Photo taken by Ian Grove-Stephensen
If you are into sports or if you are into the sports subject at the moment because of the Pan American Games, here is another site on sports I would like to suggest. It is intended for kids and teens, but I found it an interesting source of sports which are not commonly found in most English books, like Baton Twirling, Meringue or Sculling. If you want to know more about these and many others interesting sports, go to KWS – Kids World Sports.
A touchy situation took place in Rio before the Pan Am Games started last week, involving diplomatic issues, after a widely-read Brazilian newspaper published a picture of someone holding a white board which read “Welcome to the Congo!”. You can find the whole news in the NewYorkTimes and also in CbsNews online.
As an English teacher, I would suggest either of these texts as there are lots of information on the Pan Am – which is all we see these days on television… I wonder why… (sarcasm), as well as a very controversial topic, which can be a good idea to make your students talk and participate actively in class. Just beware of the time you’ll spend on it and if the topic will not offend anyone or make anyone hit the roof.
The thing is, we all know and most of us are not glad with all this mega show and spotlight on the Pan Am here in Brazil, as ONE POINT FIVE BILLION DOLLARS!!!!!! have been spent on it – and we DO HAVE OTHER URGENT PRIORITITES, which are much more important than that. I know sports are important, but not as much as the life of thousands or millions of people who die in Brazil because they don’t have medical assistance, or because they got involved in crime because they couldn’t get education and a job, or because they got shot by a stupid ‘lost’ bullet, or because…. Damn! What could be more important than life itself? People are dying every day here… let’s not hide our true problems behind a bunch of medals… Come on! Gimme a break!
So if you ask me “how many medals has Brazil won so far?”, I will tell you “I haven’t got the slightest idea” as I am not watching the games. And don’t call me an alien for that. Aliens are the people who hide the problems behind a sports event that lasts less than a month and that cost $1.5 billion. Just think about that.
Talk about sports, take a look at this great site called Sports Cliché, which helps non-native English speakers to get to understand the language of sports that is often used in the sports world.
The site is very easy to use. The expressions are easy to read. As a suggestions of how to use them in class, one idea is to bring some of the clichés (don’t forgot to make sure all students understand the meaning of cliché) to class and discuss what they mean with the class; another idea is to get the students to think of some sports related clichés used in their own country and language, which could be used as a warm-up activity to introduce a lesson that talks about sports. Let me try a few famous sentences in Brazil:
Vai que é tua, Taffarel! (this one is old, from the 2002 World Cup.)
Pedala, Robinho!
O importante é competir.
Em time que está ganhando, não se mexe.
Well, sports lingo is really not my strong suit. But I am sure the teacher and his or her students will get to remember lots of others. 
