Home (Marcos Gazzana)

Home

Thank you for dropping by!

This is my personal homepage. Here you will find a short bio and links to the several pages I keep.

SHORT BIO

I was born in Porto Alegre (Brazil) in 1974 and soon moved to London (UK), where my father did his Masters. While in London, I learned my first words in English and traveled around Europe a few times. Later on in my life, English and traveling became two of my main interests, so I find this part of my childhood especially meaningful to my life experience as a whole.

At the age of five we came back to Porto Alegre where I did my Junior and High school. Then, I went back to London to spent my year off before starting University. This was 1992, the decisive year for my career as an English teacher. When I got back to Brazil I started the Modern English course at PUCRS and soon after that I started teaching. After teaching at a few language schools, I also became involved with Business English and preparation for proficiency exams.

One of my other passions is the Internet and new technologies, I am interested particularly on the way people make use of computers to learn languages, connect to each other in order to grow personally and professionally. I started using computers back in 1993 and since then I have not stopped. One of the main reasons I use computers is simply because I teach lots of private students who have special needs, so I use the Internet to find materials which can help me give them what they really want and need to learn the language.

In 1993 I also started a series of trips around South America, which included several countries and regions. Every year I chose a different location to explore. In 1998, before graduating I traveled to US and Canada as well. During these years I developed a special interest in photography, especially landscape and nature. Naturally, these trips helped me learn more about different cultures and communication skills.

In 1999, I started teaching at Cultura Inglesa and in 2000 I took COTE (Certificate for Overseas Teachers of English, now called ICELT - In-service Certificate in English Language Teaching). In 2001 I decided to continue my academic studies and took a post-graduation course on Modern English at PUCRS. In 2002 I became even more involved with the use of computers in English Language Teaching after doing a Summer Course in Ribeirão Preto (Brazil) and was responsible for the computer training of the teacher staff of Cultura's Porto Alegre branch. During this period at Cultura Inglesa I also became a Cambridge Oral Examiner for KET and FCE exams, which I am still involved with nowadays. In 2003 I took CPE (Certificate of Proficiency in English).

At the beginning of 2004 I decided to leave my job and become more exclusively involved with Business English, proficiency exams and private classes. Then, in 2007 I started teaching at CESUCA (Complexo de Ensino Superior de Cachoeirinha) and for BLS Consultoria, which is a Business English consultancy firm that provides in-company training for major companies in Porto Alegre metropolitan area. In August 2009 I took over as a Business Training Coordinator at BLS. Now I am more involved in consultancy and recruitment area of the company.

In 2007 I also started my masters on Applied Linguistics. I finished my dissertation in March 2008 and presented it a couple of weeks later in April 2008. The research was about the semantic contribution of particles in the overall meaning of Phrasal Verbs. The study involved a thorough research on Cognitive Linguistics and Semantics, as well as the use of Corpus Linguistics tools which helped me collect the data. Read more about it in the Phrasal Verbs link on the left menu. Or simply click here!

In 2004 I also met my wife and in 2005 we moved in together. My life changed a lot since then. We now have a son called Lucas. He was born in Jan 2007 and is now running around the house, giving us a hard time, but also plenty of happiness and joy.

Lately, I have been developing a language site which I intend to launch in the future. It will involve language and technology.

Again, thanks for dropping by. Feel free to contact me and visit the links I make available hereby.

; ¬ ]

MAIN INTERESTS

Naturally, my main interests include the English language, especially issues related to phrasal verbs, idioms, aspects of pronunciation (phonology, phonetics), accents, English language teaching in general - i.e. how people learn, etc. In fact anything that has some connection with "the language of the bard", that is, English.

I also like taking pictures, even though I am not a professional photographer, but I have taken thousands of landscape and nature pictures while travelling, so I consider myself a decent one at least. Other passions I have include reading, camping, hiking, gardening, cooking, taking care of my cichlids fish tank, the Internet and of course spending time with my wife and my son.

Here are the links!

Visit my site for more info on my professional activities as an English teacher
www.marcosgazzana.com

I also have a blog I keep for my students
http://learnersofenglish.blogspot.com

...a podcast for English learners

http://englishlanguagepodcast.blogspot.com/

...a Business English site

http://businessenglish.marcosgazzana.com/

I have a site for my CESUCA students

http://cesucanel.marcosgazzana.com/

I have a site for my Areva students (temporarily unavailable)

http://arevabls.marcosgazzana.com/

...a project I am working on