Malala, Stronger than Fear

Charo has given her Intermediate students Malala’s bio to read. By Patricia McCormick

Collage (Posters) of Women Writers for World Book Day

The C1 teacher made these posters as a contribution to the School’s activities for World Book Day. The translations into Spanish of the poems are by her.

3 writers: Anne Sexton, Mina Loy, Sylvia Plath. Someone took this poster. Please, bring it back! We miss it in class! ❤ Thanks!

6 writers: Harper Lee, Joy Harjo, Audre Lorde, Mary Oliver, Alice Walker, Toni Morrison. Fortunately, this poster is still in class! Please, don’t take it! 🙂 ❤

Feminist Story-telling: Jeanne Desy, “The Princess Who Stood on Her Own Two Feet”

We’ve put together this 6-page Word doc for classroom use next year (non-compulsory public/state-run language education, EFL at the C1 or Advanced level).

We’d like to recommend getting the book but we know it’s too expensive for our students, so that is why we’re sharing one of the stories, so at least they know there is something called “feminist story-telling” that educates in non-sexist and non-mysoginist / non-women-hating values.

We hope you enjoy it!

feministstorytelling_jeannedesy (6 Word pages)

Kate Chopin’s Consciousness-raising Work

Kate Chopin’s short story “The Storm”

Kate Chopin

Kate Chopin, born Katherine O’Flaherty in St. Louis, Missouri on February 8, 1850, is considered one of the first feminist authors of the 20th century. She was following a rather conventional path as a housewife until an unfortunate tragedy — the untimely death of her husband — altered the course of her life. She was a talented and prolific short story writer but is best known for her novel The Awakening (1899), a hauntingly prescient tale of a woman unfulfilled by the mundane yet highly celebrated “feminine role,” and her painful realization that the constraints of her gender blocked her ability to seek a more fulfilling life.

Continue reading about Kate Chopin at americanliterature.com

We’re creating this post because a C1 EFL student, Yolanda Hurtado Gegg (course 2015-16), wrote a wonderful review. Read Yolanda’s review of The Storm (2 pdf pages). But first, you might want to…

Read The Storm online

We Should All Be Feminists, by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

In course 2016-17, we created C1 Materials to include two posts on this author: On We Should All Be Feminists, and on The Thing around Your Neck

In course 2015-16, C1 students at EOI Fuengirola started their course reading out this easy-to-read and enlightening essay by Ngozi in class. Probably, this played a relevant role in the fact that all of their December teamwork Oral Presentations showed some of what we call “feminist intelligence”. Listen to those at EFL Learners Speaking, on the C1 playlist (to be published through January and February 2016).

(On “feminist intelligence”, check out our blog for this, Desarrollando inteligencia feminista, in Spanish, where you can also read about the poor translation of the title of Ngozi’s essay, by a non-feminist translator, as if there were no feminist translators on this planet!)

We’d like to post the talk she based that essay on. Enjoy!

Translations. “Imagine”, poem by Ghada Al Atrash (Syria, 2013)

A C1 (advanced) student listens to a poem, recited by the poet, learns it by heart, transcribes it, recites it in class by heart after a brief introduction on the author and some words, records it for a video to share on the Net. Dedicated to the people and the peoples who have to bear war. War is crime against humanity.

And Still I Rise, by Maya Angelou (poem)

Find more links and activities about this writer on the Talking People website.

“Weekend” by Fay Weldon (short story)

Activity sent by Marisa. She uses it in Nivel Intermedio (B1, Intermediate). MF also uses it with advanced students. It’s full of interesting language for all levels! ❤

Listen to the story: Weekend (mp3)

At this link to the British Council website you will find the following downloadable files:

• Weekend Audio (mp3)
• weekend_text.pdf
• weekend_activities.pdf
• weekend_activities_key.pdf
• weekend_supplementary.pdf