Aloysius Lilius and the Gregorian Calendar

Welcome to another week!

If you are new to my blog, then hello! The aim of my blog is to give students of English as a second language an opportunity to practise listening and answering questions, learn some new vocabulary and experience everyday language and cultural differences through the creative part of my blog.

Today, I found a Discovery video clip about the guy who invented the Gregorian calendar which most of the modern world uses today. You will find quite a lot of dates to test your numbers and as I know calendars have come up in TOEFL listening before, so it should give you some useful vocabulary.

Speaking of vocabulary, here is some that comes up in the script:
   

Behold !	Look !	To pass away	To die
To pre-date	To precede in time	Flawed	Faulty
Leap Year	Une année bissextile (Fr)	To reap	To profit from

Read the questions and try to answer them after the video has finished. It is better not to watch the video, but just listen to accustom your ear to the sounds as you will not have visual clues in an exam. Here is the link:

  The Modern Calendar

 Questions:

Where was Aloysius Lilius born and in what year?
What was his profession and what was the year?
When did he present his manuscript to the Vatican?
What happened in the same year?
Why did this system become known as the Gregorian calendar and when was it introduced?
What do calendars pre-date?
What was the calendar called that was used before the introduction of the Gregorian calendar?
How inaccurate was the previous calendar and why was this a concern to the Church?
Describe how the Gregorian calendar works.
On the American Dream scale, what score does Aloysius get and why?
Give the score for the Benefit to Humanity scale and the reason why.
Finally, what score did he get for the Ripple Effect scale and why?

OK that's all for today but rest assured, I have a whole BUNCH of ideas for more posts!

Here are the Answers to Aloysius Lilius and the Gregorian Calendar post
 

Here is a hint for the next one........... 

It's a design style and, for some, a way of life....

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