CHARI’S SUPERB TALK

I already knew Chari. She was there the first time I arrived at Zurbarán. She was the one who

explained me how the bilingual section worked like. At that time she was planning to leave the

secondary school because she had found a really good job in the Statistics Institute. That was

the last I heard of her. When I saw her today I thought she might not remember me but

surprisingly she did. She greeted me and told me it was good to see a known face among the

audience. Her talk promised to be good, because Mila had tried to promote it last Wednesday,

telling us it was going to be interesting for students who were planning to study translation

and interpretation. In fact, it was much cooler than we expected.

Mila made a little introduction. She introduced Chari and right

after that, she left the stage to the main star of the day. First of

all, Chari told us that she had a Maths degree. She had been a

teacher in the bilingual section in the Zurbarán. She used to

teach in English and French but she was accepted in the National

Statistics Institute, part of the Ministry of Economy so she moved

to Madrid. Her job is very important because politicians take into

account the statistics she and her colleagues carry out. She

Showed us several examples such us a pyramid of population, an

unemployment rate chart, a chart with the number of students that give up studying at an

early age or Another graph with the number and nationality of people that visited our country

in 2012. It was really interesting because we could actually see what she does for a living:

performing statistics.

Secondly she showed us the different organizations she works for: EUROSTAT, OECD, THE

United Nations… The first one, EUROSTAT, gathers members of EFTA and the EU four or five

times a year. The headquarters is in Luxembourg. When they get together they speak English,

of course, and they talk about different topics such as the methods they must follow, how to

do the statistics… In some other organizations there are several languages you are allowed to

speak, for example in the United Nations you can speak:

English, French, Chinese, Arabic, Spanish and Russian.

Chari said they had translators and that is good news, at

last for Fátima and me due to the fact that we want to

study translation. What we liked less was that she also

told us that with the crisis and as to pay a translator is

really expensive, there were few of them now.

Maybe the most entertaining part of the presentation was the explanation of the protocol of a

meeting, to compare information of statistics that will influence the decisions that are taken in

Europe. You receive an invitation with the name of the institution, the addressee, the subject

of the meeting, the place, room and date in it. You also get a draft agenda, with the issues you

will talk about, but Chari explained that it can be changed if any of the countries want to. That

is discussed at the beginning of the talk. It is compulsory to confirm your attendance. I agree

with Chari when she said that this is a matter of politeness not an obligation. Another thing

you get it is a password to get the documents you have to prepare for the meeting form the

official website.

During the meeting you have to be dressed in a formal way, because you represent a country,

it is not a matter of being comfortable, you have a lot of responsibility. Then you have to have

your badges identified to show that you are allowed to be inside the building and pass a

security control. Next step is looking for your room and seat. After that the only thing you have

to do is to turn on your microphone. You will have a country sign, you have to place it upright

if you want to speak during to meeting. When the meeting finishes you have to get the

minutes (a brief summary of what is said and decided in the formal meeting) and of course,

you have to produce a report for your institution.

The most curious thing was when she talked about understanding different foreign people

speaking in English. She said it was difficult because there were so many countries, therefore,

many accents. She believes the most difficult accent to understand is Japanese. On the other

hand, native speakers use selectively their language. When they want to convince other

country they speak slowly but in a normal conversation they speak really fast. She said they are

a bit cheeky.

The dynamic part of the talk came. She had some

expressions on the power point presentation and we

had to find their meanings for example: The floor is

yours (it is your turn), microphone, please, thank

you, chair…What’s more I was interviewed! Chari

described us what kind of workers international

organizations were looking for. They had to be

skilled graduate with energy, know more than one

language and be able to cope with difficult

situations. So, she asked for voluntaries and I was

(more or less) one of them. I had to explain what to do if my teacher had crossed one of my

exam’s questions out but I thought it was all right. The result: I was hired.

The bell went off and Chari had a quick farewell. She encouraged us to keep on studying

languages because she had a great experience in the bilingual section and on some trips she

made with the Comenius project (She showed us some pictures of that, with people we

recognized on them). In addition, she said languages permitted her to change her job and

attend international meetings.

The last sentence she said moved me, although everything was in a rush, she really made me

think about my future with a little bit more of hope.

“Study languages made me be able to choose my way”

I hope to be able to choose my way, too. Saying goodbye but, in a more serene way:

SARA POBRE TRANCÓN

Portfolio students are always writing compositions, explaining other people the importance of

English, reading articles, practicing their language skills, etc. But, are all these things useful to

our lives? Will our work be rewarded in the future? Thanks to Chari’s talk, today we have

answered these questions.

Few years ago, Chari was a Mathematics teacher in the “Zurbarán” School. As she was able to

speak English and French (besides Spanish), she taught this subject in these two languages.

However, Chari wasn’t a conformist person; she had dreams and aims to fulfil. That’s why she

applied for a job in the National Statistics Institute (NSI) and, nowadays, she is a member of

this important organization. The NSI is an institution in charge of the performance of the

official statistics at national level because it’s necessary to know how many people are living in

our country, how many of them are young and how many are unemployed, among other

things, in order to help politicians to make decisions.

Apart from that, it is also important to compare Spanish people with other people from several

countries. Therefore, Chari has to attend international meetings, such as Eurostat, United

Nations, World Health Organization or OECD that has a specific protocol, that is:

1. The organization informs them about the schedule of meeting in plenty of time.

2. They receive an invitation.

3. They are informed when and where the meeting will take place.

4. They receive the agenda with the matters to be discussed or to be presented at the

meeting (but it is not the definite agenda since it has to be approved at the beginning

of the meeting).

5. It’s compulsory to confirm their attendance.

It should be appointed that people must dress in a formal way and behave themselves because,

when they are in this kind of meeting, they represent a whole country, so their look and

behaviour have to be correct. Consequently, they should control their feelings and express

themselves diplomatically.

If we talk about the languages spoken in these meetings, English is the main one, but, on some

occasions (such as in the UN meeting) members can also speak in French, Chinese, Arabic,

Russian or Spanish or there are translators. As a result, English is essential for Chari’s job.

But, if you want to achieve a job like that, there are only three requirements you should know,

these are:

Skilled graduate with energy.

Language competitive.

To be able to cope with difficult situations.

Thanks to the effort and her language skills, Chari has achieved her objectives and she has

obtained a job like this. Therefore, she is the perfect example to show us that learning

languages is not a useless task as it can offer us several opportunities in our lives.

RAQUEL CARRETERO JUÁREZ

Chari’s talk

Chari was an old member of my high school. She was a Mathematics teacher

here and she has come back to the IES Zurbarán to give us a talk about her job

and the importance of learning some languages.

Chari is actually working at the IME in Madrid. That is an institute where people

make statistics that is used to give politicians information about some kind of

current affairs, and it helps them to compare those statistics with other

countries’ ones. For example; they can process facts about education, health,

security… whatever they want.

Nowadays, they are working on some statistics about the number or

percentage of unemployment in Spain and also about the quantity of young

people that leave their studies very early.

She gave us a clear sample of what her

job is like and she told us to try to think

about how many friends of us smoked,

and then, about the percentage of girls

who smoked, and the boys who smoked.

We found out that many friends of us

smoked, and that it was more common

among girls. So Chari showed us three

real statistics in which there was a raking of countries with the highest level of

people who smoke, drink and then about sports. We obtained the fourth

position in the first one, and the third position in the last one.

Later on, Chari told us that each five or six years, she attends an official

meeting, where representatives for each country get together to compare their

results in certain aspects. Normally, the common language in those meeting is

English. She has been to the OECD in Paris, and also to the UN (United Nations),

which has its base on New York, but the conference was in Geneva.

But she thought that it could be very boring for us to listen to her talking about

her job all the time, so she moved subject, and she explained us a little bit of

what those international meetings are like.

First of all, Eurostat sends you a letter to inform you about the meeting. Chari

showed us a real one and its different parts: the description of the event, the

address, the place, some more information and finally, the imperative that says

you are kind of forced to confirm you participation. Chari said that here the

imperative is compulsory, but she thought that that is always a question of

politeness.

After you confirm your attendance, they send you the agenda; where a draft

agenda is written, the issues to be discussed about, and the time, of course. The

reason of that draft agenda is because people from each country can make

suggestions and modify it, so when there are some different agendas, people

vote them and the one chosen is the one that is going to be used.

And finally, you receive a personal password to enter a security web page and

that the information you need to prepare. The most boring part like Chari said;

is to make all the documents that are asked to be shown at the meeting.

When you have to go to a kind of meeting like this one, you have to wear very

formal clothes. You cannot go with your trousers and a sweater, of course.

Chari told us that you have to think that you are there to represent the whole

country, your whole country; and you have to give the impression of being very

serious with what you are doing. That’s a huge responsibility.

Once there, they give you your identification badges after having gone

through a security control. That badge is for the other representatives to know

who you are and where you come from. After that, you have to look for your

room and find your seat. In your seat there is a microphone and the country

sign. If you want to take part in the discussion you have to upright your country

sign and then, wait until the chair gives you the chance to start talking.

As I have said before, English is spoken at those meetings because each

institution has an official language. For example, The NSI has English, Eurostart

has English or another one if it’s necessary, the OECD has English and French

and you can choose whatever you want, the IMF has English as well and the

UN has English, French, Chinese, Arabic, Spanish and Russian. In each one there

is an interpreter translator and you can choose the language they have to

translate what is said during the meeting.

When English is used has to be international English, without slang or

colloquialisms. Chari told us that as there are many countries, there are many

different accents when speaking English, and she confessed that the worst ones

were Japanese people. She also said that when an English native speaker

wants to convince other person, he/she speaks slowly to make sure the others

understand what is he/she saying; but on the other hand, when it is a normal

conversation, they speak really fast.

After all these, Chari wanted us to participate in her presentation and she

taught us some common expressions or sentences that are used very often in

such a meeting:

- The floor is yours. (When the chair indicates it is your turn to talk)

- Next slide, please.

- Thank you, chair. (After the chair tells you it’s your turn)

- We should start. (This is very common after a break, when people start

talking and the chair wants to start)

- Microphone, please. (When you forgot to turn your microphone on

before starting talking)

That was kind of interesting and after that, she continued showing us some

situations, and we had to match them with the correct sentence we would say.

Just to finish, Chari told us that being diplomatic is very important in a place like

a meeting, because you can’t say things as you think them. For example, if you

don’t like something, you cannot say “I don’t like that!” you have to be polite

and say something alike “I am not entirely happy with his.” It is a question of

controlling yourself.

When we thought everything was done… they asked for

volunteers to go on the stage and make a representation in

which Mila phoned us to make a job interview and she

wanted to know what we would do in a difficult situation;

because Chari told us that to get a good job we have to

be a skilled graduate with energy, be language

competitive and to be able to cope with different

situations.

Unfortunately, I was chosen to go there even if I hate being on a stage with

many people looking at me. I hate people staring at me! Anyway… two more

classmates and I coped with that very well and I have to say, that the work

Chari did was pretty good.

MARIA MARCOS VADILLO

Chari was a Mathematics teacher in my high school. She knows values like

perseverance and effort very well.

She wanted to share her experience with languages with us. Chari can speak English,

French and she is learning Italian. Nowadays, she works in the National Statistics

Institute (Madrid). She showed us that people who work with statistics can find out

the population of a country, the rate of unemployment…These data are quite

important and the government needs them to know the current situation of a country.

In education, statistics can let us know how many

students aren´t attending school (failure at school) or

in the tourist sector it is essential to know the amount

of tourists who visit our country. I could see that

people from Germany are the most numerous tourists.

The Eurostat (Statistical Office of the European

Communities) is in Luxembourg and its main function

is to harmonize the statistics that come from different

countries around the world. We could see that in a

graph, that when we talk about teenagers who smoke,

Spain is in the fifth position. On the other hand, we

are in the ninth place with regard to the percentage of

teenagers who drink alcohol. A positive piece of

information is that Spain is in the third place if we

consider the amount of young people who practise

sport.

Chari has talked about her trips to Luxembourg. She

used to go to the Eurostat around five times a year.

People from different countries shared different

statistics and exchanged information. Chari has

highlighted that the language that everyone used was

English. They need a common language so that there aren´t problems in

communication. People from the WHO (World Health Organization) and from the OECD

(Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development) also participated in the

debates of the Eurostat. Chari has said that she had the opportunity to visit the

United Nations (Geneva). This organization was founded in 1945.

THE PROTOCOL OF A MEETING

First of all, you receive an invitation from the Eurostat. The name of the institution,

the subject of the meeting and the addressee are written in the letter. As you have to

know more details about the gathering (place, room, dates). It is compulsory to

confirm your attendance. We have to know that a meeting in the Eurostat is a serious

and important event.

If you confirm your attendance, Eurostat sends you an agenda with the schedule. It is

a draft agenda because the issues and the times of the meeting can be changed if a

country doesn´t agree with them.

A person who is attending an important meeting must prepare it. He/she can get the

documents from the web page and after that he/she prepares his/her participation.

Another important thing is the clothes. What should we wear, formal or casual

garments? As Chari says, an important meeting deserves elegant and casual clothes.

The participants of the meeting get an identification badge with their name, country

and place of the meeting. Once you are in the building, you have to look for your

room. In the room, there is a seat specifically for you. There is a microphone and a

plate with the name of the country in each seat. How can you take part in a debate?

According to Chari, you have to place upright the plate with the name of your country.

Talking about languages, the most important ones are the following:

NSI – English

EUROSTAT – English and other languages

OEDE – English and French

IMF – English

UN – English, French, Chinese, Arabic, Spanish and Russian.

Interpreter or translators are also important in these organizations. Anyway, according

to Chari, it is better to learn a language and manage yourself. Interpreters are very

expensive!! As you can see, English is the most spoken language in the European

institutions. English-speaking people have the advantage that they can speak in their

first language. In addition, they can speak fast or slowly. It depends on their own

interests. Another difficulty is the different English accents. Chari thinks that it is

really hard to understand a Japanese person who speaks English. They have a very

strange accent!!. Some frequent sentences in the debate can be:

The floor is yours – it is your turn.

Microphone please – your microphone is switched on, turn it off, please.

Thank you chair – thanks for passing me the turn.

We should start.

Next slide please – let´s change the topic.

We can forget that we are in a serious meeting and we must mind our manners.

Politeness is really, really important!!

Could we work in the United Nations? Chari believes that a person is well-qualified for

this job if:

1. The person is skilled graduated with energy.

2. The person has Language competitiveness.

3. He/she is able to cope with difficult situations.

To finish with Chari´s talk, I must remember her last tip: “Study languages. They

can help you to choose your way!!”

FÁTIMA CAMACHO SÁNCHEZ

On Friday, 9th of November, third period, we did something different. I should have had

“Economics”, but, instead of going to class, my classmates and I went to the

conference room because Chari, an old teacher from Zurbarán, was there to talk to us

about the importance of languages and several topics I’m going to develop now.

I didn’t know her but I’d heard a bit about her, because my friends from Peraleda had

been their pupils and they had mentioned her several times. When we firstly arrived at

the high school, she left, so, we couldn’t meet her. But, fortunately, we have had the

opportunity to listen to her for an hour and it has been a very positive experience for

me, and I think for the rest of the group, too.

Chari started the presentation talking about what she had studied. She studied Maths

in the University of Salamanca, and she worked in the Zurbarán for about 11 years, I

think. At the moment, she’s working in the National Statistics Institute, in Madrid. It’s an

institution in charge of the performance of the official statistical services.

Chari started to talk about different topics, for example, she said that it’s very important

to know the number of inhabitants in a country. Where she works, they analyse the

distribution by sex in pyramids, for example, the unemployment percentage. They also

collect the number of people without a job. Talking about education, they analyse how

many people give up studying at early ages. They also study the kind of people that

visit Spain, that’s to say, the tourists. Later, we were talking about smoking here in

Spain and in other countries. Spain is in the 5th position in the ranking about how many

15-year-olds smoke. The percentage of boys is the 15% and the girl’s one is 23%, so

they smoke more than us. She also showed us the ranking about drunkenness

among15-year-olds. We are in the 9th position within Europe.Talking about sports,

Spain is the third country in the ranking as regards the rest of the countries, so it’s very

important information.

She told us she used to go to meetings in Europe for 4 or 5 times a year. She said

there she can find people from all countries; some of them are: Austria, Denmark,

Latvia, Malta…When she goes there, she works in the health issue in connection with

the “World Health Organization”.

She has had opportunities to go to other institutions. For

instance, she has attended some meetings in “OECD”,

Paris. She also went to the “United Nations”, in Geneva.

Then, she changed the subject and started to talk about

the protocol of a meeting. She started saying that

“Eurostat” informs us about the schedule of meetings in

plenty of time.

The first thing is that we receive

an invitation, that’s to say, we

receive a letter, then, the agenda

and after that, the documents.

Another thing she mentioned is

that when the meeting finishes,

“Eurostat” has to write the

minutes: a brief summary of

what has been said and decided. During the meeting people have to be formally

dressed, because people represent a country. People also have to be aware of their

way of speaking which is really important. Chari said that you are given the

identification badges because this allows you to stay in the building. Once you are in

the building you have to look for a room; you have the number on a big screen. After

that you have to look for your seat. In this case, it will be written: SPAGNE.

In an international conference, there are many types of English. She said a true thing:

Many countries= many accents. A kind of anecdote she told us is that she never

understands Japanese people speaking in English. She also has difficulty to

understand native speakers, as people from The UK and The USA. Later, she told us

some frequent sentences. They are:

- The floor is yours. That’s to say, it’s your turn. - Next slide, please. - Thank you, Chair. The chair is the person that says who is the person that is

going to talk in each moment. - We should start - Microphone, please.

Then, she mentioned some sentences to be applied to different situations. Here they

go:

- On really? - Absolutely, I’m glad you brought that up - I’m sorry, could you explain what you mean by that?

Another thing she said and I really liked was that people have to be diplomatic. In spite

of what you think, you cannot say that. You have to try to say that in other words. For

example, if you are angry and you feel like saying: That’s totally unacceptable!!! You

have to keep up appearances and say: I’m afraid we would find that difficult to accept.

Another interesting example is that. Instead of saying: “That’s wrong!!!” You have to

shut your mouth up and say: “I’m not sure that’s entirely accurate”.

Another topic of the meeting was the steps you have to follow to get a job. There were

three: Firstly, you have to be skilled graduate with energy. Also your language must be

competitive and the last thing, and not less important, you have to be able to cope with

difficult situations. To have a pleasant and entertaining talk, Chari suggested Mila

making a kind of an interview to see if some of us had these three skills. Mila asked for

volunteers, but everybody felt embarrassed and didn’t want to go on the stage.

Mila had to choose three students at random. Mila first chose Rachel to know if she

was able to cope with difficult situations. Mila set out a situation and Rachel started to

talk. The way I see it, she did it quite well. Didn’t she?. Then it was Maria’s turn. She

also did it very well, too. The last candidate was Sara. I have to say that I didn’t listen to

her because the bell went off some minutes before and everybody wanted to go out,

but we all know Sara. Probably she did it perfectly well.

To finish this wonderful presentation, Chari talked to us about his experience here. She

said she had been working in The “Zurbarán” for about 11 years and she had had an

unforgettable experience. She had learnt many languages and she also said she had

taken part in the bilingual section. At the end, she showed us photos about different

activities she did when she worked as a Maths teacher in Navalmoral.

The very last thing she said was a piece of advice. She told us

to study languages because studying them we would have

thousands of opportunities. That’s all about, in my opinion, the

excellent talk about Chari. I have to say these kinds of activities

encourage us to study and to be happier, at least in my case.

Just a negative thing. I missed my class and the teacher

explained a very important thing, but I don’t really mind,

because it was worth attending the talk.

-Every cloud has a silver lining-

JOSÉ IGNACIO VERDUGO FRAILE

Chari was a teacher of the Zurbarán. She was a Math’s teacher. She isn´t in the Zurbarán, now.

She works in Madrid, in the National Statistics Centre. She sometimes has to go to

international meetings in connection with her job. In these meetings there are people from a

lot of different countries.

The objective of this talk is to show us the importance of English above all, but not only about

English. There are more languages but the common language is English. To find a job in the

future, that you know a lot of languages will be very important. It is the main message about

the talk.

I liked this talk because Chari has showed us a reality and, in my opinion, it is very important.

Then the participation of María, Raquel and Sara was very interesting. ALBERTO PORRAS DÍAZ

Chari´s talk

Last Friday we had a talk with a woman who was working in the Zurbaran

secondary school some years ago and she has got very good friends in our

high School. Her name is Chari. She also knows languages, especially English, of

course. She studied Maths in Salamanca. She told us about her experience with

languages because she works in the Statistics Institute in Madrid. They study a

lot of things like for example the percentage of people without jobs, the

people´s nationalities which visit our country… Spain is the fifth country where

girls smoke more than boys and we are the third one in relation to football.

She normally attends meetings held by OECD in Paris and she gathers with

people from every country. She talked about the protocol of a meeting which

is as it follows:

1) Eurostat informs us about the meeting´s organization in plenty of time.

2) You receive an invitation.

3) You´re informed when and where the meeting will take place.

4) You receive the agenda with matters to be discussed.

5) You have to confirm the participation.

The agenda is a rough copy because once there, they can change it. The

institution recommends the country to maintain the same delegate for every

year and write a document where you put all the things that they talk about.

You should wear formal clothes because you represent a country, so it´s very

important. You have an identification badge to pass the control and it´s

compulsory to put it on because it´s easy to communicate with everybody.

Once there, you look for the room and in the room looking for your seat, which

is with the name of your country. The official languages at meetings are the

following:

- NSI: English

- OECD: English and French

- Eurostat: English and other languages.

- UN; English, French, Chinese, Arabic, Spanish and Russian.

There are a lot of languages but there is not always an interpreter. There are

also some frequent sentences which are said in a meeting, for example, the

floor is yours or next slide, please…

And finally it´s very important to be polite because you are representing your

country. It´s easy to get a job in the United Nations because you should be a

skilled graduate with energy, master languages to be able to cope with a

difficult situation.

CRISTINA SUÁREZ BARROSO.

CHARI´S TALK

Today Chari has visited us to give a speech about the importance of languages in the

workplace. She was teacher in the IES Zurbarán ages ago. She works in The National

Statistic Institute in Madrid. She studied languages and she speaks English perfectly well.

She has shown us some graphics for us to see some statistics examples like the

percentages of boys and girls that smoke in Spain. The fact is that girls smoke more than

boys. Spain is in the fifth place within Europe in relation to teenagers who smoke and the

third place in connection with practising sports.

She represents Spain in the OECD, the organization for Economic Co-operation and

Development. The OECD is an international organization and its meetings take place in

France. She has given us like a recipe to prepare a meeting:

- Prepare the meeting with a web page given by the organization.

- Attend formally dressed.

- Looking for your room.

- Looking for you seat.

- Speak English or French.

She suggested us doing some exercises in relation to the meeting’s preparation by

practising typical phrases in different situations. Then she has given some advice such as

for example being diplomatic or controlling our feelings. To finish she has said to us that

we need three things for getting a job in The United Nations:

- To be a skilled graduate with energy.

- To have languages competitiveness.

- To be able to cope with difficult situations.

-

Finally she told Mila to interview three students as if they were applying for a job. This

speech has turned out to be very interesting and useful for my future regarding to

languages. Chari has known how to get our attention.

DIEGO ROMÀN SÀNCHE

Chari’s talk Chari is a Maths teacher who was in our High School some time ago. She speaks Italian,

English and French. She is working in the National Statistics Institute in Madrid. She studied in

Salamanca, and she has a degree in Maths. In her job for example they calculate the quantity of people who live in towns or cities or they

also study people who haven’t got a job or the students who leave studies. She was explaining

us the institutions of the European Union like for example: EUROSTAT, OECD, IMF and UN…

She also showed us a ranking that showed that the number of women who smokes is higher

than that of men´s here in Spain.

She was explaining us the protocol of a meeting:

- They have to be relaxed and be diplomatic.

- They have time to prepare the meeting.

- They receive an invitation.

- You have to have information about where and when the meeting will be.

- And finally a person has to write a summary about the things that happened in

the meeting.

During the meeting we have to wear formal clothes, have some identification badges, you also

have to look after your room and your seat and if you want to be part of a debate you have to

place upright your country sign.

After that she showed us some vocabulary to be diplomatic in a meeting and she also asked

people to help her. At the end Mila took photos of all of us and Chari.

LUCIA GONZÁLEZ FERNÁNDEZ

Chary´s talk

Chary´s talk was very interesting. She mainly talked about her job. She is a

mathematician that worked as a teacher some years ago. Now she works in the

National Statistics Institute. She showed us some bar charts, graphs… about Spain and

other countries from Europe. The first was a foreigners´ population pyramid in Spain, a

percentage graph about the students that leave their studies early, rates of

unemployment, bar charts about the smokers population between 11 and 16 year- old

teenagers compared with other countries and the same with alcoholic drinks and

sports graphs. Then she said to us that forty people meet each five or four times a year

and that they always meet in Luxemburg. In this meeting there are many institutions

like the OECD : The Organization for Economic Co-operative (Paris), the UNITED

nations (Geneva in Europe but in America it is in New York)…

+ Formality in this meeting:

1. You must receive an invitation with a lot of information about the meeting.

2. You always receive a draft an agenda with the topics but this can change.

3. There are many documents and you must read all the documents and you must

try to think of many ideas and opinions.

4. You must confirm your attendance. It´s necessary.

In the following meeting they must read the information about the previous meeting.

It´s recommended to wear formal clothes and you have to have an identification badge

because in this meeting there are many people from different countries. They don´t

raise their hands as they have buttons that the chair can see. The chair gives the turn

to speak. In this meeting the official language is the English but. In the others it is as it

follows:

NSI: English.

EUROSTAT: English.

OECD: English.

IMF: English.

UN: English, French, Chinese, Arabic, Spanish, Russian.

Translators are very expensive and for this reason everybody in this meeting knows

many languages. But they have many difficulties when the natives from the UK or the

USA speak faster and there are many accents.

+ Frequent sentences:

1. The floor is yours (you can speak).

2. Next slide, please (continue with another point).

3. Thank you, chair (when the chair gives you the turn to speak).

4. We should start (we start with the meeting).

5. Microphone please.

You must never forget that you must be very diplomatic and for each situation you

have one sentence that is very formal. Finally she told us how we can get a job in the

United Nations, you need the following:

1. To be a skilled graduate with energy.

2. To have language competitiveness.

3. To be able to cope with difficult situations.

For us to understand the difficult situations, Chary chose three students. Milagros gave

each student one situation and they had to solve it.

NOELIA MARTÍN LÓPEZ

CHARI’S TALK

Chari was a Maths teacher in the Zurbaran school some years ago. She taught in the Bilingual

Section. After that she moved to Madrid and now she is working for the government as she

works in the National Statistics Institute. She has to make surveys like for example how many

people are unemployed, or how many teenagers smoke, etc.

She has to travel a lot because our statistics has to be compared with other countries´

statistics. She goes to Eurostat meetings in Luxemburg. This is like where she works but for

Europe. She also goes to the OECD meetings (Paris). Countries like the EE.UU, Canada, Japan…

attend these gatherings, too. She also attends meetings in Geneva where the United Nations

are settled.

She has a lot of meetings and he has to speak in English of course so for her English is part of

her life. She told us that in these meetings you have to be very formal because you represent

your country. She gave us some different situations. For example if you disagree something

you have to say: “For us it is difficult to do that” instead of “We aren’t going to do that” She

also told us that they are looking for young people, they need people who speak languages

and see how they can solve different problems. She thought that we are good at languages

and she wanted to know if we were good at solving problems. Some volunteers had to show us

how they are solving problems. Mila gave them some situations and they had to say what they

would do in these situations. It was the funniest part of the talk.

PABLO LEÓN RÍOS

CHARI´S TALK!

Today, at third period, we had a really special and interesting talk with Chari. She was a

teacher in our high school and nowadays, she works in the INE, a really important

institution in Spain.

In her work, she has to do a lot of calculations about “unemployment rates”, “early

education leaving”, “the nationality of the tourists visiting Spain” and things like that.

For example, she showed us that the percentage of girls who smoke is 23% and the

percentage of boys who do so is 15% in Spain, but we are in the third position talking

about sports. Another thing that she has to do in her work is to go to Luxembourg five

or six times each year to give meetings in an important statistics office of the European

Commission called Eurostat. Here, people from the old E.U. Countries, the New E.U.

Countries and the EFTA countries meet and there are also representatives from other

associations like the OMS, the OCDE and others about health. She also has to go to

other places to give conferences in the OECD in París. It is the organization for

Economic Co-operation and Development. And the last one is the United Nations, in

Geneva.

After that, she told us what the protocol of a meeting is like. First of all, Eurostat

informs you about the schedule, you receive and invitation to tell you where you can

find the place, the date, the room and it is imperative that you confirm your

participation. You also receive the agenda with the things to talk about, but it is not

definitive because when the meeting is going to start, the countries can vote what they

prefer to speak longer and the time to talk for each country. Now, the boring part is to

read the documents. Everyone has a personal password to read the documents and when

the meeting finishes, the Eurostat has to write the minutes, a brief summary that is said

and decided in a formal meeting.

Other aspects that are really important are formal dressing, to be polite, the indication

Badges; after a security control you are given your identification badges, look for your

room and look for your seat. Here you have a microphone, you make the country sign

and if you want to take part in the discussion, you have to place upright your country

sign. A really important thing is the role that English gets here! In the National Statistics

Institute they have to speak in English. In Eurostat you can speak English and other

languages, in the OECD you have to speak English and French in the IMF you should

speak English and in the United Nations you can speak English, French, Chinese,

Arabic, Spanish and Russian. When you go to a meeting and the topics are really

important, there is normally an interpreter-translator to be sure about everyone has

understood it. But there are also problems with English because there are many

countries and many accents so it can sometimes be difficult to understand, and even

with the native speakers because of the speed.

When you are talking in a meeting of that level, you have to control your feelings and

think that you are a country, so you have to be polite! Some frequent sentences are: “the

floor is yours”, when it is your turn, “microphone, please”. In relation to situations: to

show interest you can say “really?”, tell people when you don´t understand them you

can say “pardon, could you repeat please”?... and there are different contexts like

welcome participation, to introduce the agenda, being diplomatic...

Finally, if you liked to work there, you would need some things like being a skilled

graduate with energy, speak several languages and be able to cope with difficult

situations. To show us how an interview can be, Chari asked some voluntaries to have

an interview. María, Raquel and Sara were the three “voluntaries” and if it had been a

real interview, they would have got the job without any problem!

ESTEFANÍA IMPELLICIERI SÁNCHEZ

CHARI´S TALK!

Chari studied Maths in Salamanca. She can speak English, French

and now she is studying Italian. Now she is working in Madrid, in

the National Statistics Office.

The information that they study is used by politicians and this is

the reason why they have got too much responsibility. They carry out

population, health and economics pyramids. Now they are

calculating the unemployment percentage and with some of this

information politicians take decisions. They also calculate the

percentage of teen people that leave their studies very young. Other

statistics studies are the ones about nationalities in Spain.

The European Statistic Office ( EUROSTAT) is in Luxembourg. It´s

the statistics office of the European Commission. She showed us a

study about the number of teenagers that smoke. Following this

study she showed another one about teenagers and alcohol. After

that she showed us a study about sports in different countries. Spain

is the third country in which more sport is practised.

Chari has the opportunity to go to the OECD meetings in Paris. She

also has the opportunity to go to the United Nations meetings in

Geneva. After saying that she showed us the protocol you have to

follow when you attend these meetings. The protocol you have to

follow is:

EUROSTAT gives you the information about the meetings.

You receive an invitation.

They say to you when and where the meetings will take place.

They send you a draft agenda with the agenda items.

She showed us an example of an invitation and another example of

an agenda. Then she explained us how we have to behave in these

cases, the clothes we should wear etc…She also explained us the

languages that some of these institutions require:

NSI: English.

EUROSTAT: English and others.

OECD: English and French.

IMF: English.

UN: English, French, Chinese, Arabic, Spanish and Russian.

Sometimes there is an interpreter. If there is an interpreter the

chair announces it at the beginning of the meeting. Some other

times it is difficult to understand people from other countries

because their accents are different. The Japanese accent is really

difficult for her. After that she showed us different sentences like:

The floor is yours.

Next slide, please.

Thank you, chair.

We should start.

Microphone please.

She said to us that in these meetings you have to control your

feelings and you have to be polite. She also told us about the

conditions you have to fulfil to find a job in the United Nations.

These conditions are:

To be a skilled graduate with energy.

To have language competitive.

To be able to cope with difficult situations.

She said to us that young people like us have got many possibilities

to obtain these kinds of jobs. At the end, she asked for some

volunteers to show us the situations we have to solve in English if we

want to obtain the job. Nobody wanted to be a volunteer so Mila

decided that the volunteers would be María, Raquel and Sara.

ALEJANDRO SORIA VELASCO

Chari´s talk

Chari was working as a mathematics teacher in the Zurbaran high school for many

years, so she knows many teachers, like Mila, Lara, Luismi…. She studied Maths at Salamanca´s

University and she also studied English and French, but know she is studying Italian. She

analyzes the Spanish and foreign population to know what the Spanish population is. She

calculates the number of people that are on strike; young people that don´t study anything;

the people who are from Spain around different countries; young men and women that

smoke, drink alcohol, and practise sports. She showed us some conclusions like for example

the ones that show that women smoke more than men, that women drink more alcohol than

men and finally that men practise more sports than women. She has gone five times to

European Meetings dealing with Statistics, two people from each country have to go to these

meanings and they usually talk in English. She goes to the OECD in Paris, which is other

statistics meeting where people from Europe and other countries usually go. She also goes to

the United Nations in Geneva, the main meeting point is in New York, but there is another in

Geneva, so she meets people from a lot of countries.

The normal protocol in the meeting is comparing all the results that they have.

Eurostart usually tells them that there is going to be a meeting, so they receive an invitation

where they can see what is going to take place and when it is going to be. They make a list with

everything that you have to prepare for this meeting and finally you have to confirm your

assistance, this is obligatory to prepare the room where you have to stay and these things, you

can confirm a week before the meeting. They give them an agenda with everything, but it´s

not definitive because you can change things like the hotel, the room…but you have to respect

the time that they give you. She also has to write a lot of things to be prepared in the meeting.

They normally recommend that people that go once have to go more times, because these

people know what there is going to be in the meeting and have more experience. They have to

wear formal dress, because they have to represent their country. They also have an

accreditation to know where people come from.

When they go there they have to look for their room, which is normally appearing on a

TV screen. They also have to look for their seat, but when they want to talk, they don´t have to

put their hands up, they have to put their sign where is their country´s name is upright. In the

USI they talk English; in the Eurostat they can talk English and other languages; in the OECD

they can talk in English and French; in the IMF they can talk English and in UN they can talk in

English, Chinese, Spanish, French, Arabic and Russian. They had an interpreter translator, but

now they don´t have it because we are in crisis and this is not very important. It´s very

complicated to understand English from people that are from different countries because they

have another pronunciation, for example Japanese people. The most frequent phrases are: the

floor is yours; next slide, please; thank you chair; we should start and the microphone please.

You should be diplomatic, so they use phrase like this: is it possible to fix an earlier date?

And finally she said that if we want to get a job in the United Nations it is very easy,

you have to be a skilled graduate with energy, have language competitiveness and be able to

cope with difficult situations.

CÉSAR CARRASCO LEÓN

Last day, Chari gave us a talk about meetings abroad. She studied in Salamanca and she

worked as a Maths teacher in the IES Zurbaran a long time ago. She has good friends there like

Lara, Mila or Luismi.

Now she works in the INS (Instituto Nacional de Estadística) in Madrid. That is a part of the

Ministry of the Economy and Finance. There they make surveys about a lot of topics like the

quantity of tourists that visit our country in summer. Then, she showed us the number of

smokers depending on the country and the gender. Politicians use some of those results to

take decisions.

After that, she told us about the Eurostat, that is the equivalent to the Spanish INS. She had

been there several times to conferences so far and she has also gone to the World Health

Organization´s or to the United Nations’ headquarters, in Geneva.

In the Eurostat, she said that there is a protocol of meeting, consisting of the following: The

first thing is that the Eurostat inform everybody who is interested in it, then, you receive an

invitation, you are informed when and where the meeting will take place. Afterwards, you

receive the agenda with the matters. It’s compulsory to confirm your attendance. You must

wear formal clothes, that is to say, a suit, and avoid wear jeans or trainers. That’s because you

are representing a country. After passing a security control, you receive an identification

badge. Then, you will look for your room. As a curiosity, Chari told that to take part in the

discussion you have to put your country sign upwards. It’s common to use English as an official

language at meetings, but unfortunately there are many English accents and native speakers

talk very fast.

To obtain a job in an international institution, the best is to have these characteristics:

To be a skilled graduate with energy.

To have a language competitiveness.

To be able to cope with situations.

GERMÁN MATEOS LÓPEZ

Today Chari has come to our school to give a talk about her experience with

languages. She studied in Salamanca and she was working in the IES Zurbarán

as a Math’s teacher a long time ago.

Now, she is working at the National Statistics Institute (Madrid). She works with

pyramids with information about Spain: immigrants, unemployment, early

school failure… Later, she asked us what we thought in relation to, whether girls

smoke more than boys, sport and people who drink. She showed us some

pyramids with the answers. She has to go to European countries to meetings

and she has been five times in these meetings in Luxemburg. Not only European

countries attend these meetings.

She told us the protocol of a meeting. First of all, the Eurostat informs you about

the meeting. Later, you receive an invitation with the date and all the

information. Next, they send you a draft agenda where they present you how

the things will be and the topics which will be discussed. If you want to change

something, you have to tell them and the day of the meeting you will receive

the definite agenda. Last but not least, you have to confirm your attendance.

You have to wear formal clothes to the meeting and you are obligated to have

a polite behaviour. When you arrive the meeting, you have to pass a security

control and later they give you an identification badge. It allows you to be in

the building.

In the meeting there are people from different countries, they speak different

languages but in different places the specified language must be spoken.

People can be accompanied by an interpreter but it’s expensive so not many

people have it.

During her experience in meetings she has found several difficulties; there are

many accents and it’s not the same to listen to an English speaker talking in

English as listening to a Chinese speaker. Another difficulty is that the mother

tongue of American people and English people is English, obviously, because

of that they speak so fast.

Chari told us different sentences which are common to listen to in a meeting,

for example, ‘microphone, please’, ‘the floor is yours’, ‘thank you, chair’, ‘we

should start’ and ‘next slide, please’ and later we had to guess the meaning.

Next we did an exercise, she gave us a situation and we had to choose the

correct sentence to this situation.

Chari told us what we needed in case we wanted to work in the United

Nations; you have to skill graduated with energy, language competitiveness

and when they tell you a situation you have to know how to solve it in the best

way.

Since I was 6 my dream has been to become a doctor and I continue

dreaming of it, but as years pass by, you learn that dreams might not

come true, so I can always try to be a nurse. I also love Maths and I would like

to study Maths, too but blood calls me more than numbers. On the other hand,

I love English but if I studied Maths as a degree, I would prefer to become a

teacher in a bilingual section, although I would like to visit different countries

but I don’t really like the idea of building pyramids or working with data about

different countries. I would like to explain how to solve problems, correct exams

and tell the students that Maths isn´t as horrible as they think.

NOELIA GRANADO GONZÁLEZ

The importance of studying English.

A concrete example. She studied Maths in Salamanca University. She works in Madrid. The INE

coordinates the statistics and data of the Members States and the EFTA

countries to harmonize the statics.

She showed some graphics about young

people smoking. Girls occupy 23% in the

graphics and boys occupy 15% in the

graphics. The Spanish teenagers occupy

the fifth place. She also showed other graphics in relation to

drinking. Boys and girls occupy the third position in these graphics.

THEOECD provides a forum in which governments can work. In 1945 United

Nations was founded in Geneva to develop friendly relations among nations.

Eurostat informs us about the schedule of meeting in plenty of time. You receive

an invitation. You are informed when and where the meetings will be. You receive

the agenda with the matters to be discussed or to be presented at the meeting.

It is compulsory to confirm your attendance. After a security control you are

given your identification badges with your information (name, surnames, address,

phone number…)

The official language is English at meetings but there are also others:

NSI=English; OECD=English and French; IMF=English; UN=English, French,

Chinese, Arabic, Spanish and Russian; EUROSTAT=English and other languages.

Some of the frequent sentences used in these meetings are: the floor is yours,

Next slide, please; Thank you chair; Microphone, please. Some of the sentences in

some specific situations are: Oh really? to show interest; I’m sorry or others to

value others´ contribution.

To get a job in the United Nations, you have to be a skilled graduate with energy,

to have some language competitiveness and to be able to cope with difficult

situations.

OPINION: I liked this talk because she told us about the importance of English in

their work and their studies. She also told us with how she works and the uses of

English. English is very important for our future.

NOELIA SÁNCHEZ OVIEDO

CHARI’S TALK Last Friday, we were in a talk. It was called “The importance of studying

English”. It was about Chari’s job and why English important is for it.

Chari was the speaker and she was a teacher in the Zurbaran High school.

Chari studied Mathematics at Salamanca University. She learnt languages

too. Now, she is working at National Statistic Institute where they work

out National Statistics, for example, population pyramids, unemployment

rate… With this statistics, politicians make decisions. This information is

sent to Eurostat, in Luxemburg to be shared with other countries. There are

other institutions interested in them too, such as the OECD in Paris, or the

United Nations in Geneva. In these institutions, they have meetings, which

will have to be well-prepared. At the end of the meeting, the Eurostat, has

to write the minutes, which are brief summaries of what has been said in

the meeting and then, each people has to write a report in their

institutions, in Chari’s case, in the National Statistic Institute. When they

have to give a meeting, they receive a letter with all the information,

building, room, seat,..). They must be well-dressed and wear identification

badges.

In the institutions, they talk different languages, for example, in the OECD

they speak English and French, and in the United Nation they speak

English, French, Chinese, Arabic, Spanish and Russian but the common

language is English. The main problems with English are the different

accents and the speed of native countries. If they don’t understand the

language, they use a translator, but nowadays, they can’t do that because

the recession. There they have to use correct expressions, they can’t talk as

if they were on the street and they must be diplomatic. They use some

sentences frequently like “the floor is yours” or “microphone please”. At

the end, we had a play role. It was to see if we could do this job.

It was an interesting talk because Chari explained us with a specific

example how important English is and why it is important in her job. This

talk finally made me study English because I could see that it is very

important to get a good job.

FERNANDO ALARZA BLÁZQUEZ

CHARI´S TALK

Last Friday we had a talk with one woman whose name was Chari.

She spoke about the importance of knowing English. She studied

Mathematics in the University of Salamanca. She is studying

Italian now. Now, she works in Madrid in one institution, in the

INE. Her work is to calculate how many people in Spain for

example smoke. She said that it is very important to know the

number of foreign people that are within the Spanish population.

In the talk, she said that in Spain girls smoke more than boys.

On the contrary, people from Spain do more sports than in the

rest of Europe. In Geneva the United Nations is an international

organisation. She describes the protocol of a meeting in the

next steps:

1-Eurostart informs us about the schedule of a meeting

2-You receive an invitation

3-You are informed when and where the meeting will take place

She explained the agenda, too. The agenda recommends the country

to have the same delegate every year. In these meetings, you

have to carry an identification badge to go through a security

control.

She told us some frequent sentences like :"the floor is yours",

"Next slide, please", "Thank you, chair", "We should start",

"Microphone please". Finally she told that to get a job you have

to be a skilled graduate with energy ,to have language

competitiveness and to be able to cope with difficult

situations. HAYAT MAIMOUNI

The Importance of Studying English

To begin with, the National Statistics Institute (Madrid) is the institution in charge of the

performance of the official statistics at a national level.

On the one hand, Eurostat (Luxembourg) is the statistics office of the European Commission

that coordinates the statistics and data of the member states. On the other hand, the OECD

(Paris) is the organization for economic co-Operation. And finally, the United Nations (Geneva)

is an international organization. The protocol of a meeting consists basically is this: firstly,

Eurostat informs us about the schedule of meetings in plenty of time. Secondly you receive an

invitation. In addition, you are informed about when and where the meeting will take place.

Apart from that, you receive the agenda with the matters to be discussed about. And finally, it

is compulsory to confirm your attendance. Concerning to documents, the institution

recommends the country to maintain the same delegate for years. Furthermore, the meetings

are attended by one or two delegates for country. About dressing, you have to go well dressed

to the meetings and besides, it is necessary to have the identification badges, look for your

room and look for your seat.

The official language at meetings is English, mainly, in the NSI, the EUROSTAT, the OECD and

the IMF. In the UN, apart from English, in addition French, Chinese, Arabic, Spanish and

Russian are spoken. At the beginning of the meeting the chair informs us if translation is

provided or not. The type of English used at meetings is the International English. The main

difficulties are that there are many countries, many accents and the speed of native speakers.

Examples of frequent sentences used in these meetings are “The floor is yours”. “Next slide,

please”, “Thank you”, “We should start”, “Microphone, please”. In conclusion, to get a job in

the United Nations, it is required to be a skilled graduate with energy, to have language

competitiveness and to be able to cope with difficult situations.

MANUEL GARCÍA PAJARES

THE IMPORTANCE OF STUDYING ENGLISH.

I am going to give you a concrete example about the importance of studying English provided

by a girl who works in Madrid in the INE. She studied languages and Maths in Salamanca. She

uses English in her job and she calculates things like the early school failure.

Secondly, Chari talked about the institutions that speak English and the jobs in connection with

each one. So, the National Statistics Institute is in charge of the performance of the official

statistics at a national level. There are a lot of foreigners in the Spanish population. Eurostat is

in Luxembourg. It is the statistics office of the European Commission. It tries to harmonize the

statistics methods, coordinate the statistics and data of the members stales and the EFTA

countries. In Spain, at an early age there are youngsters smoke and take drugs. Spain holds the

15th place in the ranking. The majority that smokes and takes drugs are girls.. The OCDE is in

Paris. Its mission is to promote policies that will improve situations and 34 countries

collaborate. The United Nations is in Geneva, New York. It was founded in 1945. 193 states are

members and look for peace and security.

Thirdly, Chari introduced the concept of the necessity of the protocol in a meeting. She said

that Eurostat informs them about the schedule of meetings. Secondly, they receive an

invitation. Then it informs about when and where the meeting is. After that you receive the

agenda with the matters to be discussed about or to be presented at the meeting. The agenda

consists of a draft agenda, issues and time which is very important. Finally, it’s compulsory to

confirm your attendance. This is very important. The institution recommends each country to

maintain the same delegate for years, and one or two delegates from each country attend the

meeting. People should also wear formal and comfortable uniforms, because they represent

the country and they should have identification badges. After security controls, you are given

the identification. Then, you look for a room and you look for your seat. There are official

languages at the meetings. English is spoken by all countries, but in the Eurostat, the OECD and

the UN French and other languages are also spoken. At the beginning of the meeting the chair

informs them if a translator is provided or not, and also, which languages are available. There

are difficulties like the fact that there are many countries, many accents. Chari gave us some

frequent expressions used in these meetings like: “The floor is yours” when you can speak.

“Next slide, please”, “Thank you chair” as the chair is the person that organizes it. Finally she

said that to get a job, the conditions are that you have to be a skilled graduate with energy, to

have language competitiveness and to be able to cope with difficult situations.

My opinion about this meeting is good, because I’ve learned a lot about English. I also think

that we should have more talks about this topic, as this is important for us and for our future.

CORAL PANIAGUA FUENTES

Chari´s talk Last Friday, we had a talk about working as a statistician and the importance of English for

finding a good job in the future; given by a woman whose name I do not remember well. Sorry!

Now, I am going to summarise this talk in a brief way, due to the fact that I haven´t taken

enough notes to write a good summary because I write very slowly.

First of all, she told us that she had worked as a teacher for many years here, in the IES

Zurbarán, and that she was quite happy about returning to the IES again. Then, she began the

talk by saying to us that she was now working in the National Statistics Institute.

Throughout the talk, she explained us all that she

had to do in her job every day and the changes that

she had undergone. In relation to that she said what

the statisticians did; that is to say, they perform

statistics to provide the politicians with information.

She told us that she had to go to Luxembourg four

or five times a year to attend a meeting of the

EUROSTAT, where English was the official

language. She said that she also had to go to the

OECD in Paris. Then, she talked to us about the

protocol that they had to follow when they go to an

official meeting (be polite, dress formally...).

Finally, she told us about why English is important

by giving us some examples. In relation to that, she

said that English was the official language in the meeting of the majority of the international

organizations like the EUROSTAT, the OECD, the IMF...

In conclusion, I think that this talk has been very interesting and quite important for us. It has

made me realize about the importance that English is gaining every day.

Jesús Javier Talaván Díaz

CHARI´S TALK

Last Friday, an old maths teacher from the I.E.S Zurbarán who worked in the bilingual section,

which has been very successful since that moment. Nowadays, she works at the National

Statistics Institute in Madrid. There, they, for example calculate the number of people without

job, the number of young people who have left their studies, the number of tourists... After

collecting these data, they produce charts, such as population pyramids, or even, tables

showing people who smoke at a certain age in all the EU countries to make comparisons.

She has been in different countries to represent Spain in some important meetings, like the

OECD, which takes place in Paris, or the United Nations, which is in Geneva. In these meetings

people from different countries provide information, make comparisons, make agreements...

But depending on the meeting there are different official languages, for example, in the NSI,

IMF and EROSTAT the official language is English, in the OECD they are English and French, and

in the UN the mainly languages are English, French, Chinese, Arabic, Spanish and Russian.

Although if some country wants to have an interpreter, they can have it, but it is a bit

expensive. From her point of view Japanese and native speakers (the UK and the USA) are very

difficult to understand.

As we all know, we are talking about very important meetings so

they have a protocol. Firstly, Eurostat informs them about the

schedule of the meeting in plenty of time. Secondly, they receive

an invitation. Thirdly, they are informed about the issues which

are going to be talking. Fourthly, when you arrive at the meeting

place, it is very important that they wear formal clothes, they

have to pass a security control and after that they receive an

identification badge. Fifthly, they look for their room. And finally,

they look for their seats. At the end of the meeting, the chair, who is the person responsible

for maintaining the order of the meeting, writing the minutes, which is a brief summary about

the issues of the meeting.

And finally, there are some frequent sentences like:

- Microphone please, which is said by the other countries when you are speaking

and you forget to turn on the microphone.

- The floor is yours, which is said by the chair, to allow you the turn to speak.

- Next slide, please, which is said by the chair to change the issue.

In conclusion, these important meetings are celebrated around the world or around the

European countries, where people from different nationalities put in common their

information, speaking in an official language, mainly English, so it is very important that we

learn different languages to have a good job.

ALBA ISABEL PASCUAL RUBIO

Chari’s Talk

Chari works in the National Statistics Institute in Madrid. They make the national statistics at a

national level, that information is used by the politicians to make decisions, the information is

about the unemployment rate, population pyramids, how many young people give up studies

at an early age, the kind of people who visit our country, etc. They also make statistics about

other countries, we have the 5th position in relation to smoking among teenagers who are 18

years old, a high position about drunken among 18 years old and the 3rd position at sports.

There are a lot of organizations around the world like the World Health Organization, the

Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), United Nations (Created in

1945, in New York) and all of them are united in the Eurostat. There are some meetings. In the

Eurostat and there is a protocol in the meeting. The first thing is that Eurostat has to inform us

about THE schedule of the meetings in (gently) early time, next they receive the invitation and

they are informed about when and where the meeting will take place, the third thing is that

they receive the agenda with the matters to be discussed or to be presented at the meeting

and finally you have to confirm your attendance compulsorily.

At the end of the meeting Eurostat has to write the minutes (a brief summary of what has

been said and decided in a formal meeting). In these meetings you have to dress formally, you

have to pass a security control and then they give your identification and they give you a

microphone and if you want to take part in the discussion, you have to place it upright.

There are also a lot of official languages in different meetings, they are normally in English but

in THE U.N. (United Nations) they speak in English, French, Chinese, Arabic, Spanish and

Russian but the best problem with English is that there are a lot of people from different

countries so there are many accents and also the speed of native speakers. In the meeting

there are strange phrases to say simple things like “the floor is yours” to say that it is your turn

and depending on the situation you can say “Oh really?” if you want to appear interested even

if you are not interested.

Finally if you want to see one of these conferences, you have to work for one of these organizations that I have already named and you are going to discover lots of new people with different information about these countries and probably about what they think about English.

Daniel Felipe Millanes Aparicio

Chari was a Maths teacher, here, in Navalmoral de la Mata, but now she is working in the

National Statistics Institute. There, she and other people study percentages, like unemployed

taxes, the early age school leaving or the foreign people that visit our country.

She goes to Luxembourg to the European Statistics Office four or five times per year. The

United Nations has also the headquarters in New York, but in Geneva there is the European

United Nations building. There are some steps that you must follow when you have a meeting:

1. Eurostat informs us about the schedule of meetings in plenty of time.

2. You receive an invitation.

3. You are informed about when and where the meeting will takes place.

4. You receive some documents about the meeting and you prepare the meeting.

She must also prepare the meeting with many things. People must wear formal clothes

to a meeting. Apart from this, to take part in the conversation, she must turn around the

badge that represents the country and she waits to give the word. In these days, with the

crisis, there are fewer translators. However, there are many problems, the most important

ones are that in the meetings there are many countries and also many accents, and also the

“speed” of native speakers (THE UK and THE USA). In the end, there are many frequent

sentences, such as: The floor is yours (It’s your turn); next slide, please; thank you chair (When

the “chair”, said to you: “The floor is yours”, for example); we should start (Said the “chair”)

and microphone, please.

In conclusion, to get a job, you must be firstly a skilled graduate with energy; secondly,

some language competitiveness and also be able to cope with difficult situations, with this you

have your job.

THE IMPORTANCE OF STUDYING ENGLISH.

A CONCRETE EXAMPLE.

Chari a Maths teacher, and now she is a worker in the National Statistics Institute (NST) in Madrid. She

came to our high school to explain us the importance of studying English and she gave us herself as an

example.

First of all she explained us the meaning of some abbreviations of some institutions she works for and

the places in which they are. For instance, NST in Madrid means National Statistics Institute or Eurostat

in Luxemburg that means European Statistical Office.

Then, she told us the protocol of meetings, the instructions of the invitations, the recommendations for

the meetings, the procedures of the meetings, the official languages at meetings , interpreters-

translators, some frequent sentences and how to got a job: in the United Nations.

Finally she chose three volunteers to show how to solve difficult situations in different places. In these

situations they had to explain how to do it.

In conclusion, I think that the talk was very interesting. People usually explains us the importance of studying English and gives us some examples, but this was different because the speaker gave us her own example and showed us her experience. It was great!!!

MARIA PRIETO RIOS

Chari talked to us about her experience with English. She studied in Salamanca University and

she studied some languages, too. She knew some teachers from the Zurbarán high school such

as Mila, Luismi or Lara and they are good friends. She works in the National Statistics Institute

in Madrid. This is part of the Economy Ministry. Her job is making surveys for a lot of things.

She also travels a lot.

She also told us that Eurostat is the equivalent to the INE

Europe. She works in collaboration with the WHO, the OECD

(The Organisation for Economics Co-operation and

Development in others Countries) in Paris and the UN in

Geneva.

Spain is in the fifth position in relation to people who smoke

and she showed this to us. She talked about the protocol for

the meetings. It’s very important to go well-dressed, to be

polite, you are given some identification badges, look for

your room and your seat, and in a discussion, you have to

put your hand . There you represent your country.

The Official languages at meeting are as it follows: NSI (English), Eurostat (English), OECD

(English and French), IMF (English, French, Chinese, Spanish, Russian) but there is an

interpreter-translator and there aren’t any problems.

There are frequent sentences such as: “the floor is yours”, “next slide, please”, “then your

chair”, “we should start”, “microphone, please”. Finally, Mila interviewed three girls from 2nd

Bachillerato PEL, Maria, Sara and Raquel for a job and they were successful.

LORENA JARA CAJAS

On the 9th of November 2012 in the assembly hall of the Zurbaran Secondary school a

presentation about “The importance of studying English, A concrete example”, was

given by Chari she works in the National Statistics Institute. At present she works at the

National Statistics Institute. It is the institution in charge of the performance of the

official statistics. She calculates the unemployment rate and also the educational

neglect. Now I´m going to talk about Eurostat. European is a statistical office of the

European commission. This building is located in Luxemburg and its job is to

coordinate the statistics and data of the members. For example:

-Smoking among 15 years old (2009-10)

Spain occupies the 5th place.

-Drunkenness among 15 years old (2009-10)

Spain occupies the 5th place.

-Daily moderate vigorous physical activity

Spain occupies the 3rd place.

The importance of studying English

A concrete example

Let´s continue talking about the OECD. The OECD is the organization for economic

Co-operation and Development. It´s located in Paris. In the same way I’m going to talk

about the UNITED NATIONS that is located in Geneva. The UN is an international

organization founded in 1945.

I will also talk about the protocol of a meeting. The protocol of a meeting is guided by a

series of steps. The first step is that the Eurostat informs us about the schedule of

meetings in plenty of time. The second step is that you receive an invitation. The third

step is that you are informed about and where the meeting will take place. The fourth

step is that you receive the agenda with the matters to be discussed about or to be

presented at the meeting and the final step or the fifth is that it´s compulsory to confirm

your attendance.

In relation to the invitation it is imperative that you confirm your participation. The

documents that you have to follow to have a positive experience are the following: you

have to formal dress, one or two delegates for country attend the meeting and the

institution recommends the country to maintain the same delegate for years. The steps

to get there are the following: You must take the identification badges, then you must

look for you room (TV with the numbers indicates the room) and look for you seat. The

importance of the English at meetings is a lot, because as you can see in the following

list speaking English is imperative.

Languages at meetings are as it the follows:

NSI - ENGLISH

EUROSTAT - ENGLISH

OECD - ENGLISH, FRENCH

IMF - ENGLISH

UN - ENGLISH, FRENCH, CHINESE, ARABIC, SPANISH AND RUSSIAN.

Translation can be provided or not. The main difficulties are that there are many

countries, and many different accents and the other difficulty is the speed of native

speakers (UK and USA). The frequent sentences at meeting are the followings: The

floor is yours. Next slide, please. Thank you, chair. We should start and the last

microphone, please. To get a job in the United Nations you must be a skilled graduate

with energy, you have a competitive language and, in addition, you have to be able to

cope with difficult situation.

As a conclusion, this was all the presentation that lasted approximately 50 minutes and

ended at twenty past eleven. The most important is that with this presentation we have

is to know the steps to prepare a good meeting and we have also learnt that English is

essential and now we know Chari and her job a little better.

JESUS TORRES CANO

CHARI´S TALK

Yesterday we had a talk with Chari. She worked in the Zurbaran and she

studied Maths and she came to school to explain her experience with

languages.

She works in the National Statistics Institute .They count how many

inhabitants there are in one country, how many people have a job ,how

many tourists visit a country for example. Then this information goes to the

politicians.

She works with the EUROSTAAT in Luxembourg, with the OECD in Paris

and with the UNITED NATIONS in Geneva.

To begin with she explained the protocol of meeting. First of all you receive

a letter. In this letter you can see the institution, the address, the subject,

the place, dates and apart from this, it is very important you confirm your

participation.

Secondly, in the agenda you can also see the time of the meeting, the issues

and the draft agenda that isn´t definitive .Your documents are very

important to prepare the meetings because after meetings, you have to

write a summary and when you return to your country, you have to

prepare a report.

Chari also spoke about the kind of dress you have to wear when you go to a

meeting. You should dress formally because you represent your country.

The identification badges are very important because you can see your

name and your country .Then you look for your room and look for your

seat .You have got a country sign and the microphone and therefore you

can participate in the meeting.

The official languages at the meetings are: In the NSI-English, in

EUROSTAT English, in the OCEDE English and French and in the UN

English, French Chinese, Arabic, Spanish and Russian.

We can conclude that languages are very important because you can always

learn more.

HANANE MEZIANI

Our presentation with Chari

On Friday, we had a presentation which was given by Chari, who was a

Mathematics teacher who worked in the IES Zurbaran and that now, she works in

the National Statistics Institute in Madrid. The presentation was about the

importance of English in her life.

At first, Chari said to us that she had studied Mathematics in Salamanca

University and that she speaks French, English and Italian. She also explained us

what she usually does in the NSI, and what she does is to provide information

which is used by politicians to make decisions, for example she calculates the

percentage of unemployed people, when young people give up their studies, what

kind of people visit the country, etc. Moreover, she told us that she goes five or

six times per year to EUROSTAT, which is the European Statistical Office and that

coordinates the statistics and data of the European Countries. What she does

when she goes to those international meetings, is to compare the Spanish

statistics information with the other countries. They are usually

forty people and sometimes, some people from other

institutions go there, like people from the World Health

Organization. Furthermore, Chari has also gone to other

international meetings. She’s been to the OECD,

Organization for the Economic Co-operation and

Development, in Paris and to the UN, the United Nations,

in NYC. She said that she enjoyed a lot when she went there

because she was with Japanese, Mexican, Arabic people…

Secondly, she explained us what the protocol of a meeting is. First, Eurostat

informs them about the schedule of the meeting by means of an invitation, in

which it is indicated the institution which invites you, the subject they’re going to

talk about, the place, the date, etc. With that invitation, they receive a draft

agenda with the matters which are going to be discussed or to be represented at

the meeting. Then, they have to confirm their attendance. After confirming it, they

have to access to some documents, where they have to write a personal

password, to start preparing the meeting. When it’s the day of the meeting, they

wear formal clothes, they go into the institution and they pass a secure control.

After it, they receive an identification badge and they look for the room, they go

into it and they look for their seat. Then, they have a microphone and a country

sign which are used to be able to take part in the meeting. To finish, after

attending the meeting, they receive a summary in which it’s said what they have

spoken during it, which has to be accepted by the delegates.

On the other hand, she told us the official language of the meetings, for example,

in INSI, it’s the English Language, in EUROSTAT they can use English and other

languages, in the UN it is available to speak in English, French, Chinese, Arabic,

Spanish and Russian. Chari said to us that sometimes they’ve got translators,

which is known at the beginning of the meeting by the chair. In addition, she told

us some frequent sentences they usually say when they are in a meeting, for

example, ‘the floor is yours’, which is ‘it’s your turn’, ‘next slide please’, ‘thank

you, chair’, ‘we should start’ and ‘microphone, please’. She said that she hates

when an English spoken person speaks, because they do it really fast. As they

have to be polite, in some situations they also have some usual sentences, for

example, when they have to appear interested on something they usually say ‘Oh,

really?’ or when they don’t understand something they use the sentence ‘Could

you explain what you mean by that?’, etc.

To finish with the presentation, Chari explained us how to get a job in the UN and

what you need is to be a skilled graduate with energy, to be a language

competitive person and to be able to cope with difficult situations. So, to know if

we were able to cope with them, she chose three people and they had to solve an

improvised situation.

I enjoyed this presentation a lot because Chari gave us a lot of interesting

information and we learnt so much about an interesting life. I think that she is very

clever and I would like to go to one of the meetings, to know exactly what they do

and what they speak bout. I believe she is also so lucky because she has gone to

a UN meeting in NYC and because she has visited so many countries.

GEMA PARRA MARTÍN

COMENIUS

Yesterday, we had a meeting about “Comenius”. A Spanish girl explained us

her Comenius experience. She studied at the University of Salamanca.

She's specialized in Mathematics. She speaks Spanish, English, French

and now she's studying Italian.

Now she is working in the “National Statistics Institute” in Madrid which

is in charge of the performance of the official statistics at a National

level. It is used by the politicians to make decisions. The “National

Statistics Institute” is very important to know the number of inhabitants

in the country. An economic example is the number of people without jobs.

Or, for example the education, how many young people leaving their

studies at an early age, the kind of people that visits our country or

something like that.

Then she told us she goes to Luxembourg, to “Eurostat” meetings. They

work to coordinate the statistics of the member states. That is to say,

they try to organize the statistical methods. One of the statistics she

showed us was about people who smoke. Here, in Spain more girls than

boys smoke, and we are in the third place at a European level. However, we

are in the fifth place in relation to sports!! It is really curious. You find

people from all over the world. .

The “Eurostast” organization informs people attending meetings about

their schedule in plenty of time.

Firstly, you receive an invitation to go to the meeting. The invitation is a

letter with the room number. Once in the room, your look for your seat,

the microphone, country sign... Besides, you're informed about when and

where the meeting will take place. It is imperative that you have to

confirm your participation. Secondly, you receive the “agenda”. In the

agenda the issues to be discussed during the meeting appear. The time,

personal password, secure web pages to get access to the document are

also given. Of course the official language at meetings is English. Thirdly,

when you're in a meeting, you can contract a translator but it is very

expensive. Some of the main difficulties are people from Japan, because

they're very difficult to understand and other difficulty according to

Chari is the native speakers.

In conclusion, if you want to be part of the “Eurostat” organization, you

have to be polite and responsible. Nowadays, they want workers who speak

languages like Spanish, English or French so you have a lot of

opportunities!!

CARMEN PÉREZ MORENO