Our journals

Role play is always the most difficult but interesting part of the mid-term test. Although everybody was so tired, we tried our best to do a good job. About the plays of the four groups before us, I was really impressed by what they had shown in that morning. I can see that they had put all of their effort in the plays. Those were the result of hard work, creativeness, and, of course, a lot of sweat.

The first play, a new version of Beauty and the beast, was so carefully prepared. The first group made every detail as perfect as they could. The story was logical and interesting, but rather long. Therefore, it was difficult for the audience to pay the whole attention to it from the beginning to the end. But in general, it was very good.

The play of the second group impressed me most. It was very meaningful even though it was the shortest of the five plays. The actors and actresses performed so well, especially Thùy and Thành. To tell the truth, I can never think Thành can do this job so well. That day it seemed that I had seen another person, totally different from Thành, a pretty silent one. He surprised me so much that I didn't believed that was a friend in my class but a professional actor. Despite the fact that it was a tragedy, everyone laughed a lot. Anyway, this was also a kind of success, maybe.

Next, I want to talk about the play of third group, The Five Bald Sharks. I can see that Nguyệt Nữ had put some important problems of the world into the play. They were the serious pollution, HIV/AIDS, global warming, and a lot of beggars on the streets. The performance of Nguyệt Nữ and Vân An was amazing, especially the last scene with the swords. Forgive me, Nguyệt Nữ, if you read this journal. I think your character is completely contrary to your name. And the last thing I remember most is their clothes. They was so... ridiculous, but impressive.

The fourth play, Micheal Jackson's guards, gave me some funny and interesting moments with the crazy fan and Aikido. I just want to say that the fourth group did a really good job. The play was meaningful, though the performance of Thắng, in my opinion, could have been better if there were some moonwalk, a typical dance of Micheal Jackson.

My group is the fifth one. At 11.20am, the teacher asked us if we wanted to perform then or delayed to the next week. And we said that we would perform right then, we couldn't wait for another week. Our play had some mistakes, but I still think at least it gave everybody a memorable event which was full of fun. "Made in China, baby!", this really made an amazing effect!

The room E5 must have been very dirty that day. All the five groups seemed to be fond of throwing things or beating the board and the table. To sum up, every member of every group had tried their best. Although the marks are good or bad, they deserve to be appreciated. I hope that the last two groups will have better performance after one more week to prepare. Good luck to all of you!
T.D.

DEBATES (I)

by Vu Tuong Thinh

ARGUMENTATIVE LANGUAGE SKILLS

I. Making critical comments or showing disapproval.

Having studied all the books which I possess and have found from the internet, I am convinced that the followings are the most common expressions used in debates in order to make critical comments or to show disapproval.

The idea that ___ is (a) nonsense.
It is (a) nonsense to day that ___.
It is rubbish to say that ___.
It is wrong / not sensible / unreasonable / pointless / absurd to + inf.
It does not make sense to + inf.
There is no / little sense in ___.
There is no / little point in ___.
I find it senseless / pointless / absurd to + inf.
I cannot see any point in ___.

*To + inf. … + is ___.
=> This kind of comment is made as a conclusion to what has just been deliberately discussed.



II. Making a counter-argument.

Personally, I am of the opinion that in a debate each party always tries to maintain their own points of view. This leads me to the conclusion that if people who take part in a debate continue to do that job, the debate is unlikely to come to an end. Instead, it may last forever, to be ironic. At this point, I would like to point out that besides providing the opposite party with arguments, you are supposed to know how to make a counter-argument, which seems to be an effective strategy.

Be careful here. When there is an idea which you oppose, what you say against it is your counter-argument. Yet, when you conduct a talk exposing your views on a contentious issue, you may cite a counter-argument made by your opponents which you are trying to refuse. The word “counter-argument” as it is used here refers to the first case.

III. The role of the chairperson.

The role of the chairperson is to control the debate. (S)he should sit or stand between the two teams.

The first duty of the chairperson is to call the debate to order and to welcome all that is present. (S)he should then proceed to announce the topic of the debate and the names of the teams taken part in.

Next (s)he should tell the leaders of each team and the audience how long each speech will be for.

The chairperson should then introduce the first speaker of the affirmative to open the debate, then sit down.

At the end of the debate the chairperson should do as follows:

1)Summarize what has been discussed by two teams.
2)State which arguments have been successfully refused.
3)Ask the audience to vote.

Finally, (s)he will officially announce the result of the debate.



My thought: I was asked to do the job of the chairperson in class. It was actually of toughness since both teams, affirmative and negative, take their turn expressing their opinions and points of view continuously without letting me speak a single word. Nevertheless, I strongly believe it proves something encouraging: my speaking class has become more and more active. At the end of the debate, I was carefully re-instructed by my teacher how to be a good chairperson. How hard it is to work well as a chairperson, I suppose!

Our speaking class today was quite interesting. My group conducted a debate with the motion “clothes are more important to girls than boys”. The teacher must have hesitated a lot before giving us this motion, because he had to spend a long time to choose it. Thanks to this activity, I understand more about a debate.
When I read the motion, my first opinion was to disagree with it. However, I wanted to be in the yea party, and tried to think some ideas to support the motion. I wanted to put myself in another position so as to look at the motion in a different aspect. Then, during a debate, I had to present as a real member of yea group, and had to protest my own first opinion. It was rather difficult! Sometimes I felt surprised with what I had said in order to win the debate.
Finally, the result of our debate, as Nguyệt Nữ presented in font of the class, was to disagree with the motion. I didn't feel sad when my yea party lost the debate. Contrary to this, I felt happy, really happy because I had understood the purpose of a debate. It helps us to have a more general, precise and flexible look of a problem. Of course, there must be good points and bad points in the same thing.
Although I belonged to yea party, I still kept my first opinion: disagreeing with the motion. But thanks to the debate, I had another point of view of this problem. From now, I know that the way you judge something is very important. We should look at it from many aspects before making an accurate decision.
T.D.

Today in the speaking class, we had a debate about paying tuition fee in the university of pedagogy. I was a member in the yea group. It was a luck for me because I myself agree that students in this university should pay tuition fee. Anyway, that is just a debate, and the truth is still that a lot of students has made a contract so as not to pay tuition fee.
The most important thing that makes me think a lot after the debate is the purpose of some students when they decide to enter this university. In my opinion, teaching is a special job and plays an important role in our society. A person needs the innate teaching skill, patience and enthusiasm in order to be a good teacher. If they really love teaching, they can stick to this job for all their life, in spite of low salary. What teachers do will affect the whole generation, that's why the government have given a policy to help pedagogical university's students.
However, just because the university of pedagogy doesn't require tuition fee, a lot of students try to enter this university and become teachers without paying attention to the fact that whether they are suitable for this job or not. The problem is that, how can they teach well when they don't have any interest in teaching? And how about their students? Can they study well with a reluctant teacher? I have known a lot of people quit the teaching career because they feel so bored and frustrated. That's such a waste of time and money (of the government).
Looking at the other people, I look back myself. To be honest, I love teaching, but I don't think I have enough ability to be a good teacher. Some people can explain a problem clearly with a few sentences, while some say a lot but no-one understand what they mean. Obviously, enthusiasm is not enough, knowledge and teaching skill are more essential.
T.D.

Hello, everyone. Today has been our second school day since we broke up for Tet. How’s everything? Have you got ready for a new semester with fun and knowledge galore? Ha-ha also of course with homework aplenty. This is Khánh and I’ve just made up my mind to sacrifice a night enjoying my new book to go have a word about today’s speaking class. Well, generally speaking everything was fine, as usual. Mr. Bình gave us two questions to contemplate and practice giving our opinions. To be honest, the two issues didn’t appeal to me a bit. “What is a good student?” Yep, firstly I found this ambiguous since I didn’t know what Mr. Bình meant by “good”. What does “good” here refer to? The student’s intellectual capacity or his conduct? Or both? I know I should have raised my question in class but I didn’t feel like doing so. Then I heard Linh say something like “hardworking”. It turned out that “good” here referred to the quality of the student. Yep, as I said in the class, I believe we don’t have any properly general standard for a “good” student. It depends on what subject the student studies and what kind of characteristics he has. I’ve heard millions of advice on how to be a “good” student, I could have sworn. However, to my mind, he who knows his own advantages and correspondingly has the equivalent learning style IS susceptible of studying. Briefly, there’s no particular answer to such a question.

About the second question “What do you think about UP?” Yep, I’d prefer to say nothing. I do have my own complaints, some are common, some individualistic, but who knows, maybe one day, maybe tomorrow I will come across the bright side of them and change my mind. It depends on what aspect of the problem I look into. Anyway, it’s my own choice to attend this university. It’s my own choice to set my heart on studying in-depth English. Well, I believe UP is my right place, despite its every drawback.

Whew, way too serious so far … 

Well, I must say it was my pleasure to have a chance to discuss with Ân and Hưng (I’ve already talked to PTTrang) since I can pick up something useful from them and get a general impression of the two. Ân seems to be a modern girl and she’s passionately interested in the women’s liberation, since she raised a topic on housewives and the gender discrimination. Yep, we had words because I disagreed with her wholly. However, I reckon that I can adapt her opinions further down the road for my argument-led essay on women’s liberation. 

Yep, tee- hee, let me tell you, the best saying of today I’ve heard is what Hưng shared in my group this morning . When we were discussing a topic on love, he said that he would be loyal to his wife and not look at other beautiful girls (I don’t remember his exact words). It strongly reminded me of Kail (in “Anatolia’s story”), who once made my heart twang like a guitar string when he said “I will love my only wife”. Yep, “I WILL LOVE MY ONLY WIFE”. Maybe easier said than done, as the saying goes, but I always have deep respect for Kail and the likes of him. 

~~~

Yep, that’s it. It seems enough for a journal. I’d better go downstairs and get a piece of chocolate. I hope next week we will have more fun in the class. Goodbye and have a good sleep, y’all. See you!

PS: I write here mainly to study. Should you find any mistakes, please point out so that I can learn and remedy them next time around. Thank you very much.


Khánh.