"Franklin D. Roosevelt" and "New Jersey State"

The first part of the crowded meeting was dedicated to American President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, his political activity and personal life. His birthday America celebrates on the 30th of January.

The club-members were offered to watch a slide-show “FDR” and Peace Corp volunteer Avital Muth read the information allowing the members to enjoy her pronunciation.

It was useful and interesting to learn that:

•        A 1999 survey of academic historians by CSPAN found that historians consider Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, and Roosevelt the three greatest presidents by a wide margin, and other surveys are consistent.

•        Roosevelt is the sixth most admired person in the 20th century, according to Gallup.

At the second part of meeting Peace Corp volunteer Avital Muth narrated about her native state New Jersey and showed a slide show as well. It was an interesting story about the sights, economy, national Emblem, famous people of New Jersey. Avital was asked a lot of questions by the club-members. Also we watched a video “State Dance of New Jersey – Square Dance”

It was useful and interesting to learn that:

•        The properties in the United States version of the board game Monopoly are named after the streets of Atlantic City

•        The first organized baseball game was played in Hoboken, NJ in 1846.

•        2nd in blueberry production

•        New Jersey has the most dense system of highways and railroads in the U.S.

•        New Jersey has the most diners in the world and is sometimes referred to as the diner capital of the world.

•        North Jersey has the most shopping malls in one area in the world with seven major shopping malls in a 25 sq. mile radius

After a short break everybody discussed the topic of holding Euro-cap 2012 in Ukraine. The opinions were different. Ones thought that it would be a wonderful chance for Ukraine to improve its economy, build new roads, hotels, but the others supposed that it was not good, because the host-country usually spends much more money on holding an event than earns. Anyway the discussion was vivid and everybody enjoyed.

The Center was visited by 3 foreign quests from Brazil. All of them are members of AIESEC – the biggest International non-govermental organization in the world, that provides young people with opportunities to develop leadership, professional and personal traits for positive influence on the society.

The number of visitors - 35

Look more picrures here 

Not all together...30 and Yana, Boris, Anatoliy, Olesyio, Tamara were unlucky to miss the picture :-)

English Speaking club - the Peace Corp

Dnipropetrovsk WOA session of the English Speaking Club was dedicated to the Peace Corp.

Our guests were Americans,  Peace Corps volunteers: the English language teachers Aaron, Avital and Andrew. They got introduced to the Ukrainian club members. They explained the aim of their visit to Dnipropetrovsk, the work directions of Peace Corps’ members, told about their pupils and activities in Ukraine. Each of them promised to prepare a presentation about the USA to the ESC members.

The number of the visitors – 41 (English teachers – 6, specialists – 20, students – 10, pensioner – 2, pupils – 2, librarians – 1)
There were no vacant seats!!!
Look more pictures here
Picture slide show here

English Speaking club - Wikipedia turned 10!

Dnipropetrovsk WOA session of the ESC was dedicated to the 10^th anniversary of the internet resource Wikipedia.

We listened to the message from Wikipedia founder - Jimmy Wales. It was interesting to find out about the impressive statistics on the Wikipedia users around the world. J.Wales urges all users to  write articles and correct mistakes if there are any in the encyclopedia, to make it more academic and profound.

The speaker of today’s meeting T.Gavryluik asked people who use Wikipedia to raise their hands. All the present club members raised their hands. Discussion about the recourse was very vivid. Some people love the possibility to work with this free encyclopedia. Others have doubts about the scientific value of it’s articles.

Then the discussion moved to the topic of the difference between information and knowledge. The ways of

collecting information were discussed, as well as the useful and harmful aspects of information.

Every session adds to our knowledge about USA!

3 club members asked  the password to use Wi-Fi facility of the Centre and use their  mobile phones for looking up new words in the on-line dictionaries.

New club members were introduced to the community and were familiarized with the book collection.

The WOA guest of honor , US citizen Mr. Joseph B., donated to the Centre a copy of the Pimsleur language course CD “English for Russian  speakers”.

The number of the visitors – 30 (English teachers – 1, specialists – 15, students – 9, pensioner – 2, pupils – 2, librarians – 1)

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Wi-Fi

Equipment Wi-Fi was bought for the Center WOA. The equipment is installed, adjusted and being used now. The visitors of the Center have more comfortable conditions at the meetings and more opportunities for access to Internet.

English Speaking club - Jack London anniversary

Engish Speaking club dedicated to the life and creativity of an American writer Jack London.
In the beginning of the meeting there was a short introduction, there were 6 new members and also 2 Americans.
The club-members were offered to watch a slide show dedicated to Jack London. We discussed his creativity and his works.
The second part of the meeting was Ukrainian Christmas. A slide show was presented to the attention of Americans to acquaint them with traditions of celebrating Christmas in Ukraine. Americans were impressed with the dishes for Christmas. Josef said he ate Kutja and he liked it very much. 
Katia Ivchenko sang a song for everybody. Also we sang Carols (Kolyadky) and had hot tea with cakes (prepared by Natalie Karmaz’).
Look more pictures here

Look video here

Book Display: «Jack London anniversary»

Book Display: «American memorable dates - Jack London anniversary» is presented.

It’s the books, literary resources, pictures of Jack London.

January 12^th – the 135^th – anniversary of Jack London’s birthday, American writer.