my hobby

This is miku.

My hobby is listening American music.

Especialy I like American Hip hop.

These days I like Ashlee shimpson's song.

When we listen American music, We can learn

American slung and pronunciation while enjoy music!!

It's better way to learn English.

If you interested in American Hip hop.

you can try! http://www.oricon.co.jp/rank/wa/w

My hobby and debate sources

Hi! This is Rina.

My hobby is listening to Japanese POP music and watching movies.

My favorite artist is Masaharu Fukuyama, Ayaka, Dreams come true, ELT and so on.

I like Masaharu Fukuyama very much!!!

I've been to his concert twice.

That was so wonderful!!

I want to go it again.

And I also like movies.

Recently I watched "Sunadokei", Japanese movie.

Please tell me your favorite movies.



And then these are debate resources.

That is Pro Death Penalty.

http://www.prodeathpenalty.com/

http://www.bnp.org.uk/

http://www.dpinfo.com/dpnews.htm

my hobby

Hi, this is Takahiro.

My hobby is running with my friends.

Long distance running is the most exiting sports for me. Ｉ have two reason that Ｉ like running.

First, when Ｉ run fast for long time, Ｉ'm tired. But if Ｉ won, Ｉ'd be very very very very happy and Ｉ would realise Ｉ became again!

Ｉ always run for my strongness.

Second, runnning make me more good friends and Ｉ enjoy running with them.

If Ｉ have not ran and Ｉ have not belong to Track and Field clab, Ｉ would have few good friends in the university.

We always run, lough, speak and quarrel. So the memory make our relationship deeper and deeper.

My clab URL is http://sports.geocities.jp/hirosaki_u_mid_long/ . If you are free, please look.

Takahiro・K

Tell us about your hobby

Tell us what you like to do in your spare time. Give us lots of information about it, and if you can find websites that explain it better, link to them. Try to put a picture up about it if you can, and let us know why you like that hobby.

Death penalty debate sources

OK, here you go. These are some sites I could find quickly about the death penalty.

The Death Penalty Debate is a site which welcomes adherents of both sides to argue about the pros and cons of the death penalty. It includes a number of different sub-discussions and links to other sources of information.

The US government has official information about executions and the death penalty debate in the United States. This source is especially useful for clearing up misconceptions about the death penalty in the United States. it can be used profitably by either side of this debate.

The University of Alaska also has a neutral site which has links to other sites with positions on both sides of the debate. It is most useful for helping us to understand the issues involved as well as the positions of persons on both sides of the issue.


Cornell University has a brief overview with links to more information.

Recent news about the death penalty can be found by searching Google News for information.

The most prominent opponent of the death penalty in the US is probably the American Civil Liberties Union.

Those who support the death penalty in the US also have sites that advance their points of view, focusing especially on the victims of crimes.

There is a Death Penalty Information Center.

Wikipedia has a long article with many links.

Amnesty International campaigns against the death penalty internationally.

Here's another pro page just for balance.

Please, everyone. Your first assignment is to find more sources and link to them for us here.

Welcome to English class!

Thank you for your introductions today. Please post a blog entry this week, explaining what you want to learn in this class, and how you see English being useful to you in the future. If you have links to interesting sites, please include those. If you have suggestions about how this class should proceed, let us know about that. Please make friends here and use this blog to communicate with the rest of the class.

A real life "Born in East L.A." story

Pedro Guzman is a US citizen wrongfully deported to Mexico. Luckily his story had a happy ending. But it should never have happened in the first place.

From the Los Angeles Times:

Guzman is an American citizen, but when he was arrested in May, a mental impairment may have prevented him from convincing immigration authorities of his legal status. So, rather than accord him his rights, the authorities assumed he was in the country illegally, took him to Tijuana and left him there. Desperate to bring him home, his family pleaded with the American government for help. The government refused.

Guzman's journey remains hard to reconstruct, but he eventually stumbled upon a border crossing in Calexico, where he was detained. Rather than admit their error, the authorities locked him up for missing probation hearings -- hearings he missed because the government had deported him.

Guzman was released, at last, on Tuesday, miraculously ending his three-month odyssey. For those who turned him out of his country because they couldn't understand him and assumed that he was foreign, Guzman's story should stand as a reminder of what happens when the hardhearted command America's borders.

This is Mai

Hello!
It's too late, but I managed to write here.
Mimu told me how to link here, so I write this now.

I have the same question with Misato.
I couldnt get the meaning of "Born in the east L.A."(if it's the west L.A., I'm sorry;)
Some of you got it the meaning?
If you did, please tell us!

I couldnt attend the making up class, because of part-time job.
I wanted to go...I'm sorry.
I'm looking forward to speaking with my team mate next class.

Some Questions about the movie

I watched this movie but I can't understand what they were doing. I tried to hear what they are speaking, but I undeartand the story by only image.

１．What's the meaning of "Born in the east L.A."? Is it stange that born un the east L.A.? They were singing "Born in the east L.A.～♪", but I can't understand the meanings. I think L.A. is the most fantastic city in the U.S.A, like Hollywood. Hollywood is in the north-west in L.A., but is it any difference between east and west in L.A.?

2. They were running down from the hill and through the two policeman. Where they wanted to go? First, I thought they wanted to astonish the policeman, but they didn't so.

Please tell me what they were going to do.

Born in East L.A.

I mentioned the video "Born in East L.A." in class as a humorous take on the immigration debate in the US. It's more than 20 years old now, but I think it's still funny. There's a lot of local humor in it, but I think you can still appreciate some of the humor. Let me know if you have any questions. Ah, heck! You WILL have questions. Just let me know what they are, ok?

More on immigration

Tom Tancredo is generally considered the most anti-immigrant member of Congress. Here is his proposal for immigration reform.

Other anti-immigration (or at least anti-illegal immigration) groups include:

California Coalition for Immigration Reform

Numbers USA

Federation for American Immigration Reform

_____________________________

The most pro-immigrant member of Congress is perhaps Keith Ellison, the only Muslim in Congress. Here is his proposal about immigration.

Here are some immigrant rights activists:

Immigrant Solidarity Network

American Friends Service Committee (the Quakers)

American Civil Liberties Union

_________________________

Finally, I can't resist pointing out again that my governor is an immigrant. I didn't vote for him, (living out of state I only vote for federal offices anyway) but we could have done a lot worse. If you go to his website you'll notice that he doesn't say anything about immigration, probably because immigration is a federal responsibility and state governments have nothing to do with it. And as an immigrant he can't run for president anyway.

About The U.S. immigration

Hello, everyone.
I found a news video about immigration.
If you are interested in it, please watch link.

Immigration

Well, it's been a long time since I dealt with the US immigration. AAMOF, I don't think I've ever dealt with them. They are no longer the INS, but the USCIS, and they're in the new Department of Homeland Security. Wikipedia also has information about US immigration history. There are many links at the bottom of the article you should explore. They also have another article about the US immigration debate, complete with links to more information at the bottom.

Good luck finding information for your debate!

Hi!! This is Ai

I got an e-mail to enter this blog from Kaori.
I'm very happy that I can write this comment on this blog.
It was my first time to debeto in English. It was very hard time for me.
But I enjoyed that.
Next debeto topics is the U.S. immigration.
It sounds very defficult. I'm anxiety about it.

Hi! Im Kaori!!

I forgot my password so I couldnt enter this blog.
But I found the paper that I've written my correctly password, and I was tought how to enter it by my friend.
Finally I could enter this blog. Now Im very glad to put this massage on that like this.

At last class we debated about the nuclear powar. It was too difficult for me and I was very tense, because foreign students came to see our debate. But it was very useful and I was very excited.

Kaori Mimura.

About Movies

First, I have to apologize about my delaying contribution. That's why because I had forgot my passaord. So I couldn't access this blog. I'm so sorry.

We wached some movies for a long time ago. I'm going to write about "Lion King". That was very interesting and I enjoyed it. I forgot the name of charactors but the main charactor is very strongful, so I encouraged by him. I thought I have to live more strong.

I think Disney movies are all like misicals. It's because all charactors movable and they sing a song suddenly (in spite of it's on the way of the story!). That charactor fit to musicals.

If I could have understood more English, I could enjoy movies much more.

No relation to this story, I want to watch "Pirates of curibbean" very much!! It's very intersting. Jonny Depp is very cool, neat, flash, great, and stunning(^-^*)!! If you have watched it arleady, DON'T TELL ME about the story!! I haven't watched yet.

Thanks for your reading☆

misato

Impression of watching movies in English

Hello! Today, I managed to understand the way of using this blog, so this is my first coment.
We watched three Disney moveis until last week. I have watched Alladin and Lion King, so I can understand parts of conversation.
But I have never watched Snow Dogs, I had to depend on my ears. It was difficult for me and I couldn't understand the story. Why did the hero go to Alaska? Please tell me!!(> <)
It was interesting experience to watch movie in English, so I'll try other movie.

Aladdin,The Lion King and The Snow Dogs

We watched the movies in English Class. All the movies were Disney and I like it very much.
I've seen Aladdin and The Lion King before. I like The Lion King especially. The characters are so funny, and this story give me the bravery.
I didn't understand the story of The Snow Dogs well, so I want to try again!

Lion King & Snow Dogs

I'm sorry I was late to write the blog about "Lion King" and "Snow Dogs".
I thought both of the videos was difficult to understand the conversation in detail without subtitles also. "Lion King" was easy to understand the evolution of the story, but "Snow Dogs" was difficult, so I want to watch the video again in person.
By the way, I watched the situation of the tornado in America on the TV. The tornado appeared seven at one time. I was very surprized!!

Aladdin~♪

Yesterday, I watched the Aladdin. I know the story because I have ever watched this video many times, but it was very difficult to understand the story only English sound.
I could a little understand the content of the lyrics in the video, but I couldn't understand the conversation because the characters talks so fast!
I think it is hard to understand the English sound story without English subtitles, especially part of comedy.
Although it was hard to hear conversation, I enjoyed the video.