THE FCE BLOG by Claudia Ceraso

Monday, August 14, 2006

FCE Guest Map

Sign the Guest Book or Pin the Guest Map!

To: Cambridge First Certificate in English Students, Teachers and Fcebloggers community.

Subject: Where are we?

Attachment: See the GUEST MAP at the end of the letter... unless the page is still loading.
...............................................................

Dear All,

The Cambridge First Certificate in English preparation involves getting to know the pieces of the puzzle in detail (i.e. the papers and their parts, dos and dont's). As most of you know, getting ready for the exam takes a considerable amount of time and effort.

Writing this blog is a learning experience for me. My aim is to help you in assembling the pieces of the puzzle: discuss all those aspects of the exam that can help you pass with merit and link you to the work other great teachers are doing in cyberspace. As you see, it cannot be done in the short term. I am planning to blog for a while.

This site is meant to be an online guide and companion for all FCE students. Pass the exam, drop a comment, pin your mark! I think it can be encouraging for those reading this blog in future. You’ll probably come back for language reference since many of the pronunciation, vocabulary and grammar links can help you in your CAE and CPE courses.

So, your FCE studies will one day come to an end. In the meantime, however, I do hope that you can acquire some independent studying skills to make your learning a lifelong journey. As for your comments, feedback and sample answers, they will remain in this blog to guide future FCE Students wherever they are.

I look forward to seeing your signatures.

All best,

Claudia
fceblog Editor
..........................................

So here is our new gadget. Actually, in web slang it is called a widget -I recently learned.

Try it out

Hover your mouse over the pin. Click and hold the mouse anywhere on the map, then drag it to see other countries.

Tip: Click on the map URL http://www.frappr.com/fceblog for a full screen view and then click on my pin to read the complete content of a bubble.



What is this all about?

Basically, this is a visual guest book.

What for?

For the fun of it!

Who should be added?

Anyone who has viewed and found this site interesting may sign, I mean, pin. You could be a regular user or a teacher who suggested this site to your students.

How does it work?

Click on “add”. A self-explanatory menu will appear. Your e-mail is required but not disclosed. An email icon will be shown in your bubble.

What shall I write in the Shoutout message?

The Shoutout is the bubble associated to your pin in the map: your name will be there by default. You can add your occupation, when you started studying FCE for example –you may even upload your picture. Once you have passed the exam, share your grade!

What about the Map Chat...?

I do not recommend this at all. This is a plus feature I was not looking for -I simply wanted you to have a map of visitors. It is built-in and I cannot take it out. Our site has a chat widget already with rules to use it In this map chat, any "guest user" who has left a pin on any map on any other site in any remote part of the world can be found chatting there. I do not know what you think: I am not interested. Take this as a disclaimer.

Now...

For those who find that all of the above mentioned is far too techie and would rather sign an ordinary guest book, please feel free to post a comment below.

17 Comments:

  • Hello! I'm Marta from Poland:) This summer I wrote FCE exam and I passed it with 'B' result. Do you think it's a good mark??

    By Anonymous Anonymous, At 6:48 am  

  • Good mark indeed, Marta. Congratulations! Hope the fceblog helps you enjoy learning English.

    By Blogger Claudia Ceraso, At 4:46 pm  

  • Thank you,Claudia. I will enter this site in order to get to know more knowledge about English language.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, At 8:11 am  

  • Hi Claudia!I´m Marianela!Your old student...referring to the blog, I think is a great idea because last year,while I was studying for the FCE, I tried to search a blog which had information about it and I couldn´t find one. so, I wish you have some success with it and thank you for the effort you made!

    By Anonymous Anonymous, At 11:25 am  

  • Thank you very much Marianela! Wish you all best with your CAE this year.

    By Blogger Claudia Ceraso, At 11:35 am  

  • Dear Claudia,
    this is just to let all your blog community know how amazed I am at this incredible resource. Of course, swell presentation yesterday. I'll let all my students know, in hopes they can profit from it as well. I'll certainly do!
    All the best,
    Marina Sak

    By Anonymous Anonymous, At 7:50 pm  

  • Thank you so much Marina. Look forward to your students' visits!

    By Blogger Claudia Ceraso, At 8:20 pm  

  • Claudia, I was amazed to see how interesting this blog is. Good work! I´ll be telling my students about it.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, At 11:18 am  

  • Thank you Ana Maria. Are you in Brazil? Send me an email, let me know what your students said about this.

    By Blogger Claudia Ceraso, At 11:20 am  

  • Hello Claudia !
    Great many thanks for your blog which made me much confidence of the Fce Exam, which I will take next December as a free condidate, but the problem is that I can't find the refering books to prepare well for the Exam, I have a good level in both all the skills, and wish I will pass it with succes !
    What do you advise me Claudia ? I hope to hear from you and from the Blog members soon ! Thank you for all what you do for English ! Mustafa from Algeria

    By Anonymous Anonymous, At 9:42 pm  

  • Mustafa,

    Thank you so much for your feedback and your email. It makes me happy to learn this blog can help someone to study on their own. We encourage autonomous, lifelong learners here and you are welcome!

    I suppose that by 'referring books' you mean FCE past papers. Yes, they are difficult to find online. I will be gradually publishing the few available ones as well as FCE-style exercises. Advice? Well, there's plenty in this blog... Keep visiting and please let us know how you did in your exam.

    Best of luck,

    Claudia

    By Blogger Claudia Ceraso, At 11:34 pm  

  • Hello i'm portugese and my name is CLÀUDIA... well i love to blogger i have a blog: poemaslinhaseletras.blogspot.com
    Your blog is beautiful... Congratolations!!!

    By Anonymous Anonymous, At 12:44 pm  

  • Dear Claudia,
    So nice to see other teachers using the blog, even if my students aren't. I'll have to try and get mine more student orientated, as yours is.

    Keep up the good work.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, At 9:41 pm  

  • Claudia, I know how enthusiastic you are, and this blog is good proof of that. I confess I´ve become an addict to it since it offers plenty of interesting posts. Plus, I love your writing style. I wish you the very best.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, At 3:44 pm  

  • Hello Claudia,

    I drop by your blog every now and then and as teaching the FCE course this year (for the first time) this site has been quite helpful and gave me lot of idea of what to do. I am a kind of teacher who finds teaching an extremly creative job and I always love looking for additional resources and materials and see how they can be used in clas. Unfortunately, I can not make my students take a few mintues to come by, you know teenagers...but i try to take out as much of this site as possible. Even though I teach FCE for the first time, I took the exam myself 10 years ago, plus I have been working as an FCE invigilator for the past 5 years so I feel eligible to say that this blog is really competent for its purpose! Congratulations about it!

    By Blogger Ana, At 6:00 am  

  • Hello Ana from Macedonia! (according to your Blogger profile). Thank you so much for your encouraging comments.
    About teenagers, tell them they are invited, it is not homework. Let them know there are people just like them elsewhere sweating towards the exam. If it helps to motivate, send me an email and we'll see how to get our students exchange.
    Stay in touch,

    Claudia

    By Blogger Claudia Ceraso, At 4:56 pm  

  • Hello Ana from Macedonia! (according to your Blogger profile). Thank you so much for your encouraging comments.
    About teenagers, tell them they are invited, it is not homework. Let them know there are people just like them elsewhere sweating towards the exam. If it helps to motivate, send me an email and we'll see how to get our students exchange.
    Stay in touch,

    Claudia


    yes, I am from Macedonia, you got that right!
    As for the students' motivation, it is mainly due their age and interests and how busy they are with school and exams. They even find it hard to do the necessary homework or any additional worksheets during class...so basically, they are more willing to spend their time on going out and things like that instead dedicate some time to the FCE...I still think some of them have not taken it as seriously as needed, but I "blame" it on the personality. However, if any kind of students' interaction in the future would be possible, i know whom to turn to!
    Thank You a lot!
    If any experiences, thoughts, points of view are needed for share, I am here

    Ana

    By Blogger Ana, At 9:19 pm  

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