Teaching & Learning

Christmas carols today carry cozy connotations of ancient traditions as old as King Wenceslas, but Christmas caroling as we know it dates back to the 19th Century and not much further. In fact, caroling itself didn't always involve Christmas, and the ancient tradition of traveling from house to house to wish neighbors good cheer didn't always involve singing. There's a distinction to be made between carols — songs stemming from medieval musical traditions — and today's Christmas caroling, says Daniel Abraham, musicology expert and choral director at American University in Washington, D.C. "The concept of carol in its origins has actually nothing to do with Christmas," Abraham says. Medieval carols were liturgical songs reserved for processionals in the 12th and 13th centuries. And though modern carols sometimes take their form from these original carols — starting with a refrain, followed by verses of uniform structure — they're separate entities. The act …

ABCDEFG
Thank you God for all I see
HIJKLMNOP
Thank you God for my family
QRS and TUV
Thank you God for loving me
WX and Y and Z
On Thanksgiving I thank thee!
Thanksgiving this year falls on November 22nd, as always in the fourth Thursday of the month, all across the USA and Canada, preceding Black Friday, one of the busiest shopping days in America. In 1621, the Plymouth colonists and Wampanoag Indians shared an Autumn harvest feast that is acknowledged today as one of the first Thanksgiving celebrations in the colonies. For more than two centuries, days of thanksgiving were celebrated by individual colonies and states. It wasn't until 1863, in the midst of the Civil War, that President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed a national Thanksgiving Day to be held each November.
To know more about Thanksgiving, its history and traditions, read T&L here. You may also check some relevantmultimedia resourceson this topic @: Bet you didn't know: Thanksgiving;History of Thanksgiving; Thanksgiving bec…

After Queen Elizabeth I died in 1603, English Catholics who had been persecuted under her rule had hoped that her successor, James I, would be more tolerant of their religion. James I had, after all, had a Catholic mother. Unfortunately, James did not turn out to be more tolerant than Elizabeth and a number of young men, 13 to be exact, decided that violent action was the answer.
A small group took shape, under the leadership of Robert Catesby. Catesby felt that violent action was warranted. Indeed, the thing to do was to blow up the Houses of Parliament. In doing so, they would kill the King, maybe even the Prince of Wales, and the Members of Parliament who were making life difficult for the Catholics. Today these conspirators would be known as extremists, or terrorists. To carry out their plan, the conspirators got hold of 36 barrels of gunpowder - and stored them in a cellar, just under the House of Lords. But as the group worked on the plot, it became clear that innocent people would…

The moon has awoken
With the sleep of the sun
The light has been broken
The spell has begun!

Do enjoy a very spooky and witchy Halloween this evening!

Can you match these frightful, spooky idioms with their meaning?

1. I don’t recommend that horror film. It will scare the living daylights out of you!

2. My old car finally gave up the ghost, so I’ll have to buy a new one.

3. When she saw the dark shadow in the in the moonlight, she was scared stiff.

4. What’s the matter? You look as if you’ve seen a ghost!

5. Oh, don’t be such a scaredy-cat. Nothing bad is going to happen.

6. That spooky old house gives me the creeps.

7. I wouldn’t do that if I were you. It will come back to haunt you.

8. No one lived there anymore. It was a ghost town.

MEANINGS:

be a mistake
very frightened
coward
make (someone) uncomfortable
make (someone) scared
very white, pale
deserted
stopped working

We miss you, Steve, and we don't forget the example you set for us. Thank you for pushing the Human Race forward!
Steve Jobs narrated this unaired version of Apple's famous Think Different ad in 1997... either you have already watched it or not, here it goes with all his geniality..