Jared PJ TS#8

I had to reschedule this session till monday because my mom surprised me by saying my grandfather would be in town that evening. That is probably the one person I "drop everything" for. He is a linguist himself. He has worked for the Wyclieffe organization, translating the Bible into indigenous languages.  Regardless, I meet with PJ later today and we will cover an episode of The Middle that has a very entertaining guest star.

Jared Adult TS #8

Dojun had a colleague's father pass away when we were supposed to have this session. He tried to reschedule, but I would be at graduation ceremony. When we meet shortly, I will try to ask how my graduation experience might have been different than his.

Jared Adult TS #7

In today's lesson I wanted to ask Dojun about something he could really speak at length about. I asked him personal questions about his company and whether he thought it would be good for his superiors to incorporate bigger planes into the fleet. He had great insight. And then I asked him about his company's advertising. This was fun to her about the KPop stars that represented his airline company abroad.

Jared Adult TS #6

I was busy when I met with Dojun today, I was in the middle of editing a lengthy paper for a History class. Dojun wanted to read it, but I think he would be discouraged because my diction can 100% get too bombastic! Therefore we just talked about hisotry instead. And I asked him poignant questions to keep him on his toes.

Jared TS Adult #4

In today's session, Dojun talked to me how about a Chinese flight company was in town and his company was meeting with theirs. He said that the Chinese employees did not have good English, making conversation difficult. I pointed out that he would not run into this problem! Of course he tried to brush off the compliment but it was funny.

Jared TS Adult #3

Today Dojun and I talked about baseball players for quite a awhile. He was a fan of a player who I had personally met when I was younger! (David Ortiz) This got him really excited so I could get him to listen and speak really emphatically.

TS Adult#2 Jared

I tried something different while working with Dojun today, I had him listen to the video I had prepared for my advanced level listening class that I would be teaching in the next week. It was really hard for him to get thru it even though he wanted to try. It was impossible to build schema without my powerpoint.

Jared Adult TS #1

Dojun and transition from informal chat to grammar lesson seemlessly. I don't try and overdo correcting his speaking, but rather when I reply to him I already have a question formed that asks him about comprehension on what I just said. That and I continue to prolifically write vocabulary in the margins.

Jared CP#6

Today, Dojun told me about the cherry blossom trees, and his plans to fly to Thailand to get away from the mushy romance. I thought this was a great I idea, and I laughed when he told me his plans.

Jared CP#5

Dojun, was tired today. I think he had a long day at work, I felt bad about that. He said they had recently changed a company lunch policy that limited his lunch options. This was a real downer for him. We talked about food for a bit.

Jared CP#4

While skyping Dojun this time, he entertained me very much by bringing up a state primary in the American election. He talked about his country's own upcoming elections. I really enjoyed doing this.

CP#3

Today Dojun asked me about what the difference between "college" and "university." I elucidated this for him. We covered a great deal of of basic English idioms and he seemed to understand them.

CP # 2

I really enjoyed my first conversation with Dojun. I was a little embarrassed that my dad and brother kept trying to get into the skype picture, but I think he thought it was funny. Next time I have written down notes for talking points.

TS #7 PJ

This week, class had a tasty potluck. I took this time to see how I could help maintain academic focus even in a distracting environment. After going over geometry, we started an episode of the middle on a spelling bee.

Jared TS#6 PJ

This week PJ and I started going over a few homework problems. Because I had the problems in advance. I could highlight the ESL issue and focus on its resolution. Afterwards, we concluded the middle episode on "spontaneity."

TS#5 PJ Jared

PJ and I were going to continue the TV show "The Midde" this week. We first reviewed vocabulary from last episode. Those words were "genuine" and "assume." Later we went over this weeks vocabulary, it started with a schema building clip about the word "spontaneous" and then we dove right in. This was a good lesson and I thought frequently during it on how I could improve formative checks during viewing the show.

Charlene TS #3 Adult No. 2

As planned, I met with Ileana in the lab at CIES. She told me that she has been listening to the Voice of America promised every day. She said she is beginning to understand more, and has found more on that website besides we were listening to last time. I praised her for doing this. Unfortunately, she had not received the links I sent to the cooking programs. So I pulled these up and let her locate them online. She pulled up her own email and found that the email message a headset with the links, had gone to her trash folder. She retained the use for later viewing. She noted that she doesn't cook, but she might find this interesting to look at.

I have prepared a Story Corps viewing for her, with three voices. Two of the voices have American mid-western accents, but one of the voices has an Asian accent. However, the voice speaks, I assessed, rather slowly so I asked if she would listen to the Story Corps program and watch the animation for it. She agreed to do so. After listening to it the first time, she said that she believes she understood most of it but she was confused about the relationship among the people in it. I think that she likely had difficulty with this because the relationships were not clearly stated at the beginning, and were only explained more clearly near the end of the story. We listened to part of it again. We also discussed the story. She did seem to understand about three-fourths of what was being said and said that she would listen to this again on her own. I pointed out some other possible stories that she might want to check out on her own on this Story Corps website.

Ileana said that she would like to start reading out loud with me so I could check her pronunciation and that she could hear her own voice. This is a suggestion of a friend. She thought that this might be helpful because she, apparently, sees herself as possibly having a future in the tourism business as a guide when she returns to Colombia. I agreed to prepare something for next time.

We spent some time working through a needs assessment instrument aimed at discerning factors, other than the previously discussed diagnostic issues, that might affect Ileana's learning English. Since the lesson up to that point had taken an hour, and my tutee was very accommodating with answering the lengthy questionnaire, the session today lasted a little over 2 1/2 hours. However, I think I came away from it with a much better grasp of how to help Ileana with her English needs. She is highly motivated by future employment, but especially by her son's needs. She is independent, and has a distinct distaste for overly dramatic relationships "that keep people stuck." It is clear to me that speaking – listening/listening – speaking should continue to be the focus of her tutoring. Perhaps we will be able to work in some reading comprehension activities also by having her read aloud.

Charlene TS #2 Adult No. 2

I met with Ileana at The Bay Leaf, a small store and Bay with free Wi-Fi, and Crawfordville, Florida. I especially wanted to meet here with my tutee because I know the owner and the general manager. They are not from Wakulla County and do not have southern accents. They are also very welcoming to everyone, and it might serve as local people that Ileana could speak with what her friend is not around. However, after we had ordered something to eat and drink at the counter, she informed me that she had some problems understanding the manager and the owner because they talk too fast. I suggested she could ask them to slow down for her. I reassured her that they would not take offense at this – – that there are other people in this community who don't speak English as their first language. Ileana looked a little dubious about this plan, so I decided to drop that subject and perhaps will revisit it later. This did not seem the best time to sit down with Ileana and my friends.

After we samples our refreshments, I asked Ileana if she would listen to The Giving Tree on my computer without subtitles. (The subtitles are incorrect.) She said that she would, and she did so. I asked if she thought she was able to understand the story. She said that she thought she was able to because the narrator spoke sufficiently slowly for her. The pictures also helped, and a few words of the text appeared on one of the pages in the video. She was able to retell the story to me accurately, stating that she liked it very much.

I then pulled up the Voice of America website for English learners on my laptop. I found a couple of different news stories and asked Ileana to listen to them. She said she had trouble understanding the information. So, I asked her to simply pull up the daily program of new stories. She did so and listen for a while. We discussed the stories. She, like a lot of people, is tired of hearing about Donald Trump. She was able to find a story of the daily program, however, for which she could follow the story. She said she did not understand every word. I assured her that it was not necessary to hear every word to understand the story. She consider this for a while. She had not thought about this. She admitted that she often does not hear every word of new stories in Spanish, her first language, but does understand these. She agreed to begin listening to the Voice of America website, at least one story, every day. We will discuss how this is going next week, and I promised to send her some links to other sites that she might find interesting. Evidently, she has been avoiding the news lately because she is tired of hearing about the American Presidential Election. I assured her that we all are, at this point.

Later that day I found and emailed Ileana links video of "Martha Stewart Bakes" and "Martha Stewart's Cooking School." Martha Stewart speaks slowly in these programs because she is working as she provides recipes and tips. Also, I am hopeful that Ileana might find this more interesting and less stressful than hearing about politics.

Charlene TS #1 Adult No. 2

I met with Ileana for the first time today and the CIES conference room. We can completed an initial diagnostic. Ileana complains that she can on understand the spoken English word except for her one friend and her teachers at CIES. And discussing her situation, she told me that she is from the country of Columbia. She decided to come to the United States to study English to improve her job skills so that she can get a better paying job when she returns to Columbia. She says that she was laid off from her last job, but felt if she could improve her English speaking skills, she would be much more employable. She said that there appears to her to be a real preference in Columbia for young employees. Ileana does not want to advertise her age, because she feels that part of the reason she was laid off from her last job was because of her age. She is very health conscious and reports that she eats well and exercises for her health. She is living with friends and Crawfordville, Florida, which is in an adjoining county. She said that her friend who is older than her, married a man from Crawfordville 10 years ago. The friend is from Columbia, and somehow she met this gentleman who is from Wakulla County. Unfortunately, he is 81 years old and apparently speaks with a very strong southern accent. She stated she cannot understand what he says. She is concerned because her friend will soon have to travel, and she will be alone in the house with this gentleman with whom she is not able to verbally communicate. We discussed of the strategy of writing down questions and answers to the gentleman while her friend is traveling. She said she could do this because her writing and her reading skills are in fact much higher than her ability to understand the spoken word. At this point, Ileana think she will be returning to Columbia sometime in August. She has a son who is living in Columbia with her parents. She is not intending, she said, to try to work in the United States. However, she said that her son spent six months in the United States finishing high school in North Carolina. She said he lived with her cousins who are residents there. She said her son would be thrilled if she decided to try to immigrate to the United States permanently.

Ileana shared the following placement scores that she was provided one she finished her initial testing at CIES: grammar 3, speaking 3, composition 3, reading 2, and listening 2.

Ileana stated that she has been working with the conversation partner weekly. She is also apparently has taken some initiative to get out and see the sights in the community. She has been to the old and the new capital buildings, she has walked all around the FSU campus, she has been to the Governor's Mansion, she has gone to the Tallahassee Nursery with her conversation partner to look at plants, and she has visited missions Saint-Luis. She likes photography and the music of the 1980s. She said that she finds grammar difficult, but not as difficult as trying to make out English words spoken by other people. She noted today that she did not have any trouble understanding me, for which I am thankful.We made an appointment to meet next week in Crawfordville, since CIES will not be having classes.

Charlene TS# 5 Child

I met today as planned with Nayun and her mother at the Northeast Branch of the Leon County Library. We had planned to meet on Monday, but the library was closed. Nayun had worked very hard on the last lesson and I wanted to reward her for her hard work. Therefore, today I had brought an art project that I thought would interest her, challenge her, and provide her with another way to develop her fine motor coordination in her hands. This is all aimed towards helping her to have a more legible handwriting.

Nayun and I reviewed the cursive letters that she had written during the lesson last week. She is still able to write these and remembers how to form them without prompting. Ahead of time, I had taken the letters for Nayun's first and last name and written them down the left-hand margin of the page. I asked her to finish out the page by writing each letter all the way o'clock cross to the right side of the page. She did this and was careful about her letter formation. I did have to remind her to slow down. Over the course of this lesson, she admitted to me that her friends often have races in school to see who can finish writing their lessons first. From this, I deduce that Nayun knows perfectly well how to write legibly, she is just more motivated to be the first one to finish in her class.

I noticed that Nayun did have some trouble forming the lowercase y. I demonstrated this for her several times, and had her write the letter with me as I was showing her how to make the letter. She did the best she could, but she continued to make a very small tail on the left her y. Although not perfect, the letter was more than passable, so I decided it was not worth spending more time today on trying to make a perfect letter.

I asked Nayun if she would try writing her name but not connecting the cursive letters. She did so and did a very nice job. I then asked her, after showing her, if she would try to write her name connecting the letters. She was successful on her first attempt. I asked if she had written her name using cursive letters before. She said that she had not. (Hooray for D'neilian script! I guess it does work.)

I then brought out the potholder weaving project that had brought with me. Nayun actually got very excited when she saw this. We open the project together and I explained to her. I demonstrated how to put the loops on the frame. She finished putting the loops on the frame. I then demonstrated how to weave the loops through the existing loops. This was harder. She stuck with it even though I had to help her breathe weave the beginning. After that she appeared to be "hooked," and worked with great concentration until the project was almost half finished. This was hard, but she persevered. At this point we had run out of time. Therefore I got Nayun's mother and Nayun showed her project. Her mother was very proud of her and told her so. I gave the project to Nayun and her mother to take home, in case Nayun wanted to finish the other half on her own. I praised her for her hard work and her lovely weaving.

I spoke with Nayun's mother about whether she wanted to continue the tutoring sessions since the family will be leaving for Korea soon, and we have not finished the usual eight sessions. She said that she and her husband wanted to more sessions. I am willing to continue with Nayun, but will check with Prof. Kim to make sure that she does not want to assign Nayun to another tutor for the last two sessions.

Charlene TS #4 Child

I met with Nayun today at the Northeast Branch of the Leon County Library. Nayun's mother had her little brother with her, and had to "entertain" him while Nayun and I worked. I had come well armed with many handwriting sheets so that we could practice handwriting today, her Nayun's father's request. Nayun and I went through every upper and lower case letter in the outfit that. She formed every letter very well. She didn't have to rewrite many letters. She was able to demonstrate that she knew proper form by tracing all of the letters in the proper directions before going on to write rows of need letters on the tablet provided to Her. This took quite a bit of time. I had noticed in the beginning, that Nayun wrote very quickly. I asked her to slow down and pay attention to her letter formation, and she did so. I discussed this with her little bit. She says that she likes to write fast. She was able to say that she does have a better handwriting which he writes more slowly, and agreed to write a little more slowly when she does right. Since this child has been able to do everything I have asked of her thus far, I had also, to the lesson today with worksheets showing how to write D'neilian Cursive Script. I praised Nayun for having written such nice lettering and printed script. I then asked her if she wanted to try cursive. She said that she did. Prior to this lesson, I had found that D'neilian script is now the preferred script for schools that teach cursive writing. It is full her and rounder than previous scripts, and it is easier for children to make the switch from printing to D'neilian and script. I modeled several letters for Nayun, including capital K, capital N, and lowercase a, i, e, c, n, u, and l. I did not have to tell Nayun to write slowly; she did so and appeared to be trying her best form the letters. Her attention did not waver. I assume from this exercise that if she is doing something at least a little bit challenging, her attention is not an issue. I praised her for doing such a good job, and asked her if she wanted to do something a little bit more fun. Of course, she said that she did. I then retrieved a colored pencil set that I have picked up really cheaply from an art store. This was like a paint by numbers set with colored pencils. From the two I had, and Nayun chose the one with dolphins. She began to color in the picture with the tiny little pencils provided by the set. I had chosen this exercise for her, specifically, because it is intended to help her develop fine muscle coordination and her hands. After a short time, our time was up and I returned Nayun to her mother. We agreed to meet again next week at the library.

Nayun's mother told me that the family will be leaving for an extended visit to Korea this summer sometime in the middle of May.

Charlene TS #3 Child

I had written back and forth this week to Nayun's parents regarding today's lesson. They decided that Nayun had been to the Tallahassee Museum several times, and a return trip would not be appropriately educational for her. However, she had not been to the Museum of Florida History, and that where is I met her and her family today. Nayun and her father walked from the parking garage with me to the Museum, and her mother Stayed in the family vehicle because Nayun's baby brother was sleeping.

The three of us signed in at the front desk and began the tour. I had been to the Museum last week with my adult tutee, but there was no exhibit verbiage posted for children. Children are usually taken on tour with the docent in groups through the museum. And, although there are "talking narratives" about the exhibits, the vocabulary is too high for kindergarten aged children. Therefore, I acted as docent for Nayun and her father. I father was very interested in the shipping and shipwreck information in the museum. Nayun seem to be most interested in the Paleolithic Indian period of the museum. I suspect the mannequins and the hands-on type exhibits were attracted to her. Although she did not speak, Nayun did seem to be listening closely. When we got to the end of the exhibits and entered the temporary exhibit on NASCAR in the State of Florida, Nayun's mother and her little brother, now fully awake, joined us. Right away, Nayun and noticed the free video driver to, hopped up into the seat, and asked her father if she could play he started the game for her, and she did very well, considering that she has never driven anything in her life. Pretty soon, her mother became fascinated by the game and joined her". She and Nayun took turns driving the "vehicle." Nayun's father was very amused by their reaction to the videogame – – especially, his wife's interest in the game. Nayun's father asked me how I knew so much about Florida history. I was surprised by this, since I felt like I was babbling through most of the exhibits. However, I advised him that in Florida, Florida history is taught in the schools, and if Nayun stays in the USA for a few years, she will certainly encounter Florida history and her school curriculum. He stated he was not aware of this, but said that he expects the family to be in Tallahassee for three or four years while he is getting his PhD. He said now that he knows that the museum exists, he will bring the family back again to review the exhibits, since there were several exhibits that we had to skip through due to our needing to hold the tour time down to one hour for Nayun's little brother's sake.

I asked Nayun's dad if there was anything in particular that he and Nayun's mom wanted me to work on with Nayun. I noted that her reading level seemed to be high. He advised me that Nayun is reading on a third grade level, according to her teachers. However, he said that they felt that her handwriting was not good and they would like me to help her to have a neater handwriting.

Since the family wanted to continue to play the videogame, I left them to it, and we decided to have another lesson next week at the Northeast Branch of the Leon County Library.

Charlene TS #2 Child

Met with Nayun and her father at the North East branch of the Leon County Library. There had been some confusion about where to meet, and Nayun's father initially went to the library downtown. He opted to come back to the North East branch of the library, which was near his home, rather than have this tutor meet him downtown with Nayun.

Upon their arrival, Nayun appeared to me to be a little tired, and it did not say anything initially. Her father waited in the library while she and I went into one of the tutoring rooms that were available. After some initial discussion about today's lesson, and giving Nayun a couple of choices about what to do first, she chose to listen to a story on the computer. The story was The Giving Tree.

After she finished listening to the story, I asked her if she could tell me something about the story. I in just looked at me and did not respond to any invitation to talk. Finally, I decided it was time to move on and pulled out several books. I had a book about a little girl and a dragon and asked if she would read it to me. It was on about a mid to end of first grade level. Nayun read the book to me perfectly. There were some words she did not know but she was able to sound these out. I thought this was pretty remarkable since she is in kindergarten. I asked her if she liked the story, and she said that she did. We went back through the pages and I asked her various questions about the little girl and the dragon. I asked her where they weren't what they were doing during different periods during the story. She was able to answer all the questions.

I then pulled out the flashcards that we had used at her initial assessment and went through all of these again with her. She knew all of the flashcards. I made sure to cover the pictures so she couldn't see what the words were. I asked her several questions from the question flashcards. She answered all but one of these correctly.

I praised Nayun greatly for her ability to read. She said that she liked reading and that she make good grades in school on reading. I then pulled another book from the fact I had brought to begin it. However, Nayun had begun to rub her eyes and Yon quite a bit. She began reading the book but she was clearly tired at this point. Since a considerable amount of time had elapsed, and she had done well on every task after initially failing to talk, I told her that we were done for the day. I handed her the book we had read so she could take it home and read it again to her parents.

I spoke with Nayun's father and told him she had done well and appeared to be reading above her grade level. I asked him if she was having any difficulties in school. He said that he was not really aware of any. I suggested we might want to enrich her knowledge by setting up a visit to a local museum. I suggested a couple of museums (The Tallahassee Museum and the Museum of Florida History). He said that he would talk this over with his wife and they would get back with me about the lesson next week.

Charlene TS #8 Adult

I had contacted Soon Gyu about being reassigned to another tutor for the term, but she insisted that she wanted to keep this appointment. We met in the lab at CIES. Soon Gyu said that she received an email about her new tutor last night when she opened her email, and said she would contact her this week. She advised that she will be going home to Korea for a visit in August. She is happy about this and looks forward to seeing her sister, who is expecting a baby in a few months--her parents' first grandchild. She up-ended her very successful life to come to Tallahassee with her new husband at the beginning of this year, so I am glad she gets a chance to go home and renew herself.

I have been working on a needs analysis instrument for class, and Soon Gyu agreed to "test out" a few questions with me. I found out that she considers, first, her parents the biggest influence in her life. Coming in a close second, however, is her old supervisor and mentor from her university in Jellabuk-do, Jeonju-si, Korea. She is in fact Dr. Kim, and she credits her mentor with her decision to finish her PhD and teach in Korea. She is considering going through the International TA Program at CIES, but was less clear about whether she in fact wishes to teach in the U.S. I do not know if she has decided for certain.

Following this exercise, we revisited phrasal verbs. Soon Gyu knows many of these, she said, through having memorized long lists in her ACES classes. I came "armed" with a print out from the book, Help Your Kids With Language Arts; J. Searcy, US editor (DK Publishing, NY:2013) on phrasal verbs. Pages 56-57 explain how to form, when/how to use, and how/when to separate phrasal verbs. I reviewed this with Soon Gyu and provided her with a copy of the handout, which was in color and showed lots of examples. After saying our "good-byes," Soon Gyu said she would contact me after she returns from Korea in August so we can catch up on news.

Charlene TS #7 Adult

Met with Soon Gyu at Strozier Library. We orally reviewed the minimal pairs worksheet on R v. L, in pronunciation. She was able to identify when R or L were being pronounced more than 80% of the time, and I praised her. She only hears an R-sound sometimes when an L-sound is being said. However, she always hears an R-sound in words using the LL combination. I provided her with some words that she can practice "hearing" and pronouncing with a classmate or friend.

I had prepared a worksheet focused on choosing the prepositions at, to, by, during or "0" prepositions--or so I thought. Soon Gyu found that "down" worked just as well in one instance--which led us into a discussion or phrasal verbs, another one of her recent class exercise issues. She did very well on today's exercise. I asked her to consider the meanings of the prepositions that she is using. For  instance, a person can arrive at the airport--going to the airport, with no further movement indicated at that point. If a person begins to move around, the person may be in or within the aiport terminal. Then, the person can travel from the airport to the city located close to the airport. She understood all of this, but apparently had not considered it in this way. We agreed to meet next week at CIES for a follow up on today's lesson.

Charlene TS #6 Adult

Since Soon Gyu had trouble  finding time in her schedule this week, and since we both have to eat, I suggested that we meet for lunch and a lesson at Little Athens. I thought we could discuss the cuisine, especially since there is 19th and 20th history of Greek immigration and cuisine in Florida. Her husband accompanied her to lunch. We had already met, and we had a pleasant conversation. We all discussed the food. Soon Gyu ordered chicken swarma, and tried the grape leaves and baklava. We had a rather protracted conversation about prepositions and had no time this week to discuss the minimal pairs worksheets that I had brought with me. Apparently, Soon Gyu had some trouble with an in-class exercise and wanted a rule about when to use and  week, but for now, she accepted my explanations and will continue to memorize when "at" and "to" are to be used in a sentence. I provided her with the minimal pairs worksheet that I had with me and asked that she read over it for next week's lesson.

Charlene TS #5 Adult

Arrived early at the Museum of Florida History at the R.A. Gray Building in downtown Tallahassee. This museum tour is free, and museum attendees are given a free parking token at the end of their tour that allows exit from the parking garage next door. I had texted all of this information to Soon Gyu, along with a map. When she arrived, we signed the guest book and started the tour. Attendees walk through on their own; docent-guided tours are only provided to groups, usually school children. I had not been to this museum for several years, and it has since been renovated. All of the old favorites are here--the prehistoric giant armadillo and the reassembled bones of a giant mammoth--but, much more appears to have been added, and it took well over an hour for us to walk through. We viewed and read the Paleo-Indian period, the Spanish period, the English period, saw tons of shipwreck "booty," The American Civil War, the forestry exhibit, the citrus industry exhibit, a small exhibit devoted to the hurricane and yellow fever epidemic in Port St. Joe in the 19th century--and these are only the exhibits that I can remember. We were both left with the feeling that we had missed a lot, but we never stopped reading and ogling the exhibits. Soon Gyu was most interested in the prehistoric exhibits. She was able to read the posted verbiage with no help from me. Her reading level is quite high. I tried to add what information I knew, e.g., the mammoth was found in Wakulla County; in prehistoric times, a sea covered this part of Florida up to where the Leon County Fairgrounds are now located. The last exhibit is always a temporary one that focuses on some part of Florida's history not found in the museum. Today, there was a NASCAR exhibit. Soon Gyu was not familiar with car racing, but did find it mildly interesting. The "fun" of going round and round in a circle is a hard concept to get across unless you have "been there."  And, of course, the length of this visit left us both pretty weary by the time be got to the NASCAR room. Upon exiting the museum, we decided to meet again next week at Strozier Library to discuss some grammar and work on pronunciation.

Charlene TS #4 Adult

Met with Soon Gyu at the Tallahassee Museum, as previously planned. Soon Gyu is an excellent student, who studies almost daily. I could tell from my conversations with her, however, that she has been feeling a bit "burnt around the edges" and could use a break. When I suggested a couple of trips to local museums, she was eager to go. After entering the museum, I asked Soon Gyu whether she wanted to view the Florida History trail or the Florida Wildlife trail first. I did not think we would have time today to see both. She chose the wildlife trail. I provided her with postcards from the museum, which featured photos and brief descriptions of most of the permanent animals on exhibit in their natural settings.  I told her that these were her vocabulary words for the day, and she referred to these cards as we visited the exhibits. Ironically, the first  exhibit was the  guest exhibit and held the Amur leopard that historically ranged throughout southern Russia and Asia, including all of Korea. This was a beautiful cat; we both marveled at it. Soon Gyu told me that the area where this cat is found in the wild today (only in Russia) is very cold. Judging from the leopard's coat, she did not believe it would be comfortable in South Korea. We moved onto the other exhibits that included the full aviary (hawks, vultures, eagles, ducks, screech owls); the birds were not shy. For some reason, the museum's famous white squirrels, that run freely, were no where to be found. We visited the enclosures for Florida panthers and Red Wolves. I was able to tell her that these animals are part of the state and federal captive breeding programs.  While we were visiting the panther exhibit, the Red Wolves suddenly began howling. We were never able to find out why this happened, but they were very loudly vocal for some time. We also visited the turkey, skunk, otter, deer, and bear exhibits. I talked with Soon Gyu about the recent resumption of bear hunting in the state, following recent black bear attacks in the state. Until 2015, hunting was banned in Florida. I let her know about the state's admittedly, in-hindsight foolish decision on the part of wildlife authorities to relocate nuance bears from the Ocala National Forest to the Apalachicola National Forest. Introducing new breeding adults to this area is thought to have boosted the local bear population, which in turn exacerbated the nuisance bear problem in this part of Florida. Soon Gyu said she is not aware of her country having to deal with these kinds of issues, but that she lived in an urban area in South Korea. However, she was interested in the local bear issue since she and her husband have camped in Florida and would like to do so again. So, we discussed some area camping possibilities. By this time, we had spent more than an hour at the museum, and it was hot. We decided to meet again next week at he Museum of Florida History, which is downtown, and importantly, inside and air-conditioned.

Charlene CP #6

We had two things on the agenda today, Isik and I.  We got together for a general coffee chat at Black Dog Café. But, after this we spent some time planning out the details of the project we are working on together for class. The café is particularly crowded today, and we started out sitting in the center of the room surrounded by children. But the kids were pretty good. The ordering counter was rather crowded. I ordered my usual calorie-laden, carb-laden and latte. Isik spent some time trying to get the inattentive counters staff to understand that she wanted the lowest calorie dairy used to make her coffee drink. She is always health conscious; I am usually not. We sat down for a while and chatted before we began the proportion of our meeting today. We were able to move over to a better table, fortunately, one of patron left. This did a good deal to get rid of the noise in the café that had been bothering me. After we finished the work portion of our get together today, we decided to meet again at the center to finish some things up, since we both had to run due to the length of the meeting. She had a daughter to attend to, and I had to try to figure out what was continuing to be wrong with my garage door.

Charlene CP #5

After spending sometimes trying to get our very busy schedules and sync, Isak and I decided to attend a showing of "My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2."  We had both seen the original one like that a lot. And, since this may be dealt with cultural issues, we both felt it would be really appropriate cueing for this class. I arrived at the movie theater early and waited for Isak. I thought she was late, but she wasn't. She was wearing something other than her usual "teaching clothes" (since she did not teach today), so I did not recognize her, even though she had been sitting on a bench a few feet away from me waiting for me. It didn't matter. We were able to get the tickets and something to drink and eat well before the movie started. Typically, there were trailers from upcoming events shown first. I watched my watch out of curiosity. These trailers lasted for 30 minutes. The movie was really cute. I believe Isak enjoyed it as much as I did based on the amount of laughing I heard coming from her seat. Unfortunately, we both have a lot going on so we didn't have time to do anything further that day. But, I was really glad she had wanted to see this movie, otherwise I would have gone alone. We will set up another time to get together when we see each other in class.

Charlene CP #4

Met Isak at the Cuban Grill, off Capital Cir., North East behind Carraba's for lunch. We both have quite a bit to do, but we figured out we both do have to eat. She drove in from Thomasville after teaching. We initially you were going to try to be at Ricardo's Italian Restaurant. However, I failed to check the time, and by the time she arrived in town that restaurant would be closing. So, I texted her and we switch locations. I was very glad that we did. The owner of the restaurant at the Cuban Grill was working today and he was in a particularly gregarious mood. He talked to each of us for a very long time, and I was really glad that I got to introduce Isak to this place. We both enjoyed our lunches. She said that she would like to bring her family back for a meal. Maybe we can also meet again for lunch. I have never had a bad meal at this location.