Damil_TP_#15

Adult TP- 8

2/26/2015

5 PM

Starbucks
Tennessee St.

Topic/Skill:
-Vocabulary
-Speaking

-Verb tenses: Simple past/ present, present continuous. 

Today I met up Mutaz Barki, one of my student tutees for our final tutoring session together. Mutaz had made it clear to me from the beginning that he wanted to focus our sessions on practicing his speaking skills. So it was no surprise that he rejected doing vocabulary word exercises together as I had planned. Instead, we spoke about things that interested him at the moment. for example, we discussed how he missed his country and especially his family back home. When he struggled to express himself, I helped him by teaching him common English words and phrases like "I am homesick," "I will visit my family in Saudi Arabia," "American fast food is terrible!" and more expressions. I explained the difference and context use between the words awesome, incredible, good, and amazing.   

When could not understand each other, we would both look up illustrations in google to explain what we meant. At times, I would show him a picture of an action someone is doing and then ask him "What he/she doing?" I would also look at some pictures of people doing everyday actions like brushing their teeth and then ask him "Mutaz...when did you brush your teeth?" Using these methods allowed him test his verb tense usage and let me provide error correction feedback. 

I have really enjoyed tutoring Mutaz Barki this semester. I feel that he needs to continue his determined efforts to expand his English vocabulary and basic conversational skills. He is truly invested in learning the language and making his time here in the USA worthwhile. 

Damil_TP_#16

Child TP- 8

2/16/2015

5 PM

Starbucks
Tennessee St.

Topic/Skill: 
-Reading Comprehension

-Grammar

Today was my final tutoring session with PJ. We meet up in a classroom in CIES building and were joined by two classmate observers from the new session. His mother had given me several reading comprehension essay quiz activities that he had already completed before hand. On some assignments, I had to help PJ read the comprehension essays and answer the review questions with him.On other assignments, I had similar essay activities that he had completed in class and that I had to review his errors with him. Due to the amount of material, I choose to pick an essay assignment that we could complete together that I felt that him and I would enjoy doing first.  

This first essay assignment was about the inner conflicts and games a group of children experienced during recess at their school playground. For my schema building activity I researched several of the games that the children played in the essay. I found several videos and articles about how to play them and some examples showing kids having fun playing them. PJ immediately related to the games that the children played in the essay from his own experience in school. He excitedly answered most of the review questions correctly on his own. 

We completed several other essay assignments together as well. To my great surprise, PJ asked me if I could help him with some of the word problems in his math homework. I gladly helped and after finished our work, we played the Hang Mouse game that we had been playing in weeks prior. I have learned a lot from teaching PJ, it feels like he taught me than I taught him. I learned how help children understand complex subjects and how to keep them interested in the subject matter. Yet, probably the best lesson I learned is that I actually enjoy teaching children. Its funner and rewarding at the same time. 

Damil_TP_#14

Child TP-#7
2/16/2015
7pm
PJ Chang House
Topic/ Skill:
-Reading Comprehension
-Vocabulary

Today I went to PJ’s house for his tutoring session this evening. I went a little bit earlier to before our session to prepare and preview the material that we were going to study. His mother handed me a reading comprehension assignment and some of his assignments he had completed in class as usually. The reading comprehension assignment was about a little girl staying with her grandmother for a month during her summer vacation. I remembered that in our first tutoring session together, PJ had told me that he had visited his grandmother in Hawaii in the past. So when began our session together, we began sharing our experiences of visiting our grandmothers as small children as a schema building activity. Once we read the essay and began the questions and answer section, we drew upon our prior conversation and the included illustrations to evaluate the answers to the questions.

As he has in the past 2 weeks, PJ has demonstrated that he understands what he reads and was able to answer most of the questions with little guidance. I have taught PJ that if he cannot fully understand a question on his own, he should try to draw the context meaning of the question thou the answers by process of elimination. This means that every time PJ did not understand a question, he should look at the multiple answers given to him to guess what it is asking and eliminate wrong answers as he discovers them to end up with only the correct one. After we completed the reading comprehension assignment together, we reviewed a short reading comprehension assignment he had had in class. It was a bibliography about Wilson A. Bently, also known as the Snowflake man. Once we completed this activity, we played a few games of Hang Mouse hang man game.

Damil_TP_#13

Adult TP- 7

2/16/2015

5 PM

Starbucks
Tennessee St.

Topic/Skill: 
-Vocabulary
-Speaking
-Verb tenses: Simple past/ present, present continuous. 

Today I meet with my tutee, Mutaz Barki, at the Starbucks we usually meet at on  Tennessee St. Mutaz mentioned gain that he needed help finding a room mate to help him practice his English. Preferably a non-Arabic speaker that could tutor him at times. I promised that I would ask the teachers at CIES to help him out since they knew more people than me. I commended him for using all the vocabulary that we had learned last week to help him find a room mate and communicating this desire so well in English. 

Afterwards, he told me that he would like to practice using the simple past, simple present, and present continuous verb tense. We reviewed his class work sheet exercises and practice a few of them together. I observed that Mutaz had the most difficulty applying these verb tenses when describing real life, everyday situations like the ones he expected to be quizzed on during his final verbal exam in his speaking class. So I grabbed pen and paper and began writing phrases based off everyday actions like "I shave" and asked him to write them in each verb tense form. After he had correctly written several example, I repeated the same exercise verbally this time. I really started to make sense to him after this point. For example, I asked him "Mutaz are you shaving now?" and to use the present continuous verb tense in his answer. The answer became very obvious to him and he confidently replied "I am not shaving now." I feel that this was a very good exercise for Mutaz and I will use it again next time we meet. It seems that Mutaz really enjoys learning how to apply his English knowledge in real life situations. 

Damil_TP_#12

Adult TP- 6
2/13/2015

5 PM

Starbucks
Tennessee St. 

Topic/Skill:
-Vocabulary
-Speaking

-Everyday Items

This evening I meet up with my student Mutaz Barki at a Starbucks in Tennessee St. We usually study new vocabulary and practice his reading skills that he has been working on in class. Yet, today’s session was quite different from everything else that we have done. He asked me to help him to learn how to ask for a roommate in English. So we first went over new related vocabulary words like “roommate, rent, bill, etc”. We also went over a few expressions like “I need a roommate who can practice speaking English with me”.

During our session together, we also practiced for his final speaking class exam Friday next week. The oral exam will be about describing everyday items and activities in Mutaz’s life. We created a list of key words of everyday items that we felt that he needed to be able to describe. Afterwards, I verbally quizzed Mutaz about how he used the item or performed the activity. For example, I asked Mutaz “What do you, Mutaz, do every morning?” I wake up in the morning and the wash teeth and shave. Then I go eat breakfast and drink coffee.” He practiced explain to me in the simple present and simple continuous tense how his typical day is. At times I had to ask him to pause, listen to how I expressed myself using the same exact words that he was trying to say, and emulate how I applied syllable stress and word emphasis when he repeated it. I firmly believe Mutaz is going to do very well in his final exams next week. He is very dedicated. I feel that I really need to continue helping him acquire new vocabulary and English expressions. 

Damil_TP_#10

Child TP- #6

2/10/2015

6:30 pm

CIES Classroom

Topic/Skill:

-Reading Comprehension

-Vocabulary

Today I tutored PJ Chang at the CIES building after class. One of my fellow classmates, Meredith, joined us for the session. While preparing for his tutoring session I reviewed his main homework assignment, which was a reading comprehension essay about school children requesting and receiving from their teacher a list of steps that had to be completed in order to have a successful school play. I knew that PJ was a third grader, so when he told me that he didn’t know what a school play was, it was no surprise. So we began our tutoring session by watching a short comical video about theatrical plays that I had had in mind. This helped PJ understand the story very well and the comprehension questions that followed.

During our tutoring session Meredith helped me a lot to explain words that I could not have otherwise done on my own. I learned that having someone to observe and give feedback during a tutoring session really helps one see things that one cannot on their own. Towards the end of our session I had Meredith and PJ play an alternate version of the game “Hangman” called “Hang Mouse” from an educational website. PJ really enjoyed the game and was able to learn new vocabulary about Basketball. 

Damil_CP_IE_#4

2/12/2015

1pm

CIES Student Lounge

Ramin's Intercultural Exchange class

Today in Ramin's Intercultural Exchange class we were given worksheets and asked to pair up with the same students we spoke to in our last class session. Hammed was present, but Abdullah was not, so we participated alone in the class discussion untill Zadid showed up and join our group. Today our class discussion was about cultural synergy. We looked at our worksheets and aspects of our cultural. An aspect that had interested Ahmmed and I in the previous week was how Arabs from the Persian Gulf greet very differently from Americans. 

I thought both my partners that in the USA it is vitally important to shake a person's hand when they greet you. Its the most common way of greeting people and not shaking their hand after they have extended it in greeting is highly disrespectful. On the other hand, both Zaid and Hammed told me that men commonly greet each other with a hug and kiss on the cheek. Sometimes, they profess blessings upon each other as they greet. I asked them if I would be greeted that way if I were to visit their country. I was told that this was hard to predict since it depends on the relationship and individual personality of an individual in their country. It was likely that upon my first greeting with a male in their country, I would like be greeted with a hand shake until I established the person's trust and friendship. 

Damil_TP_#11

Adult TP-#5

2/11/2015

Thomasville Rd. Starbucks

Topic/Skill:

-Perfect Present Verb Tense

Today I meet up with Mohamed Binsaif for our tutoring session at a Starbucks on Thomasville road. It had been a couple weeks since I had worked with him, so I was a lil unsure how I could help him in his class progress at CIES. We first sat down and casually discussed how we were doing and what we did in the past weeks. I told him that I was going to Japan to visit a couples weeks after the end of my course at the TEFL program at CIES. I showed him a map of where I was going to Japan and he started to give me some very interesting insights about the design of Japaneses cities. 

Mohamed told he worked for the Saudi Arabian Department of Tourism as an architecture. We worked together on his spoken grammar and vocabulary with phrases that he would use in his career. For example, he often used the word "in" when he was saying that he had been somewhere in the past. "I have traveled in t0 Europe before." "I have been to that in store already." I helped understand that in English, when you say that you went "to" someplace, it is understood that you also went inside of it. You cannot use both "to" and "in" at the same time. After sometime, we worked together on his perfect present verb tenses worksheets from class. He had a good understanding of the grammar rules regarding to verb usage, but needed my help to help him understand how they applied in real life situations. 

I feel that Mohamed is a very kind and enthusiastic student that is genuinely interested in advancing his studies in English. I see that he needs to continue communicating in both written and spoken English, while receiving good feedback from me and his teachers. He is like me in the sense that both of us are visual and tactile learners, so I know that he will continue to advance by using these methods. 

Damil_TP_#9

Child TP- #5
2/6/2015

6:30PM

PJ Chang Home

Topic/Skill: 

-Reading Comprehension 

-Vocabulary

Today I tutored PJ Chang for our fifth tutoring session. The lesson material that his mother had given me was unique in the sense that it was not a book to read with him or a reading comprehension essay. This time she gave me some of his math homework, a few work sheets that he had gotten the wrong answer on. Although math and science seem to be PJ's strongest school subjects, he seems to have a hard time understanding math word problems sometimes. In my preparation for his lesson, I made sure to do the math problems myself and think of the simplest way I could explain the mathematical expressions being used. When we worksheet together, I illustrated the mathematical expression by using the included diagrams or drawing illustrations. PJ liked the drawing technique because after we completed the first half, he completed the second half almost all on his own by drawing out the math problems. 

PJ and I also completed a poster project about Beethoven using bibliographical children's book about his life. PJ completed most of it on his own. On questions that he did not understand, I used used excerpts and illustrations from the book. We concluded our tutoring session with a brief game of hang man. It seemed that PJ had played game before with other tutors. I feel that vocabulary building games like hang man are a good motivational tool that I will continue to seek out in the future. 

Damil_TP_#8

Adult TP- 4
2/4/2015

7PM

Starbucks
N. Blair Stone Rd

Topic/Skill: 
-Articles
-Vocabulary
-Speaking

This evening I met with 2 of my tutee students, Saif and Mutaz, at a Panera Bread Co. location. We begun our lesson by speaking casually about how our week went and about Saif's weekend road trip in his new Ford Mustang. I noticed a distinct difference in their speaking abilities. Saif spoke English fluently enough that I rarely had to guess what he was saying. Mutaz on the other hand, had trouble understanding me and speaking whole sentences. 

Upon realizing the differences in their skill levels, i decided to have a multi level tutoring session with them. I showed them some comical videos on YouTube that I had seen before. The first one was video recording of a Bugatti Veryon driving into the lake. After it finished, I asked each one of them level appropriate questions. For example, I asked Mutaz "What is that? What color is it? (With my finger pointing and referring the car)." When he answered correctly, "car" and "silver", I repeated  a short sample sentence for him to understand its' usage. My example was "The car is silver." Any words that he did not know I would right down on paper to show him how it was spelled and use as much visual illustrations as I could to explain. 

I asked Saif more advanced reading comprehensions like "What happened to the car in the video? Why do you think it happened?" I made sure to emphasize the correct usage of articles in his sentence, especially the word "the." We also reviewed the correct usage of the noun "going." I learned from this session that I need to have more multi level activities prepared if I am going to help more than one student at a time. It is certainly more challenging that helping them one on one. I would also benefit from having a vocabulary list prepared for each video that will show to my students. 

Damil_TP_#7

Child TP- 4
2/3/2015
6:30 pm
CIES Building

Topic/Skill: 
-Reading Comprehension 
-Grammar

This evening I observed Briggs, my fellow TEFL classmate, tutor PJ. Before the beginning of the session, she told me that she had some reading comprehension homework to help him with. The material was a brief summary of the origin and achievements of Thomas Edison. At the beginning of the session with PJ, we watched together a short animated video based on the same subject. PJ seemed very delighted with the video. At times, Briggs would pause it to ask him who certain characters in were and what was occurring in the story. 

Once the video was finished, Briggs and PJ began reading the homework assignment together. Once they got to the question and answer part, PJ seemed to have a good understanding of the material that he had read and had little trouble answering the first questions. I believe that the video really helped him build his schema and interest in the story. As they completed more questions in the reading comprehension homework, the questions started to gradually become more challenging. I remember that Briggs and I had to define what the words predicting, fact, and admire were to him. We used vivid hand gestures and familiar objects to help him out. To make sure that he understood what he was being thought, Briggs would ask PJ to give us example sentence in return. 

When the tutoring session ended, Briggs told me that she wish she had the materials earlier than she got them to prepare appropriately. I have to agree with her in that sense. I would encourage her to try think of new ways to improvise more in case she dose not have any teaching material ahead of time. Perhaps using in book illustrations and looking up word definitions and in sentence examples on a computer device while teaching. This may interest PJ very much and would help her out with things she may not know right away. She did a good job.  

Damil_CO_#3

2/2/2015

1pm

CIES Building 

Ramin Yazdanpanah

Speaking Class
Group 4

Ramin's speaking class meet up in a small class room in CIES building. I feel that the smallness of the class room encourages students to speak to each other and receive immediate feed back. The class began by considering the conversation topic for the day, which was "This House Would Go Vegetarian." Students were divided into groups of 3 and asked to debate the pros and cons of vegetarianism. Debate positions were assigned: one student was pro vegetarian, one was anti vegetarian, and a third was a neutral member who would collect notes from the 2 arguments and summarize them in the end. 

The groups were highly animated as they shared their opinion with each other. While the class was in progress, Ramin walked around listening in on group conversations. At times, he would involve himself in a group discussion help guide their train of thought or give a funny remark. At the end of class, each neutral member of each group shared the arguments and counter-arguments of each side. Before class was dismissed, Ramin reviewed his notes from the class. He reminded the students of when and where to use the letter "s" words in sentences. I learned a lot from Ramin's enthusiasm and interest in the personal learning experience of his students. The students in his looked happy to be there and genuinely interested in the in class work assignment. I also learned from watching him that you can be involved in groups and actively participate with the class in their activity. This I feel helps students know exactly what is expected from them and how to reach their goals. 

Damil_TP_#6

Adult TP- 3
1/30/2015

5pm

Tennessee St. Starbucks

Topic/Skill: 
-Definite and Indefinite articles. 
-Forms of the adjective "going." 
-Vocabulary.

Today I tutored Mutaz Bakri, my tutee from Mecca, Saudi Arabia. We meet up and sat outside of a Starbucks Coffee shop near the CIES building on Tennessee St. Upon greeting and seating ourselves, I asked him what English language subject I could help him with. Mutaz said he is in Foundations classes and is getting very good grades. Yet, he told me that he had a limited vocabulary and wanted me to help him with his speaking fluency. We first started considering new vocabulary words from his class notes by asking him what their meaning was. Once this was established, we started practicing using these and new words in sentences. After that, practiced using the correct forms of the "going" in sentences using the new vocabulary words we learned. Finally, we reviewed the use of definite and indenite articles by refering to objects and situations in Mutaz'es daily life.

Today's experience tutoring Mutaz has taught me that teaching a foundations student requires a lot of creativity, patience, and humor. For my next lesson, I will prepare a combination of vocabulary words and illustrations, including video, which will help him and my other students around his level easily learn this new material.   

Damil_TP_#5

Child TP- 3
1/29/2015
6:30 pm
CIES Classroom
Topics:
-Reading Comprehension
-Vocabulary

This evening I meet up with with PJ Chang and his family after class for his tutoring session. His mother had handed me in days prior his reading comprehension homework and a grade level appropriate book that he himself had chosen to complete with him during the session. During my preparation for PJ's tutoring session, I went ahead and read both assignments and completed them myself. While I was doing so, I thought of ways to make it easier for him to understand new vocabulary words and expressions.

One of the methods I thought of was to use my iPad to illustrate the material he read and define new word vocabulary words. After he read the essay for his reading comprehension homework, which was about a little boy's unfortunate experience at the beach, I downloaded a picture of a beach and used it to briefly review the events in the story. Once we started on the question and answer section, I asked PJ to draw upon his own experience to the beach and the picture to answer the questions. He answer and understood most questions on his own very well, which was a great improvement over our last session. For each question he answered, I would ask him why thought it was the right answer was right and the wrong answers were wrong. I did this to help him to build confidence in his abilities and rationalize/ use context information to figure out what he didn't know. This seemed to work very well for PJ, he was very interested in reading more.

For his book reading, I made extensive use of the included illustrations and my own drawings to help him understand the technical terms used in Motor Cross Racing. At times he he wanted to talk extensively about imaginary ways the sport could be made safer and how racers race. I felt that as long as he was correctly using the new vocabulary words he had learned from the book, it was good sign of progress and thus OK as long as we finished the book in time. I feel that PJ learned a lot today and he did very well. For my next session with PJ, I will continue finding new ways to create interest in the materials we study together.

Damil_CP_IE_#3

1/29/2015

1pm

CIES Student Lounge

Ramin's Intercultural Exchange class

In Ramin's Intercultural Exchange class, we were given work sheets and asked to pair up with 2 CIES students for the day. My partners were Hammed from Kuwait and Abdullah from Saudi Arabia. Ramin defined what socialization and ethnocentrism is and asked us to use the checklists in our worksheets to discuss their effect in our home countries culture.  

In activity 1, all of the cultural norms in the checklist were relevant to classroom and educational etiquette. Through our group discussion, we came to the conclusion that there were very few significant differences between Arab and Puerto Rican/American culture in this subject. Perhaps the most significant difference was how students in Arab countries are expected to address their teacher as "Teacher" and not by there name. Hammed told me that early on when he started school, he had a very hard time adapting to local norm of calling teachers by the first or last name out of respect.

In activity 2, we considered a list that asked us what was is considered appropriate behavior in various situations. In this activity, the guys and I learned a lot about each others cultural differences, especially in the way we greet each other. I learned that Arab men commonly greet each other with a kiss, which varies on the level of seniority and respect they have for each other. When men and women greet each other, they do not touch, unless they are family. This is very different from Hispanic culture, where the opposite tends to be true. Women and men typically greet each other with kisses, yet men usually do not greet each other so unless they are greeting a senior member of the family (father, grandfather, etc). I also learned from hammed and Abdullah that when a group of Arabs walk together, the eldest one will walk ahead and lead the group. The younger members will also accommodate him to show his rank. For example, if they went to a restaurant together, they would open the doors for him and sit him at the head of the table.     

Damil_CP_#2

1/29/2015

12pm

Location: Pataria 

631 West Tennessee Street

I invited my conversation my conversation partners to go out for lunch at Pitaria, a Greek food restaurant near CIES. Hector, Saif, and Saif's friend Obid met up with me inside the lobby of the CIES building and walked to the restaurant together. Both Saif and Obid were very curious about the food and asked a lot of questions about the food. Frankly, I don't know much about Greek food but fortunately for me some of their Arabic speaking friends were there to help them order. While we waited in line, we started discussing the difference between Arabic, Hispanic, and American greetings. 

In Arabic culture, specifically from Arabic countries surrounding the Persian Gulf, it is customary for men to greet each other with kisses depending on their relationship. When a son greets his father and especially his grandfather, he will kiss him on the forehead, the nose, and perhaps even his hand in a sign of deep respect. Men of similar age who are friends will greet with a hug and a kiss on the cheek or the nose I believe. Hector and I explained to them that Hispanic men typically don't kiss each other unless they are father and son. In that case, they may kiss each others cheeks. This was one of many informative topics we discussed. I am glad I am aware of this now so I wont be caught by surprise when I visit an Arabic country someday. 

Damil_CP_#1

1/22/2015

7pm

Dunkin Doughnuts/ FSU Campus

Conversation Partner Meeting

Today I met Hector Suni Puma, one of my conversation partners after class. We said hello and walked to the FSU campus Dunkin Doughnuts. As we walked there we became antiquated with each other. Hector told me that he is from Peru and is at CIES to prepare to take the TOEFL and eventually the GRE. He recently lived in Puerto Rico, my own home country, where he just graduated from the University of Mayaguez with a Master degree in Applied Mathematics in Finance. His long term goal is to get a Doctorate Degree in Mathematics in FSU or another American university. We talked extensively about his desire to learn English and the differences between Tallahassee and the other Spanish cities he has lived in. 

Hector and I had many things in common. We are both Hispanic, Spanish speakers, and love Puerto Rico. Culturally there was not much new to share. Instead, I helped Hector understand common American phrases and expressions like "over there and yonder." Also, since he is new to the country, I helped him understand how to get a new cellphone to use during his time here. Hector did tell me a few things that I did not know about Peru. He told me that public transportation is abundant and cheap in the major cities there. Yet, to be very cautions if I ever went since some taxi drivers are criminals and drug dealers in disguise. I certainly appreciate this advice. 

Damil_CO_#1

1/22/2015- 10am

Room 213

Ryan Flemming Composition Class

Group 2B

Today was my first class observation. I joined Ryan Flemming for his composition class with Group 2B. As his students walked into the room before the beginning of class, Ryan wrote the class agenda and journal topic "What are some reasons why people want to lose weight and what is the best way to do it." Once class commenced, he explained the journal topic to the students while using vivid examples of why he would actually want to gain weight. I joined the students in their journal writing to get a feeling of what it was like to be doing a in class assignment like. i must admit, its harder than it looks. Although Ryan told students that their journal assignments were being graded for completeness of their written, most people don't express their feelings impromptu through extensive writing like is required in a journal assignment. 

After the students completed their journal writings, Ryan taught the class was a definition essay was and asked the class to start writing a rough draft on a topic of their choice. I liked the way he would walk around the class and make sure students were understand and doing their assignments. When he saw a student struggling, he would ask how he could help and guided them in their topic. He put a lot of emphasis on students developing a good thesis statement for their essay. When students had trouble understanding and finding new English words, he would use a lot of hand gestures and body motions to help them their meanings in sample sentences. In one instance he rubbed the back of his hand down his face while saying the "water" to explain to a student the meaning of the word "sweat." I liked this teaching technique very much and I will surely use it in the future. I liked his class very much and his enthusiasm is contagious. My only feedback is that some students seemed at times more distracted with their phones and talking to each other, but this is inevitable in any class.  

Damil_CO_#2

1/27/2015

CIES COMPUTER LAB

1PM 

Angle Rios Speaking Class Observation

Angle Rios's speaking class meet today at the CIES computer lab. They were practicing their speaking and listening skills using computer programs that model parts of the TOEFL test the students were to take at the end of the school. The class activity was transcribing a short spoken verse recording into English text. Students plucked furiously at their keyboard while trying to finish early. I walked around the class and observed them stopping and playing sound recordings, writing and angrily rewriting entire paragraphs in their effort to understand what they were hearing. 

After students finished writing their transcripts, the students were allowed to leave or remain on their computers to continue working on their mid term exam presentations. After the majority them had finished their writing, I asked Angle what he was going to do with the transcripts the students wrote. He showed me how the computer programs worked and the grading rubric that he used for the class. Once I saw some of the past assignments for his class, I learned how he graded the transcripts and involved students in editing in their own work. Students rewrote their transcripts based on their notes that he wrote in the margins. 

Damil_TP_#4

Adult TP- 2
1/20/2015 
7pm.
Panera Bread Co.
Topics:
-Speaking vocabulary 
-Article usage.

Today I met up with two of my tutoring students, Mohamed from Saudi Arabia and Saif from the UAE. My fellow classmate Milton Martinez also joined us for the session as and helped me tutor them. Since it was our first tutoring session together, I decided to spend my time with them by getting to know them personally and their English language leaning needs.

From the beginning of the session, both students expressed a desire to be helped with their English speaking fluency, including vocabulary and article usage. For our first exercise, I asked both of them to physically describe Milton and I using short sentences in short sentences using simple present tense. This turned out to be a effective and comical way for them to open up and practice using their English knowledge. For example,the first thing they said was "Milton is an old man" and "Damil has very white skin." While we had a few laughs as they described us, yet we made sure to correct their verb tense usage as needed.

Afterwards, Mohamed mentioned that he had a speaking class test the following day which involved verbally describing objects and people. Milton and Mohamed brainstormed various ways to describe objects and peoples that would likely appear on the test. Meanwhile, since Saif speaking ability was not on the same level as Mohamed, we worked separately for the second half of he tutoring session. Saif and I spoke about mutual interests and his hobbies back home in the UAE. While he spoke, I wrote a list of words and common expressions that he had trouble saying or properly expressing. For example, the word around and round confused him greatly. So I helped him see the difference by using his hobby of BMX bike riding to create example sentences. At the end of our tutoring session, we reviewed the list of words and expressions he had learned that night.

I encouraged my students to bring their classwork to our next session and to keep notes on elements of the English language that I could help them with. Milton and I both agreed that they should enjoy entertainment in English more often like music, movies, and television shows. This would help them be able to see how to express themselves more naturally in English with others. In our next session, I will use a speaking activity that will help them learn more vocabulary and use verb tenses properly.

Damil