Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is celebrated on the 4th Thursday of November. The first thanksgiving was celebrated in 1621 in America by the Pilgrims. The people were miserable the first year and they had nothing to eat. Then the Native Americans helped them to survive.

Today Thanksgiving is celebrated with the whole family having dinner together. Some things they eat are mashed potatoes, corn pudding, pumpkin pie and green beans.

The day after Thanksgiving is called "Black Friday". Almost all people do some shopping for Christmas because there are granted a lot of discounts. The sales on this day are of course very good.
The shops open very early and a lot of people are waiting, even early in the morning. When the shop opens, all the people try to get in - this is called "Doorbusters".

HALLOWEEN


Halloween is on October, 31st
Halloween is a shortened form of All Hallows' Eve.
Hallowed means holy.
Eve is the day before a holy day.
Halloween was an ancient British Celtic festival.
At Halloween the souls of the dead returned.
People lit bonfires to frighten evil spirits.
Now bonfires are only burnt on November 5th. Bonfire night.
Masks, costumes, ghosts, witches on broomsticks with black cats, skeletons, bats and spiders and Halloween lanterns have all become part of Halloween.
Children play trick-or-treat.
They ask for a treat hoping to get sweets.

Today Farrah, a 22 year old girl from America spent our English lesson with us. She lives with her parents in Mayrland, a state near Washington. Farrah has no brothers and no sisters but she likes it because she gets everything she wants.
At home Farrah has got a dog, a cat, a turtle and a bird.
Her hobbies are reading, listening to music, watching movies, meeting friends and of course travelling. Farrah has done Austria's most popular sport - skiing, but for the first time she was not very good at it.
She has already visited New York, D.C., Boston, Chicago, Germany, France, Amsterdam, Switzerland and Greece.
Farrah is now living in Linz. She has visited the Austrian citys Linz, Vienna, Perg, Innsbruck and Salzburg. Farrah told us that she will stay in Austria till the end of May but she wants to spend some time here again next year.
The driving age in America is 16 and you get alcohol when you are 21 years old.
Then she told us about the big difference between America and Austria. In America everything is much bigger, so there are 25 000 students at one university. What she noticed is that in Austria dogs can go everywhere they want.
I think it was a really good idea to invite Farrah to our class.

Press Review


I read an article the other day in the online newspaper "the economist" and what it talks about is that a lot of MBA schools need to integrate new technology into their teaching.

Basically what it says is that employees who are used to expensive smart phones and notebooks in their personal lives now want similar things in their professional lives.
Some professors fear that "wired" things will detract from classroom discussions, but schools are still not deterred from experimenting.
In a lot of schools electronic versions of the learning matter are used instead of paper ones.

There are some concerns which are neither for nor against the new technology.

In the article there is also some information about how many students complained that switching between text and charts took far longer than in books. All the same there are some schools that are going to test the new Apple i-pad.

There have been some classrooms equipped with new TVs and software that allow students who are off campus to share data and opinions with those who are on it.

In my opinion I think it's a good idea to integrate new technology into the teaching system. But I wouldn't like to have only electronic versions of learning matter. I still prefer learning from my own books.

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Vocabulary:

to deter (abhalten) - Somebody deterred me from doing my homework.

chart (Grafik, Diagramm) - You can see par example the turnover of a company on a chart.

The developement of advertising

I’ve just read the article „The development of advertising“ and it talks about the history of advertising.

Advertising started in the nineteenth century and it was used mainly to promote novelties and fringe products. But when the factory production got into swing brand-naming of products became necessary.

The economic depression marked a turning point between the old method of industrial organisation and the new. Then the depression brought a crisis of over-production and under-consumption, so the manufactured goods piled up unsold and prices and profits fell.

Then the firms realised they would be in a better position if they combined with other businesses and widened their range of goods. They would have to take steps to ensure that if the goods were produced there would be a market for them.

After the depression the firms relied on mass advertising to promote their new range of products.

A good change is the soap trade. From about 1850 the market had been flooded with many bars of soap which were produced by hundreds of small manufactures. Lord Leverhulme decided to „brand“ his soap by selling it.

He realised that advertisements should contain „logical and considered“ arguments as well as eye-catching and witty slogans.

Many advertisers followed his lead.

My favourite advertising spot is „Zalando“.

A man is standing in a room full of shoes. He says that nobody should tell his sister or his girlfriend of the online shop. He also mentions that delivering and sending back is free of charge. Suddenly the doorbell rings. His wife opens & starts shouting. Then her husband also starts shouting because the postman again brings some packages of shoes. At last the postman starts shouting.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tHk42otbSNQ

PRESS REVIEW

I read an article the other day on the online version of “Austriantimes” and it talks about the usage of Austrian credit cards abroad.

Basically what it says is that credit cards are the Austrians’ most favourite payment methods abroad.

There is also the information that more than 40 per cent of 1.15 million credit cards were used abroad last year. Austrians use their credit cards an average 14 times abroad to spend around 1400 Euros every year.

The company PayLife had a market share of 46 per cent and they expect a increase by 15 to 20 per cent this year because of the usage of credit cards.

In my opinion it’s a very good way to pay with a credit card because then you don’t have to take a lot of money with you.

see original link:

http://austriantimes.at/news/Business/2010-06-08/24068/Austrian_credit_card_usage_abroad_soars