Sebastian- Tutoring - 12

Today I used short scripts for the tutoring session, and concluded with a reading comprehension exercise. I told my student to read the scripts first so that she could understand the story, and after she went over them, we acted them out.

Since you need to understand the meaning of the story in order to be able to read it with feeling (which is what I wanted her to do), we had to try it a number of times. Every time she found a word that she did not know the meaning to, I would first explain it to her and then give her the dictionary definition.

I saw that she enjoyed reading the script once she understood what was going on in the story, and that made me feel good about teaching. It is nice when you help someone understand something that they did not know before, because its like creating bridges between you and that person. Suddenly, you have one more thing in common with each other.

And that is another reason why I like learning other languages. My student also enjoys it very much when I try to say something in her native tongue. She quickly helps me with pronunciation, making a student out of the teacher.

Soon I will be in Japan, and this blog will be a part of my memories past. After I get my TEFL certificate, I hope to help other people learn English just as I learned more than 14 years ago. Perhaps the next blog will be in Japanese...

Sebastian- Tutoring - 11

Because of lack of sleep, I have started with this introduction. My brain is not working properly at the moment, so please bear with me. No teddying, please.

So, yesterday I had the usual tutoring session with my student, and we went over the IPA phonetic chart. As I showed it to her, she told me that all Japanese student encounter this chart while in school, and they learn the different characters that represent the sounds.

In Japanese, R and L are pronounced exactly the same. There is no difference between them. So, once in a while, my student will come across a word which she does not know how she should pronounce. For example, once, she was talking to a friend (a close girlfriend of her's, thankfully) and she said the word "election". But remember, to the Japanese person, l and r sound the same. So it sounded more like "erection", which I do not need to explain further. But, don't worry, there were plenty of laughs.

We worked heavily on this difference, as well as the words bought, but, bat and bet. To the native English speaker, these are easy to differentiate. To the learner, it can be a nightmare, since there are slight differences to be detected. I used plenty of humor to make the studying bearable.

We did a little of reading comprehension as well. This time we read a story about a man who bought a winning lottery ticket. We did the usual question and answer, but a little more open to interpretation. It was fun.

Sebastian- Tutoring - 10

Last night we had our usual tutoring session. I gave my student a sheet with various sentences for her to correct. The sentences used "say" and "tell", and she had to figure out which was the correct way of saying them. Another worksheet was more open. She would have to find and correct the errors, if any. She did very well, but I helped her with a few when I saw that she had gotten stumped.

After that, I had her read a few stories, one of them about the winters in Irkutsk. It was interesting to read about people's everyday lives in such a harsh climate. My student learned some new words, and I saw the importance of the lessons for her. She can communicate very well in English, but she still needs to learn more vocabulary and phrases to completely understand certain things that she reads. In this lesson she answered about 60% of the questions correctly.

The second story was about a toddler that was bitten by a snake. Since this was a shorter story with simpler words, she answered most (if not all) questions correctly.

I plan to keep using the reading comprehension stories as part of our lessons, as I can see things in which my student can improve. I hope that I can also keep making the lessons interesting for her. After all, no one likes a boring teacher...

Sebastian- Tutoring - 9

Yesterday I was looking at different activities for English learners in the internet, and I stumbled upon a nice ESL site with suggestions on how to teach and with activities. As I was looking, I found a random word generator.

Now, what good is that? Well, it happened to be very useful as we played "pictionary" during our tutoring session. We used a white board for that purpose.

We also played charades. It was fun, and my student was constantly learning new words. I was surprised at how many words she learned, everyday words for me, but totally new to her.

Lastly, I had her read another article regarding a change in the immigration laws in Japan. I focused more on pronunciation and vocabulary. If she pronounced a word incorrectly, I would show her how to pronounce it correctly at the end of the paragraph or sentence. This would give her some time to try to capture the gist of the paragraph and would give her a better chance of finding out what the word meant.

As always, I am looking forward to the next session!

Sebastian- Tutoring - 8

For yesterday's session, we worked on both reading and listening comprehension. We discussed news articles. Since my student is Japanese, I chose articles pertaining to Japan. I read the first one, and asked questions about it afterward. It was about the Toyota company and how they might be innocent of the allegations that many made against them and their products. The article was very helpful for my student since she got to learn new words, like blackbox. I explained to her what a blackbox is, and how it helps determine the causes of an accident or crash.

After we examined another article about the same topic, I asked her what she thought. She gave me her opinion on the matter, and shortly after we tried another activity. I would draw pictures on a white board and then she would give me the corresponding phrase or word. She had a lot of fun with that one. During the activity, I even learned a new phrase from her. It was an adaptation of "First come, first served".

I always try to use a different approach for each session. If I don't, I feel like I am going to lose the student to boredom. As soon as I notice that she is losing concentration, I try to improvise according to the material that I have gathered and the needs of the student. I hope that I can master the art of teaching one day. This is the first step.

Sebastian- Tutoring - 7

Hello again. Our last tutoring session was about listening comprehension. I would read a story and ask my student previously prepared questions to see how much she had understood by listening. Although she answered correctly most times, there were instances where her answer would be very far from what I expected. In those occasions, I would find out what word or phrase she did not understand and explain it to her.

There was also some new vocabulary after each story, so she learned some new words there too. For example, she learned the meaning of "moniker".

On the last half of the session, we again went over proverbs in English. She learned a lot with those. I also had learned at least 1 or 2, so it was great for me as well.

I hope I can keep making every session interesting, because once it gets repetitive, the student gets tired of learning and the instructor of teaching. Something that has also helped me is my attitude. To keep a humble mindset is important, since even experienced instructors do not know everything about the subject they teach. So whenever the student asks me something that I do not know, I will reply that I do not know, but will find out for them. I imagine that doing this in a real classroom would help both the instructor and the students by keeping that bridge between them. They both are continuously learning; the difference is that one is more advanced than the other.

Sebastian- Tutoring - 6

On Friday my wife and I had another tutoring session. We covered verbs, especially those that are used to express types of sounds (or onomatopoeia). I would read the verb to her and she would give me a sentence using the verb. If she did not know what it meant, I would repeat the word again and ask her what it would sound like.

It is interesting that in Japanese, (as well as other languages, I am sure) they have onomatopoeia that does not closely resemble their English counter-part. For example, the phrase for crunch in Japanese is kuri kuri. They usually use two words instead of one to describe a sound.

During the latter half of the session we played a mini board game where we had to ask each other questions in the form of "Have you ever?". The responses were very interesting. The question "Have you ever loved someone at first sight?" generated interesting responses from both of us.

I feel that during this session we learned a lot of new things, not only about language, but also about both of our cultures and personal experiences.

Sebastian - CP2 - Week 4

This should have been the blog for week 5, but seeing as the world cup was playing on tv during the tea time, we did not talk much.

Anyway, I met Sungsub last Thursday again and we talked about different things, some of them being my trip to Puerto Rico. I showed him what the beaches looked like over there, and he also showed me an island off the coast of Korea. Apparently the island is desolate (I taught him that word), but it is very beautiful.

He also asked me how to say other things. For example, we discussed street terms like "gold digger". It was a very fun conversation.

I like speaking to Sungsub because he does not give up whenever he gets stuck on how to express something. At the same time, I find it enjoyable to teach people new things, so whenever he understands an idea that he did not understand before using the English language it makes me feel great.

I hope that I am able to help him as much as I can before our time is up.

Sebastian- Tutoring - Week 5

Hello!

Yesterday I had a very interesting tutoring session with my student (my wife). I started out by reading a fable to her regarding two frogs that decided to move because the well where they lived dried up. I first read it once, and asked her questions about the story to see how much she comprehended. Once I explained the words that she did not understand, I read it again, this time asking her what she thought the moral of the story was. She learned new words like "marsh", and also the expression "by and by".

After reading the story, I pulled out a list of "hot topics" of conversation and asked her to rate from 1 to 10 the statements, 1 being "strongly agree" and 10 being "strongly disagree". After she rated them, she would give me a thorough explanation of why she chose one or the other.

Finally, I handed her a little quiz where she had to match the correct expression to the sentence. She also learned new things there, like the expression "Been there, Done that!".

During this session, I was able to help her with listening comprehension as well as writing. She told me that she had enjoyed it, something which I was really happy about.

Sebastian - CP2 - Week 3

Yesterday I went to Starbucks with Sungsub and we had a very interesting chat while we had lunch. We spoke about a lot of things, but one of the most memorable was talking about work. I asked him how it was like working in Korea. He said most jobs in Korea are usually from morning to night. Very exhausting. I told him that I did not think that was good for families in general. He said that he agreed with me, and opened up about his feelings on the matter. He told me that he was envious of the Americans in that aspect. Most people in the US have 8 to 5 jobs, from Monday to Friday. He wishes that it was like that in Korea, because unfortunately, fathers do not spend enough time with their kids and wives.

We also spoke about the abuse that happens in many work places regarding illegal immigrants. I expressed my feelings on that matter, and he had similar views on it. He even told me that in Korea people from Thailand and other poor countries suffer discrimination in many places and are ill treated. We chatted a little more about a few other good subjects (like police in both Korea and the US) , and then had to cut the conversation short because our lunch time had ended. I hope to continue our conversation next week.

Sebastian - CP2 - Week 2

Last week I picked up Sungsub near his home, and we headed for Starbucks. My wife came along with us as well. After looking for Starbucks for a good while, we could not find it and decided to go to Chick-Fil-A. As we were eating our meal, we talked about a few things. Since Sungsub had traveled to Japan, we asked how he liked it, and apparently he enjoyed it. He also talked about his country, and how they calculate their age. In his country, he is 28, but here he is 26. I did not fully understand this when Juseob explained it to me. I did not fully understand it this time either. In any case, they say that they add a year because of the time spent in the womb, and the other reason I still did not catch.

After our meal, we drove back to his apartment to drop him off, and we started talking of what kind of movies we liked. He said he likes horror movies. Especially Japanese horror movies, which have the reputation of being the scariest ones. I said that my issue with that genre is that most of them have something to do with the supernatural, and I really do not mess with that. But it is interesting how big an audience that genre has in the world.

While we arrived at the apartment complex, I told him that next time we would go to Starbucks to have some coffee. He happily agreed. There must be some connection between Koreans and their love of Starbucks... (Do they get a discount?)

Sebastian - CP2 - Week 1

Last Thursday I met another CIES student by the name of Sungsub Song. I really enjoyed speaking with him. His English was very impressive. He told me that he was from a small town in Korea. He started asking me about my background, and I told him that I am Puerto Rican. Apparently, he did not know where Puerto Rico is, so I had to show him using Google Earth. I even showed him my town via the software! He also pointed to the place where he came from in Korea.

The conversation started getting more exciting when we talked about languages, accents, and dialects. I told him that, although most Spanish speaking people understand each other in daily conversation, we share certain words that mean totally different things. For example, I shared with him a story about something that had happened to me while I was knocking on a door in a Mexican neighborhood (I am a Jehovah's Witness). As you all know, we usually preach with a partner when we go door to door. My partner happened to be Mexican. As I approach the door, I am thinking "I got this". I knock. My partner looks at me in horror. I am dumbfounded. I had no idea what I had done wrong. You are probably thinking, "Man, just spit it out". I will...

In Puerto Rico, we have a certain way of knocking that indicates to the resident that we are friendly. Apparently, the same knocking pattern means something totally different in Mexico. Instead of saying "I come in peace", I was saying something cruel about their mother. Hence the horrified look (this happened to be a neighborhood with a very bad reputation). Thank God nobody was there (maybe they were hiding because of the message I inadvertently sent them).

So, after sharing this somewhat embarrassing story, I asked Sungsub if people experienced the same issues in Korea, or if the language is more standardized. He told me it did vary, but the biggest difference is between the people of the North and the people of the South. However, they can still understand each other.

Next time we talk, I hope we can exchange more stories and information about our different cultures. It feels so good to share experiences that seem exclusive to our culture, but in reality, are so universal.

'Till the next time!

Sebastian- Tutoring - Week 4

Hello again, everybody!

I wanted to re-enter the blog world by stating, even if no one reads this blog, that I have missed our classes and conversations. I will always remember each one of you wherever I go in the world and will share the wonderful experiences that we had during our brief, but strong knit class.

Now, back to business as usual.

Last week I had another tutoring session with my wife, this time talking about adjectives. She learned new words, like "gleaming" and "drab" (I had learned that word recently myself, which shows how much more English I need to learn). We also read from a list of adjectives, and I asked her to include the word in a sentence, which sometimes proved to be humorous (the word "handsome" brought up some interesting responses, including Will Smith, Jonathan Rhys Meyers, amongst others). It was an interesting session. My name came up as well... eventually.

Anyway, I am glad to be tutoring again. It has been a while since I have formally sat down (or stood up, as a matter of fact) with the purpose of tutoring. I will try my best to keep blogging each week and perhaps throw in a picture or two.

Updates on English Classes in Costa Rica

Hello All,

I'm happy to say that after a month I have a roster of 50+ students signed up for my classes. I have 3 beginner and 1 intermediate class. This week we are still signing students up, but come Monday my classes will be in full swing! We weren't given much to work with as far as materials and curriculum go, but I am using all of your great lesson plans and great info from Ramin as a base to create activities and lessons. I met all my students when they came to sign up and they are from all different walks of life. There are middle-aged men and women who work in the airport, taxi drivers ranging in age from 20s-60s, and I even got some young guys who work in a Disco! They were really high-energy so that class should be very interesting.

Life in Liberia is gorgeous, to wake up everyday with mountains in the background is amazing! I hope life in the states is treating you all well! I'm gonna post a picture of me ziplining and things.

Pura Vida

Conversation partner meeting # ? - I lost count by Rita Schwab

Its become so natural to meet with Eric weekly that I don't consider this meeting anymore as credits for a cetificate, rather as a meeting with a friend or son.

I have enjoyed seeing Eric mature in getting acquainted with this country, its social environment, the English language and I have to say that he has progressed so much. I am really proud of him.
I will really miss him as I am leaving north within one week. But I am sure that we will stay in touch via phone and/or internet.

At our last gathering I brought Eric the CD by Bela Fleck ' Throw Down your Heart' as it was recorded in Africa. Bela Fleck recorded in Uganda, Mali, Tanzania and Gambia, with Mali a bordering country to Burkina Faso, Eric's resident country. He recognized one recording artist on the CD, namely Ah Ndiya, and said that she was very famous all over Africa.
Eric did not know what a banjo was. We explored and found out that the origin of the banjo is assumed to be the akonting, a hand-made 'primitive' African banjo.

Eric enjoyed the music very much and I am making him a copy.

Tutoring 12 with Eric Passouc by Rita Schwab

Last Friday Eric and I met again. I had asked him if I could give him a tutoring session so that I can complete my requirements. He has been my conversation partner. Of course Eric agreed and
was excited about the subject matter: Florida State Parks.
When I inquired where he has traveled in Florida, he mentioned Gainesville, Tampa and Jacksonville, but nothing further south from that.
I showed him a Florida map and we discussed the travel distances and I had him look up several distances on mapquest. He had not been aware of the size of this state.
Then we looked at a map of all the state park of which there are many.
Next I presented a slide show of my experiences in 3 different state parks. I realized right away that my slide show was way too long. Eric enjoyed my artistic photography.
The I presented the book 'Florida State Parks' by Michael Strutin. I asked him to choose 2 state parks, one close by and another in south Florida and compare the facilities of both parks, the size, the recreation possibilities and how to access the park, namely finding driving directions.
Eric chose Wakulla Springs as it is the closest state park to Tallahassee, which he also had visited before. He found out about the history of the park, its discovery and its large springs. We noted vocabulary of recreation activities, habitat, history and wild life.
On my recommendation Eric chose Bahia Honda as the State Park in the Keys, as he was least familiar with that area of Florida. He was impressed by the difference in climate, the beaches, the difference in coastal lines of the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic and the abundance of recreation available. We made a comparison chart of the 2 parks.

Eric thought that the idea of educating foreign students on the abundance of Florida's wilderness areas and the recreation possibilities as well as the distances for traveling to these places would be very helpful. I think I created an urge to explore for Eric and I am sure he will want to visit some of these places.

Focus was on vocabulary, pronunciation and comprehension.
We met for 1 1/2 hours.
I found this prep tutoring session before my final presentation very helpful. But now I can see that tutoring one person is quite a different approach than what is needed in the classroom. I believe that the tutoring session went very well, but the class presentation was not as successful and I would make many changes.
Thank you.

Richard -- Tutoring #12

This is the last session. It was somewhat emotional.

Anyway, for this last session, I dedicated my lesson to the differences between gerunds and infinitives.

Like articles, teaching gerunds and infinitives is very hard to teach. But I felt more prepared for this compared to the former.

I started the lesson by writing "Gerunds vs. Infinitives" on the white board. Of the two terms, Kyung had no idea what a gerund was, so I told him in this way:

"Gerunds function as a noun. Gerunds are formed from modifying the verb infinite. For example, "to go" is an infinitive, but its gerund is "going."

I explained to Kyung that the word "going" could function as a verb in some cases, but I did let him know that such cases make the word "going" no gerund at all. I told him, as an example, the word "going" was a verb in the sentence "I am going to the store today." I let him know in this case, the modified verb refers to the "present continuous" rather than it being a "gerund."

I know this my way of describing this seems confusing, but I assure you that Kyung knew exactly what I meant.

Anyway, I gave him some examples of the gerunds and infinitives.

"Eating an apple a day is healthy."

In this example, I told Kyung that "eating" functions as a noun because "eating" is an activity (one of the things we use to identify nouns... is it a person, place, thing, idea, activity, etc...).

Here is my infinitive example:

"I want to eat an apple."

I asked Kyung what the principle verb was in the sentence. He said "want," and he was correct. I explained why it was correct. The verb "want" is expressing the action. The infinitive "to eat" only specifies that action.

Kyung got this, of course. He is literally a language sponge.

After I taught him the differences, we worked together on a worksheet. This was the first question (the words in the parentheses had to be modified to either infinitives or gerunds):

You should think about (save) until you have enough money (get) a decent video camera rather than (rush) (buy).

I'm so happy to share with you that Kyung got this correct! In fact, he got nearly all of them correct! But here is one where he slipped a bit:

I have trouble (understand) modern art as some artists only seem out (shock); I cannot understand them not (want) to make the kind of beautiful things we all like (look) at.

This was Kyung's answer:

I have trouble to understand modern art as some artists only seem out to shock; I cannot understand them not wanting to make the kind of beautiful things we all like to look at.

In this case, I would remind Kyung that (understand) describes an activity, so the answer would be "understanding" since it functions as a noun.

Like I said, Kyung only had few slips here and there, but he definitely did get most of them correct. I was so proud!

I had to end the lesson there to make room for Karen to give Kyung an improvement test. With my tutoring and his independent studying, it turns out Kyung moved up by one whole level.

This made me feel accomplished.

Kyung let me know that I was an excellent tutor, and so did Karen. But Kyung made me feel very special when he said that he felt that he improved a lot. It made me feel good about that. I feel like I can take this experience and apply it to my first class.

I sure am going to miss Kyung.

Richard. Out.

Richard -- Tutoring #11

For our last week together, I started the first half of our last week discussing the future, which is to say the lesson focused on the future tense.

I had prepared a board game. In a way, it was like the board we played in our TEFL class that allowed us to talk about a specific thing for 1 minute.

Only I didn't give Kyung a time limit.

Anyway, there are basically 4 ways in which we English speakers tell about the future. So I focused it on these 4 common expressions:

1. Will

2. Going to

3. Plan to

4. Intend to

This lesson was going to be a speaking lesson about the future obviously. Kyung went first and his game piece would land on a square labeled "brush my teeth" for example.

Here, Kyung had to use any of the 4 common expressions and a time, i.e. tonight, to complete his turn.

So this is what he had to say: "Tonight, I intend to brush my teeth!"

Kyung is quite the quite the natural. I feel he learns more when he speaks, so I would ask him follow up questions.

"Where will you brush your teeth?"

"Are you going to use a toothbrush?"

We kept our focus on the future tense, so any time Kyung said something in the present tense, I would tell him to put what he said in the future tense. He did! He only did this present tense thing one time. The rest of the time he stuck with the future tense.

Kyung said he liked the lesson because it made him talk a lot. His enunciation has vastly improved, I must say! I'm so thrilled that he is learning! :)

Tutoring 10 with Yongheon by Rita SChwab

Yesterday I saw Yongheon at the library again as usual on Wednesdays. He is feeling better. He has been dealing with a bad cough and was sent to a specialist. This got us talking about the health care system in the US compared to South Korean health care. We spoke in detail about health insurance, a very acute issue and Yongheons direct coverage for himself and his family. This conversation was good practise for Yongheon's pronunciation as his goal is improvement in speaking and pronouncing and sentence intonation. I therefore always encourage conversations and will pause to correct mistakes and repeat words to practise better pronunciation.

The focus of the class however was Tallahassee, the city, its history, its government and politics, its climate, its demographics down to urban planning and expansion ( see attached file). Special attention was given to the Leon County Sustainable Community Summit to be held May 6th and 7th at the newly rebuilt Turnbull Conference Center. As Yongheon is employed by the south Korean government and is working on his Master's degree in political science with focus on urban planning, I thought this summit be of primary interest to Yongheon.

I had Yongheon read the entire summit information, practicing sentence intonation, focus on syllabus and pronunciation and repeating sentences with 'proper' language flow. The "f" and the "th" is always difficult to pronounce and needs extra practice.

I hope Yongheon will attend the summit as there are many speakers and the focus is on sustainability and planning for future living. Yongheon felt that Korea is more progressed in this subject matter as well as in technology and computer knowledge.

Our time for tutoring is almost over as I am leaving north the beginning of May. Yongheon gave me a going away present, which I thought was so sweet and he suggested dinner the next time we meet.

Tutoring this student has been a good and educational experience. Thank you.

Update on Ongoing Tutoring with Shansahn

I've been tutoring Shanshan since our class ended. She is almost too good to tutor anymore! What do I do when the student has surpassed the need for instruction? I guess I just have to keep running her through some essay writing drills, instilling her with the confidence she needs to kick the serious ass that is the LSAT writing section.

I recently started having her write the essays by hand, to mirror the LSAT conditions, and also keeping the composition time under 35 min. To my surprise, this actually improved her writing! One of her problems seems to be a lack of confidence in her first thought. This is actually a common creative writing issue, people going back over and nit picking at something until it's neutered of the original vitality it had. Her typed essays weren't this extreme, there were just a few points in every one where, as I know can see, she tried to insert ideas in the middle of sentences and thereby screwed up the rhythm, grammar of them.

She also said recently: how can I make my sentences less primitive? I almost got angry at this. I told her emphatically that her sentences were not primitive, and in fact her intellect of argument was well expressed, her creativity in analysis as well. This is what the admissions people are going to be looking at, not the rhetorical flights of fancy.

She's a great student. I'll have to keep her number on file for when I need a defense lawyer :)

The First Meeting Between Faisal II and Keith

I went to the CIES dinner last week with Richard, Elizabeth and Riuting.

It had been a good week, month, end of the semester for me--a huge renewal of self-confidence, a huge purge of self-consciousness--and I was obviously happy to be there.

It was great to see Rita again--my Surrogate German Auntie. I have been seeing Ramin everywhere, it seems. He looks good clean shaven. Like my dad, I told him. Elizabeth seemed disappointed he didn't look like Jesus anymore.

I was at a table with five Asian guys--not to be stereotypically ignorant, I just don't know where from specifically--and I enjoyed listening to them speak in a language I couldn't understand. I couldn't understand the words, but there was familiar emotions and social gestures being expressed among fellow men.

One of them mentioned that he had made one of the prominent dishes on my plate--what big plates someone bought! Am I wrong, fellow attenders?--and then the conversation went around to the delicious Kabseh that someone had made. Faisal, one of them said, was responsible for the culinary masterpiece. Faisal! I said How is he?

Eventually a different Faisal came around and after going through the initial, Oh you're not the Faisal I know, we had a very fun conversation. I started giving him tips on picking up American girls. He told me he'd been going around with a piece of paper saying Hey I'm and international student, can you help me find this building? and parlaying this into a phone number...

He was worried about his accent. I told him American Women, as a homogenous whole, no exceptions what-so-ever, loved accents and he was, in fact, all set to do some serious macking on Tallahassee's fine women. There are so many beautiful girls around here! he said.

I told him he should ask the girl questions, find something interesting about her, something he was actually interested in so as not to fake it, and then reveal something interesting about himself---say, I grew up in a little village outside the capitol. My father owned a bakery. IDK I said, anything that shows you are exceptional. Because everyone is, and people like idiosyncrasy so long as it isn't harmful to others.

Walking out, on the way to a concert & and to meet as girl of my own ;) I saw Faisal and some other Arabic students--again, ignorance here is not unintentional--smoking. I know, I know. But as that guy with the beard proved in the movie we watched in class, smoking does have pros, and one of those is the social aspect. So Faisal II, as it says on my phone, and I are going to be conversation partners over the summer as I earn the next few hours for the certificate.

Love at first sight!

The Last Meeting between Faisal I and Keith

Sometimes, things just don't gel. We can't be too hard on ourselves. At least, this is the way I look at it now.

It's been about a month and a half since I last met with Faisal. We were going to go to Pizza Hut, but then I suggested we go to a local place--Decent Pizza. When we got there, it was closed, so we went next door to El Tapatillo's instead.

It was a very quiet meal. Filled with silence. I mostly talked to Faisal's friend Abdullah, because whenever I'd ask Faisel a question, he'd give me a very brief answer--I felt like I was on a talk show or something. Not a good feeling for me. Faisal wasn't jazzed about the food either.

I felt guilty when I realized afterward that an item Abdullah picked off the menu, a super-loaded nacho dish, had pork on it. Both of them are devout Muslims and pork is considered unclean for them.

In retrospect, I realize that there just wasn't enough common ground between Faisal and I for it to work out. It's like going on a blind date and thinking the person is nice, but they just aren't for you.

For the flipside, i.e. a Conversation Partner Love Connection, so to speak, check the next Blog post!

Richard -- CP #10 -- My last meeting with RuiTing

As this was my last time meeting Ruiting, it would have been downright unacceptable to do so playing Scrabble or computer games. So we instead made plans to go to the international dinner and end it with a night at the carnival, which was at the student union.

Elizabeth Vargas and my friend Keith came along to enjoy the food and the music. Each were delicious! I had some pasticio, which happened to be my favorite meal that night -- it is so darn good!

We 4 had a blast, and I'm glad the night ended on a high note.

At the dinner, Rita came by and I greeted her with a hug and she greeted us with some pumpkin bread and salad from her garden. It too was delicious. Rita, Ruiting, Elizabeth, Keith and I talked about what our plans were for the summer. It's a sort of bittersweet feeling. We're all going our separate ways but I have no doubt that we will all find success in what we achieve to do. Ruiting plans to come back and enroll at TCC. We TEFL-ers plan to go to our prospective countries to teach English. I was quite happy for Rita because that night she had submitted her CV to three schools in Europe and Mexico.

I'll be submitting my CV in May, so I hope there's some success!

Also at the dinner, I met one of the German CIES students (Chantal?) and we spoke a bit of German with each other. I'm horrible with my Deutsch and she understood nothing I said, so we went back to English. I didn't know where Ruiting was at this point, but I was too involved in all the other things going on: the awards ceremony, the music, etc.

At this point I also forgot about the carnival and when I suddenly remembered it, I kindly requested that we leave for the carnival before it closed, so we all left.

Ruiting and I "rock-climbed" and we had such a good time. We also played a game at one of the concessions and we both won!!! It was very thrilling because I never win anything and I shared my award with Ruiting. We won some beads, and I didn't have to lift my shirt up to get them.

We also went to Breakfast for a Buck and had some "eggs and bakey"

By then it was 12am and I was mad tired, so to depart, we took some pictures and we all hugged each other for the last time before I left.

It was a joy having Ruiting as a CP, and I wish him all the luck with his future endeavors.

Richard -- CP9

I met Ruiting for the last time at Tea Time. Elizabeth Vargas is his official CP, and I his unofficial because I've been so busy these past few weeks! But anyway, Elizabeth and I talked to Ruiting about what he was going to do after his semester is over.

Ruiting told us that he was leaving for China next Friday for his sister's wedding!!! I didn't know this! So little time!

I know I'll miss him because I'd like to think he defined the way in which I would approach other English learners, especially if I'm to teach out of this country (fingers crossed for Poland, Czech Rep, or any of the other Eastern European countries!!!). The experience with him was amazing, and I am glad that I am his first CP.

But in order for Ruiting to have a blast before he leaves, Elizabeth and I decided that all 3 of us should go to the dinner this Friday, after which we will go to the carnival on campus, and go cosmic bowling afterwards. Ruiting should have a memorable moment with his CPs before he leaves for China. And I need to have a memorable moment with him before I graduate!!!

Of my bowling skills, I showed Ruiting how I usually bowl (I can't put the leg behind me when the ball is thrown), and Ruiting told me I was doing it all wrong. He tried to show me the right way, but left-hander that I am, the position is too awkward and right-handed for me.... so I am just going to throw the ball the Richard Beahm way...

I'm sure we're going to have a blast on Friday. I'll let you know how this goes!

Till the final CP blog entry!

Richard -- Tutoring #10

For this lesson, I used one of the lesson plans I created for class, which I thought was a good one, and it would bring about lots and lots of conversation.

Kyung is best when he's talking. I feel like he learns more because he imitates my gestures, which I think are helpful for him.

For example, when I talk, I move my hands a lot.... and I speak slowly for him, so I really do drag out the arm-waving-motion a bit too much. If I were pronouncing a certain word like 'walk,' I would do this weird thing with my face and hands. My mouth would drop almost the length of the Great Wall of China, my hands with it... and he would imitate it! I love that!!! He's always so engaged.

Anyway, since this was supposed to be a speaking lesson, it would need to generate communication, right? Well, I thought Kyung was mature enough for this lesson, and with that said, we spoke about positive and negative stereotypes of Americans.

I started the lesson by writing out the word 'STEREOTYPE' on the whiteboard. Kyung knew what it meant, so I was grateful I didn't have to explain it to him. I think explaining that word would have been very difficult.... because I would just open a whole lot of doors with signs on which the word "FAUX PAUS" was written. I couldn't screw that up! But Kyung knew what the word meant, so I was glad.

I asked him what the general consensus of what America really is to Korean citizens. Both positive and negative. I'm glad Kyung was so open with sharing me these sorts of things. Anyway, of the postive things he hears about Americans, Kyung said that a lot of Korean people love Americans for being expressive in regards to music and dance. After all, this is Korea we're talking about, where breakdancing is such a hit!

Of the negative things, Kyung said that a lot of Koreans think Ameircans are lazy and indivualists.

I didn't not know if the latter term was something that carried such a negative quality, but sure enough, he reassured me that Koreans don't really adhere to the notion of individualism! Even this surprised me, but I assume it's this way because it gives the impression that Americans care for no one else but themselves.

Kyung also said that a lot of Koreans think Americans are too family-oriented; Americans don't really hang out with friends is what he told me. I kind of agree with this actually. I'm pretty laid back and at times, I just want friends to leave me alone on some days. When it comes to family, it doesn't matter at all. I haven't really thought about why it is liked this.

Anyway, this lesson continued for some time. I would say something like "American education," and Kyung would jump right in; "Republicans and Democrats." And Kyung would jump in on that one, too.

He asked me what the Americans think about Koreans. To be honest, I couldn't really think of anything. I grew up thinking that every Asian person was Chinese, so I told him this:

"Kyung, lots of people here think that everyone who looks Asian is automatically Chinese." Kyung laughed at this and he told me that people mistake him for Chinese all the time.

Then again, since I've known Korea as a country for quite some time (I took Tai Kwon Do lessons as a teenager), I told him that I thought Tai Kwon Do was an artistic expression for Koreans; they don't learn Tai Kwon Do because they want to fight. Kyung told me that Tai Kwon Do isn't really seen much in his country, and this surprised me a bit. Apparently, Tai Kwon Do has become very Americanized.

We also talked about the food in each of our countries, and I told him that sushi was very difficult for me to eat, although I do love it now! It's an acquired taste!

I told him about my first experience with kimchi, and he offered to take me to a restaurant with his wife for the real stuff. Apparently, the kimchi I had wasn't spicy enough. :-/

Well, if Kyung invites me to dinner, I assume he likes how open I am with him about American culture, so I must be doing a good job tutoring him.

Until next time...

Richard -- Tutoring #9

Kyung and I have been meeting twice weekly so I could get these 15 hours in before I leave -- 2 weeks from now! The 100-hour certificate is in my view! I can see it.

Anyway, for this session -- #9 -- we went over that VOA article, which was about the passing of the health care reform bill. VOA is excellent in that there is a section to their website that devotes itself to English learners. MP3s can be read to the student, too!

This was a pretty long article, so I gave it to him before we would have to meet the following week. I had originally stuck to the plan of having him listen to it in-between lessons, so I could give him a fill-in-the-blank handout with some words taken out. I planned on reading the article back to him, so he could plug in some of the vocabulary I had taken out. I even gave him a vocabulary sheet of words to focus on.

I thought this was going to be a very well-planned lesson, but the first time I read the article back to him, everything that required some word above the line had the correct word already filled in above it.

I have done this sort of exercise with Kyung before -- it was actually one of my first lessons for him! And I remember how much of a struggle it was for him the first time. He had to listen to the mp3 about 12 times before he mentioned with his pen.

So after only reading the article once to him, I must say I was quite surprised. I asked him how many times he listened to the mp3. He replied, "About 50 times."

So that's why!

I sort of panicked after this because I for a second didn't know how to continue with this lesson. Lucky for me, I had another newspaper article in my possession -- it was an FSView article written about The Kudzu Review (and I was quoted within the article). I pulled that out and had him read that to me for the remainder of the session.

I consider it a bit narcissistic of me to provide an article in which I was featured. And if I'm really going to play that game, I might as well give the website for the article in question now. :-P

Kyung and I went paragraph by paragraph after we discussed them. I would ask him, what's this paragraph saying, what words were unfamiliar (Kudzu being one of them), etc.

It was a sort of spur of the moment lesson, but I think I did safe myself in the end because he stayed interested and I'm glad we kept things moving.

Richard -- Tutoring #8

On this lesson, I worked with Kyung on his pronunciation.

First of all, English is no rhythmic language like Italian and Spanish (and even Korean!!) -- English is actually a stress-timed language. I worked with Kyung on this aspect of pronunciation.

The lesson began with my describing certain stressed and unstressed words. I found a lesson plan like mine that described these words as CONTENT and FUNCTION words. Content words are nouns, principle verbs, adjectives, and adverbs. Function words are prepositions, articles, and, at times, auxiliary verbs.

I read a sentence to him (once slowly with every word stressed) and the other (naturally) and I asked him what sounded most natural for a typical English speaker. Kyung chose the "natural" way; he's so smart!!!

I asked him why the "natural" way was thus, and he told me it was because I said it faster! Haha!!! His answer was so funny to me.

So I told him the reason why it was faster was because I did not stress every single word. Kyung seemed to get it. I gave him a handout in which it instructed to identify a word as either a Content or Function word. He got them all right! :)

So I had a paragraph for him after this, and I asked him to read it to me without trying to stress every single word. I let him know he could take as much time as he wanted, telling him to say the sentence in his head without telling me just yet. He spent about 2 to 3 minutes on each sentence within in the paragraph.

Then he would say it. Kyung did fairly well. He didn't stress the articles and conjunctions, but he still stressed certain words that didn't need it, such as have, am, and such.

But for the part, his English was getting more and more fluid as the lesson went on. I told him to keep practicing, to read things aloud. We ended our lesson there.

Richard -- Tutoring #7

It's been quite awhile since I updated y'all with what Kyung and I have been doing, so I'm just going to go in chronological order starting with the oldest (but un-blogged) lesson:

After working on narratives and story-telling, I stayed a bit on topic by having Kyung tell me what he and his son did over Spring Break... in typical chronological fashion.

This lesson was an interview (slash) mixer (slash) role-play in which I asked Kyung what he did. He told me before his son's Spring Break that he had planned to go to Universal Studios with the family, as well as traveling all throughout the state of Florida. I knew this was going to be great to talk about, so I kept this lesson mostly on communicative skills.

I started the interview by asking him if he used any English over his trip. Regrettably, he said no, and I let him know this. I said, "Kyung, you have to speak English!" I took that opportunity to do a sort of 20 minute role-play in which I was an annoying tourist and he asking for directions, ordering food, etc...

Then we talked mostly about his trip to Miami, Key West, Tampa, Clearwater, etc... There was a map of the state at which I told him to point to all the locations where he went (listening comp). He did so, and I asked him what he did there, etc...

He was very excited to let me know what he did.

Okay... next blog entry

Tutoring with Rita Schwab 9

I met with my Korean student this afternoon at the library. He had requested help with travelling by car to NYC as he wants to take his family this summer on this special trip.

First we studied the map of the Eastern United States and explored distances and possible cities to visit on the way. We looked at various alternate routes to travel north. Yonghuan inquired about time frame and distances and I turned him on to the mapquest website. He expressed an interest in wantin gto visit Atlanta, GA, Asheville, NC, Washington D>C>, Philadelphia, PA and New York, NY. We briefly talked about all these cities and then focused on NYC. I had check out the AAA travel guild as well as a book on the history of New York city and the history of the statue of Liberty. We talked about immigration and Statton Island, the ferry to Manhattan, Battery Park, 5th Ave. Broadway, Greenich village, the Empire State building, Central Park, Rockefeller Center, eating out in the city, the subway, parking the car, Washington Square, shopping at Macey's and more. Yonghuan was totally impressed and inspired. We had met for 1 1/2 hour. His assignment for next week is to plan his route to NYC from Tallahassee choosing 2 different travel routes and mapping them through mapquest.

Richard CP#8

It has been such a long time that I have not seen Ruiting. I called him last Wednesday -- this was I after I discovered that no English learner was anywhere near the Eppes Building, too -- and he told me he was on Spring Break in Orlando.

I figured the next time we met, which was today, he would tell what he did in Orlando. So it turns out he went to SeaWorld. I've been to SeaWorld many times in my life because I didn't live far from SeaWorld when I was growing up about 30 miles away from it.

He showed me pictures of the sharks, the dolphins, the whales, KRAKEN!, et cetera. It took me back to when I was probably 10 years old, fearful of the sharks and fond of the sting rays!

I would point at an animal in his pictures and ask him if he know what they are in English. He knew some. After all, Ruiting does carry around with him a translator!

We also talked about his recent TOEFL experience, and from what I understood, he didn't do well enough to get into FSU, but his scores were high enough for him to get into TCC. Still, I congratulated him because from what I understand, TCC is an excellent educational institution. He wants to transfer to FSU as a nursing student. I think it's great he wants to help people.

Conversation partner report/Rita Schwab

I finally got to meet with Eric again, my conversation partner from Bukina Faso. I had missed him over the spring break quite a bit, as we have grown to be friends. I think that I have become a sort of mother replacement for him as he confides in me and calls me if he needs help of any sort. He is quite a special person, very intelligent and bright and very honorable with a solid set of values unlike most American kids.
We met for Pizza as he says that he likes pizza, but by his small appetite I began to wonder. I asked him whether they have pizza in his country and he said that he did.
We talked about all sorts of things, personal and not so personal. I shared my travel experiences with him, in which he was very interested. I had brought a map of Florida and showed him the roads that I took and the distances that I travelled - he was impressed. I also brought a book with pictures of the natural beauties of Florida and he was really amazed. He had not idea that south Florida was so tropical and he found it quite similar to his home environment. He asked about the wildlife, the plants various habitats and I told him a bout the state parks that Florida has so many of to preserve the original beauty of this country. It was really in awe. I offered him to keep the book until next week which he gladly accepted.

After our pizza dinner I took Eric to the New Leaf market to pick up an application for work. He has been looking for a job and has not had much success. So I thought of the food coop where I know the manager and several people that work there. And sure enough, they have an opening. I will put in a good word for Eric and help him fill out his application which he has never done before. He has all of his visas to legally work and he is in the process of getting his American driver's license.

I am growing very fond of him and look forward to seeing him again next time.

Tutor Session 5 with Yongheon, my Korean student by Rita Schwab

After a long spring break Yongheon and I met at the library once again. We shared our spring break activities. Yongheon's spring break was somewhat uneventful as his 2 children did not have spring break at the same time. So he stayed home and relaxed.

My spring break however was quite eventful as I had travelled for business and pleasure down south Florida all the way to the Keys and back, leaving 2319 more miles on my speedometer.
Yongheon was impressed and did not know that Florida was this long. I had brought a map of Florida and we outlined my trip and talked about the various stops. I told him about Sarasota being the number 1 cultural city in Florida with many art galleries, museums and theatres. I told him about crossing the Sunshine Skyway bridge, the highest bridge in the United States with quite some dramatic history. I asked him to google this for the next time we meet. I talked to him about my short stay in Miami, Miami being a very diverse cultural city with any imaginable possibilities; a city to flair, of art, of music, of south-American culture, Cuban cafes,, french quarters, parks, beaches, movie stars and large freight boats and cruise liners. Yongheon was very attentive and interested. Then I told him about my camping trip in the Keys, the islands, the state parks and the furthest south spot in the United States in Key West.

This was no doubt a geography lesson for Yonghoen, as he had no idea of the size of Florida and the islands of the Florida Keys. I think a geography lesson of the United States and particular of Florida should be a part of the curriculum for any foreign student.

I had brought a book called 'Florida State Parks' by Michael Strutin. I told Yongheon that Florida has the largest number of state parks in the US. I explained that the state parks belong to the government and they are a representation of the original natural habitat of its environment. I told him how fond I was of state parks and its preservation of the original land.

We looked through the entire book and picked Bahia Honda State Park as an example, as I had just visited this beautiful paradise. Yongheon read the entire chapter to practise his reading and pronunciation skill. He learned about the various facilities and recreation possibilities of state parks, their size, habitat, nature trails, how to read their maps and their accessibility, rules and regulations. He read the entire chapter aloud to me on Bahia Honda state park which gave a description of the park, its particular location, its layout, its wildlife and its special beauty.

Then I asked him to find the closest state park to Tallahassee and we found Wakulla Springs. I asked him to google this for next time as well.

We had quite a long session for 2 hours as Yongheon told me about his past travels in the US, wanting to find out more about American cities. As his means are limited, he travelled to Tampa, Orlando and Jacksonville. He was in particular interested in the downtown areas and their business centers, as he is a student in the master's program of Political Science and Urban Planning. He was disappointed to find that there is hardly any people and not much traffic In the downtown areas of these cities. He expected to find a lot more activities and people on the street like as he is accustomed to in Korea. He told me that the streets of Seoul in South Korea are packed with people and activities. Lots of cars and motorcycles, that run errands for people and taxi drivers and people on foot, unfortunately not enough bicycles as city planning had failed to design bike trails. I told him that American cities are not like Europeans or Koreans, and that many people just drive to work and park the car.

Then we got talking about New York city, which is most different that any other in regards to activities and people. And I found his great interest for wanting to learn more about NYC. Yonghoen is planning to visit the city this summer and wants me to show him on the map how to get there. He will be travelling by car, but I think I want to show him other travel possibilities, as this might be easier for him. We decided to meet for a lesson on NYC next time we meet.

This was a long and productive meeting and it was good to see him again.

Richard -- Tutoring #6

I just finished this lesson today (Friday). Our focus was still similar to telling narratives through picture-viewing, although this time the primary focus was on writing.

So we begin the lesson by my taking out a few pictures (3 of which were in sequential order). I prepared a handout that had all sorts of vocabulary that he studied before we met, using the pictures to spot vocabulary terms.

For Kyung, writing is much easier to him. Also worth noting, all of his articles were correct! :-)

Anyway, I used one of the pictures as an example. It was a series of pictures in which a waiter collects a food order. But as the waiter brought the tray of food out to his guest, the waiter trips and drops the food all the over the guest!

I numbered each sentence that corresponded to the picture, so for example, the first picture had the waiter collecting the order from his guest.

1. The man at the table orders a meal.
2. After a while, the waiter brings out his food. [But there is something on the floor!]
3. The waiter spills the tray of food all over his guest.

The above was my own example to him.

So in one of the pictures, a man was planting a tree. I told Kyung to use the vocabulary to try to create a story using those four pictures. There were more than three pictures after all, i.e. more difficult!

Kyung is a natural! This is what he writes (parentheses are my corrections):

1. Jeff bought a tree in a pot and a bag of soil. He wants to plant a tree and he digged (dug) a hole. [Firstly, it is possible to buy a bag of soil despite the fact Jeff dug a hole. Yet I explained to Kyung that he didn't have to buy a bag of soil, as there was already a pile of dirt in the picture).

2. He takes off the tree from the pot. [This, I corrected him on. Not "off" but "He takes the tree out of the pot."]

3. He puts the tree into the hole. (This sentence was perfect).

4. The tree is planted and Jeff is like so happy. (I told Kyung I would have used the word "like" if I were in a Anna Faris movie. He laughed. I told him it wasn't necessary to use that word, so he takes it out and it makes more sense).

Although I did tell him that in order to use "like," he would have to compare Jeff's happiness to something. Here's what Kyung said: "The tree is planted and Jeff is happy like the sunshine." /That's some god-awesome poetry, right there!

For homework, I gave Kyung a news article from VOA and will have him listen to it. When we return, I am going to give him this same essay but with blanks where words need to be filled. Yes, it will be a listening comprehension exercise!

Richard -- Tutoring #5

On Monday, Kyung and I focused our attention on telling stories by looking at picture sequences. For this lesson, I focused primarily on speaking exercises, as I wanted Kyung to tell me a story based on the photos I had/drew.

So I had this picture book in which I asked Kyung to identify certain parts of the picture. Of one, he would say, "The woman is wearing a dress." Then I would ask him, "What color is her dress? Why is she looking at the hat?" For Kyung, the latter question confused him a bit.

I reminded him the title of the picture book, which was "Shopping Day." I asked him what people did on shopping day. Of course, it was obvious. "They shop..." he muttered. I happily exclaimed in the typical Richard fashion.

"The woman in the red dress is shopping," he said. This would continue on a bit until he could tell a story using the picture sequences. There were moments of pause in-between so I could tell him what an item was that he would not know. It was like playing "Where's Waldo?" I love that game!

Basically, I asked a series of questions in relation to shopping in America, which I hope he understood as my attempt to show him the American customs of shopping, i.e. the culture of it.

By the end of the lesson, he totally got it. "The woman is shopping for a hat to go with her yellow dress. She did not like some hats. None were the right fit. (If ya'll ain't familiar with this story yet, think about Goldilocks and the Three Bears.... it's totally the same story!). The last picture showed the woman very happy. She found her hat, and Kyung was able to tell this story by looking at pictures. /End of lesson.

Back from South Florida and tutoring again

my home away from home

Hola friends,

I have returned from my South Florida trip healthy and with lots more stories in my back pocket.

Glad to see spring has sprung in Tallahassee, finally as my suntan is slowly fading.

I have thought about all of you and have missed this class. It was a wonderful experience getting to know all of you and I hope that I will hear more as you enter the world of English tutoring and teaching.

I am continuing with tutoring my South Korean student. We will meet this afternoon at the library

to share our experiences during the spring break. I am presenting a lesson on the geography of Florida, the various natural habitats, wildlife and state parks. I will share some of my travel route and pictures from the trip. This is a 1 1/2 hour lesson plan stressing communication and pronunciation.

I decided to go for my 100 hour TOEFL certification. Yeah.

Best,

Rita

Maria -- CP 6

Last CP blog! For our last conversation, Lu and I went out for lunch. She had taken the TOEFL two days earlier. During lunch she tells me that she almost did not go to the test, as she thought she would not do well. She will know the results in a couple of weeks so, for now, she is simply happy for it to be over with. She is looking forward to her coming trip to Universal Studios in Orlando and soon after that she'll travel back to China. Lu was very homesick about a month ago, but now that it is almost time to go home she is reluctant. She has really enjoyed living for the first time away from home as an independent adult. She's learned to cook for herself, do the laundry, shop for food. She's proved to herself that she can do it. She also tells me how happy she's been to be outside of her mother's range and she goes on to explain the role of the mother in Chinese society. From what I hear, when it comes to moms, cultural differences become a moot point (la mamma è sempre la mamma! as they say in Italian).

All in all, Lu has had a great experience in the US and can't wait to come back for her continued studies. I hope she does!

Maria -- Tutoring 5 (TOEFL preparation)

Last tutoring session and last day before the test. Lu is sure she will not be able to score what she'd hoped for on the TOEFL. Sometimes that is how things are. Still, she's got to try her best. What she scores will make a difference in her plans for next year. I don't remember the actual numbers she gave me, but if she scores the higher one, she'll apply to go to graduate school, if the lower, she'll do one year as an undergraduate in the US in order to improve her English before taking the TOEFL again. From my perspective both options are good (I would not want to go to graduate school without sufficient knowledge of the language), but it is clear that Lu would like to make it to graduate school right away (for the -- arguably -- wrong reasons): it would make her parents proud and she is afraid of letting them down. Finances don't seem to be an issue here, so I point out that if she ends up having to do a year as an undergraduate it will only help her prepare better for graduate school: her English will be better and she'll be familiar with the way the system works. Lu lightens up a bit. This last tutoring session turns out to be more like a pep talk for a consolation price, than anything else; making Lu see the test as a measure of her level of English rather than this forbidding wall that is keeping her from entering graduate school paradise (just kidding). It is, nevertheless, hard to take a test when you know you won't do as well as you'd like. However, it is also good to know that it doesn't mean the end of your life... just quite yet ;).

Maria -- Tutoring 4 (TOEFL preparation)

Today we are dealing with questions 5 and 6 of the speaking section of the TOEFL. These are the hardest questions in the set, as they don't have a written component to prepare the testee to the topic s/he will hear discussed on the tape. However, like questions 3 and 4, the topics of these questions are also college related. Question 5 deals with an "administrative" issue (first day attendance, compulsory discussion sections, and the like) and question 6 is a snippet of a lecture on any academic subject (psychology, economics, engineering, etc.).

Since Lu's main difficulty is in listening comprehension, these questions are the hardest for her. She is a good student and an ambitious one too, but it is obvious more than once that she is pretty much ready to give up on these. "I cannot follow half of what they're saying," she complains. With only two days to go to the exam, there is not much time for real improvement. So, to try to help her feel more in control, I suggest we analyze the structure of these conversations/lecture snippets, since they are all quite similar. For instance, question 5 usually follows this pattern: 1) the issue at hand is introduced (for ex. mandatory first-day class attendance) 2) two students (or a student and an administrator) discuss how this affects them (or the student) 3) a couple (up to three) suggestions are given to solve the problem one of the students (or the student) has.

I ask Lu to take notes while she is listening to the recording, in order to jot down what the issue is, what kind of problem it is causing the student complaining about it, and what suggestions are given to solve it. Usually this is the point of the question, with the testee being asked to comment on which solution s/he would choose and why. Lu can take surprisingly long notes given how little she seems to understand about the issue or topic discussed -- but her notes are of random complete sentences, rather than of the key concepts expressed in the recording. She is trying to comprehend full thoughts, one at a time, instead of trying to catch the gist of what is being said. No wonder she is getting lost in the process. We listen to the recording again. It is a slow process, also because Lu is not convinced that this is of any use toward the exam. "At the exam I won't be able to listen to the recording again," she moans. But now you do :) I counter, so let's take advantage of that in order to try to improve your listening comprehension effectiveness in this specific type of question (talk about learning for the test!). Lu smiles amused and tackles the recording one more time.

Mosquitoes, Centipedes and Scorpions…Oh My!!

My first couple of days in Costa were chill….almost too chill if at all possible. I hung out with my old host mom for a day and chatted it up, catching up on our shenanigans over the past two years. Her daughter is engaged to an American and is working in South Carolina and I relayed how bad healthcare sucks in the USA (which surprisingly came up several times during my stay). The next day I met up with another volunteer, Abe, who is from Brooklyn and is pretty laid back. He's from Brooklyn but he fits in perfectly in Costa. I also met the program's assistant director, Julia, who my parents thought was an imaginary person who didn't exist for any purpose other than to lure me to Costa Rica and scam me! But low and behold she was legit. In fact she's my age and she's from Texas. We had a nice little lunch in San Pedro and got to know each other. It was fun; I was thinking if this is what my experience was going to be like, I shouldn't be worried at all. However, I wouldn't be hanging out with these gringos the entire time. I was assigned to teach English to mostly taxi drivers in Liberia which is a major town in the Guanacaste region. Which, I mean, is a bummer because these people I just met definitely would be a safety net of English I could understand and people with things to talk about that is related to the US, but I know this experience is for something bigger and better. I met the other volunteer Alice in San Pedro as well, she seems cool enough, and she was the person I was corresponding with most of the time before I came to Costa.

Orientation is taking place in a small town near La Fortuna which is the city where the active volcano Arenal is. The small town is about as rural as it gets, There is a paved road that leads off into several unpaved roads, there is a very nice river about 2 miles down said dirt road and it is gorgeous. The school is designed for teachers in training to teach English, the teachers in training that I have met are all really interesting. They come from Chile, Peru, Guatemala, Mexico and Nicaragua, one of the guys I met from Nicaragua is the most interesting to me. He grew up in Nicaragua, went to college in Wisconsin, met and married his German wife there, had two kids and went to visit Nicaragua and ended up staying because his grade school friends were working on a project with an orphanage. The orphanage is the most interesting part to me, The government of Nicaragua has really strict rules and laws protecting children from abuse so Ali, said teacher in training, is having a hard time running his organization as an orphanage, which is heavily needed in Nicaragua. So Fabretto, the organization serves as a before and after school program to keep kids off the streets. Ali says he appreciates that the government is so strict against child abuse, but the government doesn't offer any solution to the problem of orphans. So Fabretto has to get its funding from people in the US, Spain and Italy. I am planning on visiting his organization soon, because Nicaragua lies to the north of Costa, I am really interested in seeing how it works and the impact that its making on his community.

Orientation itself was short, but we covered what we should expect from the local partners who are a part of this project. Well I guess I should explain the project. ALIARSE is an acronym for a non-profit organization that runs CREST which stands for Costa Rica English for Sustainable Tourism, their goal is to have over 500 volunteers teaching English by 2017. The program has a lot of intricacies; ALIARSE solicits funding from sponsors like the national phone company, the national electric company and the chamber of tourism to name a few. And they all work together to house, feed, and support the volunteers; the sponsors in the different communities throughout Costa also bring the workers of the tourism industry together so that they can be evaluated by the volunteers.

So far I'm scared out of my mind… This will be my first real teaching gig and I'm scared I might choke and be a horrible teacher. In theory I think I'm a great teacher in training, but in practice…ehh…I have only so much experience. And to think that tomorrow I will meet 100 students who are eager to begin learning….Alright enough with the negative talk. The grandson of the older couple that I am staying with just told me that he will be a part of one of my classes…talk about pressure…at least ill know if I suck right off the bat! Well now that I have unloaded my fears onto this blog, I guess I should star lesson planning for the first week….lets hope I don't screw this up too much!

 

Dwinetta

Richard -- CP #7 (which is to say I'm getting a 100 hour certificate)

The last time I spoke to Ruiting was before spring break. Again, we played Scrabble, only this time we played with 3 other people: Eric (Rita's CP), Rachel (Eric's new CP (?)), and Ruiting's friend Lu (?), who is also from China. I know... 5 people can't play Scrabble, but who cares?! Rules (from board games) are meant to be broken

First of all, the Americans won. That's to be expected if you're playing an English version of Scrabble, yes? Actually, I commend Ruiting, Eric, and especially Lu for having good sportsmanship. Yes, although I had won again (with Rachel being in second), I feel as though they all were winning in their own way. Every time I put down a word neither of them knew, I took the opportunity to explain it to them while Ruiting and Lu searched for the word in their translators. It is actually a very good learning tool! We ended up playing for 2 hours. Hey, I love Scrabble, and I am glad that the English learners love it, too.

I don't want to spend the rest of my CP hours playing Scrabble, though, so I am going to try to get Ruiting out of his comfort zone again. The last time this happened, I took him to First Friday and he was so awkward during the expo. Anyway, it's baby steps I'll need to take with him.

Richard -- Tutoring 4

As far as I know, few Asian languages have no definite and indefinite articles. For Kyung, this was the case, so I decided to focus this tutoring session on his writing. I had read his writing before and there were instances in where he would use an article incorrectly... and very frequently, too. Anyway, I started the lesson by explaining to him what the differences were between definite articles and indefinite articles.

Let me tell you, articles come naturally to me. I never thought even once whether I used them incorrectly (because I knew they were correct). Still, it is EXTREMELY difficult to teach.

So I use the white-board to draw pictures, telling Kyung that THIS drawing is a PARTICULAR one, different from all the rest. So I ask him: Is it "I saw the woman in the red dress walking" or "I saw a woman in a red dress walking" ? He was correct, so that was a relief.

As we moved on, it got more challenging for me to teach. There are always exceptions when it comes to articles. Yet I was constantly repeating myself. I had given Kyung a handout the week before with 60 questions with nothing but fill-the-correct-article-in-the-blank. We went down some (because I honestly was at a standstill). He had some correct, some not. I tried to explain to him why a certain one was wrong. I also explain to him why he was correct in some of them, hoping that that would reinforce his understanding of it.

Anyway, it was well over an hour, so I decided to stop with that handout and gave him a new one, which he never saw or even worked on. We went down the list of questions... and you know, he got them mostly all CORRECT. I was very surprised. I actually felt like a real teacher despite how I taught articles (because I thought I was failing, honestly). It was great!

He told me I was a good teacher! I was happy and confused. How did I do this? -- especially with how I approached in teaching it. The lesson was over by then, so I gave him a short writing assignment asking him to write about what he does when he wakes up. I told him to try to use articles as much as he could, but to use them correctly. I'll see if he gets it, still. Hopefully he does.

Anyway, I thought he learned something. I mean, he was very happy he got most of the questions right in the handout, so I must have done something right, huh?

Maria -- CP 5 and critical incident

On our 5th meeting Lu gives me a cute little necklace she's brought from China. She tells me she has brought a few tokens like this in order to show her thankfulness to those who would help her in this new and foreign country. To me this is a very nice thing to do, and I smile when she makes a big point about wanting to bring to the US something "made in China". The true big point for me is that she feels that I've been of help to her. (In fact, I decided then to give her a small token in return. It was fairly difficult to find something actually made in the US, but I did, and the whole process of looking for this little object made me think about how much I myself have learned from this tutoring experience, and how glad I am to have done it).

During our conversation, Lu tells me about a problem a friend of hers has had with her CP. They had gone to Orlando on a trip, but at some point a heated discussion had broken out between them. So heated in fact, that Lu's friend had stormed out on her CP. The topic seems to have been China or Chinese politics. Lu cannot explain it very clearly, but the bottom line is that the CP showed a tremendous lack of respect for China and its people and "knows nothing (Lu's words -- I decide it is not the right time to interrupt with some grammatical prudery) ... like all Americans." Ouch! But, the story gets better. After Lu's friend takes off and does not come back for a while, her CP calls the police on her (!!). At this point of the story Lu is fuming: "stupid, stupid, stupid" she repeats in disbelief. Well, I venture to interject, if the CP could not find your friend and they were in Orlando on a trip, maybe calling the police was the only thing to do? "She could have called my friend on her cell-phone" comes Lu's quick reply. "My friend's CP is stupid," she concludes.

In the end things got straightened out and the police let both Lu's friend and her CP go. From Lu's explanation it is not clear to me what really happened, but it seems (to me) that a cultural misunderstanding was at the root of this incident and that the police got needlessly involved. It sounds like a perfect critical incident to me, so I ask Lu what she thinks about it. In her opinion, one should not speak without knowing what they are talking about and that Americans have a tendency to do so. She finds Americans to be over confident in their beliefs (she mentions other examples) and thinks they should listen and learn before they start preaching to others. (Sounds like a familiar complaint). She herself prefers to be quiet rather than open her mouth before knowing enough about the subject being discussed. She adds that this is the proper thing to do in China, where society and the language itself recommend that you measure your words. So, we continue, trying to compare both cultures on this topic, and pretty soon the hour is over.

Hey class!

Well this is my first morning in Costa Rica guys! My Spanish has been getting me around pretty well so far. Although the adresses here aren't really addresses theree more like directions. For example, I'm staying with my old host family for the night and to get here from the airport, I had to tell the taxi driver the address which is: Moravia, neighborhood Los colegios by the Guaria Pharmacy, 200 meters east and 150 meters south, green house on the corner....lol so yeah its a little tricky... Anywho I'm meeting with the program in a few hours and Im pretty sure we are jumping right into teaching. I have all of your great lesson plans and the resources from Ramin, but I'm currently trying to start a syllabus, which is harder than it looks. I'm thinking I want to have a pretty open class flow, where I can feed off of what the students already know. I just want something like a guide, just in case. I plan on doing a diagnostics to see what the class is expecting and what they have learned from previous volunteers. Wish me luck!! Also I have created a skype ID so if any of you would love to see and talk to me that would be great! I would love to hear from you! you can find me through my full name Dwinetta Rozier or my skype ID : Dwinetski

Ta ta for now....

Rawan-CP-Week 6 (to replace week 5)

Well, today I am inputting my final CP blog!! I met with my Turkish 'friend' today. She is doing great, and her English is improving. I think her listening skills have gotten better. The only thing that hasn't changed is that she is still using 'later' to substitute for 'in'....for example, 'my husband, 2 years later will get his citizenship,' instead of saying 'in 2 years, my husband will gain his citizenship'...so, I had to correct her and explain that. I think I did right by stopping and explaining it. She didn't understand why 'later,' didn't really mean what she thought....it just didn't sound right.

I am pleased to say that I AM CONTINUING my TEFL efforts!!! I'm so glad I stuck with it. I feel useful to someone, and that's nice to know!!!

:0) She also considers me a FRIEND, which is really nice, too.

Over and out. --Rawan.

Richard Tutoring #3

I think this tutoring session went better than last's. Basically, the lesson was about how one would ask for or answer something politely. I had a list of about 14 things, e.g. "What do you say if someone asks you to accompany them to lunch, but you can't?"

We proceeded down this list as Kyung would tell me what he would have told the person at first, and in most cases, this is when I interfered by telling him a more appropriate way, after which he wrote it down and we practiced.

We went through the list 3 times, and he was writing all this stuff down because next week (after Spring Break) I plan on giving him a handout with MC style questions for purposes of reviewing.

Also next week, we're going to go over (in)definite articles and how they're used. I'm starting to feel like a good tutor now. He thanked me for giving him an informative lesson, so that's all good.

Sebastian - CP - Week6

Hello guys (and girls)! Long time no blog...

Last Sunday I met with Juseob for the sixth time. I almost ran out of things to say when, out of nowhere, he pulls out a practice copy of the TOEFL test that he is going to take this Friday. He mentioned to me how disappointed he was. He had many incorrect answers and so he asked for my help. I helped him by replacing some of the words in the sentences with the correct ones. He was happy that I could help him at a personal level, and told me that he thought I was going to do a good job in teaching whenever I had my students. I was also very pleased to hear that I spoke in a manner that was very easy for him to understand. I shared with him my feelings on learning English, since my first language is Spanish. I think he appreciated the fact that I could relate to him in that way. In that moment, I recalled the class where Ramin told us to learn another language, to become language learners. I think that is a very important part of being instructors. We will be able to empathize with the students, and that will definitely unlock their hearts and minds to learning.

Well those are my thoughts, anyway. Until the next time!

Maria -- CP 4

This is a conversation Lu and I had about a week ago -- I realize there is a lag in my blogging! We had not seen each other for three weeks because I had had to travel first and then had fallen sick with the flu. Lu told me about her date with an American and how that compared with China. Then we spoke for a while about her studying for the TOEFL, how important it is that she score well, and how I could help her prepare for it (this is what the tutoring sessions have been about). Lu likes speaking in English and is genuinely interested in learning it, so it is easy to have a conversation with her. She is going through a phase, though (I think): her speed has increased, but her pronunciation sometimes suffers from it, so I find myself having to concentrate on her prosody in order to follow what she is saying, and then speaking back to her in a slower and more enunciated way as a subconscious reaction (I just realized that I do this!). I should just tell her that she need not hurry :)

She has also gotten into saying "they don't know nothing" -- I have to admit it does sound juicier than "they don't know anything", but grammar always had a reputation for being dry, so I remind her. Other than this and the occasional odd word, Lu is very capable of expressing herself in English. I am really enjoying these conversations.

Rawan-CP-Session 5

My CP and I did not meet due to her recent bout with the flu or some other kind of illness. I would like to continue meeting with her during the next few weeks, if she's up for it, because I think she's getting a lot out of our meetings.

however, I think I would like to do more outdoor stuff with her; lake ella walks, whatever, in order to strengthen her knowledge and vocabulary. I found that she had a lot of questions: what is this? What is that? And I think if we expanded our surroundings a little, she might find it easier to learn more.

Let's hope she's feeling better soon!

Maria -- Tutoring 3 (Day 2 TOEFL preparation)

Lu and I met again at Strozier library a few days ago. On this day we were going to practice questions 3 and 4 of the Speaking section of the TOEFL test. These questions integrate reading and listening with the speaking part. For each question, the testee first reads a short passage, then listens to either a conversation (question 3) or a snippet of a lecture (question 4) related to the passage just read, and finally answers orally to a question regarding what s/he just heard. After looking at several examples it becomes clear that question 3 usually deals with a college student's "administrative" issues (attendance to class, required discussion sections, holds on account due to unpaid fees, and the like); whereas question 4 entails reading for a college level class and understanding a lecture on ANY given topic (homeostasis, infant communication, Malthus's gloom and doom economics, you name it). Given that the TOEFL test is taken in order to attend college/graduate school in the US, it seems only fair that its content should be university related. However, this very content makes these questions more difficult than one would think. Question 3 deals with problems/issues/realities students experience in an American college, but these can be quite different from the ones experienced by students coming from another country's university context. For instance, Finnish college students will never have to deal with a hold in their account because they don't have an account to begin with, since college in Finland is free of charge. This, obviously, does not mean that once a Finnish student is in an American university he or she won't understand the concept (or reality) of "having a hold in your account" -- but that will happen after having taken the TOEFL. That is, the TOEFL, although logical in its content, by being so US specific adds a "cultural" difficulty to the linguistic one. Maybe this is unavoidable, I don't know.

But going back to Lu. She is not having an easy time with these questions. After practicing a few of them we realize that her main problem is their listening part, rather than the speaking one. She just doesn't understand enough of what is being said to be able to speak about it with the required detail. This is also reflected in the low score she got in the listening section of the mock TOEFL test she did as her homework. It is a good thing she did this test, as now she is aware of where she is and what her likely score on the real test will be. It is, unfortunately, much lower than what she expected and nowhere near where she would like it to be. She is worried and feels self-defeated, so I point out that learning a language takes time, much like learning to play the piano, or skating, or any other skill. You cannot cram a language into your head, like you can the Napoleonic wars or the elements on the periodic table. Practice makes perfect and it takes time. This universal truth helps her realize that it is not her fault that she is not where she would like to be and look instead at how far she has actually advanced in the short time she has been in the US. Still, she has to take the TOEFL, so we will meet again tomorrow.