Emily CP #2

Date/Time: Tuesday, 21 March 2017 @ 7 PM
Location: Tallahassee, FL

For my second meeting with Saeed we again went to Starbucks. This time Saeed asked me to focus on correcting his English as he spoke; giving me permission to interrupt him if he made any mistakes. We spent the bulk of our conversation talking about what Saeed was going to do on the weekend, have a barbecue with friends, and how one appropriately expresses future plans. It was interesting because Saeed kept saying “at the weekend” instead of “on the weekend” and I had to continually remind him that while the statement is grammatically correct it is not a phrase that many Americans use. Since Saeed made me hungry talking about a barbecue we talked about our favorite foods, what vegetarianism is, and our favorite desserts. Saeed was talking about how much he missed some foods back home in Kuwait. It was interesting to note how much easier our second meeting was. I felt that I could understand Saeed more than before and he the same, not to mention that the initial awkwardness was gone. Saeed is showing a genuine interest in getting to know me and exploring some American culture, we’re even planning to go to the library so I can teach him how to rent movies through FSU.  

Sabrina TS#7

March 24th @ 4pm to 6pm

Taslima’s Apartment 

This session we did a lot of yes/no conversation practice. I had a few pictures pulled out on my laptop. Each image showed people doing various activities. We began the session with me asking the questions. For each picture I asked her three questions whose answer would be a yes/no. Afterwards, it was Taslima’s turn to look through the pictures and ask me questions to which I would have to answer yes or no. It was actually quite fun. I felt like this activity allowed Taslima to use more descriptive vocabulary. It also took Taslima’s attention away from correcting her grammar and directed her concentration on finding what part of the picture she would ask me about. 

Next, I pulled out a a series of yes/no interview type questions. These questions were posted on a ESL teaching website. I asked Taslima over 10 questions from here, but I told her she could not just end with yes/no. She would have to explain the alternative if she chose so. Then I asked her more conversational questions that anyone could ask her. Like, “Do you have a car? Do you drive? Do you live alone?” Again she would answer with explanation. In later part of the session, I asked Taslima to ask me ten questions she was curious about. Sometimes she had trouble with arranging her subject and object in the sentences. But I just told her to say it and then noted the errors and afterwards we reviewed the errors. Taslima would write down all the mistakes she made for her own practice. 

At the end of the session, we watched a recipe video on how to make macaroni and cheese. In this video there came words like “stir, pour, boiling over” to which Taslima had questions about. I reused these words in example sentences and had Taslima write it down. I told her to re-watch the cooking video and try to use visual aid to understand what was being instructed. Overall it was quite a fun session! I did notice that sometimes I tend to go too fast. From my perspective I think its okay but for Taslima it makes her feel lost. So I need to be more cautious about my speed and take things slow. 

Sabrina TS#6

March 23rd @ 9AM - 10AM

Skype 

In this session So Young and I did a lot of vocabulary review. I shared with her a list of historical vocabulary words. It was a list available on a website called quizlet.com. We went through each of the words and I gave her example sentences and more detail definitions. Afterwards, I asked her questions about a few of the words. For example I asked her to explain the difference between culture, community, and civilization. After some discussion over the vocabulary words, we did a game together. On the quizlet website there is a matching game. We successfully completed the game. Afterwards I asked So Young to write two paragraphs about a Korean historical event using the newly learned vocabulary words. 

It took So Young some time to brainstorm what she would write about and outline her ideas. I told her it did not have to be long but just wanted to see if she knew the usage of the words correctly. She shared her two paragraphs and we reviewed the errors. We had a discussion on run-on and incomplete sentences. 

We then read an article on Ancient Egypt from a scholarly historical website. Before reading, So Young and I talked about what we knew about ancient Egypt. So Young did not know much about the history except that they were builders of the pyramids. I used this article because it used many of the vocabulary words we had learned earlier in the session. 

After reading, we discussed the new information we had gathered about ancient Egypt and I asked So Young some comprehensive questions. For our next session, I decided to provide So Young some extensive reading material. I told her to read the first chapter of the book, “The Gift of the Magi” and we would discuss it for our next Tuesday session.

Sabrina TS#5

March 19th @ 6:30pm to 8pm 

Taslima’s Apartment 

This session we worked a lot on learning words and using them in conversation. I bought a list of verb words used very frequently in the English language. The list had all the verb tenses listed in different categories. Taslima and I went through the entire word list (which was quite huge). To my surprise she was familiar with most of the words but had only a receptive knowledge of them. Whenever she had trouble defining a word, I gave her hints. I would act it out with whatever stuff was available in our setting or give or other clue words. We focused on a few words that Taslima seemed to have questions about. For example, “put”, “set”, “bought”, and “brought”. She asked what was the difference between putting something on a table and setting something. To be honest, often I was not ready to answer her questions. In these cases I gave her a lot of example sentences to help her understand. 

Afterwards we worked on conversation. First I had an example scenario. I chose the topic shopping and began with myself. So I asked a question and then answered it myself, demonstrating how I would like our conversation practice to go. We stayed with the topic of shopping. I asked various, “when, where, how” questions and Taslima attempted to answer. I noted down the major errors in pronunciation and context as we went along. An error she kept having was saying “weekend-day” instead of “weekend”. I reviewed the errors and repeated to redo the conversation. 

The next topic we chose to have a conversation about was “work”. Taslima is a stay at home mom at the moment, but I told her to describe what work she does as a mom. I wanted to help her use the verbs she already knew productively. This conversation seemed to go well. 

Overall, I was very pleased to see Taslima engaging in conversation. I think she is growing confidence in her speaking abilities. I realized I should choose topics more to her interest and this might further help improve her English speaking skills.  

Jacqueline TS #4 child

3/25 10:00-11:00 am

Yesterday I tutored Alex (and his older sister). I printed out a worksheet I found online matching vowels to the correct picture. Some of the pictures he wasn't familiar with, so I told him what they were and wrote them out for him. I had him copy the words on his own paper, then we discussed the sounds each vowel made. After matching them on the paper, I came up with a story for a couple of the words and used my hands for another visual aid. I can tell he understands me, but some words he's unfamiliar with, so I think this helped. For example, I asked him if he thought the word 'umbrella' was for inside or outside. Then I asked him if he knew what 'rain' was. When he didn't, I drew him a picture. Next, we discussed the purpose of the umbrella- To keep you dry and protect you from the rain. I had him write out some of the key words from my description and go over the sounds. 

After going over the vowels, we read one of the books from the library about "short i sounds". He's able to recognize letters, but doesn't know the sounds each letter makes. When I gave him the sounds, he did really well putting them together and figuring out the words! Very proud of him and his sister. They were very focused today, despite all the distractions in the home :)

Jacqueline CO #1

3/22 9-9:50am Group 1A Grammar

On Wednesday I observed Felicia's grammar class. As she taught, she was sure to speak slowly as she enunciated her words. I could tell she was passionate about teaching and really enjoyed it. When she would ask questions and students would respond with an incorrect word/phrase, she would repeat it back to them as a question and discuss why that word/phrase was inappropriate for that sentence. Other students would chime in and guess what the word should be. When students gave the correct answer, she would get really excited and say, "Good job!" or give them a high five. She was very encouraging in their learning process. Throughout the class she had us break into pairs to discuss questions like, "What are 5 things about your favorite hobby?" (which turned into the students answering with 5 of their favorite hobbies), "What are 5 facts about the United States?", and "What are 5 examples of conjunctions?" She would give the students a few minutes to discuss, then would bring it back to a group discussion, going around the table the discuss the answers. Towards the end of the class, they did a worksheet on simple present vs. present continuous. It was fill-in-the-blank, but the infinitive verb wasn't listed, and sometimes, two words needed to be in one blank. The students seemed very confused and she realized the worksheet was not a good testing measure for their knowledge. She wrote a word bank on the board, then went around the table to discuss which word went with each sentence, then went around again to discuss conjugating it to the correct verb tense. Overall, I think Felicia was a very good teacher and the students we're in a positive learning environment.

Chloe CO #3

For my third classroom observation, I observed one of Angel’s reading classes. The class focused on reading comprehension. They read a story together and answered a list of questions. To begin with, they focused on their knowledge of the main character: They knew she was poor and unhappy about her life. This was followed by asking what they knew about the life she wants- For example, she wants a fancy house, famous friends, she wants to be envied. When a student answered a question, Angel asked them to point out the specific part of the text they were referring to. This helped the rest of the class to understand the answer. The students brainstormed as a class and compared the woman’s values to her husband’s values, making two lists on the board. They came up with adjectives like “materialistic”, “selfish”, or “responsible”. The discussion included many “why” questions: Why is the dinner important to her? Why is she sad about the ticket? Some questions were opinion-based: Are her concerns about jewelry reasonable or foolish? The class also discussed some of the figurative language, such as “drunk on pleasure” (Pointing out that this doesn’t mean she’s actually drunk). I thought the story was a good choice- it seemed to be level-appropriate, and it was quite interesting and entertaining. The class discussion helped students to focus on their reading comprehension and learn from each other.