MENTAL ACTIVITIES

      Based on the idea that reading is the centre of learning skills since human birth, are we aware of metacognitive strategies that we use unconsciously? People begin learning with reading at the early age, and they choose reading strategies that are also called as mental activities to comprehend the intended message or context as solving the complex clauses and become a good reader. Thus, there are metacognitive strategies that people handle in terms of their learning skills. Highlighting and writing important words or ideas, visualization and re-reading are three of the reading strategies that I use mostly in point of my learning skill.

      Highlighting and writing important words or ideas is the most important reading strategy that I mostly handle. Highlighting that is the first of the strategy warns the brain and takes the attention to highlight words or ideas. In other words, highlighting reminds people that there are some words or ideas that need to be focused. For instance, these highlighting words or ideas can be main ideas or keywords and when I see these patterns, I underline them both to recognize the most important parts and to find them more easily when I return to review the text. Besides, using colourful materials makes comprehension easier while underlining. To exemplify, I use pink for definitions while I use yellow for unknown words. These materials help me to differentiate what they are. Writing that is the second step of the strategy is the key to the way of success for me because writing is also revising. From my point of view, for example, I take note underlined words or ideas that are relevant the issue that I am learning to keep it in the long-term memory. While I am taking notes, I both re-read and re-write more than once at the same time. To sum up, highlighting and writing important ideas or words help people comprehend more easily and keep information in the long-term memory.

       Visualization is the other essential metacognitive strategy that I try to employ. Visualization means that creating events or persons in the mind based on descriptions included in the text. It attributes our imaginary world. The more we imagine, the more we get involved in it while reading descriptive paragraphs. Supposing that you are reading a fantasy book and there are lots of sentences written with descriptive language. When reading, you cannot give up reading. This is due to these descriptive sentences. Because you feel like that you are in it; in order words, it becomes your world. In conclusion, visualization is the key point for connection with the text.

       Last but not least, re-reading has an importance between reading strategies. Re-reading is revisiting the text that we do not comprehend any intended message. It can also be claimed as monitoring strategy. There are two ways of using re-reading. First one is that when we just check the text to find the keywords or ideas, we use re-reading to recognize more easily. On the other hand, the second one is that when we do not get the intended message and we are not able to make any comprehension out from the text, we use re-reading to revisit and get the more clarity about the text. Re-reading is an important reading strategy for more clarity.

       Taking everything into consideration, underlining and writing important words and ideas, visualization and re-reading are the most useful strategies that I discussed in this essay. People employ metacognitive strategies either they are aware or unaware to get the intended message depends on different learning styles.

CHINESE CULTURE VS JAPANESE CULTURE

Chinese culture and Japanese culture look like the same , but actually, they aren’t the same. First of all, Chinese is a tonal language while Japanese tends to be more monotone. The other difference is their foods. For example, chinese foods vary by region ,but tend to have stronger

flavors. On the other side, Japanese cuisine is known for its more subtle tastes. Japanese cuisine use a lot of fish stock(dashi), kelp, miso, soy sauce, sake and rice vinegar and their famous foods include sushi, tempura and ramen while Chinese cuisine generally favors soy sauce, rice wine and ginger and their famous foods include Peking duck, chow mein, char siu(BBQ pork) and yumcha/dim sum. Another thing is Chinese holidays and Japanese holidays and how they're celebrated. While Chinese people celebrate Lunar New Year, Japanese people don’t celebrate Lunar New Year. Rather, they celebrate the Western New Year according to the Gregorian calendar. The way they're celebrated is similar, but different. In both, there's a large emphasis on visiting with family and cleaning before the New Year, but the Chinese New Year tends to be celebrated very differently, with firecrackers and red things everywhere. The other one is names. Chinese names usually only have one syllable, but Japanese names usually have about three syllables, and end in a vowel (similar to Italian names). For example, Chinese names include Ma, Lú while Japanese names are generally include Yuzuki, Kazuyuki. Lastly, Chinese people can often be seen talking loudly at public places. On the other hand, In Japan, talking or laughing loudly in public places is considered as discourteous. They even keep their phones muted during travelling.

SOURCES: http://theydiffer.com/difference-between-chinese-and-japanese-culture/

http://www.wikihow.com/Distinguish-Between-Japanese-and-Chinese-Cultures

HISTORY AND FEATURES OF TOWER BRIDGE

Tower Bridge is a combined  bascule and suspension  bridge in London. It is a iconic symbol of London. The construction started in 1886 and took 8 years. It has become 122 years from past to now. 432 construction workers employed. The bridge was officially opened on 30 June 1894 by the Prince of Wales and ,his wife, the Princess of Wales. It is the one of the Trust’s bridges not to connect the City of London directly to the Southwark Bank , as its northern landfall is in Tower Hamlets. The bridge consist of two bridge towers which was tied together at the upper level by two horizontal walkways . The bridge is 800 feet (240 metres) in length with two towers each 213 feet (65 metres) high, built on piers. The main bridge deck carries two lanes of road traffic between two low-level pedestrian walkways across both suspension spans and the opening bascule section of the bridge, with the walkways separated from the roadway by fences. The roadway passes through each of the two towers, whereas the low-level walkways pass around the outside of the towers. The bridge's present colour scheme dates from 1977, when it was painted red, white and blue for Queen Elizabeth II's Silver Jubilee. The bridge deck is freely accessible to both vehicles and pedestrians.

SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tower_Bridge

TOAST SKAGEN

Toast skagen is one of Swedish traditional foods. It was named for a fishing port at the northern tip of Denmark. It is typically served as a starter at Swedish dinner parties. This traditional food is an elegant combination of shrimp and other intredigents like mayonnaise on a small piece of sautéd bread. It was created by Tore Wretman who is the popular Swedish restaurateur. He embraced Swedish culinary traditions during the deaces immediately after World War II, more than anyone else. At a time when home cooking was starting to fade away and was replaced by foreign fast food, he also elevated classic Swedish foods into fancy restaurant repertoire, lending the new status.

INTREDIGENTS: (FOUR SERVINGS)

·       4 slices of white bread

·       320 g(11 oz) peeled shripms (prawns)      

·       4 tbs mayonnaise

·       1 tbs Dijon mustard

·       150 g(5 oz) whitefish roe

·       50 g(2 oz) fresh dill

·       1 lemon

·       Butter

       PREPARATİON:

First of all, cut off the crusts of the bread   slices. Secondly, sauté the bread in a little butter until it turns golden Brown on both sides. Thirdly, place on paper towels and if the shrimps are large, cut them into small pieces. Then, save four sprigs off dill for garnishes. Chop finely the rest of the dill and mix them with the shrimps, mayonnaise and mustard. After that, apportion the mixture on the slices of sautéd bread. Then, shape the whitefish roe like eggs and place on top of each toast. Garnish each with a sprig off dill and serve with a slice of lemon.

SOURCES: http://www.toastskagen.com/

SCENES FACTS FROM THE LORD OF THE RINGS

There are 10 scene facts about The Lord of Rings.

1)   As the Orcs have black blood, the inside of their mouths should be black as well. To achieve this, The orc actors had to swill a liquorice-based mouthwash prior to each of their scenes.

2)   When Bilbo dropped the ring before leaving Hobitton, the floor was magnetic to prevent the ring from bouncing. This was done to demonstrate the importance and weight of the ring.

3)   While they are filming, Viggo Mortensen, called Aragorn in the film, got into character during a conversation. So, Peter Jackson referred to him as Aragorn for over half an hour without realizing it.

4)   Hobbitton was made a year ago before production began to make it. It looks like that it was natural, lived-in place and they used real vegetable patches.

  5)The original cut was four hours and thirty minutes long.

)  6) When the trailer was released on the Internet on 7 April 2001, it was downloaded 1.6 million times in the first 24 hours.

   7) The Battle of Helm’s Deep featured hundreds of spears made of cardboard tubes so that none of the charging horses would be injured.

8)   The bodies lying underwater in the Dead Marshes were made of silicone.

9)   When Frodo and Sam are in Osgiliath, Sam says, 'By rights, we shouldn’t even be here.’This was nod to the devition the screenplay had taken from the book’s storyline. In the book, Sam and Frodo never passed through Osgiliath at all.

10) The Lord of the Rings trilogy became the most nominated film series in Academy Award history with 30 nominations, surpassing both the Godfather trilogy and the Star Wars franchise.

SOURCES: http://thechive.com/2015/05/18/behind-the-scenes-facts-from-the-lord-of-the-rings-35-photos/

DO YOU KNOW PROBOSCİS MONKEY?

The proboscis monkey or long-nosed monkey is a reddish-brown arboreal Old World monkey. It is endemic to the southeast Asia island of Bornea and also can be found on all three nations that divide the island: Brunei, Indonesia, and Malaysia. Males have a head-body length of 66 to 76.2 cm and typically weigh 16 to 22.5 kg while females measure 53.3 to 62 cm  in head-and-body length and weigh 7 to 12 kg. The proboscis monkey has a long coat and the fur on the back is bright orange, reddish brown, yellowish brown or

brick-red. They also have long nose. The face is orange-pink. They co-exist with the Bornean orangutan. Proboscis monkeys also generally live in groups composed of one adult male, some adult females and their offspring.They are seasonal eater. The proboscis monkey eats primarily fruit and leaves. Furthermore, they eat flowers, seeds and insects to a lesser extent.

SOURCES:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proboscis_monkey

MAKE YOUR BRITISH TEA

We can make British tea with 8 steps. Firstly, pick your tea. This is the most important step to making perfect British tea. British tea is made with black tea leaves, so look for that when buying tea. Early Grey, black tea, breakfast tea or British tea are preferred by English people. Secondly, boil the tea. You can boil freshly drawn water in an electric kettle, a stovetop kettle, or even a pot if needed. Thirdly, get your tea or tea bags ready in the pot or mugs. If you are using mugs, put a teabag in each mug. If you want to make tea in a teapot, warm the teapot with hot water and then, add teabag for per person. If you are making tea with loose-leaf tea in a pot, add 1 teaspoonful of tea per cup, plus one extra teaspoonful for the pot. Forth step is that pour boiling water over the teabag, and stir briefly. You have to make sure it is boiling in this step. Fifth

step is that wait. You must wait for time to develop its flavour. Sixth is that remove the teabag. Never squeeze the teabag. Because squeezing will release a bitter taste into your tea. Seventh is that add milk and sugar to taste. You need to use sterilised milk to achieving the classic taste. You need to look for right colour. The perfect cup of tea will have a dark orange-brown look once the milk has been added and stirred. Finally, your British tea is ready. Enjoy your tea J