Sunday 7 December 2008

Xtranormal Slang Dialogue

UPDATE FEBRUARY 2015

Sadly this post is no longer current, as Xtranormal ceased to exist in 2013, so no videos are available. They are all lost! What a shame!!

New Words Quiz
I am fascinated by the new words which are entering the English language at such a fast rate. I only took "my eye off the ball" for a short while during the summer (to get down to composting, bricklaying, making a huge haystack, learning how to cook Italian dishes and many other gentle pursuits) for me to re-enter the world of teaching English only to come across such strange sounding words as "twitter" and "Plurk". What on earth did these words mean? Where did they come from? Who was using them? Did I need to know them? If yes, why did I need to know them? I asked myself these questions from a pedagogical point of view. Being of an inquisitive nature, of course I had to find out what these words meant.... If you are not sure of the meaning just press on the words. I have actually become a "Twitterer" and I have joined a Wiki for fellow Twitterers. Where it will lead me to will be an adventure!!

In the middle of writing this post I took a short break and I couldn't help looking at my sidebar and I saw the word "smeet" in Larry Ferlazzo's blog. This is a totally new word for me today and it's "hot off the press"!!! Larry Felazzo's site is excellent and I learn a lot from it.

A brilliant site for teachers and students to keep up to date with new words is bbclearningenglish.com. One of my favourite words of all time is "bling" and this lesson click here is dedicated entirely to this word!

Another one of my favourite sites for keeping up with the meaning of new expressions which come into the English language is WordSpy  Recently I had to look up the following words as they were new for me and I thought it would be good to create a little quiz to test you! Have a go and see how you get on!

A "fakeaway" is
a) something which you know is fake but looks genuine
b) a homemade meal that is similar to a takeaway meal purchased from a restaurant
c) something not worth the price you have paid

" recession chic" is
a) style and elegance on a tight budget
b) living beyond one's means during a recession
c) trying to look chic but not succeeding

"adorkable" means
a) adorable and cuddly
b) delightful and charming in a sociably akward way
c) an adorable young lady from Dorking

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Hi Janet! I am working for Xtranormal as QA Analyst. Let me thank you for using our application. Keep visiting us... we might add other Universes to choose from in the near future. And remember: if you can type, you can make movies! ...other stuff coming from our technology is on the roadmap. Again, stay tuned!

Janet Bianchini said...

Hi Hugues

I had great fun making my short movie. I'll stay tuned for other stuff in the future. Btw, is there a section to add props eg "a cuppa" in the programme?

Regards
Janet Bianchini