more little cries than smiles.

Della finished her crying and dried her face. She stood by the window and looked out unhappily at a gray cat walking along a gray fence in a gray back yard. Tomorrow would be Christmas Day, and she had only one dollar and eighty-seven cents to buy her husband Jim a gift. She had been saving every penny she could for months, with this result.

Jim earned twenty dollars a week, which does not go far. Expenses had been greater than she had expected. They always are. Many a happy hour she had spent planning to buy something nice for him. Something fine and rare — something close to being worthy of the honor of belonging to Jim.

There was a tall glass mirror between the windows of the room. Suddenly Della turned from the window and stood before the glass mirror and looked at herself. Her eyes were shining, but her face had lost its color within twenty seconds. Quickly she pulled down her hair and let it fall to its full length.

Now, Mister and Missus James Dillingham Young had two possessions which they valued. One was Jim’s gold time piece, the watch that had been his father’s and his grandfather’s. The other was Della’s hair.

Had the Queen of Sheba lived in their building, Della would have let her hair hang out the window to dry just to reduce the value of the queen’s jewels.

So now Della’s beautiful hair fell about her, shining like a brown waterfall. It reached below her knees and made itself almost like a covering for her. And then quickly she put it up again. She stood still while a few tears fell on the floor.

She put on her coat and her old brown hat. With a quick motion and brightness still in her eyes, she danced out the door and down the street.

Where she stopped the sign read: «Madame Sofronie. Hair Goods of All Kinds.» Della ran up the steps to the shop, out of breath.

«Will you buy my hair?» asked Della.

«I buy hair,» said Madame. «Take your hat off and let us have a look at it.»

Down came the beautiful brown waterfall of hair.

«Twenty dollars,» said Madame, lifting the hair with an experienced hand.

«Give it to me quick,» said Della.

The next two hours went by as if they had wings. Della looked in all the stores to choose a gift for Jim.

She found it at last. It surely had been made for Jim and no one else. It was a chain — simple round rings of silver. It was perfect for Jim’s gold watch. As soon as she saw it she knew that it must be for him. It was like him. Quiet and with great value. She gave the shopkeeper twenty-one dollars and she hurried home with the eighty-seven cents that was left.

When Della arrived home she began to repair what was left of her hair. The hair had been ruined by her love and her desire to give a special gift. Repairing the damage was a very big job.

Within forty minutes her head was covered with tiny round curls of hair that made her look wonderfully like a schoolboy. She looked at herself in the glass mirror long and carefully.

«If Jim does not kill me before he takes a second look at me,» she said to herself, «he’ll say I look like a song girl. But what could I do—oh! what could I do with a dollar and eighty-seven cents?»

At seven o’clock that night the coffee was made and the pan on the back of the stove was hot and ready to cook the meat.

Jim was never late coming home from work. Della held the silver chain in her hand and sat near the door. Then she heard his step and she turned white for just a minute. She had a way of saying a little silent prayer about the simplest everyday things, and now she whispered: «Please God, make him think I am still pretty.»

The door opened and Jim stepped in. He looked thin and very serious. Poor man, he was only twenty-two and he had to care for a wife. He needed a new coat and gloves to keep his hands warm.

Jim stopped inside the door, as immovable as a dog smelling a bird. His eyes were fixed upon Della. There was an expression in them that she could not read, and it frightened her. It was not anger, nor surprise, nor fear, nor any of the feelings that she had been prepared for. He simply looked at her with a strange expression on his face. Della went to him.

«Jim, my love,» she cried, «do not look at me that way. I had my hair cut and sold because I could not have lived through Christmas without giving you a gift. My hair will grow out again. I just had to do it. My hair grows very fast. Say ‘Merry Christmas!’ Jim, and let us be happy. You do not know what a nice— what a beautiful, nice gift I have for you.»

«You have cut off your hair?» asked Jim, slowly, as if he had not accepted the information even after his mind worked very hard.

«Cut it off and sold it,» said Della. «Do you not like me just as well? I am the same person without my hair, right?

Jim looked about the room as if he were looking for something.

«You say your hair is gone?» he asked.

«You need not look for it,» said Della. «It is sold, I tell you—sold and gone, too. It is Christmas Eve, boy. Be good to me, for it was cut for you. Maybe the hairs of my head were numbered,» she went on with sudden serious sweetness, «but nobody could ever count my love for you. Shall I put the meat on, Jim?»

Jim seemed to awaken quickly and put his arms around Della. Then he took a package from his coat and threw it on the table.

«Do not make any mistake about me, Dell,» he said. «I do not think there is any haircut that could make me like my girl any less. But if you will open that package you may see why you had me frightened at first.»

White fingers quickly tore at the string and paper. There was a scream of joy; and then, alas! a change to tears and cries, requiring the man of the house to use all his skill to calm his wife.

For there were the combs — the special set of objects to hold her hair that Della had wanted ever since she saw them in a shop window. Beautiful combs, made of shells, with jewels at the edge —just the color to wear in the beautiful hair that was no longer hers. They cost a lot of money, she knew, and her heart had wanted them without ever hoping to have them. And now, the beautiful combs were hers, but the hair that should have touched them was gone.

But she held the combs to herself, and soon she was able to look up with a smile and say, «My hair grows so fast, Jim!»

Then Della jumped up like a little burned cat and cried, «Oh, oh!»

Jim had not yet seen his beautiful gift. She happily held it out to him in her open hands. The silver chain seemed so bright.

«Isn’t it wonderful, Jim? I looked all over town to find it. You will have to look at the time a hundred times a day now. Give me your watch. I want to see how it looks on it.»

Instead of obeying, Jim fell on the couch and put his hands under the back of his head and smiled.

«Dell,» said he, «let us put our Christmas gifts away and keep them a while. They are too nice to use just right now. I sold my gold watch to get the money to buy the set of combs for your hair. And now, why not put the meat on.»

The magi were wise men—wonderfully wise men—who brought gifts to the Baby Jesus. They invented the art of giving Christmas gifts. Being wise, their gifts were wise ones. And here I have told you the story of two young people who most unwisely gave for each other the greatest treasures of their house. But in a last word to the wise of these days, let it be said that of all who give gifts, these two were the wisest. Everywhere they are wisest. They are the magi.

Listen Here: The Gift of the Magi – O. Henry’s most famous story http://englishstory.ru/the-gift-of-the-magi-o-henry-s-most-famous-story.html#ixzz67gfGBYzM

DECEMBER 3

Book 1, pages 44-46, read the text  Farm.

Winter

Winter is a beautiful and magical time of the year. This cold season consists of three months: merry December, snowy January and frosty February. The winter season brings us large snow flakes, snowstorms, icicles hanging from the roofs of houses, amazing patterns on the windows. The real winter days do not hurry to come, they appear with the first frosts, snowflakes and hoarfrost in the morning. Fallen snow during the night, every morning glitters and shimmers in the rays of the cold sun, and blinds the eyes of people who are rushing to work and leaving intricate lines of tracks in the snow. Snow lies everywhere: on the roofs of buildings, on benches, on paths and roads. Trees proudly stand dressed in snow-white outfits.There is the frosty breath of the coming winter in the air. Nature sleeps hiding under a snow blanket in anticipation of spring.

 

NOVEMBER 19

BOOK 1 PAGES 38-41

LESSON FIVE, READ AND TRANSLATE

EXERCISES ON PAGE 41

COUNTING MORE THAN HALF A BILLION INDIVIDUALS AND OVER 70 DIFFERENT BREEDS, CATS ARE THE WORLD’S MOST POPULAR PETS. EVEN THOUGH THEY ARE CURIOUS ANIMALS WHO LIKE TO EXPLORE AND HUNT, CATS ARE ALSO A TRULY SOCIAL SPECIES. THEY COMMUNICATE WITH HUMANS THROUGH MEWING, PURRING OR SOMETIMES GRUNTING, AND IT IS POSSIBLE TO EVEN LEARN CAT-SPECIFIC BODY LANGUAGE TO BETTER UNDERSTAND THEIR NEEDS AND WISHES.

 

NOVEMBER 12

Book 1, pages 30-32
Exercises on page 34, 35

NOVEMBER 5 

A DOG’S LIFE, LISTEN HERE

SHORT STORY
HI. I’M DINO, THE FAMILY DOG. I HELP KEEP PEOPLE SAFE, ESPECIALLY ON THE
ROADS. TAKE A LOOK AT MY DIARY TO SEE WHAT I DID LAST WEEK.

SUNDAY

SOME CHILDREN REALLY DON’T THINK. OUR NEIGHBOUR’S BOY RAN IN FRONT OF A
CAR TO GET HIS BALL. THE CAR ALMOST HIT HIM. I SAVED HIM THOUGH.
REMEMBER, ALWAYS LOOK AND LISTEN.

MONDAY

Walking on the street at night can be very dangerous, especially if you wear dark clothes. Car drivers
can’t see you very well, just like these two I had to take home. Luckily I never go out without my
reflective jacket and collar. Remember, BE SEEN!

TUESDAY

People can get very angry when driving, usually for silly reasons. One driver started shouting at Mum
today when she stopped to let some children cross the road. I soon made him stop.

Wednesday

One thing makes me really mad. Grrrrrr. People walking on a dangerous road when they can walk on
the safe pavement. I saw two girls doing that today but I soon made them change their minds.

Thursday

Seat belts can save your life! I make sure everyone in our car wears their seat belt. If they forget, I
soon remind them. Even I’ve got one.

Friday

I like Fridays. The roads are quieter. But you still have to be careful. I caught Dad talking on his mobile
phone while driving. I soon stopped him though. Don’t worry, he got his phone back.

Saturday

Today Mum took me for a walk. One car was parked in a very dangerous place. It was right on the
corner of the street. Don’t worry though. I left him a message!

A dog’s life
dog car ball look listen night
clothes angry cross the road pavement seat belt mobile phone

 Match the days with what Dino did.

Sunday He made an angry man stop shouting.
Monday He reminded the family to wear seat belts.
Tuesday He saved a boy on the road.
Wednesday He left a message on a car parked dangerously.
Thursday He made two girls walk on the pavement.
Friday He took two children home.
Saturday He stopped Dad talking on his mobile.

October 24

Simple Present or Present Progressive

1. Andy sometimes … comics. (to read)
2. We never … TV in the morning. (to watch)
3. Listen! Sandy … in the bathroom. (to sing)
4. My sister usually…  in the kitchen. (to help)
5. My mother…  breakfast now. (to make)
6. They often … the bathroom. (to clean)
7. Look! The boys … home. (to come)
8. Every day his grandfather  …for a walk. (to go)
9. I  with my friend …at the moment. (to chat)
10. Cats … mice. (to eat)

 

1. Every day Julie (take)  the bus to go to her office.

2. At the moment you (do)  an English exercise.

3. Tom and Julie (learn)  English this year.

4. The bank (open)  at 9.30 every morning from Monday to Friday.

5. Our cousins (come)  to see us next Sunday.

6. Tom (read)  the newspaper every morning on the train.

7. Julie usually (clean)  the house on Saturdays.

8. At the moment she (write)  a letter to a client.

9. Julie (speak)  three languages : English, French and Spanish.

10. Today is Sunday. Tom and Julie (relax)  in their garden.

OCTOBER 10

                                                 Drinking water

The tap water is generally safe, as it comes directly from mountains, but you may also purchase bottled water. You can get both mineral water with gas and normal spring water on almost every street corner. This water is available in both the rural areas and the capital. You can  open the tap either at work or in a house and drink running water. It’s absolutely safe for drinking and even tasty. In the streets and yards of Yerevan you can see certain water springs. The unique one-meter-high bubbling jet offers clean and tasty Armenian water. Come close and drink. It is completely free.

Homework

Use the new words from the text in the sentences:

spring-1. գարուն, 2. աղբյուր, 3 զսպանակ,

both… and…-և….և…

either… or… կամ… կամ…

neither… nor… ոչ…. ոչ…

trap-ծուղակ

tap-ծորակ

OCTOBER 1

TOM’S JOB

Tom works at a bank. He is the manager. He starts work every day at 8:00 am. He finishes work every day at 6:00 pm. He lives very close to the bank. He walks to work every day. His brother and sister also work at the bank. But, they do not live close to the bank. They drive cars to work. They start work at 9:00 am. In the bank, Tom is the boss. He helps all the workers and tells them what to do. He likes his job. He is also very good at his job. Many customers like Tom, and they say hello to him when they come to the bank. Tom likes to talk to the customers and make them feel happy. Tom really likes his job.

1. QUESTION

 SEPTEMBER 24

Complete the following sentences using appropriate articles.

1. She gave me ……………………. book.

2. Put ……………………. book on …………………… table.

3. There is …………………… apple in the fridge.

4. If you are hungry, you can eat ………………………… banana.

5. She told me ………………………. interesting story.

6. My brother has ………………………… pet dog.

7. I want …………………… glass of water.

8. I watched ……………………… movie yesterday.

9. I have seen ………………….. movie you are talking about.

10. I have ……………………. sister.

11. She can play ……………………… violin and ………………….. piano.

12. I went to ……………………….. hospital to see Jane.

Read the text

A Good Boy

Billy always listens to his mother. He always does what she says. If his mother says, “Brush your teeth,” Billy brushes his teeth. If his mother says, “Go to bed,” Billy goes to bed. Billy is a very good boy. A good boy listens to his mother. His mother doesn’t have to ask him again. She asks him to do something one time, and she doesn’t ask again. Billy is a good boy. He does what his mother asks the first time. She doesn’t have to ask again. She tells Billy, “You are my best child.” Of course Billy is her best child. Billy is her only child.