Text nº 13 for translation: A global food crisis could be approaching. 15 de diciembre de 2021.

Buenas tardes, estimada familia IPEP #inglésipep #ingléspagsypau (en Twitter).

Vamos otra semana más, con otro texto con el que vais a reciclar vocabulario ya trabajado, además de ser de los temas habituales en las pruebas: medioambientales, cuidado de la naturaleza y similares.

De nuevo, es un texto extraído de un artículo del periódico The Washington Post, y que podéis leer entero para aprender más vocabulario aquí.

The Washington Post. Democracy dies in Darkness

Amid drought, conflict and rocketing prices, a global food crisis could be approaching, top expert warns.

You’re reading an excerpt from the Today’s WorldView newsletter.

Global food prices are soaring. Fertilizer costs are sky-high. In Afghanistan, nearly 23 million people — more than half the population — are expected to facepotentially life-threatening food insecurity this winter. Madagascar is confronting its worst drought in 40 years, with more than a million people there in need in urgent food aid.

Is a new global food crisis coming?

In an interview this week, Maximo Torero Cullen — chief economist at the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization — told me the answer is: Not yet, but we could be on the brink. The world is witnessing an increase in localized and conflict-driven food crises, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa. But across the globe, the food price surges of recent months are still not as bad as the two critical spikes sparked by weather, biofuel production and surging Asian demand in 2007-2008 and 2011-2012.

That doesn’t mean we won’t get there. Because of the pandemic, global hunger shot up by an estimated 118 million people worldwide in 2020, jumping to 768 million people, the most since as far back as 2006. The number of people living with food insecurity — or those forced to compromise on food quantity or quality — surged by 318 million, to 2.38 billion.

As vaccination rollouts lag in the developing world, Cullen told Today’s WorldView that he fears the slower economic recoveries in low- and medium-income nations could worsen the food insecurity picture further in 2022.

How did the pandemic change the nature of global food insecurity, and how is the problem evolving?

The major drivers before covid-19 were conflict, and climate and economic downturns. Lockdowns and covid-19 have exacerbated those problems.

But what is new are two things: One is the significant recovery plans and inflation we are seeing as the U.S., China and other countries create excess demand, which has affected, of course, prices because of their demand for commodities. The competition for containers has exacerbated the situation, making transportation costs higher.

The other element is fertilizer prices and scarcities. Countries like Bolivia that used to export to Peru, for instance, are exporting much, much less. An incredible shrinkage. Russia has put some export limits on fertilizers. China produces one-quarter of the fertilizers in the world, but now they are also importing. So the pressure on that sector is a different than we’ve faced before.

By Anthony Faiola

Reading comprehension: Virus.

Buenas tardes, estimados alumnos.

Esta semana vamos a aprender y repasar vocabulario sobre el puñetero Covid, puesto que es normal que en los exámenes se usen textos y temas de actualidad. 

Boris Johnson reports U.K.’s first known death from the omicron coronavirus variant.

You can read the whole article by clicking here.

LONDON — At least one person has died from of the omicron variant, the British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said on Monday as he urged Britons to quickly increase their protection with a booster shot. It was the first reported fatality in the country from the variant.

Johnson, who was speaking to reporters during a visit to a vaccination clinic in West London, said that the omicron variant “was producing hospitalizations, and sadly at least one patient has been confirmed to have died with omicron.”

“I think the idea that this is somehow a milder version of the virus, I think that’s something we need to set on one side and just recognize the sheer pace at which it accelerates through the population,” he said.

The prime minister’s office did not immediately offer any further details about the victim.

Officials in England and Scotland say omicron cases appear to be doubling every two to three days and is spreading faster than it has in South Africa.

On Sunday, Britain reported 1,239 new cases of the omicron variant, a near-doubling of the 633 cases confirmed on Saturday. There are now a total of 3,137 confirmed cases of the variant in the country. Scientists suspect there are in reality 10,000s of new infections.

The Washington Post. Democracy dies in Darkness.

Nicola Sturgeon, the first minister of Scotland, said Friday that the omicron variant will overtake the common delta strain “within days, not weeks.”

Omicron could become dominant in some European countries by next week, officials predict

The prime minister said, “the best thing we can do is all get our boosters.” Johnson made the comments as Britons stood in long lines outside clinics on Monday, waiting to get their third dose of vaccination.

Others who tried to book appointments via the National Health Service website were told to try again later. Some people said that the NHS website had crashed.

On Sunday evening, Johnson announced in a televised address that Britain would try to get booster shots to everyone age 18 and over by New Year’s Day, bringing forward an earlier deadline by a month.

“A tidal wave of omicron is coming,” Johnson said. “And I’m afraid it is now clear that two doses of vaccine are simply not enough to give the level of protection we all need.”

To reach that target, the NHS will need to carry out about a million vaccinations a day, double what it is doing now.

Health Secretary Sajid Javid warned Monday that omicron infections were doubling at “phenomenal” rate.

“We’re once again in a race between the vaccine and the virus,” Javid told Sky News. “Two doses are not enough, but three doses still provide excellent protection against symptomatic infection.”

The good news: the health services agency said preliminary studies found that third, booster jab of Pfizer would likely raise protection from omicron considerably — to 70 to 80 percent range.

Teresa Lambe, a co-author of the study and a professor at the Jenner Institute at University of Oxford, said neutralizing antibodies might not tell the whole story and that other immune responses against omicron may be stimulated by the vaccines.

Lambe said that early studies by others also suggested that a booster dose of existing vaccines may be effective against omicron.

She urged people to get a booster and said, “I am carefully optimistic,” but that is currently sensible to “prepare for the worst, but hope for the best.”

Lambe and other scientists said it is a numbers game: if there are suddenly, quickly millions of new omicron infections in Britain, even if the variant is not more deadly, the large number new cases will send a lot of people to the hospital, where some will die.

Saludos.

Grammar test online: relative clauses in English

Buenas tardes, estimados alumnos.

Foto de @mmolpor Casa en Budapest hoy en día.

Vamos con otro test, a ver qué tal van esos conocimientos de gramática inglesa. Y también, de asuntos internacionales, como la crisis en la frontera de Polonia y Bielorrusia que está jugando con la vida de miles de inmigrantes

Gracias a Anne Applebaum, cuyo artículo 'A Dictator Is Exploiting These Human Beings' he usado como base para coger las frases. Dos pájaros de un tiro.

Test online: Making suggestions in English

 Buenas tardes, estimados alumnos.

"Shall we change our tickets then?", asks Victoria.

Foto de Wikepedia

Texto cogido de CREA, TEMA 1, PAU.

Nota sobre gramática: En la última frase, con forma interrogativa, tenemos al falsa pregunta 'Shall we...?' que hemos traducido como '¿Qué te parece si cambiamos los billetes?, por lo que en realidad es una sugerencia.

Ve este vídeo breve -le puedes poner subtítulos en español- para aprender cómo se pueden hacer las sugerencias en inglés:

Aquí tenéis un resumen en inglés y en español de las expresiones más comunes que podemos usar:

@mmolpor

Y ahora, un pequeño test online: 

Reading comprehension: What will the weather be like?

Buenas tardes, estimados alumnos.

Foto de @mmolpor Caminos de Segovia.

CÓDIGOS DE COLORES:

AZUL: Traducciones.

ROJO: Aspectos gramaticales.

VERDE: Aspectos culturales.

NARANJA: Estructuras concatenadas

MORADO: Traducción y sinónimos, antónimos, etc.

Amarillo: Palabras con trampa.

Os dejo una plantilla para que, sobre la marcha, podáis ir completando con sinónimos, antónimos, etc y los significados. Espero que os sea de utilidad. Pinchad aquí para descargarla.

WHAT WILL THE WEATHER BE LIKE?

Michael and Victoria live in Australia and are planning a trip to the United States. They are flying to Miami, New York and Alaska and they don't know what the weather is going to be like.

Victoria looks at the weather channel on the Internet. She finds out that in New York it will be partly cloudy with a slight chance of showers. The high will be around 80F with East Northeast winds of 15 to 25 mph. 

"I find that the temperature is surprisingly high for this time of the year in New York", Victoria says to Michael.

"For Miami I suppose we'll have to pack our bathing suits", Michael adds.

"It seems like we aren't going to be very lucky. The weather forecast for Miami is as follows" says Victoria "Sunny with cloudy intervals. High of 57F. Winds South, 5 to 10 mph."

"What? Only 57F? That's very low. I can't believe it. That temperature can't be right for Miami. Besides it's going to be windy."

"Yeah" agreed Victoria. "It seems like we'll have to take our bathing suits for New York instead of for Miami. And, remember, later we'll go to Juneau, Alaska." 

"Yes, that's going to be very cold. Right?", asks Michael.

Foto de Wikipedia

"Let me see. I will check it on the weather channel again. It says: Juneau, Alaska. Overcast with rain showers at times. Temperatures in the mid to upper 30s. Winds East Southeast, 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 50%."

"Brrr...that's going to be very cold. I think I'd rather go to the Caribbean. I want to enjoy a hot climate, sunny skies and no thunderstorms."

"There are also thunderstorms in the Caribbean", says Victoria.

"Yes, I know, but that's only from May to June and September to October."

"Shall we change our tickets then?", asks Victoria.

Foto de Wikepedia

Texto cogido de CREA, TEMA 1, PAU.

Vocabulario básico: puedes descargarlo aquí.

@mmolpor

Reading comprehension: Underbrush and pine trees are a problem.

 Buenas tardes, estimados alumnos.

Foto de @mmolpor Caminos de Segovia.

Underbrush and pine trees are a problem

The mountain town of Canton is at an elevation of 6,000 feet, the highest in the area. It is surrounded by thick underbrush and pine trees. Because of six years of drought, these plants are a major fire hazard. Thousands of trees and tons of underbrush are going to be removed over the next five years at a minimum cost of $3 million. The brush is going to be removed first, then the trees are going to be cut down and removed. A cleared nonflammable area will then safely surround the town of 4,000.

Residents look forward to the work, because it will help their town survive a future forest fire. "But there are two problems," said one resident. "All the extra trucks are going to make traffic pretty bad. Once the area is cleared, we have to make sure dirt bikers don't try to make the cleared area their personal playground."

A recent fire burned 4,000 acres and destroyed 11 homes in nearby Hamilton. The fire was raging toward Canton, but a sudden rainstorm put it out. Residents know that they won't get lucky twice, so they are hoping this massive clearing operation will avoid a worse result in the future.

Ninety percent of the cutting and clearing are going to be paid for with federal funds . Unfortunately, if the trees are on private property, they must be paid for by the residents themselves. Prices can range as high as $1,000 to cut down and remove one tree. Officials say that residents can apply for state and federal loans if necessary. 

"Well, what good does that do me?" asked Thelma, a 65-year-old widow. "I'm living on social security. I've got four trees on my property. The government's not going to loan me money when they know there's no way I can pay it back. So what am I supposed to do? These planners with all their big ideas ought to think of the little people."

Texto cogido de CREA, unidad 1, PAU.

Saludos.

Cambios en los verbos al añadir -ing en inglés

Buenas tardes, estimados alumnos.

En la clase de hoy martes de 16:00 a 17:00 ha surgido la duda de qué cambios hay que hacer en un verbo cuando se le añade -ing.

NOTA: Cuando ese sufijo -ing se añade un verbo, se traduce de dos maneras, como os voy a poner en estos ejemplos.

foto de @mmolpor del zapatero Tarregó en Jaén, frente al supermercado Dani.

1. 'The shoemaker is dyeing the brown boot to make it look like new again'.

    'El zapatero está tiñiendo la bota de color marrón para que quede como nueva otra vez'.

2. 'The shoemaker has been dyeing the boot for nearly one hour'.

    'El zapatero ha estado tiñendo la bota durante casi una hora'.

3. 'The shoemaker was dyeing the boot with a special coloring dye'.

    'El zapatero estuvo tiñendo la bota con un tinte especial'.

En estos casos, -ing se añade al verbo para indicar que 'algo está pasando'.

4. 'People all over the world have been dying because of the Chinese covid for more than now years now'.

     'Mucha gente de todo el mundo se ha estado muriendo por culpa del covid que vino de China.'

NOTA: Es importante no confundir los verbos 'dye' y 'die' que no se parecen en nada.

Por otra parte, se puede añadir -ing a un verbo para que sea el sujeto de una frase, como por ejemplo:

4. 'Dyeing shoes, boots and leather objects in a very specialized technique'.

    'Teñir zapatos, botas y otros objetos de piel es una técnica muy especializada'.

En esa frase, 'Dyeing' /'Teñir' es el sujeto, y lo vamos a traducir no por 'tiñiendo...' sino por 'teñir...'

5. 'Smoking is not very good for your health, but many people still do it'.

    'Fumar no es bueno para la salud, pero mucha gente todavía lo hace'.

6. 'Studying after working is a very tough task, but most of my students do it'.

    'Estudiar después de trabajar es una tarea muy dura, pero muchos de mis alumnos lo hacen'.

7. 'Yawning and blinking is unavoidable thing to do in lessons at night'.

    'Bostezar y parpadear' es algo inevitable en las clases nocturnas'.

Os he preparado un cuadro con los principales cambios que se realizan en la morfología del verbo y que os podéis descargar en pdf aquí.

@mmolpor

@mmolpor

Y ahora, un poco de práctica: añade -ing a estos 25 verbos de esta ficha  y luego mira las respuestas correctas en este archivo.

foto @mmolpor

Mañana lo comentaremos en clase.

Saludos.

Grammar test online: conditional sentences in English.

Buenas tardes, estimados alumnos.

Aquí os dejo un test de 15 preguntas sobre aspectos diversos de vuestros contenidos, tales como: pasivas, condicionales, relativos, tiempos verbales en presente, pasado y futuro, adverbios, conjunciones, etc.

Probad con el siguiente test online para averiguarlo.

Saludos y venga, adelante.

Grammar test online: conditional sentences type 3 in English: who, that, which, whose, where, when, why, whom, etc. 22 de noviembre

Buenas tardes, estimada familia IPEP #inglésipep #ingléspagsypau (en Twitter).

Vamos por otra semana que nos acerca un día más a la Navidad. Llueve, poco, sopla el viento, mucho, y hay ejercicios, los justos espero. Y, como la laboriosa abeja del vídeo, nos toca seguir en la lucha, trabajando y esforzándonos para conseguir nuestra meta.

Toca hoy repasar las oraciones de relativo, que ya estuvimos analizando en profundidad durante todo el mes de octubre. Os remito a esos días, a esas entradas en el blog, para que repaséis una miajilla antes de hacer el test.

Os recuerdo que sí ponéis vuestra dirección en el test, os debe llegar el formulario corregido y evaluado, así como a mí una copia. 

Mucho ánimo y adelante, que nos queda poco. 

Grammar test online: simple past and past continuous. Teoría, práctica y Test de past simple y past continuous.

Buenas tardes, estimados alumnos.

Yummy, yummy, requeteyummy.

When you are talking about the past, you use the past continuous for actions that continued to happen before and after another action, or before and after a particular time. This is often called the `interrupted past'. You use the 'past simple' for the other action.

                Charles was watching television when the doorbell rang.

                 It was 6 o'clock. The train was nearing London.

 

WARNING: If two things happened one after another, you use two verbs in the past simple tense:

'As soon as he saw me, he waved his hand'.                             

Y ahora, en español normalito: 

'Cuando estas hablando sobre el pasado, se puede usar el pasado continuo para referirse a acciones que continuaban sucediendo antes y después de otra acción, o antes o después de un momento concreto en el pasado. A esta acción se le llama normalmente 'un pasado interrumpido'. Se usa el pasado simple para la otra acción:

'Charles estaba viendo la televisión cuando la puerta sonó'.

Tenemos dos acciones en el pasado: ver la tele, sonar una puerta. Cronológicamente, las primera es la acción de ver la tele, que se vio interrumpida por el sonido de la puerta cuando alguien llamó.

'El tren se aproximaba a Londres. Eran las 6 de la tarde'

Buenas tardes, venga, a por otra cervecilla, 0,0, que son ustedes muy jóvenes. Hoy toca repasar los pasados simples y los pasado continuos cuando los usamos en una misma frase. ¿Quién puso estos nombres, por cierto?

Veamos: 'I was yawning in the chemistry lesson while the teacher was trying to call our attention'

Veamos: 'Yo estaba bostezando en clase mientras que la profe intentaba llamar nuestra atención'.

O también: 'My boss phoned me while I was talking to some students so I couldn't pick up the call'.

'Mi jefe me llamó por teléfono mientras que yo estaba hablando con algunas alumnas, por eso no pude atender la llamada'.

O incluso: 'My boss was shouting my name while I was listening to music with my earphones on'.

'Mi jefe estaba gritando mi nombre mientras que yo estaba escuchando música con mis cascos puestos'.

O también: 'I was eating a creamy lasagna when my mum saw that it was the dinner that she had prepared for that evening'.

'Yo estaba comiéndome una lasaña cremosa cuando mi madre vio que era la comida que ella había preparado para la cena de esa noche'.

Nota: recordemos que cuando se añade -ing a un verbo que termina en -y, muy raras veces se cambia dicha -y. Lo veremos en otra entrada

Recordemos estos tiempos verbales: Podéis descargar el archivo aquí.

@mmolpor

@mmolpor

Os dejo un pequeño test por Google Drive para que practiquéis un poco con estos dos tiempos verbales. Ya sabéis, 'yo estaba durmiendo cuando me llegó un mensaje #ingléspagsypau de mi profe de inglés en el que me decía que tenía que hacer ejercicios para hoy'. Malaje

'I was happily sleeping when I got a message from my teacher...'

Cronológicamente: 

Primero: Yo ya dormía. Yo estaba durmiendo.

Segundo: me despierta el malaje con un mensaje.

Truco: La primera acción la pondremos siempre en 'pasado continuo' y la que interrumpe, en 'pasado simple'. Pero sigue siendo un masaje.