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.