Is There a Ghost ?

This song by Band of Horses asks an "Is there..." question.

Is There A Ghost lyrics

I could sleep
I could sleep
I could sleep
I could sleep
When I lived alone
Is there a ghost in my house?

I could sleep
I could sleep
I could sleep
I could sleep
When I lived alone
Is there a ghost in my house?
When I lived alone
Is there a ghost in my house?
My house...

I could sleep
I could sleep
I could sleep
I could sleep
When I lived alone
Is there a ghost in my house?
When I lived alone
Is there a ghost in my house?
My house...

I could sleep
I could sleep
I could sleep
I could sleep
When I lived alone
Is there a ghost in my house?
When I lived alone
Is there a ghost in my house?
My house...

There is/There are

Review and practice using "There is..." and "There are..."

Possessives

Review the difference between possessive adjectives and possessive pronouns.


Listen and repeat the examples.

Apartment Tours

Take tours of two very different NYC apartments.

3,300 sq. ft. loft

200 sq.ft. small, cool

You can explore other apartments from the Top Tours menu at the left of the page in the link.

The Kitchen

Listen and repeat kitchen vocabulary.

The Simpsons' House

Watch as the famous Simpsons' house is built with Sims 3 software.

Houses and Homes

Listen and repeat vocabulary words related to houses and homes.

Where You Live

Bathroom Vocabulary

Listen and repeat.

In the Bathroom

Listen and answer the questions.

Bedroom vocabulary

Listen and repeat.

Rooms in your home

How many rooms are there in your home?
Is there a kitchen?
How many bedrooms are there?
Is there a living room?

Your Dream House

Click on the link below to hear six different people describe their dream house. You can click on the blue words in the text for vocabulary help. Take the quiz and listen again or read the text to find the answers

Dream Houses

What is your dream house like? Write a description in the comment box.

In - On - Under

This song is a bit silly, but after listening it stays in your head for quite a while. Sing along and learn the propositions of place.

Furniture

Listen to the furniture vocabulary. Then listen again and repeat.

Listen and Draw

Click on the drawing activity link. Listen to the instructions and draw a picture. Click "play" to listen and draw and "See picture" to check the results. 
Pay attention to the prepositions (in front of, over, on)

Drawing Activity

How to Play Like a Harlem Globetrotter

The Harlem Globetrotters are a famous exhibition basketball team that combines athletics, theater, and comedy.
The original team began in Chicago in the 1920's. They adopted the name New York Harlem Globetrotters because the Harlem sector of NYC was considered the center of African-American culture at the time. After four decades of existence, the Globetrotters played their first "home" game in Harlem in 1968.

Famous ex-Globetrotters include NBA greats Wilt "The Stilt" Chamberlain, Connie "The Hawk" Hawkins, Nat "Sweetwater" Clifton, as well as Marques Haynes, George "Meadowlark" Lemon, Jerome James, former Temple University coach John Chaney, Reece "Goose" Tatum and Hubert "Geese" Ausbie. Baseball Hall of Famers Bob Gibson and Ferguson Jenkins also played for the team at one time or another. In 1985, the Globetrotters signed their first female player, Olympic gold medalist Lynette Woodard, and their second, Joyce Walker, just three weeks later.

Grand Central Station

Said to be "Manhattan's only remaining great gateway," Grand Central Terminal (not "station" as it is so often mistakenly called) is a magnificent example of art meeting functionality. Visible on the south side of 42nd Street is a grand beaux arts façade with three high arched windows separated by pairs of fluted columns. At the top is a beautiful clock and crowning sculpture of Transportation. 
Inside the terminal, gold and nickel plated chandeliers hang from light blue ceilings covered with celestial mapping that displays the zodiac constellations (major stars even glow with fiber optic lighting). Sixty integrated railroad tracks act as a transport hub for over 500,000 people daily, including commuters from Connecticut and New Jersey.
The lower level offers dining and retail shops. In addition to the travel concourse, professional public tours of the Historic Central Terminal are also given. As times and rates vary, please check for more information.

At the Airport

Repeat the vocabulary related to airports and flying.

Love Song to Public Transportation

Ride, ride, ride along on a musical tram ride.



(the other aerial tram is in NYC)

Present Progressive with the Road Runner

What's that coyote doing?




Note:  "posting" a letter is "mailing" a letter in US English

Growing up in NYC

George Ancona is a Mexican-American photographer who grew up in NYC.
This is his webpage. Click on My Story to read about his life.
In the video below he talks more about the immigrant neighborhood  in Coney Island where he grew up.

And here he tells us about his mother's kitchen

Present Progressive

Repeat the sentences using "to be" in present progressive.

Where to go on vacation...??

Listen and decide where each person likes to go on vacation.
To play the
vacation game
click on the pictures of the vacation spots and drag them to the people who like them.

Travel the World with Matt

14 months in the making, 42 countries, and a cast of thousands -- watch as Matt dances his way around the world.



For more information on Matt and his travels and a list of all the countries he visited read Matt's story at wikipedia.
You can find the origin of his dance on the Gratitude page, the tab is above on this page.

Transportation from the Airport

Do you want to take a taxi, or a shuttle, or a limo??

NYC Weather

The weather in NYC goes from one extreme to another.


WINTER

SUMMER



Check out the weather in NYC at the NYCTourist page

Rain Songs

Here are two songs about the rain that almost every child in the US knows. Like all popular songs they have many versions with slightly different words.

It's Rainy

CSI NY

The sixth season of CSI NY begins with Mac's team recovering from a hail of machine-gun fire aimed at them while they were at a local bar remembering one of their fallen members. One person's life is significantly changed by the event, and the CSIs become determined to find the shooter.
This is the beginning of the first episode of season 6.

...and here are The Who singing the theme song from CSI NY (Oct. 20, 2001) at the Concert for New York City. You can see that New York City has really adopted this song as its own.

Out here in the fields
I fight for my meals
I get my back into my living
I don't need to fight
To prove I'm right
I don't need to be forgiven

Don't cry
Don't raise your eye
It's only teenage wasteland

Sally ,take my hand
Travel south crossland
Put out the fire
Don't look past my shoulder
The exodus is here
The happy ones are near
Let's get together
Before we get much older

Teenage wasteland
It's only teenage wasteland
Teenage wasteland
Oh, oh
Teenage wasteland
They're all wasted!

Vacation plans

Sally and Mark talk about vacations.

The Weather

Listen to the conversations about weather - then listen again with subtitles.

What's the Weather Like?

Practice describing the weather.






What's the weather usually like in Maracaibo? ... and in NYC?


What kind of weather do you like? ....don't like?

Weather Vocabulary

Listen and repeat words related to the weather.

Comparing Cities

If you could live anywhere, where in the world would you like to live? Here's a list of the 10 Most Liveable Cities in the world to help you choose. It is based on the findings of numerous surveys such as Mercer's Quality of Living Index and the Economist's Urban Liveability Index.




Where would you most like to visit?...or live?  Why?

Comparing Modes of Transport

Listen to the descriptions of four ways to get to the station. Then answer the questions about what you heard.


How to Get to the Train Station

Let the Sunshine In

Hair: The American Tribal Love-Rock Mursical is a rock musical with a book and lyrics by James Rado and Gerome Ragni and music by Galt MacDermot. A product of the hippie counter-culture and sexual revolution of the 1960s, several of its songs became anthems of the anti-Vietnam War peace movement. The musical broke new ground in musical theater by defining the genre of "rock musical", using a racially integrated cast, and inviting the audience onstage for a "Be-In" finale.
Here the cast of Hair sings "Let the Sunshine In" in Washington Square Park - in the Greenwich Village section of New York City.

We starve-look
At one another
Short of breath
Walking proudly in our winter coats
Wearing smells from laboratories
Facing a dying nation
Of moving paper fantasy
Listening for the new told lies
With supreme visions of lonely tunes

Somewhere
Inside something there is a rush of
Greatness
Who knows what stands in front of
Our lives
I fashion my future on films in space
Silence
Tells me secretly
Everything
Everything

Manchester England England
Manchester England England
Eyes look your last
Across the Atlantic Sea
Arms take your last
embrace
And I'm a genius genius
And lips oh you the
doors of breath
I believe in God
Seal with a righteous kiss
And I believe that God believes in Claude
Seal with a righteous kiss
That's me, that's me, that's me
The rest is silence
The rest is silence
The rest is silence

[Singing]
Our space songs on a spider web sitar
Life is around you and in you
Answer for Timothy Leary, dearie

Let the sunshine
Let the sunshine in
The sunshine in
Let the sunshine
Let the sunshine in
The sunshine in
Let the sunshine
Let the sunshine in
The sun shine in...

What Causes Earth's Seasons?

Are there seasons in Venezuela?

Why don't we have winter in Maracaibo?

Which season do you think you like the best?

30 Days ...

This is a traditional teaching rhyme used to identify which months have 30 days and which have 31 days. "Hath" is an old form of "has", no longer used except in poetry and old texts.


Try to repeat and memorize the verses.

Comparatives - Comparisons

Review the lesson on comparative adjectives, and listen to the interview with an artist.

Big and Small

Review the use of big and small - then answer the questions at the end.

Summer Poetry

When people live through four seasons a year, summer is a time for enjoying the outdoors, for relaxed days and lazy nights - as described in this poem by Carl Sandburg.

Back Yard
Shine on, O moon of summer. Shine to the leaves of grass, catalpa and oak, All silver under your rain to-night. An Italian boy is sending songs to you to-night from an accordion. A Polish boy is out with his best girl; they marry next month;      to-night they are throwing you kisses. An old man next door is dreaming over a sheen that sits in a      cherry tree in his back yard. The clocks say I must go—I stay here sitting on the back porch drinking      white thoughts you rain down.      Shine on, O moon, Shake out more and more silver changes. If you enjoyed this poem, read more... Carl Sandburg

Comparatives

Practice with comparatives.

Our World from Space

The Known Universe takes viewers from the Himalayas through our atmosphere and the inky black of space to the afterglow of the Big Bang. Every star, planet, and quasar seen in the film is possible because of the world's most complete four-dimensional map of the universe, the Digital Universe Atlas that is maintained and updated by astrophysicists at the American Museum of Natural History. The new film, created by the Museum, is part of an exhibition, Visions of the Cosmos: From the Milky Ocean to an Evolving Universe, at the Rubin Museum of Art in Manhattan through May 2010. 

Seinfeld

Seinfeld was one of the most popular TV series of all time - and it was set in NYC. 
The song Time of Your Life(Good Riddance) by Green Day reached a massive audience in one night, when it was used during the special two part "Clip Show" for the final episode on May 14, 1998.

 Time of Your Life(Good Riddance) by Green Day

Another turning point, a fork stuck in the road

Time grabs you by the wrist, directs you where to go

So make the best of this test, and don't ask why

It's not a question, but a lesson learned in time

It's something unpredictable, but in the end it's right.

I hope you had the time of your life.

So take the photographs, and still frames in your mind

Hang it on a shelf in good health and good time

Tattoos of memories and dead skin on trial

For what it's worth it was worth all the while

It's something unpredictable, but in the end it's right.

I hope you had the time of your life.

It's something unpredictable, but in the end it's right.

I hope you had the time of your life.

It's something unpredictable, but in the end it's right.

I hope you had the time of your life.