Advent Calendars: what they are and where they came from

December is the time when people are getting ready for holidays 🎄🎁. And to make this period fun and exciting there are lots of different ways to do it. Some people choose Advent Calendars. But what they are? And when they became popular 🤔?

The Advent Calendar was first used by German Lutherans in the 19th century. Many advent calendars take the form of a large rectangular card with “Doors”, one for each day of December leading up to Christmas Day.

Nowadays you can find such “countdown” calendars for kids and adults, from chocolate ones to huge beauty boxes. But there’s one important thing - put yourself together and try not to open all “doors” until the last day 😉.

We couldn’t help discussing this amazing topic with our youth from Kherson and Mariupol and our friend, a VSPP Alana Underwood. At the meeting we decided that we would open a “door” of the English Learning Advent Calendar every day up to December 24 🎄.

If you want to do practice your English - join our FREE meetings and learn 🇺🇸🇬🇧while having fun.

How to be grateful no matter what!

This coming Thursday, people in the USA 🇺🇸 and some other places are going to celebrate Thanksgiving Day 🦃🍁🍰 so we couldn’t avoid talking about the importance of this holiday. Alana Underwood, an American VSPP, shared some traditions of her family and told how beneficial it was to be thankful for everything and everyone. How giving thanks helps people feel better ❤️‍🩹 and even more, it might change someone’s life. She also shared some great prompts for a gratitude journal 📝 in the chat. After that we focused on a practical side - we looked through some tips how to move from journaling to behavior and after that we played a “Gratitude game”.

Why we remember and forget

Why do some people remember everything🙋🏼‍♀️but the others forget 🤷‍♀️?

During our English Speaking Practice for adults we talked about memory and had the discussion on this topic. After that we came to a conclusion that living a stressful life might be one of the reasons why we forget things. So it’s really important to take care of your mental health, have some time to relax and recharge your batteries 🔋. As usual we learned some advanced idioms and practiced them sharing our experiences.

What tips can you name to boost your memory?

Inside Out - feel all your emotions

What is your strongest emotion? -this question we were asked by our American friend, a VSPP, Alana Underwood. Almost everyone in our group said that joy is their common feeling despite challenges they’re facing today. We looked through different scenarios which were in the movie “Inside Out” and compared them to our everyday life. It helped us to think about our emotions and find out the importance of feeling them all. We also discussed how much control we have over them and what to do to get better.

Board games as the way of therapy

Have you ever thought about games as a way to recharge your batteries 🪫? Of course, there’s another bad thing about playing games - addiction. Thus you have to be really careful when you choose what to play and how long it might take. Our friend, a VSPP, Alana Underwood prepared two speaking activities for our youth which help everyone relax and get to know each other better. While we’re rolling the dice we could cover different essential topics to discuss - family and friends; books and tv shows; education and school; travel etc. All students were excited to see the answers and shared some memorable moments with each other.

They are so sweet and kind. Love working with them.

Music to my ears

Is there anything similar between reading 📖 and music 🎶? How these activities affect your mental and physical well being? Our meeting with an American VSPP, Alana Underwood, helped youth from Kherson and Mariupol regions find lots of benefits of these pastimes. After the discussion, Alana being a therapist and physiologist in Texas, decided to insert some exercises to help everyone feel calm and less stressed. So we did some breathing exercises for a while and shared some other ways to feel relaxed. After the meeting all participants got some useful expressions related to the topic and chatted on our Telegram Group with each other.

What's the point of reading?

That’s been the third time when active youth from Mariupol and Kherson joined the English Speaking Practice with our 🇺🇸friend, a VSPP Alana Underwood. This time our topic was related to reading and how it affects our mood and live in general. We’re really excited to hear that all participants who joined yesterday, are crazy about reading 📖 📚. They showed us their books and shared the plots of their favorite ones. We had some people who were reading the same book at the same time - they have definitely lots in common. After some speaking part, Alana shared some positive impacts of books and we discussed them together. They were also given some homework 📄 in the chats on Telegram and WhatsApp - to find more positive aspects of reading and how books make people feel. It would be really interesting to read their comments and get a feedback from Alana. Thank you @peacecorpsukraine for giving us a chance to improve our knowledge and achieve new skills.

UNO: What is it exactly?

The United Nations Organization (UNO) is known for bringing countries together to promote peace and cooperation. It was set up after World War II on October 24. Since that time, this holiday is observed annually, where members get together to discuss global issues and work out solutions. The UNO encourages countries not to give up when they ran into obstacles. 

Thus we came together on the English Practice and talked about different organizations who support the world and global issues, we looked through some advantages and disadvantages, we read an article to find out more details about their mission and learned some common phrasal verbs according to the text.

 

Setting Goals

Another great meeting for Youth of Kherson and Mariupol cities was yesterday where we all gathered to improve our English. At the beginning the participants were asked some questions from our friend, a VSPP, Alana Underwood about their weekend and exciting things about Ukraine. After that discussion she presented different speaking activities and exercises to help students understand how to set goals and achieve them. Our participants did enjoyed the activity “Goal Worksheet for 1 year” because they could set an attainable, think about steps to get it and barriers that might happen and how to work with them.

They all got a homework activity, which required to consider their future plans and what they want to be/have/see in 1 year, 5 years and 10 years. 

Youth Development

We’ve already started our new meetings for Youth Development supported by Peace Corps Ukraine. Yesterday we had a first session which was attended by more than 25 students originally from Kherson and Mariupol but reside in different parts of Ukraine and even abroad. There was also a special guest, a virtual service pilot participant from Texas, USA 🇺🇸, Alana Underwood, who agreed to help us improve our English and strengthen self resilience. So we all got acquainted with each other doing some speaking activities and asking questions to each other. We were so impressed with the level of their English - they sound really well.

For the next meeting we’re preparing a nice and important topic to discuss - “Setting goals and how to achieve them”. So if you’re interested in developing soft skills, please DM and join us online.

Service above self

It’s been a tradition to invite honored guests to our events on All Ukrainian Library Day (September 30). And even if we are not gathering in our @library_kherson_ua in Kherson we still keep doing that online. This year, English Speaking Practice invited an American citizen, a Former Peace Corps volunteer, a Rotarian and just a great person Geoffrey Deron Glen who moved to Ukraine right after the full scale invasion of Ukraine. One of the interesting facts about him is that he’s helping people and doing his best to support Ukrainians despite anything. During this online meeting we could get to know each other better asking different questions about his volunteering work, his dreams, thoughts and of course what things he find more interesting and attractive in Ukraine. It was a big pleasure for everyone to spend time together, having fun and sharing our stories and experiences.

“Together we can do more!” - don’t forget about it 😉. 

Установча конференція Корпусу Миру США в Україні

Цей тиждень розпочався з гарною підтримкою від Корпусу Миру США в Україні, і зокрема Оксана Шабас, програмний менеджер з молодіжного розвитку, зібрала представників різних організацій, які працюють над молодіжними проєктами по всій Україні на установчій конференціі разом із учасниками пілотної програми віртуальної служби США 🇺🇸. Ми мали змогу представити нашу Херсонську обласну бібліотеку для дітей імені Дніпрової Чайки та програму з підтримки емоційного здоровʼя «Speak up!» для молоді з Херсону та Маріуполя. До речі, нашим партнером у цьому проєкті стала організація ЯМаріуполь, яка має 34 куточки у 21 місті України для людей які на превеликий жаль, були вимушені виїхати з міста під час війни. Віримо що ця програма не залишить байдужими нашу молодь та вони розширять свої знання з певних питань, отримають підтримку та нові знайомства 🤗.Незабаром розкажемо усі деталі 😉

Comfrot and Annoyance

Is it easy for you to leave your comfort zone? What makes you feel annoyed mostly?
Last English practice was dedicated to one of the most popular topics nowadays, I guess.
We looked through different situations that are happening everyday, such as: being stuck in a traffic ; waiting in long queues; being interrupted while speaking or working ; organizing or planning the day etc. While we were imagining them we also talked about our emotions, whether we feel comfortable or irritated. After that we revised some grammar rules of using “Had Better and Would Rather” structures.

Did you know that?

Did you know that there are more than 150 phrases with “get”? 🫣How many of them do you use in your speech?

One of the best things about our English Speaking Practice is that we learn some new common phrases every time with native speakers. Thus on the last meeting we revised and improved advanced phrasal verbs with GET doing different exercises. We had a nice conversation with each other and used target vocabulary immediately after learning it.

“The secret of getting ahead is getting started” - so start learning English with our community 🙌.

DM for details or join our telegram group https://t.me/+TS58W2NYNenDOTg0

The Importance of Charity

September 5 is considered as an International Day of Charity 👏🏻❤️so we couldn’t help but talk about the importance of donating and charity work. Especially now when Ukraine and its people need support from others. Of course we discussed that we had to start helping in our communities where we are, and even a small contribution can make something big for people in need.

As usual we revised some common and essential phrases we need to know in order to talk about charity and dealing with no -profit organizations.

And always remember “WE CAN’T HELP EVERYONE…BUT EVERYONE CAN HELP SOMEONE”

Everything will be Ukraine

One of our English Practice participants said “Ukraine is my comfort zone!” What is Ukraine for you? 🇺🇦🌻🌾🌊⛰️🍉

On the Independence Day we talked about our amazing country, which is trying to survive now, we shared what we love our country for and what we can do to approximate victory. After that our friend, VSPP Varley Paul also found out more facts about Ukraine 🇺🇦.

We all believe in our victory and appreciate everyone who stands with us 🤗

The Art of Photography

On the World Photography Day 📷 which was on August 19, we talked about this kind of art. We started our conversation with different types of photography and shared what pictures we take most of the time: landscape 🌊, selfie 🤳, daily life photos🚶etc. The popularity of taking pictures increases every day and there’s no person who doesn’t have any photos on her phone. So one of the speaking tasks was to find and describe photo in a smartphone which was taken on a specific date - we chose August 24, 2023. All the participants shared their stories and memories from that day a year ago: among them were family pictures, sunsets, pets and just random things. Sometimes it is so great to get back to those moments and live them one more time even through the photo.

How many of photos do you store in your phone📱?

We're still young enough!

Do you consider yourself a young person? And does age matter if you want to start doing something new?

On International Youth Day, which is August 12, we had an incredible English Speaking Practice called “We’re still young enough”. It was so engaging because all participants talked so much about their attitude to this holiday and youth in general, their life experiences and future plans. One girl said that if you have plans for the future and you’re enjoying what you have now - you can relate to youth 🙌🤗.

Also there was one speaking activity which took us most of time - visitors had to name advantages and disadvantages of being different ages (7, 14, 21, 40, 60). 

We all came to conclusion that we should make the most of each day no matter what and no matter how old we are. I just want to wish everyone always have the courage to follow your dreams and the wisdom to make them a reality. 💫

Expect the Best, Prepare for the Worst

“Expect the best, prepare for the worst” 🤔how do you think this statement might be useful in different situations?

As for me and our participants, we of course hope that everything will be fine and do our best to make it happen but what if something goes wrong 😑 - we have to be prepared for it, haven’t we?

We looked through random situations like job interview, first day at college/ work, going on holiday and imagine what we’d do if our expectations weren’t met. After that we started talking about going on holiday and how we react to some challenges while traveling 🧳. Because we didn’t have enough to discuss more questions and did more exercises but we’ll continue our conversation on our telegram group. You can follow us here 👉 https://t.me/+TS58W2NYNenDOTg0

The Art of Delegation

Despite those power issues in Ukraine 🇺🇦 we’re trying to catch up our meetings during English Practices. We started off with one of the summer speaking activities, which are always engaging and fun. Then we talked about chore delegation and our attitude to it, how often we want other people do something for us and what things we do ourselves. Of course we learned the grammar construction “Have/ Get something done” and “Have someone do something” and practiced using them in our speech, doing different activities.

What about you: do you prefer doing something by yourself or find people who can do that for you? 😉