GOING VIRAL

Having received a large number of positive comments in the past few months

has given us the nudge to expand Sparkles'© activities and make it even more

accessible to both, students and teachers. You can probably guess - we have

created a Facebook page. Since we strongly believe sharing our thoughts and

ideas and direct communication with the readers can make both, learning and

teaching better, this was a logical step further. On www.facebook.com/

Sparkles.newsletter you can already find the details from the previous issues,

which we would be delighted if you commented on. Starting from this issue,

there will be polls, discussions and competitions enabling you to take part in

the creation of Sparkles© on a daily basis. First of all, with Christmas ap-

proaching, we thought we could choose the best songs, books and films having

to do with Christmas. The lists will be there soon, and the results will be pub-

lished in the next issue, in December. Of course, if you feel the need to add

something we've forgotten, write a comment. Everything is always so much

better if it is done together.

Besides Sparkles© on Facebook, nothing special has happened in the past

month or so. Even though September scared us with winter-like temperatures,

October was really nice and we had a chance to enjoy the true Indian summer,

making the most of our scarce free time. All in all, ten school weeks are be-

hind us. Six more until the winter break. Enjoy your days at school. ▪ I.P.

All Saints' Day is a

celebration of all Christian

saints, particularly those

who have no special feast

days of their own, in many

Roman Catholic, Anglican

and Protestant churches.

In many western churches

it is annually held on

November 1 and in many

eastern churches it is

celebrated on the first

Sunday after Pentecost.

It is also known as All

Hallows Tide, All-

Hallomas, or All Hallows'

Day.

The next day—All Souls'

Day—specifically

commemorates the

departed faithful who

have not yet been purified

and reached heaven.

Christians who celebrate

All Saints' Day and All

Souls' Day do so in the

fundamental belief that

there is a prayerful

spiritual bond between

those in heaven and the

living.

There are various

traditions related to this

day across the globe, but

most of them involve

visiting the graves of

deceased relatives,

bringing them flowers and

lighting candles. ▪ M.I.

Inside this issue:

Thanksgiving

Day

2

Buy Nothing Day 3

Guy Fawkes

Night

4

St Andrew’s Day 5

News from

schools

6

Xmas best of 7

PLN 8

Contributors to this

issue:

Romana Gašpar, prof.

School of Economics

and Tourism Daruvar

Ivan Lukovečki,

cartoon artist

DID YOU KNOW? ALL SAINTS’ DAY

ISSUE 07/13

November 2013

Monthly newsletter for and by English learners and teachers in Bjelovar-bilogora county

Editors:

Maja Ivanović, prof.

Komercijalna i trgovačka škola Bjelovar

Irena Pavlović, prof. mentor

Srednja škola Čazma

email: sparkles.newsletter@gmail.com

All Saints’ Day candles

Thanksgiving is an important American festivity. It is celebrated on the last Thursday in November

and many schools, offices and shops have an extended four-day weekend. It is an opportunity for

families to thank God for all they have and many people travel great distances to be with their

families on that day. It is also the beginning of the Christmas season.

The tradition of Thanksgiving started with the Pilgrims, the founders of America. They left

Great Britain in 1620 because of religious persecution. They wanted to start a new life in America

and practice their religion in freedom, so one hundred men, women and children left Britain on a

small ship called the Mayflower. They had a very difficult sea voyage and many of them died, but the rest came to the north-east coast of North America in December 1620 and founded Plymouth.

There was nothing but wilderness found on the area and since it was almost winter and they didn’t

have a roof over their heads and had almost nothing to eat, they immediately started building

small homes. They didn’t succeed in cultivating crops because of the winter, which was therefore very unpleasant. Almost half of them died because of bad living conditions. The friendly Wam-

panoag Indians helped them to get through the winter, and in the spring the Pilgrims met an In-

dian called Squanto. He taught them how to grow corn, hunt animals and live in the wilderness.

Soon the Pilgrims and the Indians became good friends and the Pilgrims started to have a nice life

there. They worked hard and had an excellent summer harvest. By November 1621 everyone had food and a home, so their leader, Governor William Bradford, decided to celebrate their success

with a dinner for the Pilgrims and the Indians.

Today the traditional Thanksgiving meal is similar to the first one. People eat roast turkey,

sweet potatoes, corn, cranberry sauce and pumpkin pie. Most families start their meal with a prayer - they thank the Lord for all he has given them to have and to enjoy throughout the past

year.▪ M.I.

THANKSGIVING DAY

DIY—PUMPKIN PIE

Ingredients

1 package cream cheese, softened

2 cups canned pumpkin, mashed

1 cup sugar

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 egg plus 2 egg yolks, beaten

1 cup half-and-half (milk+cream)

1/4 cup melted butter

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon ground ginger

1 piece pre-made pie dough

Whipped cream, for topping

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 180 °C.

Place 1 piece of pre-made pie

dough down into a pie pan and

press down along the bottom and

all sides. Pinch and crimp the

edges together to make a pretty

pattern. Put the pie shell back

into the freezer for 1 hour to

firm up. Fit a piece of aluminum

foil to cover the inside of the

shell completely. Fill the shell up

to the edges with pie weights or

dried beans and place it in the

oven. Bake for 10 minutes,

remove the foil and pie weights

and bake for another 10 minutes

or until the crust is dried out and

beginning to color.

For the filling, in a large mixing

bowl, beat the cream cheese with

a hand mixer. Add the pumpkin

and beat until combined. Add the

sugar and salt, and beat until

combined. Add the eggs mixed

with the yolks, half-and-half, and

melted butter, and beat until

combined. Finally, add the vanilla,

cinnamon, and ginger and beat

until incorporated.

Pour the filling into the warm

prepared pie crust and bake for

50 minutes, until the center’s set.

Place the pie on a wire rack and

cool to room temperature. Cut

into slices and top each piece with

a generous amount of whipped

cream.

(http://www.foodnetwork.com)

November 2013 Page 2

THIS MONTH’S BUZZ

A Thanksgiving prayer

It's time to lock up your wallets and

purses, cut up your credit cards and

dump the love of your life - shopping.

Saturday November 30th 2013 is

Buy Nothing Day (UK). It's a day

where you challenge yourself, your

family and friends to switch off

from shopping and tune into life. The

rules are simple, for 24 hours you

will detox from shopping and anyone

can take part provided they spend a

day without spending!

Everything we buy has an impact on the

environment; Buy Nothing Day highlights

the environmental and ethical conse-

quences of consumerism. The developed

countries - only 20% of the world popu-

lation are consuming over 80% of the

earth's natural resources, causing a

disproportionate level of environmental

damage, and an unfair distribution of

wealth. To find out more, visit:

http://www.buynothingday.co.uk/.

▪ I.P.

Black Friday is the day after Thanksgiving Day

in the USA and falls on the Friday after the

fourth Thursday in November. It is one of the

busiest shopping days in the USA and a holiday

in some states but also an unofficial beginning

of the Christmas shopping season.

There are two popular theories as to why the

day after Thanksgiving Day is called Black Fri-

day. One theory is that the wheels of vehicles in

heavy traffic on the day after Thanksgiving Day

left many black markings on the road surface,

leading to the term Black Friday. The other the-

ory is that the term Black Friday comes from an

old way of recording business accounts. Losses

were recorded in red ink and profits in black

ink. Many businesses, particularly small busi-

nesses, started making profits prior to Christ-

mas. Many hoped to start showing a profit,

marked in black ink, on the day after Thanksgiv-

ing Day.

Many people have a day off work or choose to

take a day from their quota of annual leave on

Black Friday. Some people use this to make trips

to see family members or friends who live in

other areas or to go on vacation. Others (the

majority) use it to start shopping for the Christ-

mas season because many stores have special

offers and lower their prices on some goods or

even extend their opening hours. Those special

offers and discounts are the guarantee that me-

dia around the world will broadcast videos of

numerous buyers anxious to get the product

they've been eyeing for a while and ready to do

whatever it takes to get a hold of it. ▪ I.P.

Black Friday in United States

To buy or not to buy - that is the question!

“Oh, for the good old days when people would stop Christmas shopping when they ran out of money.”

~ unknown ~

Page 3

THIS MONTH’S BUZZ

Page 4

On that night many people in London were happy be-

cause the conspiracy was discovered so when Guy

Fawkes was captured they started big bonfires in the streets. Someone made an effigy of Guy Fawkes and

they burnt it in the fire.

Ever since that day the British have celebrated Guy Fawkes’ Night. Today young people make a Guy with

old clothes and fill him with newspaper. Then they go

around the streets with the Guy and ask for ‘a penny for the Guy.’ With the money they collect they buy

fireworks.

On the night of November 5th there are bonfires and

fireworks to burn the Guy. Some people even have bonfires in their gardens. Everyone makes a lot of

noise and they all love the excitement and the fire-

works. They eat toffee apples. In Lewes, Sussex, there is a big public festival on Guy

Fawkes’ Night where people dress in historic cos-

tumes and they burn the Guy on the top of a hill. ▪ M.I.

GUY FAWKES’ NIGHT

STUDENTS’ CORNER

November 5th is Guy Fawkes’ night or Bonfire

Night. This British festivity goes back in the early

1600’s. It marks the failed Gunpowder plot. During this period there were religious problems

between Protestants and Catholics. King James I

was a Protestant and he passed severe laws against

Catholics. A group of twelve Catholics decided to burn down the Parliament Building with the King

inside. The leader of the plot was Robert Catesby

and the explosives expert was Guy Fawkes. Guy was supposed to light the explosives on November

5th, but he was caught and tortured by the King’s

soldiers. The rest of the traitors were caught three days later and they were all hanged. Then, an Act

of Parliament was passed appointing 5th November

each year as a day of thanksgiving for 'the joyful day of deliverance'.

Remember, remember

The fifth of November

Gunpowder, treason and plot.

I see no reason

Why gunpowder and treason

Should ever be forgot.

A typical bonfire with a Guy burning

2/3

On the last day of November the Scots (and

the rest of the world) celebrate St Andrew's

Day; St Andrew being the Patron Saint of

Scotland. It is a day to celebrate Scottish

culture, food and dance and also the beginning

of Scotland's winter festivals connected with

Advent.

St Andrew was one of the Twelve Apostles

believed to have died on a diagonally trans-

versed cross which the Romans sometimes

used for executions (hence St Andrew's

Cross). In 832 AD Andrew is said to have ap-

peared in a vision to a Pictish king the night

before a battle against the Northumbrians.

On the day of the battle a Saltire, an X-

shaped cross, appeared in the sky above the

battlefield and the Picts were victorious. The

Saltire, or Andrew’s Cross, was subsequently

adopted as the national emblem and flag of

the Scots while Andrew was first recognised

as an official patron saint of Scotland in 1320

at the signing of the Declaration of Arbroath.

It was an appeal to the Pope by Scottish no-

blemen when asserting Scotland’s independ-

ence from England.

ST ANDREW’S DAY

November 2013 Page 5

STUDENTS’ CORNER

CHECK IT OUT!

Have you read this? Have you seen this? Have you heard this?

This is a story of Elise Dembowski who

has never been able to make friends.

After failing at every attempt to

become popular, Elise nearly gives up.

Then she stumbles upon a warehouse

party where everything changes and she

falls in love—with DJing.

This song will save your life is an

exuberant novel about identity,

friendship, and the power of music to

bring people together. ▪ M.I.

Based upon the novel by Rick Riordan,

Percy Jackson and the Olympians: the Sea of Monsters is the second part of

the story about the son of Poseidon

(half man, half god). Percy and his

friends embark on a quest to the Sea of

Monsters to find the mythical Golden

Fleece while trying to stop ancient evil

from rising and thus restore their dying

safe haven. ▪ M.I.

Bangerz is the fourth studio album by

Miley Cyrus. It is somewhat different

from her earlier work, showing that she

outgrew her Hannah Montana phase. The

lyrical themes on this, primarily, pop

record revolve largely around romance.

Two singles have been released so far—

"We Can't Stop" and "Wrecking Ball".

And despite the fact that she’s shocked

us with her new image, we can’t deny

that the songs are great. ▪ M.I.

To get a real taste of Scotland, wear a kilt

and make sure your menu that day has Cullen

skink, roast shoulder of lamb with potato and

onion and spiced winter fruit served with

creamed vanilla rice pudding. Of course, if you

are old enough, it should be followed with

some quality Scotch whiskey. Slainte Mhath!

Visit www.scotland.org to find out more.

There is a playlist necessary if you're about

to host a Scottish-themed party and link to

download St Andrew apps including recipes, a

whisky tasting guide and animated history of

St Andrew.▪ I.P.

Page 6

As you have probably heard, the e-Class Register, developed by CARNet, is a web application for the management of the class

register in electronic form. It has all the functionalities of existing class registers with additional functionalities that enable

the use of ICT technologies. After logging in on any kind of a computer with Internet access, you can enter teaching hours,

absent students and marks with just a few clicks. Students also have the possibility of viewing their grades and, through them,

their parents as well. After two months of usage teachers in High school Čazma and Commercial and trade school Bjelovar all

say the same: We'd never accept going back to paper version.

CARNet explains the benefits: Along with the existing functionalities of the paper-based class register, the application will

have the added value of a reporting system that will help the teachers in monitoring the students and preparing reports for

sessions of the teacher's council. In a quick, simple and reliable way, homeroom teachers, teachers and principals will be able to

see various reports on grades and absences, and there will also be the possibility of alarming the homeroom teacher about stu-

dents with a large number of negative marks or absences and alarming the principal about backlogs in the execution of the cur-

riculum. An additional advantage will be the prevention of malversations concerning unauthorized entries as well as cases of

theft and accidental or intentional destruction of the class register with which schools are sometimes faced with.

(http://www.carnet.hr/)

Keeping up:

e-Class Register in two schools in Bjelovar-bilogora County

My Heritage, Your Holiday

NEWS FROM SCHOOLS

Agency for mobility and EU programmes approved a grant

to a Comenius project My Heritage, Your Holiday, which

Romana Gašpar applied for. The project began on Septem-

ber 1, 2013 and will last for 2 years. The partners of

School of Economics and Tourism Daruvar are France,

Spain, Italy, Romania, England and Portugal. The topic of

the project is rural tourism with great emphasis on pro-

motion of the local region and its tourism.

The first meeting was held in Toulouse in France from

October 7 to October 11, 2013. It was a teachers meet-

ing, and Romana Gašpar, the project coordinator, Dinka

Ivanović, the head teacher, and Ksenija Škorić, the

teacher of vocational subjects, took part in it and pre-

sented their school and their region. The objectives of

the first meeting were getting to know the partners and

getting to know their schools and the regions they come

from. The overall results are going to be a dictionary com-

prising of different words related to tourism in 7 lan-

guages, a web page and a digital brochure.

The next mobility is going to be held in Spain in February

and the meeting will cover a variety of workshops on

human heritage and IT. ▪ R.G.

The Power of Dreams

Everybody dreams. That much we know. Sometimes our dreams

are pleasant, sometimes not quite so nice, nevertheless, they

are a part of us and are usually a product of our current

preoccupations. Be that as it may, our sweetest dreams and

our worst nightmares tell us a lot about ourselves (our

greatest desire, need, fear or love) and can often haunt us on

a regular basis. Dreams we dream the previous night don’t

always stay in our memories, especially not all of them, but

they can often stay stuck in our consciousness, bugging and

nagging until we decipher their meaning. This is what 1st grade

students of Commercial and trade school Bjelovar dream

about... ▪ M.I.

“The greatest dream I have ever had was when I played a football match as a professional football player with Messi, Ronaldo and other amazing players in the world. I scored a goal and Ronaldo hugged me, the whole stadium was on their feet,

cheering, singing, laughing and celebrating.”

Matej Kos, 1.a

“I dreamed that I was in school and a boy gave me puppy

slippers.”

Nikolina Osmak, 1.a

“I remember dreaming about a snake on a road wearing a cap

and riding a bike.”

Filip Šimunović, 1.a

“I had an awful dream where I was late for school. My brother was driving and saw me running on the street. He pulled over and told me to get in the car and I froze. What was so awful about it,

you ask? Well, you haven’t seen my brother drive...”

Josip Palaić, 1.a

“I dreamed that I was a lost dog.”

Marina Filić, 1.a

“I had a terrible dream where I went to the store to buy some ice-cream. There was a playground next to the store where a huge space ship landed, and a big green alien came out. He tried to

kidnapp me!”

Antonia Kristić, 1.a

XMAS BEST OF…

November 2013 Page 7

DUOLINGO

There aren't many educational projects with a

large number of users online. This one however,

started by professor Luis von Ahn (best known

as creator of reCAPTCHA), being the quick,

easy, fun and free way to learn foreign lan-

guage, has more than 14 million users.

It is called DuoLingo. It is a publicly available

completely free language learning resource and

tool for translating the Internet via real peo-

ple, rather than automatically. Through exten-

sive written lessons and dictation, with a little

less practice speaking and using a gamified skill

tree which users can progress through, you can

learn Spanish, German, French (for English

speakers) and English (for Spanish speakers).

Last month The Language Incubator feature

was released in order to introduce more lan-

guages.

As the authors explain, during the learning

process users gain "skill points" when they com-

plete a lesson. Skills are considered learned

when users complete all the lessons associated

with the skill. You start with four "lives" on

early lessons, and three on later lessons, a

"life" being lost with each mistake. You must

retry the lesson if you make a mistake after all

lives have been lost. There is also a timed prac-

tice feature. Altogether, the whole course

teaches more than 2,000 words.

The simplest way to give it a go is to register

online, on www.duolingo.com, using either your

email address or Facebook account to log in.

However, there are also mobile versions avail-

able (iOS and Android apps) which means you

can take your language learning course with you

wherever you go.

In today's world, where there is no such thing

as free lunch any more, a free language course

that is up to scratch shouldn't be ignored. ▪ I.P.

LET’S TRY THIS...

Have you noticed Christmas decorations on display in supermarkets

and malls? Yup, it will be here soon, in mere six weeks. And, since this

is Sparkles©' first Christmas, we thought we could create something

together. We've prepared the lists of five modern and five tradi-

tional songs; five films and five books, all having to do with Christmas

and we'd like you to choose the best in each category. Starting from

November 15th, the lists will be on our Facebook page, in form of

opinion polls for you to vote. The results will be published in the

December issue. So, make sure to visit

https://www.facebook.com/Sparkles.newsletter

and cast your vote!

THE BEST CHRISTMAS SONG OF ALL TIME

Band Aid - Do They Know It's Christmas?

Bruce Springsteen - Santa Claus is Coming to Town

Mariah Carey - All I Want For Christmas Is You

The Pogues - Fairytale of New York

Wham! - Last Christmas

THE BEST TRADITIONAL CHRISTMAS SONG

Deck The Halls

Hark! The Herald Angels Sing

O Come All Ye Faithful

O Little Town of Bethlehem

Silent Night

THE BEST CHRISTMAS FILM OF ALL TIME

How The Grinch Stole Christmas (2000; Ron Howard)

It's a Wonderful Life (1946; Frank Capra )

Miracle on 34th Street (1994; Les Mayfield )

Love Actually (2003; Richard Curtis)

Home Alone (1990; Chris Columbus)

THE BEST CHRISTMAS BOOKS OF ALL TIME

Christmas Carol - A Charles Dickens

The Night Before Christmas - Clement Clarke Moore

How the Grinch Stole Christmas - Dr. Seuss

The Polar Express - Chris Van Allsburg

The Gift - Cecelia Ahern

PLN is an acronym for Personal Learning

Network. The acronym is relatively new,

but the idea is not. Since teachers are

information junkies and mostly very social,

they have always had learning networks—

people they learn from and share with.

Teachers at your school make up the core

of your PLN. Network central is wherever

you gather between and after classes. You

can share the information from articles or

books you had read, conferences or work-

shops you'd attended.

The technology brings an added value to

the whole thing. The sheer volume of in-

formation avai lab le today can

be overwhelming at times. Moreover, social

networks can be used as (noisy) teacher’s

lounge. The greatest benefit is, of course,

the fact that space is no longer as issue.

You can communicate to everyone online, no

matter where they are, which is essential

for foreign language teachers. Profession-

als accustomed to living online can show

you how to access resources which are

normally in the form of links—to websites,

to e-books, to blogs, or to activities. You

can save the links on a social bookmarking

site, use tags instead of file folders and

thus easily search for specific items.

The kinds of discussions teachers share

with their PLN hasn’t changed all that

much over the years–what works in class,

how students learn, how to become a bet-

ter teacher, but how they meet other

teachers, where they discuss ideas, and

how they share information has changed.

Significantly. Keep up! ▪ I.P.

Personal Learning Network

Instead of teaching a lesson and then forgetting about it and mov-

ing on to teach another lesson, why not try to reflect on the lesson:

You think about what went well, what went less well, and why; you

think about what you could do differently next time and the effect

this might have. You look for the holes in your lesson plan, but you

also make a note of any particularly fine moments that you hadn’t

anticipated and think about how they came about. You do this sys-

tematically, and over time you identify recurring patterns, both

good and bad, and make action plans to minimise the latter. ▪ I.P.

Have you tried ...

What type of teacher are you?

Are you a bright-eyed staffroom neophyte?

Or counting the days to retirement? Are you

a curriculum committee away from your first

headship? Or permanently parked in the

staffroom easy-chair of middle

management?

Take the quiz to find out. http://

www.tes.co.uk/article.aspx?

storyCode=6363259&s_cid=Landing_teacher

typequiz#.UmlmpRDlPAZ

November 2013 Page 8

TEACHERS’ CORNER

CPD IN 10 MINUTES OR LESS If you have a few extra minutes while surfing the net, check out this

amazing tool for supporting your continuous professional development:

http://tlp.excellencegateway.org.uk/tlp/cpd/definingcpd/index.html