I had dinner with Chong Zhang tonight and it was my first experience with Chinese culture! She made a huge dinner for Mitchell and I. We enjoyed a nice home cooked meal and talked about her new experiences living in the US. We spoke about the food and I asked for the recipes. She made pork with vegetables and she taught me that the best way to make the pork tender is by putting the salt on it once it is already cooked.
An interesting phrase we taught her was "we'll see". I explained to her the different contexts in which one can use it in. We showed each other pictures of what other foods are typical to our cultures. It was a great cultural exchange!
Thursday, April 28, 2016
Tyler Lee TS#8 Adult
April 21
For our last session, I decided to use my multi-level listening lesson plan to give In-hwa very focused listening practice and experience with extracting the main points from a spoken text to answer questions. We starting with schema building by listening to Bob Marley's song One More Cup of Coffee, and then we had a conversation about the role of coffee, tobacco, tea, and alcohol as social and culturally accepted substances in the US. Once I felt that we had warmed up the topic significantly, I had In-hwa watch the video of Michael Pollan speaking about plant drugs. We then had a comprehension check so that I could decide which level activity that I should assign In-hwa, and I started by assigning her the intermediate exercise--taking notes on the main ideas of what Pollan was saying the first two times through the video, and then answering short response questions the next two times. I realized that after the second listen, In-hwa's notes were still kind of sparse, so I decided that it would be beneficial to go through some of the true and false questions with her as a comprehension check. She got most of them correct, though at this point I realized that the appropriate activity for her to do at this point would be a close test. In the next two listenings she was able to complete the close test correctly and when we went through the short response questions together, I was able to use guiding questions to help her answer them on her own.
This was a great lesson for In-hwa and even though it really challenged her, it helped her realize what kind of focus is really required to improve her listening skills. It was great working with In-hwa these pasts couple months and it was really rewarding to see that I was able to help her improve her English competency and learn valuable information about how to continue to improve by herself.
For our last session, I decided to use my multi-level listening lesson plan to give In-hwa very focused listening practice and experience with extracting the main points from a spoken text to answer questions. We starting with schema building by listening to Bob Marley's song One More Cup of Coffee, and then we had a conversation about the role of coffee, tobacco, tea, and alcohol as social and culturally accepted substances in the US. Once I felt that we had warmed up the topic significantly, I had In-hwa watch the video of Michael Pollan speaking about plant drugs. We then had a comprehension check so that I could decide which level activity that I should assign In-hwa, and I started by assigning her the intermediate exercise--taking notes on the main ideas of what Pollan was saying the first two times through the video, and then answering short response questions the next two times. I realized that after the second listen, In-hwa's notes were still kind of sparse, so I decided that it would be beneficial to go through some of the true and false questions with her as a comprehension check. She got most of them correct, though at this point I realized that the appropriate activity for her to do at this point would be a close test. In the next two listenings she was able to complete the close test correctly and when we went through the short response questions together, I was able to use guiding questions to help her answer them on her own.
This was a great lesson for In-hwa and even though it really challenged her, it helped her realize what kind of focus is really required to improve her listening skills. It was great working with In-hwa these pasts couple months and it was really rewarding to see that I was able to help her improve her English competency and learn valuable information about how to continue to improve by herself.
Tyler Lee TS#7 Adult
April 18
In-hwa presented about Korean culture in her class yesterday and she wanted to talk me through the presentation for me to learn a little bit more about Korean culture and to give her input on her delivery of the topics. As to be expected, her pronunciation with the sounds that we have been working with like <l>, <r>, <w>, <j>, <z>, and <th> is still not perfect, but I can tell that she has been giving more thought to her articulation and she will correct herself sometimes when she recognizes that she used the wrong sound. Luckily, this is not diminishing her fluency significantly and I feel that she has improved her speaking speed since I have been working with her. In-hwa's presentation was very interesting and I learned a lot about marriage customs and cultural expectations in Korean culture especially. After her presentation, I broached the subject of marriage in the US and we watched a short video clip about the evolving definition of marriage in the US, focusing a lot on gay marriage and the reduced religious significance for many of the US citizens. We had a lot of interesting conversation this session and I think that the best thing I've been able to do for In-hwa's development is facilitate speech production, serve as a model, and help correct any grammatical or pronunciation errors that she may make.
In-hwa presented about Korean culture in her class yesterday and she wanted to talk me through the presentation for me to learn a little bit more about Korean culture and to give her input on her delivery of the topics. As to be expected, her pronunciation with the sounds that we have been working with like <l>, <r>, <w>, <j>, <z>, and <th> is still not perfect, but I can tell that she has been giving more thought to her articulation and she will correct herself sometimes when she recognizes that she used the wrong sound. Luckily, this is not diminishing her fluency significantly and I feel that she has improved her speaking speed since I have been working with her. In-hwa's presentation was very interesting and I learned a lot about marriage customs and cultural expectations in Korean culture especially. After her presentation, I broached the subject of marriage in the US and we watched a short video clip about the evolving definition of marriage in the US, focusing a lot on gay marriage and the reduced religious significance for many of the US citizens. We had a lot of interesting conversation this session and I think that the best thing I've been able to do for In-hwa's development is facilitate speech production, serve as a model, and help correct any grammatical or pronunciation errors that she may make.
Tyler Lee TS#6 Adult
April 13
I started our session off a little differently today and we listened to the Stevie Wonder song "Superstition" while following along with the lyrics to the song, pausing after each verse to explain what superstition is, and the implications of things like the number 13, breaking a mirror, seeing a black cat, and other superstitions in American culture. After we listened to the song, I asked In-hwa if there were superstitions in the Korean culture and had her describe some to me. I thought it was really strange that the reason why the number four was unlucky is because is it the same word as death in Korean. Afterwards, I had In-hwa read a short selection on superstition and answer some multiple choice questions that I found on a TEFL website. We did the questions orally and I found that In-hwa's reading comprehension is good and that she can respond fairly well based on information from the text. After this activity we reviewed listening and production of <l>/<r> and <s>/<z> sounds with some minimal pairs, and introduced minimal pairs with <z>/<j> sounds.
In-hwa usually likes the normal structure of our tutoring sessions but it was good to change it up for today and do some work that was a little less formal and more culturally informative.
I started our session off a little differently today and we listened to the Stevie Wonder song "Superstition" while following along with the lyrics to the song, pausing after each verse to explain what superstition is, and the implications of things like the number 13, breaking a mirror, seeing a black cat, and other superstitions in American culture. After we listened to the song, I asked In-hwa if there were superstitions in the Korean culture and had her describe some to me. I thought it was really strange that the reason why the number four was unlucky is because is it the same word as death in Korean. Afterwards, I had In-hwa read a short selection on superstition and answer some multiple choice questions that I found on a TEFL website. We did the questions orally and I found that In-hwa's reading comprehension is good and that she can respond fairly well based on information from the text. After this activity we reviewed listening and production of <l>/<r> and <s>/<z> sounds with some minimal pairs, and introduced minimal pairs with <z>/<j> sounds.
In-hwa usually likes the normal structure of our tutoring sessions but it was good to change it up for today and do some work that was a little less formal and more culturally informative.
Tyler Lee TS#5 Adult
April 11Because In-hwa had an in-class debate this week on whether coffee or tea was best, we warmed up by debating the topic for a few minutes and I encouraged her to argue her case for coffee against my case for tea, correcting any errors she may have and helping to make any of her arguments more clear. Since I was hungry at the beginning of our session, we started talking about food; I had In-hwa tell me a bit about her favorite foods
from Korea and I shared some of my favorite foods with her. To prime her for the speaking lesson I had prepared for class, I directed the conversation to talk about healthy food choices that are also delicious. After the conversation warm
up, I decided it would be appropriate to have In-hwa make a list of five bits of advice she would have for a foreigner visiting Korea on what to (or what not to) eat and drink in order to develop and maintain good health in the country, foucsing on tips that a foreigner might not already know and might benefit from knowing. Once she finished with this, she gave me her advice, and I responded with some of my own suggestions based on my experiences in the US. I ended the session by giving In-hwa another diagram showing tongue placement to aid with pronunciation of vowel sounds and doing a short minimal pair activity with short and long vowel sounds found in the pair want/went.
Tyler Lee TS #4 Adult
April 6
Like usual, we started our session with a conversation warm up; we talked about our families, how much we miss them, how many siblings we had, and other generalities. Once the topic was primed, I had In-hwa speed write for 10 minutes to tell me as much about her family as she could and after error correction we spoke more specifically about our relationships with family members and recalled specific memories with them. I know In-hwa misses her family in Korea, but I did find out that she actually lives with her oldest sister who is in Tallahassee. I feel that my strategy of getting In-hwa to produce a lot of language in the first half of our sessions is showing its value, and even though she still pauses a lot and is uncertain at times, she is beginning to convey ideas more smoothly and in less time. After this, I gave In-Hwa a printout depicting tongue positioning for consonant sounds to serve as a visual aid to help with her pronunciation. We did listening and production of sounds using minimal pairs with <f>/<p>, <l>/ <r>/<w>, and <s>/<z>. In-hwa's listening for these sounds has improved a lot judging from the listening quizzes that we have been doing every session, and she is starting to be able to articulate some of the minimal pairs clearly so that I can understand which she is using.
Like usual, we started our session with a conversation warm up; we talked about our families, how much we miss them, how many siblings we had, and other generalities. Once the topic was primed, I had In-hwa speed write for 10 minutes to tell me as much about her family as she could and after error correction we spoke more specifically about our relationships with family members and recalled specific memories with them. I know In-hwa misses her family in Korea, but I did find out that she actually lives with her oldest sister who is in Tallahassee. I feel that my strategy of getting In-hwa to produce a lot of language in the first half of our sessions is showing its value, and even though she still pauses a lot and is uncertain at times, she is beginning to convey ideas more smoothly and in less time. After this, I gave In-Hwa a printout depicting tongue positioning for consonant sounds to serve as a visual aid to help with her pronunciation. We did listening and production of sounds using minimal pairs with <f>/<p>, <l>/ <r>/<w>, and <s>/<z>. In-hwa's listening for these sounds has improved a lot judging from the listening quizzes that we have been doing every session, and she is starting to be able to articulate some of the minimal pairs clearly so that I can understand which she is using.
Tyler Lee TS#3 Adult
April 4
To start this session, In-hwa and I spoke about how her debate went; even though she received a B grade for the test, she was not happy with her performance and said that she froze up and forgot what her argument points were. I explained to In-hwa that it is going to be difficult, but the only way to get past this problem is going to be to learn how to think in English instead of translating Korean thoughts into English words. To start building fluency I had In-hwa speed write for 10 minutes about a simple topic-- describe your hometown and what you like to do there. I told her to just write as much as possible in the time limit and don't worry too much about making grammar errors, though I could tell that after years of programming it was a difficult task for her. After reading the writing sample, we spoke about the same topic with the same idea, try to keep it simple and think in English when speaking. I have noticed that the thing In-hwa needs the most is practice with generating speech and building fluency. After this exercise, we worked more on listening and pronunciation using minimal pairs. We reviewed <l> and <r> and then worked on weak vowel sounds <e> and <i>. Showing In-hwa a diagram that depicts tongue position when producing <l> and <r> sounds has helped, but as we know, it will always be a challenge for a native speaker of Korean to produce these sounds like a native speaker of English; she is definitely showing some progress though.
To start this session, In-hwa and I spoke about how her debate went; even though she received a B grade for the test, she was not happy with her performance and said that she froze up and forgot what her argument points were. I explained to In-hwa that it is going to be difficult, but the only way to get past this problem is going to be to learn how to think in English instead of translating Korean thoughts into English words. To start building fluency I had In-hwa speed write for 10 minutes about a simple topic-- describe your hometown and what you like to do there. I told her to just write as much as possible in the time limit and don't worry too much about making grammar errors, though I could tell that after years of programming it was a difficult task for her. After reading the writing sample, we spoke about the same topic with the same idea, try to keep it simple and think in English when speaking. I have noticed that the thing In-hwa needs the most is practice with generating speech and building fluency. After this exercise, we worked more on listening and pronunciation using minimal pairs. We reviewed <l> and <r> and then worked on weak vowel sounds <e> and <i>. Showing In-hwa a diagram that depicts tongue position when producing <l> and <r> sounds has helped, but as we know, it will always be a challenge for a native speaker of Korean to produce these sounds like a native speaker of English; she is definitely showing some progress though.
Tyler Lee TS#2 Adult
March 28
We met at the CIES courtyard again and started the session with some warm up conversation to give me a better opportunity to hear In-hwa generate speech, listening for phonemes that prove particularly difficult for her to pronounce and for errors in grammar. After our conversation warm up, In-hwa shared her debate topic for her speaking test; even though her opinion of the topic is the opposite of what she has been asked to debate, she is to argue that students should be allowed to carry guns on FSU campus. At first I had her argue her true opinion, which is that students should not be allowed to carry guns on campus, and I argued against her, giving her examples of arguments that she could use for her case. I think providing these examples for her helped her to understand how to navigate her use of rhetoric and to think about what counter arguments that she should be ready for. For the last portion of the session we focused on minimal pair pronunciation exercises for the phonemes <l> and <r> and the phonemes <s>, <z>, and <th>.
We met at the CIES courtyard again and started the session with some warm up conversation to give me a better opportunity to hear In-hwa generate speech, listening for phonemes that prove particularly difficult for her to pronounce and for errors in grammar. After our conversation warm up, In-hwa shared her debate topic for her speaking test; even though her opinion of the topic is the opposite of what she has been asked to debate, she is to argue that students should be allowed to carry guns on FSU campus. At first I had her argue her true opinion, which is that students should not be allowed to carry guns on campus, and I argued against her, giving her examples of arguments that she could use for her case. I think providing these examples for her helped her to understand how to navigate her use of rhetoric and to think about what counter arguments that she should be ready for. For the last portion of the session we focused on minimal pair pronunciation exercises for the phonemes <l> and <r> and the phonemes <s>, <z>, and <th>.
Tyler Lee TS#1 Adult
March 21
I met In-hwa in the common room at CIES in the afternoon. It was a beautiful day to be outside so we went out to the courtyard to become acquainted with one another and to begin our tutoring. In-hwa has studied English for many years in Korea, but because of the heavy focus on reading and writing competency and the lack of focus on listening and speaking in the Korean approach to English education, she finds it very difficult to link ideas together fluidly and does not usually think in English; instead, she usually thinks in Korean and then translates what she wants to say into English. In-hwa also communicated to me that she often has great difficulty pronouncing words correctly and wants to work on producing better English sounds. After doing a bit of evaluation orally, I had In-hwa write for 10 minutes about her trip to New York that she took for spring break so that I could see where her errors were and how difficult it was for her to generate written language quickly. For our next meeting we will work on minimal pair pronunciation drills, and work to prepare arguments for debate topics that will be used in her speaking exam next week.
I met In-hwa in the common room at CIES in the afternoon. It was a beautiful day to be outside so we went out to the courtyard to become acquainted with one another and to begin our tutoring. In-hwa has studied English for many years in Korea, but because of the heavy focus on reading and writing competency and the lack of focus on listening and speaking in the Korean approach to English education, she finds it very difficult to link ideas together fluidly and does not usually think in English; instead, she usually thinks in Korean and then translates what she wants to say into English. In-hwa also communicated to me that she often has great difficulty pronouncing words correctly and wants to work on producing better English sounds. After doing a bit of evaluation orally, I had In-hwa write for 10 minutes about her trip to New York that she took for spring break so that I could see where her errors were and how difficult it was for her to generate written language quickly. For our next meeting we will work on minimal pair pronunciation drills, and work to prepare arguments for debate topics that will be used in her speaking exam next week.
Tyler Lee CP#6 In-hwa
In-hwa and I had our last meeting at Korean Barbecue for dinner on Tuesday evening because I found out that she had never been before and because I was really craving some good sweet potato noodles and kimchi. In-hwa was surprised to find out that I am a vegetarian and laughed because I wasn't going to eat meat at a barbecue restaurant, which is fair enough! In-hwa told me that she really likes to cook and that she and her boyfriend like to do so often; I told her that I need some good kimchi recipes but I'm not sure if I'll be getting her cooking secrets any time soon. She ordered the sashimi bowl and I learned that her favorite fish is grouper, so naturally I had to share some of my grandfather's fishing stories with her. I pulled up some old photos that my grandfather had taken in the 60s with enormous goliath groupers that weighed over 500 pounds and In-hwa was incredulous. I still am when I look at the photos, but it's always fun to show the photos to other people. We spent the rest of dinner sharing interesting family stories until it was time to leave. I really enjoyed spending some free time with In-hwa and getting dinner as an informal end to our meetings and am glad to have met her!
Tyler Lee CP #5 In-hwa
I met In-hwa for coffee on Monday
afternoon at the Starbucks across from CIES. In-hwa likes more involved drinks,
whereas I'm more of a black house coffee guy myself.
Although we spent
quite a bit of time together for tutoring sessions, it was nice to just spend some time chatting with her instead of tutoring and helping her do work for classes. In-hwa has been away from home for a very long time and she shared with me that even though she has had a good time in Tallahassee and has a boyfriend here, she is ready to go back to Korea and be with her family and friends. CIES seems like a very good program but also appears to be very demanding for students, academically and emotionally, and I'm sure if I was in her shoes I would be ready to return home as well. When she mentioned to me that she had a boyfriend, I was a bit surprised because I had never heard anything about him before; In-hwa met him at her church and he seems to be a very intelligent and driven Korean man who is doing post-doc research at FSU. I didn't feel like it was appropriate to ask, but I wonder if they will continue their relationship when she leaves.
Tyler Lee CP#4 Do-Jun
I spoke with Do-jun again on Monday at the same time. He had a very long day because inspectors from a Chinese airline company visited the airline company he works at to verify safety standards and other logistics as part of a yearly census. Do-jun told me that because Korea is a popular destination for Chinese tourists, it is to their benefit to meet Chinese standards exactly so as to facilitate a good line of business through the two entities. Do-jun explained to me that he is glad that he is working in aviation because it is what he studied in school but that he wishes that he could take more time off from work to do more traveling. His regret is that he took a job right out of university in stead of studying abroad in the US, but he has hopes to spend a significant amount of time here in the future. He explained to me that even though he has visited the northwest US for business trips, he would much rather visit Florida and enjoy the warm weather and the ocean. Being from Key West, I told him a lot about my hometown and all of the things that I would recommend him to do when he gets the opportunity to make it there. Do-Jun's hometown is Busan and he told me that he has taken several trips to Jeju island, where I should make sure to visit if I am ever able to travel to Korea. It definitely looks beautiful.
Tyler Lee CP#3 Abdullah
I met Abdullah at Black Dog Cafe on Sunday afternoon to have some coffee and meet each other. I had heard great things about him from Mitch and Wonmi so I thought it would be a good idea to contact him and plan a meeting with him. Abdullah's competency is what I would consider to be advanced, and he very rarely had to ask me to repeat a word or phrase. Abdullah is from Saudi Arabia and is an engineer looking to get his master's degree in the US in engineering administration; since I know nothing about engineering and had never met anyone from Saudi Arabia before, I learned a lot from our interaction. Abdullah worked at a desalinization plant on the coast of the Red Sea and informed me that Saudi Arabia has the most sophisticated plant of its kind in the world. I knew that there was not much fresh water in Saudi Arabia, but he really struck the point home when he told me that their desalinization plants have to be very efficient and sophisticated or else people wouldn't have water at all. Even though freshwater scarcity is becoming a larger issue for many places around the world, it seems that Saudi Arabia is at the most extreme of these conditions. I also learned that while much of Saudi Arabia can reach as high as 50 degrees Celsius in the summer, his home, Abha, is in the mountains and maintains comfortable temperatures. If I were to ever visit Saudi Arabia, I would definitely go there, especially after seeing the photos that Abdullah showed me. He is a very kind person and very interesting to talk to.
Tyler Lee CP#2 Do-Jun
I spoke with Do-Jun at 9AM which is 10PM in Seoul, something that was very interesting to me. While I was sipping on my morning coffee, Do-Jun was winding down from his day hanging out with his girlfriend and doing chores around the house that he doesn't usually have time to do during the week. Do-Jun is very friendly and his English is very good, though he denied it when I mentioned it to him in true Korean fashion. I learned that Do-Jun works in aviation at an airline company that services Korea, Japan, China, and a few other locations in Asia, and that he has to communicate with some of these people in English from time to time since it is their only shared language, something I also found very intriguing. We spent a good amount of time comparing and contrasting each other's cultures, and Do-jun was particularly interested in travel and sports, and I found out that he really enjoys baseball and soccer. I was surprised to find out that he was 38 years old, just as he was surprised that my last name was Lee; I told him that he would have his youth into his old age, and he said that I may have that luck too if I could find my Korean family. I think it would be fun to spend time with Do-jun and it's unfortunate that we cannot be in the same location to chat and have a drink, but I enjoyed my conversation with him.
Tyler Lee CP#1 Jaime
I met Jaime at his apartment and I was very surprised when I met him, because for one reason or another I expected him to be a student closer to my age. Jaime is a 75 year-old Angolan man that lives in Portugal and is a very accomplished lawyer and businessman. I took Jaime to Proof to have a couple beers and I learned that the sole reason for Jaime being here is to study English because he has always wanted to do so; his only motivation seems to be internal and he expressed to me that he wants to be an example for his children, to show them that they can continue learning and accomplishing new things well into their old age. Jaime's story inspired me and made me think of all of the older people in our country that retire and slowly stagnate into their older years, waiting for the end instead of filling every moment that they have with meaningful living. Jaime often has to pause for extended periods of time to say what he wants to in English, though most of what he cared to communicate was able to be understood. There were a couple occasions when I had to speak Portuguese with him to explain a concept, like the difference between tipping at a bar and tipping at a restaurant, or to clarify something that he had said, but he is determined to learn English. Jaime loves beer and jazz music, and so do I; I think we're going to be friends.
*I was never able to get back in touch with Jaime, so I guess I thought wrong!
*I was never able to get back in touch with Jaime, so I guess I thought wrong!
Tyler Lee TS#8 Child
April 25
During our last session I decided to focus on travel since Andy will be returning to Korea in June. He is very excited to return and see his family and friends; I am very curious how his time speaking, listening, reading, and writing in English here will impact his further English acquisition in the future. I introduced some vocabulary related to travel and we spoke of different modes of travel--by boat, train, car, plane, and bus. When I asked Andy what his favorite part about coming to Tallahassee was, he responded that his favorite thing about Tallahassee was going to Cancun (this made me laugh). This answer prompted me to find some visuals of Cancun and other destinations, and using photos as a reference, I led him into an activity describing these places and what mode of travel he would use to get to them. Because Andy is only six, he doesn't use many adjectives to describe what he is talking about, so this activity was useful because it gives him an immediate visual to base his descriptions on.
I learned a lot about teaching from working with Andy and even though I enjoyed my time with him and found it to be a rewarding experience, I have found that I prefer tutoring older students.
During our last session I decided to focus on travel since Andy will be returning to Korea in June. He is very excited to return and see his family and friends; I am very curious how his time speaking, listening, reading, and writing in English here will impact his further English acquisition in the future. I introduced some vocabulary related to travel and we spoke of different modes of travel--by boat, train, car, plane, and bus. When I asked Andy what his favorite part about coming to Tallahassee was, he responded that his favorite thing about Tallahassee was going to Cancun (this made me laugh). This answer prompted me to find some visuals of Cancun and other destinations, and using photos as a reference, I led him into an activity describing these places and what mode of travel he would use to get to them. Because Andy is only six, he doesn't use many adjectives to describe what he is talking about, so this activity was useful because it gives him an immediate visual to base his descriptions on.
I learned a lot about teaching from working with Andy and even though I enjoyed my time with him and found it to be a rewarding experience, I have found that I prefer tutoring older students.
Tyler Lee TS#7 Child
April 13
Andy has been learning about space in his science class at school, and since it seems to interest him very much, I thought it would be a good idea to incorporate it into the session. We read a basic book about space, learned some new related vocabulary, and then focused on writing some sentences using the vocabulary that included words like explore, comet, and orbit. I found a short video about space exploration that helped to add some good visual context to what we were talking about and increased Andy's motivation for doing more activities in the session. After this, we played some online space-themed grammar games to start differentiating the concepts of past progressive and past simple tenses and I finished the session by facilitating a conversation utilizing both structures and helping Andy to do so as well. I have found that while Andy hasn't truly acquired productive use of past progressive, he mostly demonstrates that it is in his receptive knowledge.
Andy has been learning about space in his science class at school, and since it seems to interest him very much, I thought it would be a good idea to incorporate it into the session. We read a basic book about space, learned some new related vocabulary, and then focused on writing some sentences using the vocabulary that included words like explore, comet, and orbit. I found a short video about space exploration that helped to add some good visual context to what we were talking about and increased Andy's motivation for doing more activities in the session. After this, we played some online space-themed grammar games to start differentiating the concepts of past progressive and past simple tenses and I finished the session by facilitating a conversation utilizing both structures and helping Andy to do so as well. I have found that while Andy hasn't truly acquired productive use of past progressive, he mostly demonstrates that it is in his receptive knowledge.
Tyler Lee TS#6 Child
April 6
Andy and I continued to work on using simple past tense and continued using grammar games to reduce the affective filter and increase motivation ( I remembered to bring some chocolates too). Two of the grammar games that we played involved story telling. The goal of the activity was to get Andy using his imagination while creating a short paragraph telling a story and to effectively use the simple past tense to do so. I introduced the past progressive form, though only expected Andy to be able to produce past tense phrases and sentences. We did this activity collaboratively and I provided scaffolding and suggestions as to how to make the sentences more descriptive and how to carry the story forward. Andy chose to write about monsters chasing us through a forest. The next game we played was a tic-tac-toe hybrid where each person takes turns and tells a truth or a lie using past-tense verbs; when the other person guesses whether the sentence was true or false, they get to take their turn in the tic-tac-toe match. Andy seems to enjoy these lessons and I feel that I am finally beginning to understand what it takes to teach younger students.
Andy and I continued to work on using simple past tense and continued using grammar games to reduce the affective filter and increase motivation ( I remembered to bring some chocolates too). Two of the grammar games that we played involved story telling. The goal of the activity was to get Andy using his imagination while creating a short paragraph telling a story and to effectively use the simple past tense to do so. I introduced the past progressive form, though only expected Andy to be able to produce past tense phrases and sentences. We did this activity collaboratively and I provided scaffolding and suggestions as to how to make the sentences more descriptive and how to carry the story forward. Andy chose to write about monsters chasing us through a forest. The next game we played was a tic-tac-toe hybrid where each person takes turns and tells a truth or a lie using past-tense verbs; when the other person guesses whether the sentence was true or false, they get to take their turn in the tic-tac-toe match. Andy seems to enjoy these lessons and I feel that I am finally beginning to understand what it takes to teach younger students.
Tyler Lee TS#5 Child
March 30
This session was notably better than the last, and I feel that we were able to get in a lot of meaningful grammar practice and speech production. Kyoungbo had a talk with Andy after our difficulties last week and I came prepared with chocolate for a motivational reward and with several grammar games loaded onto my laptop. Andy frequently makes conjugation errors when using simple past tense to talk about his experiences, so we focused on games that facilitate its use. The games would present a sentence with a missing verb and Andy had to choose the correct multiple-choice answer to fill in the blank with the proper simple past tense verb. Between games we had conversation practice and focused on producing speech using the simple past tense and as long as Andy was attentive and participated, I gave him a piece of chocolate as I had promised him earlier. It's kind of amazing to me how much motivation can be yielded from game-ifying grammar lessons, rewards, and parental intervention.
This session was notably better than the last, and I feel that we were able to get in a lot of meaningful grammar practice and speech production. Kyoungbo had a talk with Andy after our difficulties last week and I came prepared with chocolate for a motivational reward and with several grammar games loaded onto my laptop. Andy frequently makes conjugation errors when using simple past tense to talk about his experiences, so we focused on games that facilitate its use. The games would present a sentence with a missing verb and Andy had to choose the correct multiple-choice answer to fill in the blank with the proper simple past tense verb. Between games we had conversation practice and focused on producing speech using the simple past tense and as long as Andy was attentive and participated, I gave him a piece of chocolate as I had promised him earlier. It's kind of amazing to me how much motivation can be yielded from game-ifying grammar lessons, rewards, and parental intervention.
Tyler Lee TS#4 Child
March 23
This session was distinctly difficult and I'm not sure if it was because Andy had a long day, because he is six years old, or both. When Kyoungbo left, Andy was acting particularly shy and would only answer me with sounds when I asked him a question or tried speaking with him. I was finally able to solicit a response when I suggested that we use his colored pencils to do some of his homework (that did actually require the use of colored pencils). The direction for the homework exercise was to color the picture of every object that started with K and the exercise quickly devolved into color scribbles and sparsely-worded responses to any attempt I tried at coaxing meaningful speech production from him. Eventually, I suggested that we try to write some sentences that use adjectives to describe something, but Andy refused to do anything that resembled work and insisted on drawing only. At this point I stopped Andy and told him that we needed to put the pencils away if he wasn't able to use them and work with me at the same time; the rest of the session consisted of me trying to talk to him and facilitate speech production while keeping him from trying to take his pencils out again. When I suggested we read a book, Andy just wanted to look at the pictures and did not have any desire to attempt to read any words. Needless to say, this session was very frustrating and a bit enlightening for me. I told Kyoungbo about the experience and that it would be best to leave the pencils at home next time.
This session was distinctly difficult and I'm not sure if it was because Andy had a long day, because he is six years old, or both. When Kyoungbo left, Andy was acting particularly shy and would only answer me with sounds when I asked him a question or tried speaking with him. I was finally able to solicit a response when I suggested that we use his colored pencils to do some of his homework (that did actually require the use of colored pencils). The direction for the homework exercise was to color the picture of every object that started with K and the exercise quickly devolved into color scribbles and sparsely-worded responses to any attempt I tried at coaxing meaningful speech production from him. Eventually, I suggested that we try to write some sentences that use adjectives to describe something, but Andy refused to do anything that resembled work and insisted on drawing only. At this point I stopped Andy and told him that we needed to put the pencils away if he wasn't able to use them and work with me at the same time; the rest of the session consisted of me trying to talk to him and facilitate speech production while keeping him from trying to take his pencils out again. When I suggested we read a book, Andy just wanted to look at the pictures and did not have any desire to attempt to read any words. Needless to say, this session was very frustrating and a bit enlightening for me. I told Kyoungbo about the experience and that it would be best to leave the pencils at home next time.
Tyler Lee TS#3 Child
March 16
For this session I had Kyoungbo bring in some of Andy's homework from school so that I could see what he was doing in his classes and hopefully implement some of the material into our lessons. Andy was not very excited to do homework and insisted that we read a book, so I suggested that we read a book of his choice as a reward once we finished an activity. For example, the activity for his English class involved words starting with J, and so I used the different words involved to get Andy talking about his experiences and knowledge about each of the words and related vocabulary and concepts. After completing the homework assignment, we read another superhero book and I brought his focus on adjectives that were used and how they modified the subject that they referred to. Once finished with the short book, I worked with Andy to make sentences using each of the words from his assignment and showed him how to use adjectives to write more descriptive sentences.
For this session I had Kyoungbo bring in some of Andy's homework from school so that I could see what he was doing in his classes and hopefully implement some of the material into our lessons. Andy was not very excited to do homework and insisted that we read a book, so I suggested that we read a book of his choice as a reward once we finished an activity. For example, the activity for his English class involved words starting with J, and so I used the different words involved to get Andy talking about his experiences and knowledge about each of the words and related vocabulary and concepts. After completing the homework assignment, we read another superhero book and I brought his focus on adjectives that were used and how they modified the subject that they referred to. Once finished with the short book, I worked with Andy to make sentences using each of the words from his assignment and showed him how to use adjectives to write more descriptive sentences.
Wednesday, April 27, 2016
Isik TS #8 with Michaella Malone
Tutoring Section 8 with Michaella
Date/Time: April 24, 2016/ 10:00 a.m.-11:00a.m.
Location: Starbucks near the Trader Joe’s on the Thomasville
Road
Topic/Skill: Grammar and Descriptive Writing /The practice
of descriptive writing
Feedback provided to tutee: In the descriptive writing,
reader should be visualizing being in the moment of what I am describing.
-the purpose of describing a person, place, or thing
-must pay close attention to detail and should use your five
senses
-use lots of adjectives!
Example:
The river was a fragile, universe-blue color, like the
subtle sweep of a painter’s brush.
Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I
brainstormed for 5-10 minutes, and then I wrote this essay below:
“Jogging in the woods
Jogging is my favorite daily activity. In my busy schedule,
I always find time to go out and the exercise. It refreshes my thoughts and
ideas. It builds my muscles to be strong.
While I am jogging, I observe the nature; long and narrow
pine, cheerful cardinals, playful squirrel, and even dears. The nature changes
by seasons in the woods. The color changes on the leaves are spectacular in the
fall. Some threes have several hues of yellow, red, and brown. I like to watch
them while I am jogging.
In this beauty, when I see a dead squirrel, it is very
disturbing. I start blaming careless and cruel drivers. I lose my concentration
of jogging and worry about the creatures’ future in the wood, because cars are
increasing in the subdivision. “
Isik TS #7 with Michaella Malone
Tutoring Section 7 with Michaella
Date/Time: April 15, 2016/ 9:30 a.m.-11:00a.m.
Location: Starbucks near the Trader Joe’s on the Thomasville
Road
Topic/Skill: Grammar and Informative (direct) writing/the
practice of Beginning Sentence Correction 6 and writing an informative essay for
the article titled; “2 Years After Boko Haram Kidnapping, the Search Goes On
for Nigerian Girls” from the New York
Times: http://nyti.ms/20DylmA
Feedback provided to tutee: During the practice of Beginning
Sentence Correction 6, Michaella gave me an important feedback about the
question of “who is coming to dinner?” I thought for bunch of people I should
use “are” instead of “is.” She explained to me even I am asking for more than
one person I should say or write “is.” Example is who is coming to dinner?”
Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: During
the writing section what I learned from Michaella is the importance of first
paragraph in informative/direct writing. This is the paragraph that catches the
reader. We worked on my first paragraph.
Mitch TS #16 Adult
This is my last blog entry. I am writing about a tutoring session I had with Isik quite a while ago, but forgot to log into the blog. During this tutoring session we did just about what we always do. We started out doing multiple choice questions related to writing style and grammar, but today what was different was that after we completed this, we practiced some short writing activities where she wrote a mock recommendation and some other mock writing samples. Although they are not that useful for her writing, I think these mock assignments help her with her speech, because she is speed writing, and makes similar mistakes to those in her speech. In this way, I was able to pick apart her speech and correct her short compositions. As my last post, I will say that tutoring Isik was a great experience for me and I think that it gave me a lot of confidence in tutoring and teaching adults and high school students during my stay in Spain.
Isik TS#6 with Michaella Malone
Tutoring Section 6 with Michaella
Date/Time: April 10, 2016/ 2:00 p.m.-3:00p.m.
Location: Starbucks near the Trader Joe’s on the Thomasville
Road
Topic/Skill: Grammar/Proofreading of Student Project:
Creating a Society
Feedback provided to tutee: Michaella and I get together to
work on my class project for my students. It is a group project for 4-5 students.
Students will create an imaginary society. I brought my written project to
Michaella to work on grammar in use. We
looked at all power points slides and my imaginary society as an example of the
project. She gave me the feedback on my writing style and grammar.
Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I
corrected my inconsistent and mismatch headlines of the slides. The explanation
of the topic continued between the slides, so I should give same headline for
each slide. I should be careful if I am writing the dates. For example I should
add nd, rd…, It should be 2nd, 3rd…
Isik TS#5 with Michaella Malone
Tutoring Section 5 with Michaella
Date/Time: April 6, 2016/ 4:00 p.m.-5:00p.m.
Location: French café/pastry: Au-Peche-Mignion
Topic/Skill: Idioms and Opinionated Writing/Writing an opinionated essay for the Article: “Air France Faces Backlash Over Veil Policy on Route to Iran”
from New York Times Web Site: http://myti.ms/1q3IHJN
Feedback provided to tutee: MIchaella brought me idioms:
1. Stick my neck out
Meaning: taking a risk for someone else
Example: Why should I stick my neck out for them? They never
paid me back before
2. All thumbs
Meaning: clumsy and awkward
Example: I’m all thumbs because I’m so nervous for my test.
3. Spilled the beans
Meaning: told someone before they were suppose to know
Example: he was planning on surprising her with a vacation,
but her sister spilled the beans.
4. Hang on
Meaning: to persevere; to not give up
Example: the business had many years of financial trouble,
but somehow they were able to hang on.
5. Money talks
Meaning: Money has the power to influence people
Example: We’ve been waiting 3 months for our delivery, and
people who put their orders in after have gotten theirs. I guess money talks.
Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I read the article and underlined information
that I used for my writing, and I wrote my opinionated essay;
“One of the international business strategies is to deal
with cultural requirements of host country. Air France wants to make a business
with Iran; however Iran has a standard dress code for female flight attendance.
Air France accepts it and sent a memo to the employees.
Two opposite views reacted to this decision. The national
Union of Flights Attendances responded to memo as “an attack on freedom of
conscience.” Air France relented, saying
the assignment would be voluntary. Airline also said to le Monde, the French
newspaper “This obligation, which therefore does not apply during the flight,
is respected by all international airlines serving the Republic of Iran.
Women dress code shouldn’t be a business strategy or
competition tool between companies. Union made an effective step up to protect
women employees. “
Tuesday, April 26, 2016
Michaella CP#6
Tuesday, April 26th, 2016
Today my friends and I met Maddie for lunch at the Hecht House. We walked to tropical smoothie and enjoyed some time together before making our way back to CIES. We sat outside and talked about Maddie's new classes. She even has Professor Kim for listening class! She did mention that she misses some of her friends from last semester, but hopefully she will make new friends soon. Next, Maddie and I took my friends around the CIES building. We showed them the conference room, the student lounge, and some of the classrooms. It was cool to interact with the other students who were getting ready for class as well. Before we left, we walked Maddie to her Speaking class. She joked that we were like her mom dropping her off at school. I am glad we got to spend part of our day with her, because this might be the last time I get to hang with Maddie before I graduate :(
Today my friends and I met Maddie for lunch at the Hecht House. We walked to tropical smoothie and enjoyed some time together before making our way back to CIES. We sat outside and talked about Maddie's new classes. She even has Professor Kim for listening class! She did mention that she misses some of her friends from last semester, but hopefully she will make new friends soon. Next, Maddie and I took my friends around the CIES building. We showed them the conference room, the student lounge, and some of the classrooms. It was cool to interact with the other students who were getting ready for class as well. Before we left, we walked Maddie to her Speaking class. She joked that we were like her mom dropping her off at school. I am glad we got to spend part of our day with her, because this might be the last time I get to hang with Maddie before I graduate :(
Michaella CP#5
Monday, April 25th, 2016
Maddie and I went to dinner at Taco Republik. We shared guacamole, and we each tried different tacos. It was delicious and the perfect spot to meet! We spent the majority of our time talking about traveling and food, two of our favorite things in life. She told me about these Peruvian chocolate candies called Dona Pepa. Every time she would visit Peru, she would take a huge box back home to Panama and sell them at school. We talked about some of her favorite places she visited in Barcelona as well. I was writing everything down so I can check them out when I am in Spain. Maddie is planning on visiting me while I am over there which would be so fun! We talked about traveling to nearby countries, like France and Italy. Hopefully next year she will have the time to come visit :)
Erika CP #5
I met with Abdullah on Sunday to play pool. We talked about final exams in the US and how I am graduating this week. He told me about how he hasn't been accepted to an American university yet so, he will most likely have to go back to Saudi Arabia by July. It's such a shame. He loves speaking English and I know that he wanted to stay here longer.
We also talked about our favorite shows, 80's music, and I showed him some funny dance moves (the q-tip and the shopping cart).
We played three rounds of pool and there are obviously differences with the rules he plays by and the ones I have learned! By his rules he won all three rounds, but by mine, I would have won once. I'm looking forward to our next meeting!
We also talked about our favorite shows, 80's music, and I showed him some funny dance moves (the q-tip and the shopping cart).
We played three rounds of pool and there are obviously differences with the rules he plays by and the ones I have learned! By his rules he won all three rounds, but by mine, I would have won once. I'm looking forward to our next meeting!
Erika TS #8 Child
I had my last tutoring session with Astin on Saturday. I had printed out a few work sheets for him to work on that tested reading comprehension. There were two short passages (1 paragraph each) and they had questions that followed. We were not able to finish the second one since he was losing focus, so then we talked about his school, friends, and favorite food as a way to practice productive speech. After this short "break" of talking, he read a little more and then our session was over. As closure to the lesson we went over sounds that vowels make when there are two vowels next to eachother (example: 'ou' sounds like 'ow!'). I am really going to miss this little guy!
Erika TS #8 Adult
I had my last tutoring session with In-Hwa on Friday and we covered vocabulary. We went over a list of American phrases I had prepared for her. My mom had trouble understanding these when I was younger, so I figured that they would be difficult for foreigners to understand because they are not literal. The list was the following: 1. A bigger bang for your buck
2. As easy as pie/ piece of cake
3.Between a rock and a hard place
4. Break a leg
5. Catch 22
6. Brownie points
7. Chick flick
8. Close but no cigar
9. In the bag
10. New kid on the block
The first time we went over these, I defined them and gave her an example. The second time, I asked her to give me her own definition of the phrases at random. The third time, I asked her to give my hypothetical scenarios in which she would use these phrases.
Monday, April 25, 2016
Mitch CP #6
Today was my last conversation partner meeting with Abdullah. Abdullah loves to play pool with us now. It is pretty much all he wants to do. So, Abdullah and I went to play pool. I taught him all kinds of interesting things today. I told him about how Americans like fishing and boating as hobbies, I told him about some hobbies that I have. He told me about how he finds it strange that every building in America seems to play music constantly. I thought this was interesting, as I had never noticed this about our country until he mentioned it. There is ALWAYS music playing, in ever store, restaurant and mall. We had more exchanges about the differences in our two cultures, and it was really interesting to hear all that he thought. He told me more about how life is in Saudi Arabia and in other middle eastern cities. I found it all very interesting. This is my last required meeting, but I have made friends with Abdullah and will most likely meet him again before the semester ends. This is another lasting impact that this TEFL program has made on me.
Mitch TS # 15 child
Last Sunday was my last tutoring session with Astin. I did not expect to get so attached while tutoring him these last few weeks, but it was genuinely sad that it was my last time. I kept my promise in making this lesson fun. It was far more relaxed than his other lessons. We went over new vocabulary, and we did some more of his favorite word-searches. We also reread one of his favorite books, and I focused on pronunciation and complete understanding, because he does not have trouble reading this book. After our lesson was over, to our surprise, Astin and his mother had some small presents for Erika and I, and thanked both of us for being his teachers. I can describe this as the moment that made me excited for what I have set out to do. Astin genuinely was going to miss us, and said bye so many times. Seeing that impact I had made on his life was tear jerking, and it was very rewarding. I think it was a good sentiment for the last session. I am ready to go do this abroad!
Mitch TS #14 Child
On Monday the 18th was my second to last meeting with Astin. Astin and I did more or less what we usually do. We started out by going through his English homework and I did not give away any answers, but helped him through the various activities and assisted him where he had issues. In addition to this, his mother asked me to have a conversation with him about what cheating was and why it was bad. It was interesting, he was very sad he got yelled at, but when I was explaining it to him, it turns out he did not understand at all what he had done wrong or why he had gotten yelled at. After explaining it, it seems that he understood and promised me he would not do it again at school. We then read one of the books from his favorite series, and did a series of word search exercises in which I incorporated both reading and vocabulary. I asked him to read all the words, rewrite them, then tell me what they meant, and finally when he was done he could do the fun part: find them! He loves these exercises, and even though he always wants to skip to finding them, I use that to my advantage as intrinsic motivation for him to get through the work part of it first. Astin was sad that he only got to see me one more time, and I told him next time I would make the lesson fun because he had been such a good student.
Isik TS#8 with Mitchell Hudson
Tutoring Section 8 with Mitchell Hudson
Date/Time: April 7, 2016/ 10:50 a.m.-11:50 a.m.
Location: CIES
Topic/Skill: Grammar/ to write a e-mail message to a faculty
member for a job position
Feedback provided to tutee: I was planning to apply to a
job. I brought an e-mail message as a draft. We work on this message.
Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: It was a last section of tutoring. I listed my
repeated grammar mistakes that I should take care of in my writings. I should
use an active voice. I should be careful when I write modal verbs in my e-mail
messages such as would, should, could….I can use modal verbs for explaining an
obligation or an advice; “You should see a doctor for your cough.” I can
utilize them for a possibility; “It is better to go to the job fair. They might
hire me.” I can also use them on my e-mail messages as permission: “Could
you let me know about your on-call schedule next week? Then I can arrange mine.
Isik TS#7 with Mitchell Hudson
Tutoring Section 7 with Mitchell Hudson
Date/Time: April 5, 2016/ 10:50 a.m.-11:50 a.m.
Location: Starbucks near the CIES on the Tennessee Street
Topic/Skill: Grammar/ to write a cover letter
Feedback provided to tutee: I was planning to apply to a
job. I brought a cover letter as a draft. We work on this letter.
Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I worked on using precise language and active
voice. I wrote “….I have been engaging my student to raise their awareness global
and understand cross-cultural characteristics of societies.” It was a run-on
sentence. I changed to “I encourage my students to raise their global awareness
and understand intercultural characteristics of societies.”
I changed the conjunction “especially’ to “specifically.” I
corrected this sentence; “Especially I have been explaining the connection
between technology and society in global and intercultural perspective.” to “Specifically,
I have been explaining the connection between technology and society through an
intercultural lens.”
Isik TS#6 with Mitchell Hudson
Tutoring Section 6 with Mitchell Hudson
Date/Time: March 29, 2016/ 10:50 a.m.-11:50 a.m.
Location: CIES
Topic/Skill: A Persuasive writing/ to write a persuasive composition
and to continue to diagnostic test
Feedback provided to tutee: Mitchell brought me several questions
to write a persuasive composition. I had chosen the question which is “what is
your opinion about your cell phone?” I wrote the composition. Mitchell read it
and gave me feedbacks.
Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I worked on my “topic sentence.” First, I wrote “My cell phone is a necessity
for my daily communication and interaction with people.” Mitchell suggested me
to be specific for the daily communication and interaction. I changed my topic
sentence to “Cell phones are a necessity for daily communication and social
media interaction.” This is using precise language and active voice. I talked about a daily communication in my
first paragraph and social media interaction in my second paragraph.
Isik TS#5 with Mitchell Hudson
Tutoring Section 5 with Mitchell Hudson
Date/Time: March 24, 2016/ 10:50 a.m.-11:50 a.m.
Location: CIES
Topic/Skill: Grammar Rules/ Practice a diagnostic test
Feedback provided to tutee: Mitchell brought me a diagnostic
test. I answered the questions in the test. He explained my grammar mistakes.
Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I
practiced to use conjunctions correctly. Examples are “I cannot play in the
game until I practice more,” “I hid in the basement, because my brother
was mad at me,” “Victor erased the
answering machine message so that Nora would not find out, ”and “She
scored a goal and won the game.”
I practiced to revise two sentences into one better
sentence. Two sentences are “The bicycle tire is flat.” and “The bicycle tire
is on the bike.” The best revision is “The bicycle tire on the bike is flat.”
We also worked on purposes of writing a composition in the
diagnostic test. The question has the title:
“Good Reasons to always drive safely” as an example topic of essay writing. Multiple
choices of the question are persuasive, expository, narrative, and descriptive.
This topic is persuasive, because the writer would explain good reasons of
drive safely to peruse the readers to drive safely.
Sunday, April 24, 2016
Michaella TS#8 Adult
Sunday, April 24, 2016
Today I had my last tutoring session with Isik. It was bittersweet because Isik has been such a joy to work with. I will miss our time together! We have worked on various aspects of formal writing, and I can happily say that I've seen her writing improve greatly over the last seven weeks. I've given her the basic guidelines for informative, persuasive, and descriptive writing, which we worked on today. Isik expressed her concern for descriptive writing because it often requires a large vocabulary. Once Isik was done writing, we went through her essay together to see how we could add more descriptive language to her writing. We took her sentence, "I observe the trees, birds, squirrels, and even deer" and changed it to "I observe the long, narrow trees, cheerful cardinals, playful squirrels, and misguided family of deer." Overall, it was a very productive session, and I look forward to keeping in touch with Isik in the future :)
Today I had my last tutoring session with Isik. It was bittersweet because Isik has been such a joy to work with. I will miss our time together! We have worked on various aspects of formal writing, and I can happily say that I've seen her writing improve greatly over the last seven weeks. I've given her the basic guidelines for informative, persuasive, and descriptive writing, which we worked on today. Isik expressed her concern for descriptive writing because it often requires a large vocabulary. Once Isik was done writing, we went through her essay together to see how we could add more descriptive language to her writing. We took her sentence, "I observe the trees, birds, squirrels, and even deer" and changed it to "I observe the long, narrow trees, cheerful cardinals, playful squirrels, and misguided family of deer." Overall, it was a very productive session, and I look forward to keeping in touch with Isik in the future :)
Saturday, April 23, 2016
Isik TS # 4 with Michaella Malone
Tutoring Section 4 with Michaella
Date/Time: March 31, 2016/ 9:30 a.m.-10:30a.m.
Location: CIES
Topic/Skill: Grammar and Factual Based Expository Writing/Expository
Writing Practice
Feedback provided to tutee: Michaella gave me the format of expository
writing. The format is:
Definition: process of explaining a subject/topic
Goal: to share information with the reader
Important tips:
1. Must be fact-based and not opinion based
2. Must use third person perspective. Ex: He, she, it, him,
her, its
3. Examples of types of expository essays
-compare/contrast
-explain a step-by-step process
-identify a cause/effect relationship
Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I
wrote an essay to identify a cause/effect relationship:
The title of essay is Explaining Sociology.
Attention grabber sentence is: “Under the general education
requirement, sociology is one of the core social science courses in higher
education. “…
The topic sentence for first paragraph: “The reason of this
requirement comes from a contemporary sociologist, Wright Mills. He explains
the connection between social facts in society and personal issues in
individuals lives.” ….
The topic sentence for second paragraph: “The purpose of
sociology courses is students would able to make this connection to their lives
and to raise their awareness about their own social environment.”…
Isik TS # 3 with Michaella Malone
Tutoring Section 3 with Michaella
Date/Time: March 28, 2016/ 3:30 p.m. -4:30 p.m.
Location: Starbucks near the Trader Joe’s on the Tennessee Street
Topic/Skill: Grammar, Persuasive Essay/Persuasive Essay
Writing Practice
Feedback provided to tutee: Michaella gave me the format of
persuasive essay. The format is:
Intro
-attention grabber
-explain topic
-thesis statement (it must support your point of view)
Body (3 body paragraphs):
-topic sentence
-detail support
-possible counterargument
Conclusion:
-summarize key points
-restate thesis
Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: Persuasive
writing practice which Michaella gave me, has four questions. I choose this
question: “Do you think technology has been beneficial or harmful to our society?”
I wrote an outline, then I composed my writing. Because of a
word count limitation in blogs, I
share with you my attention grabber,
topic sentences for each paragraph:
An attention grabber:
“As an early morning riser, I use my cell phone’s alarm clock
most days.”
Topic sentence for each paragraph:
The technology maintains job expansion……
Technology also is a good way to communicate….
The accessibility of knowledge is very easy with
technology….
Technology is very effective learning tool for education….
Isik TS # 2 with Michaella Malone
Tutoring Section 2 with Michaella
Date/Time: March 23, 2016/ 4:00p.m.-5:00p.m.
Location: Starbucks near the CIES on the Tennessee Street
Topic/Skill: Grammar, idioms, and Mid-term Exam/Study on a
mid-term exam and practice grammar and idioms
Feedback provided to tutee: The first part of section, Michaella
and I studied on basic theories of language acquisition. The second part of section, I answered grammar
questions for tenses and idioms
Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: The
basic theories of language acquisition are behaviorism, innatism, and
Interactionism. Behaviorism was explained by Lada (1964) as an imitation,
practice and habit. Innatims was explained by Chomsky (1959) as a set of
principles for all languages. Interactionism was explained by Long (1983) as an
interactional modification.
I practiced the grammar. I wrote these sentences to practice
correct tenses: “I tried to explain to him the problem, but he had difficulty
understanding me.” “I don’t know why you didn’t go. If I were you, I would
have gone.” “Kate claims that if had gotten she got an MBA after finishing her
bachelor's degree, she might have been considered for the position.”
Idioms are “regret to inform”, “spoke on my behalf”,
and “ended up getting.”
Isik TS #1 with Michaella Malone
Tutoring Section 1 with Michaella
Date/Time: March 21, 2016/ 4:00p.m.-5:00p.m.
Location: Starbucks near the CIES on the Tennessee Street
Topic/Skill: Grammar/Correct the grammar errors, prepare to
write!, and to write an essay
Feedback provided to tutee: Michaella brought me an exercise
to write an essay. First, I read an essay to correct the errors. Second, I
wrote answers to the questions for a preparation to writing. Third, I wrote an
essay by using the sentence patterns: although/even though and (not) …at all. In
every step, my tutor gave me feedbacks.
Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: Verb
tense, punctuation, and conjunctions are important in English writing. Past
tense and simple present tense are common tenses to use. I wrote this essay:
My Favorite Place by Isik Akyollu Denizman
I have a very busy life. I take care of my family. I teach
four classes at Southern Regional Technical College in Thomasville, Georgia. I
commute to work from Tallahassee to Thomasville for half an hour. There are the
reasons; my favorite place is my home. Even though my job is in
Thomasville, my home is very close to the border of the state of Georgia.
Driving to work is not boring at all. Although I have a very hectic work
schedule, I spend good times with my family, and I can relax, listen to music,
and read a book. I can see peace and harmony in my home.
Isik TS #4 with Mitchell Hudson
Tutoring Section 4 with Mitchell Hudson
Date/Time: March 22, 2016/ 10:50 a.m.-11:50 a.m.
Location: CIES
Topic/Skill: Grammar Rules/ Find the grammar mistakes on my
cover letter
Feedback provided to tutee: Mitchell pointed my repeated
grammar mistakes. We practiced a proof-reading of my cover letter. He explained
my grammar mistakes.
Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: During
the proof-reading of my cover letter, I realized that I wrote “in” before the
name of university. I should write “at” instead of “in. One of collective nouns
is “faculty”. It can be used as an adjective such as “a faculty member.” “Maximum” as a noun takes “of”; for example,
“a maximum of 180 students.” “Experience” as a verb takes different
propositions; “I experience at Valdosta State University” and “I have
experience in the field of teaching.”
I learned two verb idioms for my cover letters. It is better to say “I would welcome an
opportunity to expand on my qualifications for this position” instead of
“I would welcome an opportunity to more fully describe my qualifications
for this position.” It is also better to say “This academic position will give
me an opportunity to carry out my teaching skills” instead of “this
academic position will give me an opportunity to continue to improve my
teaching skills.”
Isik TS # 3 with Mitchell Hudson
Tutoring Section 3 with Mitchell Hudson
Date/Time: March 17, 2016/ 10:50 a.m.-11:50 a.m.
Location: CIES
Topic/Skill: Grammar/ How to avoid run-on sentences and using precise language
Feedback provided to tutee: I learned how to avoid run-on sentences by practicing exercise with Mitchell. Run-on sentences are a
sentence with at least two independent clauses (complete thoughts) which are
forced together instead of being properly connected. Using precise language is
also effective methods to avoid run-on sentences. A vague sentence is
“Karen is wearing boots of the most extremely high quality in the world.” A
precise sentence is “Karen is wearing very nice boots.”
Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I
learned that period, comma and semi-colon are crucial in the sentences.
Examples are “I like big families. When I get older, I want to have a big
family.” “We usually leave at 11:00, but today we are leaving at 10:30.” And “I
don’t want much for Christmas; just some chocolates and a little toy car.”
Isik CP # 6
Sixth Meeting with my conversation partner:
April 8, 2016 in the Black Dog Cafe at Lake Ella between 1:30p.m.-2:30p.m
Charlene and I have met the second time in the Black Dog
Cafe. The weather was gorgeous. The spring was here. She paid my cafe (Thank
you! Charlene). I made a critical incident by saying “fat free milk” instead of
“skim milk” for my order. We had sat near of the indoor playground where kids
were playing. We were so occupied by our lesson plan, so we hardly paid
attention their noisy game.
We dedicated our last conversation meeting to our
teaching that will be on next Thursday, April 14. We talked about the
vocabulary of the speaking lesson plan. The level of the classroom will be high
intermediate. Charlene told me that we should give less vocabulary words to
this level of students. We went through each word and took several words out of
the list.
Our conversation was based on the meaning of words and the
story from Drew Barrymore’s book. We decided to ask students conversational
questions for expressing their thought and ideas. The story has several experiences
about how to do laundry, work at the cafe house, and live in an apartment. We
will ask to the students whether they have similar experiences. We also censored several inappropriate words
in the story. We didn’t want the students distract from these words.
Isik CP # 5
Fifth Meeting with my conversation partner:
April 1, 2016 AMC 1:45a.m.-3:30p.m for the movie; My Fat
Greek Wedding 2
This time, we decided to go to a movie. Charlene offered to
go to My Fat Greek Wedding 2. It was a
fun idea. The movie was about one of the Greek families in United States.
I noticed how Mediterranean culture shares by nations;
Spain, Italy, and Turkey. It is different than American culture and has
delicious cuisine. During the movie they ate delicious Greek food which is a
similar Turkish food. I surprised that they didn’t drink a “Greek Cafee” : )
In the movie, strong
family ties shapes the relationship between Portokalos family members. The older sister in the family, Toula married
with American man contended with aging parents and their endless needs of
cousins and friends. She has also a
teenager daughter graduating from high school. She wants her to say with the
family to go to college.
Movie was funny and cheerful. Charlene and I had a great
time.
Isik CP # 4
Fourth Meeting with my conversation partner:
March 25, 2016 The Cuban Grill on the north capital circle 1:30p.m.-2:30p.m
I finished my volunteer job early in Dearlake Middle School.
This gave me an extra time to explore the plaza where the Cuban grill is. This plaza also has the Carraba’s Italian
grill. It is big and front of the plaza,
so that it was difficult to see the Cuban Grill right away. The Cuban grill has a corner lot with beautiful
plants and flowers. I realized how beautiful place but it is hiding behind the
big restaurant.
The plaza also has a limited parking p. It took me five
minutes to find a parking space for my car.
I also noticed the apple tech store in the plaza which was very busy
with the customers.
I walked to the Cuban
grill, because I found a parking space the other side of the plaza. When I
approached to the restaurant, I saw a man talking to customers. Later on I
realized the owner of the Cuban grill. I
went in the restaurant, chose a table, and waited my conversation partner,
Charlene. Restaurant has beautiful plants inside too.
Charlene and I talked about politics, education, and Tallahassee
as usual.
Isik CP #3
Third Meeting with my conversation partner:
March 10, 2016 in Grassroods Cafe in downtown Thomasville, GA
10:00a.m -11:30a.m.
This time, we had met at the cafe house in Thomasville, GA.
Tallahassee is very closed to Thomasville. I could drive from north side of the
city to Thomasville in thirty minutes. I have been teaching in Southern
Regional Technical College in Thomasville four days a week. It was very
convenient for me to meet Charlene after my class.
Charlene liked the cafe place. She asked about a specific
cafee brand to the cashier. She read it on the website of cafe house. The
cashier recommended the house cafe which had special mix from several brands of
cafee. We had sat inside for a while and then we decided to walk on the street
while we were drinking our cafee. We did
window shopping on the street and sat on the bench on the pedestrian way.
Charlene talked about her two step daughters. One of them is
very successful pottery artist. She has had her pottery web site. The other has
been writing a blog about her spirituality.
We also explored one of the boutiques in the downtown of
Thomasville which has had dresses from Israel and Italy. It was very surprising
to come across a global fashion in a small town of South Georgia.
Isik CO #3
Class Observation #3
Date/Time: March 31, 2016/ 11:00 a.m.-11:40 a.m./CIES /4B Reading
Topic/Skill: The article titled: “Managing Diversity for
Success: the Case of IBM” / Reading practices for the TOEFL exam
Teacher Presentation: Mr. Ramin Yazdanpanah introduced me to
the class. I told them about TEFL certification program. They went to the
computer lab to practice for the TEFL exam.
Classroom Management: The students already have the article.
They worked as a peer group. They did a comprehensive question practice.
According to the rubric they focused on grammar accuracy, connection the ideas,
and summary mechanics.
Student participation: After the computer practice, students
went back to the class. Teaching assistant Ms. Haylee tutored them about TOEFL
reading practice and a mid-term exam review.
Feedback provided: The teacher assistant gave the feedbacks
for TEFL reading practice and mid-term review.
Lesson(s) on teaching you learned: The computer lab studies
are very effective preparation for the TOEFL exam. Students build their own vocabulary learning skill
extensively and intensively.
Isik CO #2
Class Observation #2
Date/Time: March 25, 2016/ 9:00 a.m.-10:40 a.m./CIES /4B Grammar
Class
Topic/Skill: Reducing Adjective and Adverb Clauses / Writing
sentences by reducing clauses
Teacher Presentation: Ms. Leslie Wagner told me the topic of
the class. She introduced me to the students. I told them I am a student at the
TEFL program. The teacher posted the power point to show what they are going to
do in the classroom. She introduced to the class the phrasal verb of the day;
“take over.” She explained it in the sentences. Students wrote own examples and
shared with the class.
Classroom Management: The teacher gave an article to student
to read. The title of the article is
“Educational Benefits of Travel.” After the reading, the teacher asked to
students adjective and adverb clauses in the article. She told them how to
reduce them in the sentences. Last forty minutes, student went to computer lab
to record a story.
Student participation: Students went to computer lab for recording
practices. They divided into groups. Each group had 2-3 students and three
different stories. Each student read and told the story with own words by
reducing an adverb clause and used a past tense. After the story telling, group
members responded to the student using perfect modals to express regret and
draw conclusion.
Feedback provided: Instructor gave feedbacks in every
activity and exercises.
Lesson(s) on teaching you learned: For advance level grammar
class, inductive approach is very effective. Their reading level was
appropriate to speed reading, skimming and directing.
Wonmi Lee CO #6
21 April 2016
Today, I met Abdullah at Cascades Park. It was a beautiful day, not too hot with a cool breeze, which was perfect. It has been a while since I've met Abdullah, so it was nice to sit in the park and just chat.
He is on break, and we discussed what he did during break. We also discussed about future plans. For myself, we talked about going to Korea, and for him, Saudi Arabia. He said he would be quite sad to leave the US, while I was excited about my opportunities there. We plan on continuing to meet even though I am done. Bowling and beach plans are made!
Today, I met Abdullah at Cascades Park. It was a beautiful day, not too hot with a cool breeze, which was perfect. It has been a while since I've met Abdullah, so it was nice to sit in the park and just chat.
He is on break, and we discussed what he did during break. We also discussed about future plans. For myself, we talked about going to Korea, and for him, Saudi Arabia. He said he would be quite sad to leave the US, while I was excited about my opportunities there. We plan on continuing to meet even though I am done. Bowling and beach plans are made!
Wonmi Lee TS #8 Adult
18 April 2016
Today, I met up with Sanghoon to go over his presentation regarding PESTEL analysis of the Fiesta Bowl! The subject was quite interesting because I have never heard of it, and was a new concept for me.
He had some grammar mistakes, which we fixed. We also went over some content, since I was familiar with the PESTEL analysis. We also went over pronunciation, enunciation, and intonation of words and phrases. He is still having trouble with f and p, which I hope to fix before I leave.
Today, I met up with Sanghoon to go over his presentation regarding PESTEL analysis of the Fiesta Bowl! The subject was quite interesting because I have never heard of it, and was a new concept for me.
He had some grammar mistakes, which we fixed. We also went over some content, since I was familiar with the PESTEL analysis. We also went over pronunciation, enunciation, and intonation of words and phrases. He is still having trouble with f and p, which I hope to fix before I leave.
Thursday, April 21, 2016
Tyler Lee TS#2 Child
March 10
The second meeting with Andy was again at Books-a-million, and when I arrived, Andy and his father had already selected several superhero books that Andy wanted to read. In the first session we had, I recognized that he does not consistently use simple past verb forms correctly to express what he or another person did in the past, so I decided to focus on reinforcement of this grammatical form whenever we came across it in the books. I used events in the batman books to encourage Andy to talk about himself and his own experiences and shared related past experiences with him to model the simple past structure. When he makes errors and I recast, he tends to correct himself and understand the model for simple past, though I know that it will take continued efforts to acquire the form for productive language.
Andy's reading fluency surprised me and we also worked on sounding-out larger words and corrected any pronunciation issues that got in the way of conveying meaning.
The second meeting with Andy was again at Books-a-million, and when I arrived, Andy and his father had already selected several superhero books that Andy wanted to read. In the first session we had, I recognized that he does not consistently use simple past verb forms correctly to express what he or another person did in the past, so I decided to focus on reinforcement of this grammatical form whenever we came across it in the books. I used events in the batman books to encourage Andy to talk about himself and his own experiences and shared related past experiences with him to model the simple past structure. When he makes errors and I recast, he tends to correct himself and understand the model for simple past, though I know that it will take continued efforts to acquire the form for productive language.
Andy's reading fluency surprised me and we also worked on sounding-out larger words and corrected any pronunciation issues that got in the way of conveying meaning.
Tyler Lee TS#1 Child
Wednesday, March 2
My first meeting with Andy went well. He is a six year-old form South Korea who has been in the US for less than 2 years, but because of his age and the frequency by which he is exposed to English at school, his accent does not strike me as very foreign. Andy loves superheroes, especially Batman, so our primary evaluation for his language skills consisted of reading a Batman book and talking about ourselves to get to know one another. Andy's father Kyoung-bo expressed to me that he wants Andy to work on pronunciation and speaking since they are planning on moving back to South Korea in the summertime and he will not be able to be around many native speakers.
Wednesday, April 20, 2016
Michaella CP#4
Wednesday, April 20th, 2016
Today I took Madeleine to Paisley Cafe for lunch. She was excited to try a local, Tallahassee restaurant, so I thought Paisley was the perfect place. We each ordered soup and a sandwich, and sat outside to enjoy the nice weather. We talked about school, some of her favorite traditions in Panama, and we even practiced some Spanish. I always enjoy my time with Made because we are either laughing or sharing stories that both of us can relate to. Although we were assigned to be conversation partners, I can genuinely say I have made a new friend as well. I hope Made and I are able to stay in touch after she returns to Panama. Until then, I look forward to spending more time with her before I graduate!
Today I took Madeleine to Paisley Cafe for lunch. She was excited to try a local, Tallahassee restaurant, so I thought Paisley was the perfect place. We each ordered soup and a sandwich, and sat outside to enjoy the nice weather. We talked about school, some of her favorite traditions in Panama, and we even practiced some Spanish. I always enjoy my time with Made because we are either laughing or sharing stories that both of us can relate to. Although we were assigned to be conversation partners, I can genuinely say I have made a new friend as well. I hope Made and I are able to stay in touch after she returns to Panama. Until then, I look forward to spending more time with her before I graduate!
Tuesday, April 19, 2016
Mitch TS 13 Adult
This is another post from an old session. On that day, Isik and I did an exercise where I got her to write answers to questions in an organized essay format and had her practice organizing things like an essay. She wrote answers to a few short answer questions that I got from a website called "englishforeveryone.com." These exercises are always helpful for Isik because I can help her fix recurring writing errors that she makes. The recurring errors in my experience are the hardest to fix errors because they have been made into a habit, and I designed this lesson to help her work through these bad habits of writing.
Mitch TS 12 Adult
This is a post from a tutoring session that happened actually a little while ago between Isik and I. I forgot to upload 3 of the tutoring sessions right after they happened, so I will do so now. Isik and I did a worksheet that was very good. The worksheet came from a website that was entirely based around English writing and different writing style and had questions of varying difficulty. I think Isik benefited a lot from this worksheet, and she also told me she thought it helped her a lot.
Mitch TS 11 child
Today was another good tutoring session with Astin. I told him to bring a book with him and he did. It is cool to see my tutoring style actually working with him, because now he knows what I expect and for the most part does not do the things that I have consistently asked him not to. When he used to not know a word, he would just guess it, but today he actually made a conscious effort to pronounce every word he did not fully know.
Mitch TS 10 child
Today with Astin, we did a lot of worksheet activities. To start off the tutoring, I helped Astin complete his English homework, and then we did vocabulary worksheet where he learned new words like "Taxi" "Hot-air balloon" and other modes of transportation. He really likes vehicles and things of this nature so it was good to keep his attention in this way. Astin was very focused today and I believe by the end of the session he had a good grasp of the vocabulary.
Monday, April 18, 2016
Michaella TS#7 Adult
Friday, April 15th, 2016
Isik and I met at our usual spot, Starbucks, to complete our seventh tutoring session. I prepared an error correction worksheet and printed an article from the New York Times about the kidnapping of the Nigerian girls. Isik mentioned how much she enjoys the error correction worksheets because it it gives her great practice with writing. She also seemed very interested in the Boko Haram article, which helped spark her creativity. I had Isik read the article and write a page long informative piece on the subject. She spent 15-20 minutes writing, and then we reviewed together. By reading the essay aloud, we noticed that Isik definitely had all the right content, she was just unable to structure the sentences correctly. We spent 10-15 minutes revising the essay and brainstorming ideas of how to reword a sentence so that her thought process was presented clearly to her audience. Overall, it was a very productive tutoring session and I look forward to our next one!
Isik and I met at our usual spot, Starbucks, to complete our seventh tutoring session. I prepared an error correction worksheet and printed an article from the New York Times about the kidnapping of the Nigerian girls. Isik mentioned how much she enjoys the error correction worksheets because it it gives her great practice with writing. She also seemed very interested in the Boko Haram article, which helped spark her creativity. I had Isik read the article and write a page long informative piece on the subject. She spent 15-20 minutes writing, and then we reviewed together. By reading the essay aloud, we noticed that Isik definitely had all the right content, she was just unable to structure the sentences correctly. We spent 10-15 minutes revising the essay and brainstorming ideas of how to reword a sentence so that her thought process was presented clearly to her audience. Overall, it was a very productive tutoring session and I look forward to our next one!
Michaella TS#8 Child
Monday, April 18th, 2016
Tonight was my last tutoring session with PJ :( Our time together went by so fast, but I am thankful that I had the opportunity to work with him. PJ is incredibly bright, and I really enjoyed getting to tutor him in writing and reading comprehension. Tonight we worked on proofreading writing errors, context clues, and reading comprehension. I've noticed PJ's reading comprehension has improved the most since our first tutoring session. He seems to be grasping the main idea and context better, which makes it easier for him to answer the reading comprehension questions. I hope PJ benefited from our time together and continues to excel in school as he moves on to 5th grade next year!
Tonight was my last tutoring session with PJ :( Our time together went by so fast, but I am thankful that I had the opportunity to work with him. PJ is incredibly bright, and I really enjoyed getting to tutor him in writing and reading comprehension. Tonight we worked on proofreading writing errors, context clues, and reading comprehension. I've noticed PJ's reading comprehension has improved the most since our first tutoring session. He seems to be grasping the main idea and context better, which makes it easier for him to answer the reading comprehension questions. I hope PJ benefited from our time together and continues to excel in school as he moves on to 5th grade next year!
Michaella TS#7 Child
Wednesday, April 13, 2016
For our seventh tutoring session, PJ and I worked on a school essay. The essay required him to incorporate three different articles into a 5-paragraph essay. The articles included information about coyotes, squirrels, and pigeons. Since PJ had already constructed the essay in school, we mainly focused on the revising and editing process. I explained the importance of including an introduction, and we talked about referencing the prompt when trying to decide what information to include. I think PJ could see through the revision process how he left out key facts that would help with the development of his essay. I hope practicing with this school essay will better prepare him for his next writing assignment! :)
For our seventh tutoring session, PJ and I worked on a school essay. The essay required him to incorporate three different articles into a 5-paragraph essay. The articles included information about coyotes, squirrels, and pigeons. Since PJ had already constructed the essay in school, we mainly focused on the revising and editing process. I explained the importance of including an introduction, and we talked about referencing the prompt when trying to decide what information to include. I think PJ could see through the revision process how he left out key facts that would help with the development of his essay. I hope practicing with this school essay will better prepare him for his next writing assignment! :)
Sunday, April 17, 2016
Erika TS #7 Child
I tutored Astin on Friday and we went over some worksheets that I prepared that focused on reading comprehension. I had him read a short story about a boy who had three pets. First he read the story, which took some concentration so he could figure out how to read some of the words. After reading the story, I asked him some questions about the story; I read them to him as he followed along on the paper. He had to write down the answers to the questions (example: what is the boy's dog's name?). He still has some issues with writing letters backwards since he is left handed but we are working on it!
Erika TS Adult #7
I tutored In-Hwa on Friday and we went through a reading passage and analyzed it in an extensive manner. The passage was about a woman apartment hunting. When she was done reading the text, I asked her first what the main idea of the passage was, then I asked her more specific questions like the ages of the characters and where they lived and why they were there. Once we established these main points, we went over vocabulary that she was not familiar with such as: security deposit amenities, and sublease.
After the reading exercise we practice production skills as I asked her about her plans for the rest of the week. We talked about a baby shower she was attending as well as her anniversary with her boyfriend (she did not know the word anniversary!).
After the reading exercise we practice production skills as I asked her about her plans for the rest of the week. We talked about a baby shower she was attending as well as her anniversary with her boyfriend (she did not know the word anniversary!).
Saturday, April 16, 2016
Wonmi Lee TS #8 Child
16 April 2016
I had a session with P.J today! He was excited to tell me that he had a sleep over at his friends house the previous night. I prepared a Mentos/Coke experiment for the day. However, he had some homework that needed to be done, so we focused on that for half of the class.
The homework was reading comprehension and the normal English homework. After we finished one story, we moved on to the mentos experiment. He really enjoyed the experiment part, but not the "learning" aspect. He also seemed very unfocused today.
I will do one more lesson next week, on the 25th of April.
I had a session with P.J today! He was excited to tell me that he had a sleep over at his friends house the previous night. I prepared a Mentos/Coke experiment for the day. However, he had some homework that needed to be done, so we focused on that for half of the class.
The homework was reading comprehension and the normal English homework. After we finished one story, we moved on to the mentos experiment. He really enjoyed the experiment part, but not the "learning" aspect. He also seemed very unfocused today.
I will do one more lesson next week, on the 25th of April.
Wednesday, April 13, 2016
Erika TS #6 Adult
I tutored In-Hwa on Sunday and came prepared with a list of typical phrases that Americans use since she had liked them so much during our previous tutoring session. The list was as follows: 1. John Hancock 2. Taking a rain-check 3. Bury the hatchet 4. Water under the bridge/ cutting the
water with knives 5. Bail couch potato 6. Down to earth 7. Crash (to fall asleep, to crash a car, to sleep over at someone's house) 8. Pig out 9. uptight 10. Up the wazoo.
When I presented each term for the first time, I gave her their definitions. After this, we looked at the paper where she had written down the phrases and as I would point to a phrase, she would have to give me their definition. After this exercise, I had her create scenarios in which she would be able to use each phrase. For example "I fought with Erika, but I called her and apologized so that we could bury the hatchet." I ended up role playing the situations with her to make it fun.
Wonmi Lee TS #7 Adult
12 April 2016
I met up with Sanghoon at Dirac Library. He seemed very tired, and I later found out that he had stayed up late trying to finish a presentation analyzing the Fiesta Bowl using PESTLE analysis.
He had his presentation tomorrow for the T.A class (not about the Fiesta Bowl) and therefore we practiced that. I could tell that he did not have much time to practice, so instead of going over content, I focused more on phrasing and overall structure.
I met up with Sanghoon at Dirac Library. He seemed very tired, and I later found out that he had stayed up late trying to finish a presentation analyzing the Fiesta Bowl using PESTLE analysis.
He had his presentation tomorrow for the T.A class (not about the Fiesta Bowl) and therefore we practiced that. I could tell that he did not have much time to practice, so instead of going over content, I focused more on phrasing and overall structure.
Wonmi Lee TS #6 Adult
April 9 2016
I met up with Sanghoon at Starbucks today with his wife. She was a very calm and collected and it was very nice of her to buy me a cookie!
Sanghoon showed me his revisions from the previous day, and we practiced his presentation again. He had questions on how to answer questions, what kind of questions students will ask, and how he can avoid reaching a "wall" or "blank space".
We also practiced f/p sounds again as a short warm up lesson.
I met up with Sanghoon at Starbucks today with his wife. She was a very calm and collected and it was very nice of her to buy me a cookie!
Sanghoon showed me his revisions from the previous day, and we practiced his presentation again. He had questions on how to answer questions, what kind of questions students will ask, and how he can avoid reaching a "wall" or "blank space".
We also practiced f/p sounds again as a short warm up lesson.
Wonmi Lee TS #7 Child
9 April 2016
It's been a while since I last saw P.J. I had a morning tutoring session before and was a bit late. However, he was very understanding.
We finished our project that we started last time, with the green pennies, and I showed him pictures of our results. He shows high interest in what he calls, "chemicals", but actually means reactions between substances. He seems to like things exploding, or changing color, or sudden changes.
I originally was going to talk about chemical reactions and molecules (atoms, different elements like hydrogen, oxygen, and so on). However, he had homework that needed to be done, so we focused on that.
It's been a while since I last saw P.J. I had a morning tutoring session before and was a bit late. However, he was very understanding.
We finished our project that we started last time, with the green pennies, and I showed him pictures of our results. He shows high interest in what he calls, "chemicals", but actually means reactions between substances. He seems to like things exploding, or changing color, or sudden changes.
I originally was going to talk about chemical reactions and molecules (atoms, different elements like hydrogen, oxygen, and so on). However, he had homework that needed to be done, so we focused on that.
Wonmi Lee TS #5 Adult
8 April 2016
I was not feeling well this week, and had to change our lesson time with Sanghoon. I am very grateful that he is so understanding and caring.
We met at Red Eye coffee, and again went over his presentation. We timed it and tried to focus on more specific pronunciation, intonation, and enunciation.
He has definitely drastically improved his intonation with certain phrases, but still tends to forget about the f and p sounds. I assigned some phrases to practice, but he did not practice them. He can obviously hear the difference and comprehends it. However, when not thinking about it, he makes the mistakes again.
I was not feeling well this week, and had to change our lesson time with Sanghoon. I am very grateful that he is so understanding and caring.
We met at Red Eye coffee, and again went over his presentation. We timed it and tried to focus on more specific pronunciation, intonation, and enunciation.
He has definitely drastically improved his intonation with certain phrases, but still tends to forget about the f and p sounds. I assigned some phrases to practice, but he did not practice them. He can obviously hear the difference and comprehends it. However, when not thinking about it, he makes the mistakes again.
Wonmi Lee CP #5
7 April 2016
I et up with Abdullah at Dunkin Donuts on campus. We had a great discussion about my incident with my broken tooth from my retainer. We also had a great conversation about the American view of foreigners. We also discussed how Korea views Saudia Arabia, and how Saudia Arabia views South Korea.
I did not know this, but apparently Saudia Arabians think highly of South Korea due to their systematic and well-developed companies and society. It was new to see that a person of an unfamiliar culture think highly of one that is close to me.
I et up with Abdullah at Dunkin Donuts on campus. We had a great discussion about my incident with my broken tooth from my retainer. We also had a great conversation about the American view of foreigners. We also discussed how Korea views Saudia Arabia, and how Saudia Arabia views South Korea.
I did not know this, but apparently Saudia Arabians think highly of South Korea due to their systematic and well-developed companies and society. It was new to see that a person of an unfamiliar culture think highly of one that is close to me.
Wonmi Lee TS #4 Adult
2 April 2016
I met up with Sanghoon at Red Eye coffee today. We went over his presentation for this TA class. It was a presentation that had a short review session, instructions, a quiz, and going over answers.
We worked on organizing the speech, how to make it more fluid, and pronunciation (still has trouble with f and p sounds). We also worked on intonation of sentences, enunciation, and syllable stress.
I met up with Sanghoon at Red Eye coffee today. We went over his presentation for this TA class. It was a presentation that had a short review session, instructions, a quiz, and going over answers.
We worked on organizing the speech, how to make it more fluid, and pronunciation (still has trouble with f and p sounds). We also worked on intonation of sentences, enunciation, and syllable stress.
Wonmi Lee TS #3 Child
12 March 2016
I met up with P.J again today. We continued to focus on animals groups and eating behaviors.
This time, we newly went over the differences that a food web chain makes. It was more conceptual, therefore required more explanation rather than linguistic support.
For example, higher level consumers, when increased or decreased drastically, had a more drastic effect on the ecosystem compared to producers or primary consumers. However, when producers were greatly decreased, we can see that it has the biggest effect on the WHOLE ecosystem.
I met up with P.J again today. We continued to focus on animals groups and eating behaviors.
This time, we newly went over the differences that a food web chain makes. It was more conceptual, therefore required more explanation rather than linguistic support.
For example, higher level consumers, when increased or decreased drastically, had a more drastic effect on the ecosystem compared to producers or primary consumers. However, when producers were greatly decreased, we can see that it has the biggest effect on the WHOLE ecosystem.
Monday, April 11, 2016
Michaella TS#6 Adult
Sunday, April 10, 2016
Isik and I met at Starbucks in the early afternoon. This tutoring session was different from our others because I was able to help Isik with her PowerPoint presentation for her class. Isik wanted help editing her work and making sure her presentation was clear and comprehensible. We went through every slide together, and I was able to fix any errors that may have occurred. Many of Isik's errors included forgetting prepositions like "of" or "on." She mentioned that this is a mistake she makes often when writing. One of the things I enjoyed most about this session is being able to give Isik perspective from a student viewpoint. It was helpful to let her know if certain instructions were left ambiguous, or if certain word choices were not best suited. Overall, the presentation turned out great, and I hope Isik's presentation went well!
Isik and I met at Starbucks in the early afternoon. This tutoring session was different from our others because I was able to help Isik with her PowerPoint presentation for her class. Isik wanted help editing her work and making sure her presentation was clear and comprehensible. We went through every slide together, and I was able to fix any errors that may have occurred. Many of Isik's errors included forgetting prepositions like "of" or "on." She mentioned that this is a mistake she makes often when writing. One of the things I enjoyed most about this session is being able to give Isik perspective from a student viewpoint. It was helpful to let her know if certain instructions were left ambiguous, or if certain word choices were not best suited. Overall, the presentation turned out great, and I hope Isik's presentation went well!
Michaella TS#6 Child
Sunday, April 10, 2016
On Sunday PJ and I worked on completing his homework assignment as well as the material I prepared for our tutoring session. Professor Kim provided me with a guideline of reading standards that PJ is expected to respond to while in school. These guidelines included multiple choice, open answer, and determining the meaning of a word. After reviewing these guidelines, I found two stories, one short and one longer, that PJ would read and answer questions afterwards. The questions included multiple choice, word meaning, and mainly open answer responses. PJ seemed to enjoy the content of the stories, which helped keep his interest and focus throughout the session. I reminded PJ how important it is to reference back to the content when he is unsure of an answer. Hopefully he will keep this in mind while taking his next test :) I look forward to continuing this practice with PJ.
On Sunday PJ and I worked on completing his homework assignment as well as the material I prepared for our tutoring session. Professor Kim provided me with a guideline of reading standards that PJ is expected to respond to while in school. These guidelines included multiple choice, open answer, and determining the meaning of a word. After reviewing these guidelines, I found two stories, one short and one longer, that PJ would read and answer questions afterwards. The questions included multiple choice, word meaning, and mainly open answer responses. PJ seemed to enjoy the content of the stories, which helped keep his interest and focus throughout the session. I reminded PJ how important it is to reference back to the content when he is unsure of an answer. Hopefully he will keep this in mind while taking his next test :) I look forward to continuing this practice with PJ.
Michaella TS#5 Adult
Wednesday, April 6, 2016
Today Isik and I met at a French Bakery called Au-Peche-Mignon. It was quaint and quite, which made it the perfect place for tutoring. We spent the first few minutes discussing the Turkish language. She shared common greetings with me, such as "How are you?" and "Good evening". We practiced the pronunciation together until I got the hang of it. It was my first time hearing or speaking Turkish so it was cool to learn something new!
To begin the tutoring session I reviewed over a list of idioms, such as money talks, all thumbs, and spill the beans. We discussed examples of how these could be used in everyday conversations. Although Isik knew a few of them, it was helpful for her to learn the news ones and review over the meanings of the ones she was familiar with. Next, I had Isik read an article from the New York Times. The article discussed the current issue arising in French airlines that women are being required to wear a hijab while in Tehran. I wanted Isik to use the persuasive techniques that we had previously covered to form an opinion on this issue and write a short response to the article. Isik seemed to love this activity because it was a topic she was interested in, and she was able to practice more with opinionated writing. I hope to do another activity similar to this in one of our upcoming tutoring sessions!
Today Isik and I met at a French Bakery called Au-Peche-Mignon. It was quaint and quite, which made it the perfect place for tutoring. We spent the first few minutes discussing the Turkish language. She shared common greetings with me, such as "How are you?" and "Good evening". We practiced the pronunciation together until I got the hang of it. It was my first time hearing or speaking Turkish so it was cool to learn something new!
To begin the tutoring session I reviewed over a list of idioms, such as money talks, all thumbs, and spill the beans. We discussed examples of how these could be used in everyday conversations. Although Isik knew a few of them, it was helpful for her to learn the news ones and review over the meanings of the ones she was familiar with. Next, I had Isik read an article from the New York Times. The article discussed the current issue arising in French airlines that women are being required to wear a hijab while in Tehran. I wanted Isik to use the persuasive techniques that we had previously covered to form an opinion on this issue and write a short response to the article. Isik seemed to love this activity because it was a topic she was interested in, and she was able to practice more with opinionated writing. I hope to do another activity similar to this in one of our upcoming tutoring sessions!
Michaella TS#5 Child
Wednesday, April 6, 2016
During this tutoring session, I was able to help PJ with his school project on St. Augustine. PJ had previously taken a field trip to St. Augustine, and he was expected to create a PowerPoint presentation that displayed the history of St. Augustine as well as the places that he and his classmates visited. I really enjoyed working with PJ on this project because we were able to focus on his writing skills in a creative way. PJ really seemed to enjoy using the computer and learning more about PowerPoint in general. I taught him new techniques, such as inserting a text box and adding new bullet points, which will hopefully help him in his future projects. It was also helpful to have researched the list of places that he visited prior to our tutoring session because I was able to have a general understanding of what PJ should address in his presentation. Although I was there to help with any error corrections, I was thoroughly impressed with PJ's word choices and his descriptions of each place!
During this tutoring session, I was able to help PJ with his school project on St. Augustine. PJ had previously taken a field trip to St. Augustine, and he was expected to create a PowerPoint presentation that displayed the history of St. Augustine as well as the places that he and his classmates visited. I really enjoyed working with PJ on this project because we were able to focus on his writing skills in a creative way. PJ really seemed to enjoy using the computer and learning more about PowerPoint in general. I taught him new techniques, such as inserting a text box and adding new bullet points, which will hopefully help him in his future projects. It was also helpful to have researched the list of places that he visited prior to our tutoring session because I was able to have a general understanding of what PJ should address in his presentation. Although I was there to help with any error corrections, I was thoroughly impressed with PJ's word choices and his descriptions of each place!
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)