Katelyn_TP_#13

On February 13th, I met my conversation partner, Fabrice, for an English lesson. I asked if he wanted to just chat, but he demanded I give him an English lesson, so I told him I would count this as a tutoring session. He said he wanted to work on reading, and because I had not brought any materials (thinking we would just talk,) I pulled up some BBC articles on my cell phone, quickly skimmed them for some details, and then had him read them before asking comprehensive questions similar to the TOEFL styles we had gone over in class. The articles were about the 70th anniversary bombing of Dresden and a conference on the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI), before I pulled up an actual sample of a TOEFL reading. Before he read the first article, I asked what he knew about World War II and Germany, and explained where Dresden is located. While he read, I had him ask me when he did not know how to pronounce a certain word, or if he did not know the definition--this is a technique I borrowed from watching Josh's reading classes. He read the Dresden article out loud, which allowed me to correct his pronunciation (I noticed he pronounces the silent “b” in “bombing,” as well as errors in "marches" and "humanity," and helped him realize this by repeating the words correctly). After the SETI article, we talked about aliens in pop culture, including movies. I asked if he believes in aliens (he doesn't), and we talked about aliens in pop culture, including movies. Fabrice was able to read the articles without much difficulty, except a few words, but he had trouble with the comprehension questions I asked. I believe it would have been better if I had questions written out, where he could look at the questions while checking the reading.