Don_M_TP #4 (Adult)

I met with this Foundation level student, and reviewed the vocabulary that we learned in our first session.  I viewed reading lesson.  He

understanding of senctence structure in his few weeks here is impressive.  At his request, we reviewed then practiced personal and possessive

pronouns. 

I then had him identify the objects around us, and I asked him to discriminate between singular and plural.  For example,  I pulled a leaf off

of a tree and said, "Leaf".  He wrote it in his grammar log and repeated, "Leaf".  Then, I pulled a handfull of leaves off the tree and said,

"Leaves".  I showed him how to spell leaves, which he wrote in his log.  Next, I said Winter, Spring, Summer, Fall.  After each word, I looked

to see if he understood his seasons.  He did.  I repeated these words again.  But this time when I said 'Fall', I dropped a handful of leaves,

and repeated 'Fall".  He made the connection that Fall is the season when the leaves fall off the trees.

We spent the remainder of our time, with learning and using new vocabular.

Emily_Group CIES Tutoring_2

Someone new joined my group tutoring session.  Her name is Arif, and she is from Bangladesh.  She told me that she is the only Bangladeshi person at CIES and has been in the U.S. for a year and a half.  She has two sons, six and twelve years old.  I can’t exactly remember their names, but remembered thinking that they sounded interesting.  She told me that their names mean “Mountain” and “Beautiful” in her language, which I thought was really cool.  Amanda and Andre came to tutoring as well, but Giulio never showed up.  Arif told me that she wants to get better at grammar and vocabulary.  I asked the group how they normally learn new vocabulary in their classes.  They said that in some classes they are given vocabulary quizzes, and in others they just write down unfamiliar words that they come across and look them up on their own in their dictionaries. 

I gave all of them a list of adjectives and asked them to read through it and underline all of the words that are unfamiliar to them.  After that, I started going through the list and talking through each word with them.  I pulled up pictures on my computer for visual aid, wrote examples and synonyms on the board, and asked them to come up with example sentences using the word. I saw them taking notes every now and then on what we talked about, which is good.  They seemed pretty engaged and asked questions.  I told him that I would keep their lists so that I can see what all they underlined and make a new list of the words for them to memorize.  Sometimes it’s hard to know exactly where to start and what to do that would be the most helpful for them.  Any feedback or suggestions?

Don_M_CP-#2

Tuesday, 10/29/13.  I met two of three conversation partners at the campus library.  Our conversation covered first impressions of Tallahasee,

 food, and classes.  Neither are interested in sports, so they declined the invitation to watch a soccer match.  We discussed how to order

food, types of salads and types of chicken on salad.  This is were I introduced them to the Cajun custom of 'Blackened' meats (e.g. blackened

catfish, blackened chicken, etc.) 

They observed that Americans do not like the way Arabs get there attention by pointing and snapping their fingers.  I explained to these

Foundation level students that this is culturally offensive to Americans and gave the following example.  An Italy male pinch a pretty female

to show his appreciation for her beauty.  They were shocked by this behavior.  I then compared their cultural displease to pinching a strange

woman, to American displeasure with having someone snap their fingers at them.  I then took the opportunity to teach them the correct and

incorrect way of asking a female coed for directions.  'Excuse me miss,...'


I am meeting them for dinner at an Arab resturant on Thurday.  This will be the first time I've eaten Arab food.

Bobby - CP 2

Abdullah and I had out first meeting yesterday. We were supposed to meet at 3:30 and go to the Tallahassee Museum. Unfortunately, the museum closes at 5 on weekdays and Abdullah was late...but for good reason! He was getting his CIES certificate finalized, and when he finally came down to meet me, the first thing he did was show me his certificate. He was very happy about this, and seeing that was really great. That being said, his English is obviously very good. Not once in our meeting did I misunderstand anything he said. His grammar and pronunciation are practically flawless, so our session was really enjoyable in that regard.

Instead of going to the museum, I decided to bring him to Lake Ella and Black Dog since it was such a nice day out. We got some teas and made casual conversation just to get to know each other. He's a really smart guy and very interesting to talk to. He's from Saudi Arabia, is married (they're expecting their first child!!), has been in Tallahassee since early 2012, and is going to the University of Jacksonville in the Spring for his master's in Business Administration. Overall, Abdullah has a lot going for him, and I imagine he will be very successful.

We exchanged a lot of information: food from our respective cultures, how to take college classes in the US (I introduced him to ratemyprofessor.com), and explanations of customs. However, there was one moment that made me a little uncomfortable. We started talking about the protests going on in Saudi Arabia at the moment. For those that don't know, many women in the nation have been protesting a law that prevents them from driving. Abdullah was very vocal on this matter, and although I am of a different belief, I made sure to keep quiet because I didn't want to offend him. Instead, I just conceded that I thought ALL people are bad drivers (except me, of course) and that no one should ever drive. I was kidding though. :)

Except for this last bit, I had a great time with Abdullah. I hope we can go to the Tallahassee Museum next time!

Jodie TP Child #1

I met my tutee, David, at the LCL library.  David is 9 and has a twin brother.  He and his family speak Korean at home.  At first, David did not want to give me any eye contact.  His mother, Sarah, a lovely lady, instructed me that she would like David to work on reading comprehension.  I had some books with me, and they were on various levels.  He also had 4 books with him when we met.

We started by reading in one of the books out loud.  He could pronounce most of the words correctly, but he did not pay any attention to punctuation at the end of the sentences.  He read one sentence after another until he almost ran out of breath, then he stopped.  I explained to him and he did better from that point on.  He mispronounced “expect”, but when I asked him what that word was, he was able to pronounce it correctly.  When I asked him if he understood the meaning, he did, and gave me an example when I prompted him to.  He had a hard time pronouncing “specifically”.  We went over it a few times, he was much better at it.  We went over its meaning, using an example.  We read a few pages of another book that was just a little more difficult than the first.  I read some more to him.  He retold what I read, and his comprehension was about 80-85 %.  We had an exercise in which he wrote down what he did in school that day.  His sentences were very short, but good.  We went over his paragraph, and he explained to me in details. 

We talked about how often he and his brother come to the library.  Because I don’t have little ones at home, I wondered what the contents were of two of the four books he brought.  They looked cartoonish from the covers.  I asked him to read out loud from the first page, and we had to stop (because I believe those books will not be a good influence for a boy of 9).  His two other books included one on “Star Wars” and one on a very famous pop singer (who actually died from drug overdose and who had criminal charges and tons of issues in life).

We didn’t have time to work on other exercises I brought.  When the session was over, I talked to David and his mother, Sarah.  I told David that three of those books are not good for him.  I encouraged him to read books that will help him to grow to be the best that he can be.  Sarah told me that she wants to encourage her boys to read a lot.  I shared with her that my daughters would have never been allowed to read those books when they were at his age, or even older.  I understand that, due to the language barrier, Sarah doesn’t know what her boys are reading.  She told me that a lot of her son’s friends want to read those books.  I encouraged her to have her sons read books that can influence them to be the best they can be and to be able to contribute to society. I shared that reading about people who have done that in various ways would be helpful.  We looked at the section of biographies for his reading level. Sarah was very appreciative.

I have a better understanding of how to prepare for my next lessons with David.  I will find books that will help him work on building his vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation.  At the same time, they will be books that will inspire him to dream…

Jodie CO #2

I observed Felicia’s Group 2 grammar class.  Her voice and smile showed the students that she was glad to be there to teach them. 

The class started with an exercise on the projector.  It had 15 or so sentences with various errors.  The students were instructed to correct the sentences.  The errors were on verb tenses, contractions, conjunctions, singular vs. plural, and articles.  The students worked on the sentences individually, and the entire class went over the answers together.  She explained very clearly the reasons for the corrections.  Students were free to ask questions when they did not understand.  For example, there should not be another verb which follows “it’s” because “it’s” is “it is”.  If there is another verb after “it’s” in the sentence, then there are two verbs for one subject in that sentence.  Felicia also reminded them the reason for the different usage between simple present and present continuous.

The second activity was a handout.  The students moved around in the classroom posing questions to other students using the suggested phrases.  Felicia walked around the classroom to listen and correct their questions and responses.  Most of the students did not understanding “traffic court”.  She then broke the two words down and explained the meaning very clearly.  The students seem to be very relaxed in her class.  They seemed to be very eager to participate when they knew the answers. 

The way Felicia corrected her students was very good.  If a student gave an answer that was not completely correct, she would say, “Good, your answer is close”.  She also let students correct their own errors.  For example, a student said, “Yesterday, I go to the store.”  She repeated the student’s sentence to a certain point and waited for the student to continue with the correct word. “Yesterday, I … “

I applied her technique for correcting my tutees and it worked very well for us.

Paul TP CIES #1

I met with Badar and Ulisses yesterday in my first group tutoring session! Joelle was supposed to come, but did not show up, and Ulisses came late because of an appointment. However, Badar arrived punctually! He is from Libia and is 17 years old. I spent the first while just conversing with him and making sure he was comfortable with talking with me.

Badar is in Level 1, but he speaks with an accent that is pretty easy for me to understand for the most part. He has been in Florida for 6 weeks, 3 of which in Tallahassee. He does have a lot to learn about English since he is in Level 1, but he knows more than I expected him to. I asked questions about when he started learning English and what he feels are harder aspects for him to grasp. He didn't really have a sure answer, but the time with him allowed me to assess what items we can start working on for next time.

I decided to go over some of the texts we had between each other to teach him how to properly ask some questions. When he had texted me beforehand, he wrote, "What time I will you meet you and where ?"
So I taught him about having to move the "will" to before the subject of the clause. I then went into modal auxiliaries (in both statements and questions) by writing some down and having him come up with a couple examples based off of my modeled examples.

Ulisses came in at about this point. He is in level 2 and has been here from Brazil since August! He and Badar actually have some classes together apparently, so it's fairly easy to teach them together since they are at close levels and they get along. It was a little harder for me to understand Ulisses when he spoke, which surprised me since I'm used to hearing Hispanic accents (and Spanish and Portuguese are so similar!). He is concerned about his speaking for the most part (from what I gathered). He said that he often gets a bit shy and then ends up speaking less.

When going over modal auxiliaries with both of them, it was clear that Ulisses was already familiar with them, as he shot out some examples such as, "must," "can," "should," and "may."
All in all, the first meeting with them went very well. I told them that for next time they can bring any homework that they might need help with understanding.
I look forward to meeting with them next time! Also, Badar just became another one of my conversation partners. So it looks like I'll be seeing a lot of him!

Paul - TP Child #2

I met for the second time with P.J. yesterday evening. We read a book about zoo animals for 40 minutes and then went over the vocabulary (assigned to him by his school) for about 25 minutes. This time, my time management was better! Last week I struggled with quickly getting back on topic when the conversation had deviated a little.

P.J. read well, and when he came upon a word he didn't know, he would still give it his best shot of pronouncing it. The first encounter of a word he was unfamiliar with was "vivid." About 20 minutes through reading through the book, I related the "subtle spots" of a black panther to the "vivid stripes" of a zebra. So when I flipped back and asked him about it, he pronounced it correctly after re-reading. Other than difficulty with pronouncing a couple words like "vivid" and "subtle," P.J. had a good understanding of most of the book. There were some words that he did not know in the book that we then went over. A lion's mane serves as a strong example of that.

After finishing the zoo book right on time, we hopped into the vocab words! He already knew some of them pretty well, but we went over all of them as either a review or a new lesson. I struggled a little bit with explaining the word "clever." I brought up "The Tortoise and the Hare" story to use in explaining several words - lazy, hard-working, win, etc. Funny enough, it turns out he had just read that book earlier in the week, and I had no idea! The vocabulary lesson went pretty well, even though it lasted a few minutes longer than my goal. I feel pretty confident, though, that he has a good understanding of his vocabulary words.

Greg - TP - Adults # 2

My second tutoring session with adults was a bit disappointing attendance-wise.  We changed the time by 30 minutes for one student, who ended up not coming.  A second student had to leave after 30 minutes, leaving only one who stayed for the hour.  I found out later that the no-show had to help a friend at the police station after a car accident.  We will go back to our original time, because it is more convenient for 3 of the 4 of us.

On the positive side, I am excited about what we are doing in the sessions.  Using the assessment from week one, I have developed a good outline and have located corresponding resources to help with the needs revealed in the assessment.

Each week we will follow a three subject approach to our sessions:

1. Pronunciation
2. Grammar
3. American Culture or How to Self-Study English

In using the internet to look up resources that address their needs, I found some great sites.  One very user-friendly, colorful, and multi-media using site I found is ElementaryEnglish.com. At the beginning of class, I took the time to explain to the students that how I planned the lesson, using easy to find, very useful resources, is what they would need to practice doing since they would not always have CIES or a tutor.  I reminded them that life circumstances will change and that they won't always be able to afford the time or money to go to a language school.  Then I showed them how I typed in the search window, "Pronunciation of verbs ending with the sounds t, d, or id." The results showed many sites.  I showed them my selection and, voila, our video resource.  They got very interested and wrote down the site address.

For this week, I used an illustrated video from this site to help with the pronunciation of verb endings that have the sounds t, d, or id.  Last week I helped a CP with this using a worksheet, but this video was more helpful and stimulating.  My Korean and Brazilian students both need help with this.  The video is full of explanations and practice, and it is easy to pause in order to listen to them individually.

With my one remaining student, we transitioned to grammar.  I had originally planned to study prepositions using this same site - this time making use of activities I had created to practice the use of prepositions as explained and illustrated on the site.  However, this is a big need for the Brazilian, who had just left.  I decided to hold what I had prepared for next week.  I then asked the Korean if her work at school this week has caused any new problems to surface.  She immediately thought of her need to know more transition words for her writing class.

I took the time again to show my student how we were going to find help for her need on the internet.  I typed in "transition words."  The first result I chose was gold.  It categorized tons of  transition words by types of transitions.  We practiced this orally, finding variations for "for example, first, second, next," and so forth.  I gave a thesis sentence about her and her brother, and we walked through a paragraph we created, using transition words for each new supporting detail.  I said, "People say my brother and I are very much alike, but I disagree.  (Then we searched for a transition word to replace "First of all.")  That's how we worked through the paragraph.  The result:  she was connected to a great wealth of transition words to begin using, and she learned how she could have found them on her own.

David_TP_Child#1

So for my child partner, I met with Maria Nichols. She is 12 years old and is from the Ukraine, and she told me that she speaks both Ukrainian and Russian as well as her developing English (which she is very good at.) Right from the start I kinda threw out my game plan. Seeing as This is my first meeting with her (Their car broke down last week) I was going to start with my diagnostics and go from there. I could have gone with this, but she was very shy, and I wanted her to feel comfortable talking with me, and asking questions... it's fairly vital with it comes to tutoring, I think we can all agree. So we just talked a little about what she likes, things she enjoys... She told me about Odessa and some of the changes she had to get use to when she moved over here. The real ice beaker was when I asked her a question in Russian. She replied without thinking, and then realized I had asked here in Russian. We talked about how I knew Russian, and some of the differences between it and Ukrainian. This took about 15 minutes, but it was well worth it.

By this time, I could tell that she spoke excellently, so I moved on and we started talking about writing, reading and grammar. We soon got on the topic of reading, and how much she loved it, so I asked her what she liked to read, and she pulled out a book she had been going through. It was the illustrated classics version of Journey to the Center of the Earth... the same kind I had growing up, so we decided that she would read it out loud, and I would listed and help her with words. As she started reading, I started making notes of different words she either mispronounced, or needed help with. At the end of each chapter, we went over the words, and she asked questions about words she did not understand. I felt it was a pretty good system, because she started employing the things we went over in what she was reading next.

We did this for the rest of the time, and I felt it went well. She was very engaging and was asking questions, and I was able to make a log of common mistakes she was making, and giver it to her to keep in mind. She wants to read the book "Little Women" next, and we got about a chapter in before time ran out, so we are going to keep on reading that next week... that is if she has not finished it by them. I encouraged her to read as much as she wanted. All in all I think it went very well, and I look forward to next week!    

Greg - CO # 3

My first class observation was a grammar class with Ms. Ramos.  I really enjoyed her presentation, so I wanted to see how she might teach a different subject.  Today, I observed her speech class.  I was not disappointed.

A lot of chatter was going on in class as she arrived and booted up the computer.  It wasn't noise to her.  She verbalized her delight in the fact that there was a lot of free conversation going on among them.  She didn't ask for silence during roll call, but just called out their names and noted responses among the chatter.  Her walking from the computer to the board was enough cue for the chatter to cease.

Ms. Ramos began with a completely student-centered review of body parts.  She utilized the entire whiteboard with her illustrations, labeling each part as students responded to her questions and clues.  Rather than immediately spelling difficult entries, she asked for the spelling when the body part answer was given.  She also prodded for distinctions between parts (hip/pelvis), and noted other uses for words (trunk of the body, which holds organs, and traveling trunk, which holds our things).

Corrections were made politely and indirectly, such as when "spine" was pronounced "spin."  With this, she asked the student, "How do we spell that?" His spelling caused a self-correction, which he made without even being asked.  When one table was being a bit too unresponsive initially, she mentioned being able to hear the front table well, but that she needed to be able to hear more from the back table.  From that, and due to the many student-centered activities, there was high to complete involvement of all students for the remainder of the class.

Transition was made from body parts to a dialogue that pairs had created the previous day.  Time was given for pairs to practice for the upcoming dialogue presentation.  The students took the roles of doctor and patient.  A trouble word was discussed before the practice began, so that everyone would be able spell and pronounce it (I think). "Prescription" was the word, and Ms. Ramos involved them in identifying the prefix, root, and suffix. They got the word right, but the doctors in the dialogue practiced "real world" over prescribing of drugs!  Ha! (I worked in a pharmacy before coming to CIES.)

A teacher's assistant helped during the practice time at one table, while Ms. Ramos helped at the other.  Following the presentations, corrections were made in a way that I am going to note for future use: "Can I make a little suggestion?" and other kind phrases were used, totally avoiding pointing out some of the quite humorous mistakes, such as a patient saying "I have a big pain in my neck."  (I get those, too, but find healing by changing who I hang around with!)

A final transition was made into another activity that enabled students to practice asking for and giving information.  The subject was interesting - "Wonders of the World," and the game was and engaging competition.  Everyone had a small facts paragraph about one of the Wonders, and everyone, including the TA and me, went around asking guided questions and answers (scaffolding).  The answers were placed in a grid, and whoever filled in the most facts about the Wonders was the winner.  Everyone was walking around (kinesthetic learning) and having a good time trying to win (intrinsic motivation).

The class closed with a preview of the the form a quiz would take during the next class (helping lower the affective filter and make evaluation fair).  Ms. Ramos also shared that the topic after the quiz would be "Timed Speaking," giving the rationale that this skill will help with the TOEFL.

If you can, observe one of Ms. Ramos' classes.  It was certainly a benefit to me!

Ryan - CP #2 - Abdullah2

CP#2 – Abdullah

On Friday night, I got a cryptic text from Abdullah, one of my CPs. “Cafe Shisha now.” Not wanting to let him down, I borrowed a friend’s car and drove up to shisha for our second meeting as conversation partners.

The last time I met Abdullah, he had a level3 friend with him who interjected in both English with me and (most of the time) Arabic with Abdullah. I’ll have to make sure that next time we meet, it’s one-on-one so Abdullah is encouraged to practice his English as much as possible.

Café Shisha turned out to be a poor place to be CPs with Abdullah. Of course this meeting was on his terms, but it was difficult to communicate in a place centered on stasis, sitting back and smoking hookah (well, for me, watching Abdullah and his friend smoke).

Despite the challenge of the situation, Abdullah did get noticeably better at his production between the beginning and end of our session. Vocabulary was hard for him, but just listening to me allowed him to parrot parts of my sentences and contextually pick up vocab. So I think that was helpful.

I do have to admit to feeling very lost at one point. Between Abdullah showing me pictures of body builders on his phone, and his friend demanding I add him on Instagram and comment on his gym photos, some of it was just confusing and weird…but in the end I figured out that they go to the same gym as I do (they had seen me there) and they want to work out with me. So maybe that can be another CP session? Kinda weird but idk haha.

These foundations meetings are always a challenge, but I don’t think this was poor. I just have to be sure to set the terms of our next meeting, to avoid doing activities completely unproductive towards encouraging the use of English…maybe a some trips to other places in Tallahassee would be good…Lake Ella sounds nice J

Ryan - CO #2 - Reading

Classroom Observation #2

Last Monday, I went to a Level 2 Reading class. Students had just begun reading Matilda by Roald Dahl. Ryan, the instructor, played the audiobook while students read from their physical copies. I think this did a lot to help students hear the pronunciation of words, and maybe improve their ablity to focus on content and comprehension rather than struggle over difficult curveball words. 

One thing Ryan did differently than in the first class I observed was his manner of correcting mistakes. Whereas in my first CO the instructor would ask, “Can you say that onnnnnne more time?”, Ryan employed what he called the “what?” method, which is essentially just going…”what?” when someone makes a mistake in their English production. While it’s certainly more blunt, it also is identical to what most English-speaking conversationalists would hear as a response if they uttered something as unclear.

Ryan paused the audio at many points to ask questions for comprehension checks, and to allow students to ask about vocabulary words. I think this makes good sense, as it also catches up anyone else in the class who may have fallen behind. He also used it to explore emotions and character motivations, which I think can do a lot to illuminate how writers use certain words in context to create feelings.

One thing I though was really cool was the passage from Matilda that they just happened to be reading the day I came to observe. A librarian is asking Matilda, who she came to know as a precocious young girl and voracious reader of intellectual books, about her home life. Her parents are revealed to be mean, unsupportive, selfish, and borderline childabusive (ok, I know we’ve all seen the movie, sorry for the recap). At the end of the section, I just thought it was such an appropriate analogue to why the CIES students should be reading these novels and practicing their reading skills in the first place. It seems to fitting that they got read about a girl who has gone far beyond her means to read, in order to experience a life fuller and richer than the one originally given to her. I hope the CIES students will continue reading and enriching their lives long after their English courses at CIES are over, and long after reading Matilda way back in a forgotten level 2 reading course.

Greg - CP #5

Today was my first time to meet with Awad since meeting him briefly at the tea last week.  Awad is from Saudi Arabia.  He is older than my other CP's and TP's, is married, and has a higher level of English.  In fact, this is his last session before he moves to Texas for Master's level work in finance.

This meeting was very rich in cultural exchange.  We walked to an Arabic restaurant he enjoys.  The walk was filled with the normal "getting to know about each other" conversation, allowing me to see how well I could understand him and he, me.  I was relieved that our conversation was smooth, and that the tone of the conversation was open and warm.  My first impression at the tea was very different, though we only had about 45 seconds to talk before he informed me he was leaving for a nap.

While standing in line to order, I found out that he was from Saudi Arabia rather than from where my assumption had placed him (Kuwait).  My expression of joy at having my first encounter with someone from his country, even shaking his hand as I expressed my gladness, made a smile on his face.  I knew from that point that we both were going to enjoy the lunch hour.

Before we began talking, I asked him if carrying on a conversation during a meal is considered acceptable or not in his culture.  Once I knew it is considered fine, I felt at ease.  I have experienced the opposite in my travels. We discussed education systems, my home state of Alabama, his home region of Saudi Arabia, what each region of his country is famous for, and what Alabama is famous for.  We discussed how and why Alabama and other states are divided into counties, problems with corruption in my county - now bankrupt, and how finances are managed and distributed among the 5 regions of his country.  We also enjoyed learning more about each other's birth family and marriage family.  It was really a valuable time of exchange.

I came away with a good impression of a man from his country.  I hope he left with the same impression about this man.  I am always aware that I am an ambassador on many levels.  It's not just about English.

Greg - CO # 2

My class observation today was a level 3B grammar class taught by Ms. Stringer.  As students found their seats, the teacher asked them about their weekend activities.  To her surprise, most students had lived boring weekends.  Only one had ventured out to play.  Everyone laughed about their uneventful weekend, starting class off with some informality. The agenda was on the board from the start.

Roll call was done without involving the students.  The teacher would look up from the computer, see someone was there, and say, "Ramos is here.  Juan is here. . . (fictitious names to protect the innocent). Personally, I think it is better to interact with the students at every possible point, even roll call.

Roll call was followed by the passing out of graded tests.  She gave them a chance to ask questions about their beautiful mistakes, using the board to explain the corrections.  At the end of class, I heard her explaining her policy of no make up tests to a student who had not shown up for the test.

Names were always used during the teacher/student interactions. Students felt comfortable interrupting the teacher with questions or additional comments.  Once or twice, this seemed to be a negative interruption in that it caused an explanation of something being taught to have to start back at the beginning.  The teacher did not show disapproval, but I could tell her train of thought had been temporarily derailed due to the poorly timed interruptions. On the positive side, some students were participating.  There were a couple of students that remained silent throughout most of the class.  One older student seemed to dominate a bit with questions and statements.  It wasn't terrible, and maybe it was more noticeable since there were some quiet students.  The teacher handled this by addressing others when she had a new question to ask.

Ms. Stringer chose a very interesting article about teen court called "Getting a Second Chance."  Some cultural exchange happened at this point as students shared how teenage criminals were dealt with in their countries.  As she handed copies of the article out, she explained the grammar points for gerunds and infinitives, doing some example work with these, but not much.  The article had the gerunds and infinitives in bold, as well as new vocabulary listed at the bottom.  Students read the article as the teacher played classical music in the background.  (Nice ambiance!)  Once finished, a PowerPoint was used to identify sample sentences from the article, with the grammar notes beside them.  To my surprise, not a single notebook was opened, and not a single student was taking any notes.  Maybe this was review material, but I would have encouraged some note-taking.

A worksheet was used, giving the students a chance to construct sentences with gerunds and infinitives. Some of their constructed sentences where put on the board and discussed.  The teacher showed her knowledge of language interference as she helped a student with his sentences.  She realized that sentence structure in Arabic was the source of the problem he was having as he was trying to complete the assignment.

Class moved on in a logical order and at a fairly rapid pace, ending with a preview of how they would continue the same subject the next day.  No homework was given.

Ryan - CIESTP1 (TP#1)

CIES Tutoring Session 1

On Friday I met with one of my CIES group tutees. Since Isabella and Osamah canceled just before the tutoring session, it was just Byron and me. Byron is an Ecuadorian chef-in-the-making, working on his English skills before pursuing a bachelors degree to make his parents happy, and pursuing an AA-degree at Kaiser college for culinary arts to fulfill his passion for making food. After meeting with foundations level CPs who only wanted to do well on their IELTS or TEFLs, it was such a rewarding experience to spend an hour working with Byron, who had clear intrinsic motivation to speak English. He told me the languages of food are French and English, and he wants to learn them both. Love his passion.

The first ten minutes, we just sat together in our Strozier study room and talked. It was great. Just from conversing, I could diagnose a few issues in his use of the more complex past tense phrases. I wanted to know what he needed help with it, so he showed me a few things that had just been confusing him lately. He was confused about the sentence “I am retired.” He saw am retired as a unique past-tense construction, the meaning of which he couldn’t understand. I gave a lot of examples of those types of adjectives (tired, wasted, potted (plant) etc.) and how they come from past tense verbs, but are adjectives when used this way. I came up with the ‘Potted’ example last, as it is used both ways (potted plant=adjective, the plant is potted=present adjective//passive verb) I didn’t quite know how to explain that those are almost the same thing but different, but I’ll have the answer in our next session. I mean it's basically just that past-tense verbs have been used as adjectives...a lot. Admittedly, they've become adverbs too. Complex. We also looked at some determiner use for 'some/a couple/few'.

At the end of the session, I asked if he wanted to work on a listening drill. I had prepared two stories from the WBEZ Chicago radio program This American Life. I choose a few stories from the show “20 Act in 60 Minutes”. I had already retrieved and simplified for reading the transcripts for Act 8, “The Greatest Dog Name in the World," and Act 13, “More Lies.” Those can be heard here http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/241/20-acts-in-60-minutes and you super should listen to at least ACT 13, ‘cause that story kills me it’s so funny. Anyways, for the first story (Act 8) we read the transcripts first, and I answered his questions about vocab/grammar/meaning. It was revealing showing how poorly produced even native speakers' grammar is when we speak English. I think he appreciated seeing the freedom we have when speaking to make a lot of mistakes, but we briefly discussed some of the rules that don't get broken in speech, namely things like tense and agreement. The next story (Act 13), we listened to first before reading over the transcript, checking comprehension one part at a time, and then read the transcript for full comprehension checking. It was a great little exercise, and he got a laugh out of the stories, especially after we worked through and clarified exactly what was happening and what people meant.

Can’t wait to tutor him again, it was a great session.

Emily_CO_1

The classroom observation I chose to do first was Alexandra Ramos’s level 1C grammar class.  On the elevator ride up to the fourth floor, I started a conversation with the other person in the elevator, who is from Brazil, and he happened to be going to the class that I was observing.  One of my conversation partners, Soren, was also in the class. Normally I would expect the students in a 9:00 grammar class to be very sleepy and out of it, but everyone seemed fairly cheery (maybe due to Ramos’s friendly disposition).  She started with recording attendance and asking everyone how they are and telling them good morning.  Then, she went up to the whiteboard to begin reviewing the simple present tense.  She did a good job throughout the class of asking the students to tell her what certain terms mean or to give examples.  This strengthens their ability to produce sentences and verbalize them on their own rather than merely being fed the information.  Most of the students seemed attentive and comfortable in participating and asking questions.  When one student asked her a question about a different kind of sentence, she made sure to come back to his question and explain.  It is evident that she cares about her students and their learning.  First, they reviewed how to do negative statements, the present continuous tense, and turning statements into questions as well.

 A fun activity she did for practicing the present continuous tense was pulling up a Google image search of famous paintings and having the students describe what is happening in each painting.  The students gave some good example sentences, and when someone said something like, “they are excited,” the instructor made sure to ask, “is that in the present continuous tense?” When the student inquired, “exciting?” the instructor used this opportunity to stop and explain why exciting in that case was not the present continuous tense, writing examples on the board for visual aid. 

Another activity that she did was getting the students to write a list of five family members that they think about the most and what they think they are doing right now.  She walked around the class as they were writing to see if they needed help or had questions.  Then she modeled a real life situation and utilized role-play in practicing the present continuous tense.  She picked a student and asked them to pretend that they are calling someone to try and figure out what their loved one is doing.  For example, one student wanted to know what his brother was doing and pretended to call his workplace.  Someone else hypothetically answers the phone and the student asks, “What is my brother doing?” Then the student would have to come up with an answer: “He is working right now.”  She repeated this process with several more students.  This activity puts the concept into context and helps the student remember how it is used.  At the end of class she told her students that she would give them two exercises to do tomorrow that review the present continuous tense and questions.  This is a good idea because that way she will have a tangible way to evaluate whether or not all of the students understand.  Some of the students in class today probably need a little more practice.  I noticed a little hesitance and uncertainty from some of the students today, but maybe it was just because those students are more introverted learners.

I was given the impression that Alexandra Ramos is someone who cares about her students and wants them to understand.  After class, she even wanted me to give her some of the notes that I took from observing her class today so that she can improve as a teacher.  I told her that I would email her this blog write-up.  :)

Greg - TP - Child - Session #3

I met with P.J. for the third time last night.  Our tasks this time were to work on listening comprehension using two different mediums.  We first read together from a book with a collection of stories.  We read "The Elves and the Shoemaker."  This story was an experiment.  Ms. Kim thought it probably was a bit beyond his comprehension level, but wanted to stretch him and see.  I guess she was applying the I+1 strategy.  I think we ended up I + 2. 

P.J. was a bit worn out from the day of school and after school care.  It took us some time to get his engine running.   What I learned about P.J. was that he responds accurately about 80 percent of the time when my comprehension questions used indirect evaluation (multiple choice, complete my clue with the correct word from the story, etc.)  However, when I tested his recall using direct evaluation methods (having him answer my question by needing to create the entire answer from memory in complete sentences), it was overload for his tired mind with this advanced material.  This helped me to see he was receiving and remembering more than it first appeared.

We are going to try other methods of expressing recall when evaluating comprehension.  Next week we will take a walk in the neighborhood to see if activity while listening helps (as opposed to sitting at the desk).  I will tell the story in my own words, and then let him tell it back to me (in sections, of course). 

We also used his computer to study what fables are, listening to the definition and to three fables.  By now he was warmed up and a bit more interested in the subjects of these animal centered stories.  They were also more on his level.  In addition, he seems to enjoy learning from the computer more than from physical books (intrinsic motivation).  This was actually school homework, as they will be studying fables starting Tuesday.

I look forward to seeing what impact a change in teaching style will have on P.J. next week.  We will be walking in the dark with a lantern, telling and retelling stories.  Anybody got some smores?  Ha.

Bobby - CO_grammar 2

I went to Felicia Ciappetta's Level 2 Grammar course again, since the majority of time last week was devoted to the students taking a diagnostic test. Today's lesson was on the present perfect tense. The students were given a worksheet, seen below:

Students had to change each of the statements to the present perfect tense, and phrase it as a question that they would ask their classmates (i.e. "Have you ever arrived late to a movie?") Felicia then asked the students specific questions about which students had ever had these experiences. I noticed that Felicia tried to lower the students' 'affective filter' by giving personal accounts of these experiences. For example, she talked about sleeping in class one time and how the professor yelled at her in front of the whole class. The students enjoyed this and could relate to such an experience. 

Following this activity, Felicia started to get into the teaching portion of the lesson. She asked the class when the present perfect tense is used and explained that it is used for experiences in the past. She gave something like the following illustration to help them understand: 2010--------------X(now)----->

• forming the present perfect: have + past participle
• "I have spoken Spanish since 2010."

The students understood, but some were confusing this tense with others (past perfect - "had had" and present perfect continuous - "have been going"). After the lesson, students took out their books to complete an activity. During this time, Felicia addressed students individually if they had questions during the lesson. There was just enough time left in class for students to complete the activity, talk about it amongst themselves, and speak with Felicia about any problems they ran into. Great observation!

Emily_CP_3

I just met with Neto, my conversation partner from Brazil.  He is so sweet!  We met at Starbucks, and he bought me coffee.  He told me that he’s been here for two months and does not feel as comfortable speaking English as he does reading and writing it.  In spite of that, he took the initiative and ordered the coffee for both of us.  While conversing with him by email and text, I noticed that his written English has very few errors, but conversing with him was more difficult.  He was very smiley and pleasant and seemed a bit nervous and bashful while having trouble thinking of how to say something, but I was very patient.  I can empathize with him from my own language learning experiences.  He is 22 and is getting a degree in Chemical Engineering in Brazil.  He only has one year left in his undergraduate program but took a break to come to the U.S. and learn English.  He’s supposed to go back to Brazil in August.  We brainstormed Halloween costume ideas for him.  I think he’ll end up choosing to be Sheldon Cooper from The Big Bang Theory; either that or Woody from Toy Story.  Neto keeps a tiny black journal in his pocket and fills it with new words or phrases that he learns.  I saw that for most of the words, he has the English word with the Portuguese translation next to it.  As we were talking and he learned something new, he wrote it in his journal.  He wanted me to write in it as well as I explained something to him.  He would ask me things such as what the past tense of a certain verb is, whether listening to music or watching movies in English would be helpful, and much more.

Neto and I decided that Monday nights are going to be our meeting time for now on.  I’m excited to get to know him better and help him become more comfortable with speaking English.