TED TALK: NOT JUST A DIET

Hi! 

I am Aitor Gutiérrez and I am going to do a TED TALK about why vegetariansm and veganism are more than just a diet, what implies being vegetarian/vegan and more things!

To do this TED TALK, I will use a PowerPoint to follow the presentation.

Hope you enjoy it!

TED TALK: NOT JUST A DIET

TED TALK: ABOLITION OF EXAMS

 TED TALK: ABOLITION OF EXAMS

Hi everyone! I'm Sofia and today I bring you a TED Talk. A TED Talk is a talk that was originated by Richard Saul Wurman and is still used today. They cover a wide range of topics including science, arts and design, politics... 

Today I am going to discuss the abolition of exams, the pros and cons and a possible solution. I leave you with the video, I hope you like it! 

Link to the video: https://youtu.be/RxezBqC6L78 

Is this the same? Analysing headlines

 ANALYSING HEADLINES

In this post I am going to analyse how the way we write a headline can totally change the way we see the rest of the news.  The headlines are:

As we can see, in the first headline we can see the word "shame" something that may be that calls the reader to enter the article as it is a "news bombshell" since it is an event that has caused a great stir, and because of the word, it incites the reader to visit the web page. We may come to think that it is an article that seeks to collaborate in the media hype because of the way the headline is expressed.  In addition, by using the expression at the beginning, it may be that some of the readers who share the tennis player's thoughts may feel offended and therefore stop buying or reading the newspaper. 

Secondly, we find a much more formal headline, in which they report the situation but respecting something very important, which is not to show certain types of words that could make many of the readers feel insulted if they share the ideas of the professional tennis player. I think this headline is much more appropriate as it merely reports the situation without contributing to the media hype. 

In my opinion, it would be much more pleasant for me to read the second headline than the first one, as I think it is a much more formal headline if I just want to be informed about the situation. If I wanted to find out about the commotion and contribute to it as much as I would with friends or on social media, I would read the first headline as it is much more inviting for the reader to go in and read it. 

Book review: La Celestina

 In this post I am going to do a book review of La Celestina. It is a book that it was compulsory to read when I was in high school and that I still remember the story because I had to studied it a lot for an exam.

The main character of the story is named Calisto, who falls deeply in love with Melibea when he sees her for the first time while looking for one of his hawks. Melibea, at first rejects him and that is how the story begins, with the rejection of Melibea.

Calisto, full of pain caused by the rejection goes to La Celestina, who is a witch who can make Melibea fall in love with him. 

La Celestina was known to be a dangerous person who was only interested in money but that was no problem for Calisto who was deeply in love with Melibea. 

Celestina negotiates with Calisto the price of the agreement which surprises Celestina for being very high. He pact with the servants of Calisto to distribute benefits because the servants recomment Celestina to Calisto. This is a very important point of the story.

Celestina, after accepting the deal, goes to Melibea's house to sell a yarn. She tells her about Calisto and Melibea loses her manners to which she later apologizes buy buying the yarn that is charmed.

As soon as Melibea touches the yarn she begins to change all her feelings towards Calisto and speaks that same night with the Celestina to have a date with him.

Calisto, enormously grateful, gives her a chain that has a very high economic value. The two servants are very happy to see the good economic business they are doing by agreeing with Celestina that they will share the profits.

Melibea and Calisto agree to meet again. Calisto, madly in love, climbs the wall of Melibea's parents' garden and satisfies his sexual desire with her by making her lose her virginity to a man she did not want freely.

After the economic success of the servants and LaCelestina, the servants decide to go to the house of La Celestina to share the profits they had obtained, to which Celestina plays dumb to not give them any money. The servants, very angry, end up killing the Celestina as a symbol of revenge, which will be punished by the justice and sentenced to death.

On the other hand, the next day Calisto meets again with Melibea, with the bad luck to fall asleep in her bed. That same night, trying to escape from Melibea's father, going down the stairs, he loses his balance and ends up dying instantly. Melibea, seeing that the love of her life had died, decides to tell her father everything that has happened regarding the loss of her virginity (at that time this was the most disrespectful thing that could be done to the family) and decides to throw herself from the top of her house by committing suicide.

Same player, same day, different information

In this post I am going to analyse two news that involves the same topic. Where is going to play the next football superstar Erling Haaland.
Both newspapers clearly defend an idea and a club, and this causes them to make fake news in many cases. Here we will analyse two news and I will post more examples so you can check that this is not the first time it happens, and it is not going to be the last one.
These are the two titles:

https://www.sport.es/es/noticias/barca/deportes-cuatro-haaland-elige-fichar-13058831

https://okdiario.com/diariomadridista/real-madrid/raiola-ya-juega-real-madrid-179004

Both titles involves the same things but gives a different ending. On one hand, in the "SPORT" article they say that Haaland is going to sign for Barcelona if Barcelona have the funds to do it, because Haaland wants to play for F.C Barcelona.

On the other hand, in "OKDIARIO"  thay say that Haaland's dream has been always play for Real Madrid, saying the completely opposite that SPORT is saying.

In my opinion I just see impossible for Barcelona to have enough funds to pay a transfer for Haaland and for paying his salary, so I don't believe SPORT's article.

Both articles are from the same day and what they do is to misrepresent the information by taking it to the side that interests your newspaper just for a few clicks and views, not caring about the credibility of the information they are exposing in the article.

This is happening today in most of the sports articles but it is also being found in articles that have nothing to do with sports causing a great fall in the credibility of journalism and therefore a resounding loss of quality, where it is much more important the clicks than the quality of the article.

Other front pages in other newspapers exposing fake information are easy to find. Here are some examples:

                              

To conclude with this article, I just want to say that do not trust everything you read and always keep in mind who is the media that gives you the information and what are their ideals.

Unschooled kids: the parenting method that lets kids make the decisions

 ARTICLE SUMMARY

The parenting method that lets kids make the decisions

In this post we are going to deal with a hot topic nowadays, especially in North America: unschooled kids.
An unschooled kid is defined as a child who is taken out of school to decide what he or she wants to learn. 
The mother argues that her children learn about what interests them, that they do not need subjects such as mathematics, language, social or natural sciences, music or art, as they themselves decide what they like and what they want to learn about. 

In addition, she also argues that they do not have a fixed schedule and daily routine. Her children go to bed when they are sleepy and get up when their bodies tell them they are rested, and also they eat when they´re hungry. They play in nature, learning about nature, animals, gardens, crops, etc. 

If they are interested in cows, for example, then the mother takes them somewhere where there are cows so that they can learn about them, but she firmly believes that school is not necessary, and that they should only learn about what they are interested in, in this case, cows. 

The mother argues that taking her children out of school has given them the freedom to make choices about their future, which, with the current education system, she believes deprives them of such choices. 

In the article, the mother says that they learn something new every day because every day she asks them what they want to learn at that moment, and they choose the activities according to what they feel like doing each day.  

In my opinion, if I were a mother, I would not choose this educational method for my children. Although I think it's great that they learn according to their interests, I think there are also basic notions about different skills that they should acquire, we never know what adult life and the future will bring, so I think it's also necessary to have certain skills such as science, language, maths or art. 

I believe that teachers are also prepared to teach pupils not only the subject matter, but also many other aspects that we would be depriving children of if we take them out of school, such as socialisation, making friends at school, trips with friends, camps, theme days, etc. 

BOOK REVIEW: THE DIARY OF ANNA FRANK

 Hello everybody! I'm Sofia and today we are going to review together the Diary of Anne Frank! I hope you like it!

First of all, I'll leave you with the synopsis of the book: 

"Hidden with her family and another Jewish family (the Van Daans) in an attic of an Amsterdam warehouse during the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands. Anne Frank, aged thirteen, recounts the life of the group in her diary, which she called 'Kitty'. Aided by several office employees, they stayed for more than two years in the achterhuis (known as the 'secret annexe') until they were finally betrayed and arrested. Anne kept a diary between 12 June 1942 and 1 August 1944. On 4 August 1944, neighbours (names unknown) betrayed the eight hiding in "the Secret Annex". In addition to the Diary, he wrote several short stories that have been published gradually since 1960. His sister, Margot Frank, also wrote a diary, but no trace of it has ever been found. After spending time in the concentration camps of Westerbork in the Netherlands and Auschwitz in Poland, Anne and her older sister, Margot, were deported to Bergen-Belsen, where they both died during a typhus epidemic between late February and mid-March 1945 (the typhus was caused by the extreme lack of hygiene in the concentration camp). Edith Holländer (mother of Margot and Anne) dies of starvation in Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp. Hermann Van Pels (one of the eight people in hiding) was sent on 6 September 1944 to the gas chambers at Auschwitz, where he died weeks later. His wife, Auguste Van Pels, dies in mid-April 1945 in the Theresienstadt concentration camp. Peter Van Pels dies on 5 May 1945, three days before liberation. Fritz Pfeffer died in the Neuengamme concentration camp on 20 December 1944. The diary was first published under the title Het Achterhuis (The Secret Annex) in the Netherlands in 1947 by the publisher Contact. In April 1955, the first English translation was published under the title Las habitaciones de atrás (The Secret Annexe) (Editorial Garbo, Barcelona). The Diary of Anne Frank is thus a unique testimony to the horror and barbarism of the Nazis, and to the feelings and experiences of Anne herself and her companions. Anne died in the Bergen-Belsen camp in March 1945. Her diary will never die.

The book was written by Anne Frank during the Second World War (1942-1944). In a notebook given to her by her parents, little Anne begins her account of her experiences "in the Secret Annexe", where they spent two years in hiding.

The hiding began when his sister Margot received a notice to work under the Nazis in Germany, and so they decided to go into hiding in a factory. In the end, 8 people live together in the hiding place.

In her diary, which Anna calls Kitty and considers her only friend, she tells the story of her daily routine in the house, with the fear of being found or killed, as bombing raids are heard all the time in the surrounding area.

CHARACTERS

The main characters of the book are:

• Anne Frank: a 13-year-old girl who, being Jewish at the time of the Second World War, remained in hiding to protect herself from Nazi persecution, along with eight other people.
• Kitty: refers to the name of her diary, a book given to her by her parents, which became her personal diary and her friend, in which she recounts all her experiences in hiding.
• Otto Frank: Anne and Margot's father, the person Anne loves the most.
• Edith Holländer: Anne and Margot's mother, who does not have a very good relationship with Anne.
• Margot: Anne's sister, she was 16 when she had to go into hiding.
• Mr. Van Daan: A member of "The Secret Annexe", and is considered an arrogant person.
• Mrs. Van Daan: Wife of Mr. Van Daan, spiteful but at the same time cheerful.

I think the book is very readable and gives an insight into what life was like during the Second World War. This book is able to get you involved in the fear of the people in hiding for two long years and the desire they have to enjoy life. It also allows you to get to know in depth each of the people who were in the house and as it is a true story, it increases your feelings towards them, or even your dislike of them.

I have read this book as the Second World War has always been a subject I have enjoyed and what better way to learn about it than to immerse yourself in a book that perfectly describes the horrors experienced during that time. 

As a moral, we can learn how man is capable of destroying himself to achieve an end, and that the end does not always justify the means. 

What is your opinion, would you read the book? I'll read you in the comments! 

VTS, how to do it and examples

 Good afternoon,

In today´s post we are going to give you some examples of VTS (Visual Thinking Strategies) with the photo below. 

To use VTS, we ask ourselves three open ended questions about a photo.  The first question gives the viewers a chance to interpret on their own what they are seeing (What’s going on in this picture?). The second question encourages evidentiary thinking (What do you see that makes you say that?). Finally, the third question pushes them to think further and deeper that the first layer of a piece. (What more can we find?)

First of all, let's look at what is happening in this image.

As we can see, there are several pupils in a classroom, with a teacher sitting in a corner at the teacher's table.  The children are looking up at the ceiling. The teacher seems to be correcting some exercises or preparing some extra activities for another lesson.

We can see that some of the pupils are in uniform and some are not.

Finally, we can see that the image was not taken in Spain because of the facial features of the pupils.

In the classroom we can see that the floor is old and that there are bars on the windows. The desks also show signs of age deterioration.  

What all this leads us to think is that the facial features of the pupils do not correspond to Spanish facial features. Furthermore, it gives the impression that it is a middle-class town or school because of the basic dress of the pupils. It also leads us to think two things, firstly, that it may be the last day of the school year as not everyone is in uniform, or that due to economic difficulties not everyone can afford to pay for it. 

We believe that the pupils are looking up as they may be watching a video projected on the blackboard or a photo they are taking from another perspective, as we can see several children posing with their hands. It seems that there is another teacher apart from the one sitting at the table, as that is why they are looking up in the picture. 

Finally, we can think more deeply that students are finishing the course, due to one of the reasons mentioned above, and that is why they are doing other kinds of activities and why they are standing up instead of sitting at their desks. Furthermore, there are no books on top of the desks, there are only sheets of paper and pencil cases, which may lead us to confirm that they are doing some kind of different activity. 

AD ANALYSIS: SALSA JEANS

Hello! Today we want to analyse a campaign that went viral on social networks of the jeans brand "Salsa".  First of all, we want you to check the advertisment.

WOMEN UNDER PRESSURE

    ANALYSING THE ADVERTISMENT

After you have checked the video, the first thing we are going to do is to analyse the video itself, that it represents the pressure that womens suffers in this society.

First, there is a teenager that compares his body with the body of a model making her feel bad about himself. This is something very common in our society, where reality is never expose. All of the photos are touched up to make it as perfect as possible, making other people to compare with them, and making them feel bad about his own body. This is something that punishes almost every women and makes them feel insecure about themselves

The next scene, there is a women that needs a sanitary towel and is asking for it with craftiness so anyone knows that he is with her period. In the society we live, everything that surrounds women period is very taboo, something that makes them ashamed, when his something natural. In this video it is also criticized this non sense thing.

The next part there is a teenager that his wearing a very colorful, not typical outfit and his father shake one´s head disaproving his daughter outfit, as if he was her boss instead of his father. In this part it is criticizing that men has the power to criticized what other women can wear or not.

The next seconds there is a girls who is wearing a skirt and because of the wind hers butt was seen, and this is because the clothes that are made for women are not well designed. As well, there was a women getting rid of the hair between the brows, because in this society is very frowned upon when is something that doesn´t disturb anyone.

There are more situations where women has to do things just because in this society is frowned upon, and not because they choose to do it, like for example having a baby. 

The advertisment ends with the sentence "LIFE PRESSURE WOMEN A BIT TOO MUCH" that we think is the summary of the whole video. Then it expose the article they want you to buy that are underpressured jeans that refers to getting rid of all the situations they have to suffer wearing this comfy jeans.

PRODUCT

The product they are advertising is a confortable jean for every women independently of the size they have.

When you start watching the advertisment, you don't know that the product they want you to buy is a jean, because they mainly focus on the things that womens have to suffer in their daily lifes and they play with the thing that womens live with a lot of pressure, and they are advertising jeans that are confy and width, the opposite to what they expose of womens daily lifes.

Here the brand is not so important, what is important is the complaint they make about what women have to suffer, and they play with the pressure they are under by advertising a very comfortable pair of jeans for them, so that they are free of tensions. Even so, this brand is not the first time that makes a complaint like this as we find other examples such as: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KSleDG34qx0

It is clear that the target audience for this ad are womens, especially womens who may not have a standard size for today's society. When the Portuguese firm "Salsa" arrived in Spain, it did so with a denim model that promised to be the favourite of Spanish women, at least those with the most pronounced curves, i.e. women with a narrow waist but proportionally wider hips and bum.

At that time, there were not many options to buy jeans for this type of body, because if you bought one that fit well in the hips, in the waist it was too big and you had to fix it, so Salsa, offered the perfect solution for this type of body. As a result, "Salsa" defined the niche market it wanted for its product.  They offered a specific pattern, with the yoke specially sewn to slim the bum area and with a stretch fabric for a better fit to the body. Over the years they innovated and expanded the models, becoming top sellers. 

Thus, we can see that by focusing on a specific type of customer and having a very specific market niche, they managed to build customer loyalty so that by expanding their product range, they became top sellers.

The main strategy they use in this advertisment is that Salsa denounces what women have to suffer in this society and uses this not only to raise their voices on this issue, but also to take advantage of it and provoke an effect of approval towards their brand. Their objective is to cause womens to buy their brand, simply for the fact of denouncing the things they have to suffer in the advertisement.

COMPANY

Salsa Jeans was created in 1994 in northern portugal. It has always been known for taking risks in their ads to denounce all kinds of situations of harassment suffered by women, the stereotypes to which they are subjected, that by wearing a 40 you are not less than a person who wears a size 34. They take risks trying to change the reality of the world and it is these types of actions that always add up in the fights for women liberty.

MESSAGE

The message that the company wants to give with this ad, beyond getting you to buy the pants of their brand, is to make a public denouncement of the daily situations that women have to suffer just because they are women, such as being forced to have children, assuming that men have more power than women, and so on.

CONCLUSION

This type of advertisement, which denounces a reality, will always have our approval. Since their main objective will always be that you buy what they are advertising, but that they do it in this way seems to me a very correct way to draw attention and make people think about the subject, while you make them remember the ad, and therefore remember their product. It's a real win/win for them, even thought some times even if sometimes it doesn't work out well and they create a lot of controversy.

Hope you like the advertisment review of Salsa, tell us your opinion about it!

Sex and consent: How parents can talk to their children

ARTICLE SUMMARY 

How can parents talk to their children about sex and consent.

Talking about consent, relationship and sex with your child is a must but, how do we do?

In this article they talked with Ruth Heneke Eliot who works in the charity School of Sexuality Education and with Cecile Gwilym, head of training and sexual violence prevention, and they answer some common questions that involves these topics.

They expose that this has to be worked at any ages where you can talked about different topics. It has to be built progressively.

Also they talked about unwanted physical contact and how to give the message that this is incorrect. They expose that you have to know why they are doing it and not just punish them, because they will relate the action with the punishment they get instead that  reflect on what they have done and the consequences it may have on the other person that was affected.

Additionally, they touch other topics such as:

• What can you do if your child is being sexually harassed?

They expose that it is extremely important to let your child know that they dont have to be subjected to this behaviour and to feel safe in and outside the school. Also it is very important to report this cases to the school management team.

• Is sending nudes illegal?

This questions has two parts: First, you have to be atleast 16 years old and the most important thing, it has to be consented and it is a crime to send them to another person or upload it into a website.

• What if I´m too embarassed to talk about sex, nudes or anything like that?

This is something normal, very very few parents talk to their children about this topics on a positive way but you have to be prepared as it is not just one conversation, it has to be talked more than once as it is a crucial topic for a teenager.

In my opinion, I agree with everything that is exposed in this article because in this society the subject of sex is taboo, but it is a very important issue for teenagers, since the only example they have to follow is porn and let's say that this is not a good example. We have to talk about it without any qualms, advising them and trying to talk about it naturaly and making it clear that sex is something that involves two people, and that we must always have great empathy and put ourselves in the place of another, in order to prevent wrong actions that can do much harm to third parties.

We also have to support teenagers who have suffered abuse and to be clear that they are not alone, but all of this can be prevented with a good previous education that should be given in schools about sex, couples and intimacy.

In conclusion, we have to talk about it with our children as this will prepare them to be exposed to a subject that is always very complicated for everyone at the beginning but that is part of life.

ASSESING SECTION!

 Hi readers!

Here is a post where you can asses our blog so we can improve it as much as we can!

Hope you can help us to improve!

TV SERIES: How To Get Away With Murder

How to get away with murder is Aitor´s  favourite TV serie. It is an American Legal thriller that was released in 2014. The main character is the actress Viola Davis who interprets Annalise Keating.

The main drama is that Annalise is a very, very famous law teacher that, from one day to another, she with her students become involved in a murder so, she has to solve this case without anyone knowing that has happened.

It has six seasons and it is a bit long, but for sure it is one of the best series you can see.

Viola Davis has won an EMMY for the best principle actress in 2015-2016 becoming the first afroamerican actress to won this award.

Now, Aitor is going to do a synopse of the serie so you can see why this serie has to be seen by everyone!

Series Review: ATYPICAL

 Hi everyone! My name is Sofía and today we are going to review a series which can be found on Netflix. It's called Atypical, and it's based on the story of an autistic boy and how his life progresses.

I recommend it because I think it is the way to know a little closer how special and charming this kind of people can be.

I leave you with the video!

https://youtu.be/m_IGr5w9mAg