9.35am My new student rings to check exactly where the house is.
10am Promptly my new student M arrives, clutching notebook and pencil case, looking nervous.
10.05am we get going. I have planned lots to do but am not sure how fast we'll go. M wants to build up her confidence and get really good at spoken English. She's Polish, so has an excellent attitude to work and learning. We start with a fairly stilted example of a 'Hello' conversation and we're off! I have a 'getting to know you' sheet of typical phrases and we carry on. She's very frank and I learn a lot about why she moved to UK and what ghastly things happened to her, her hopes for the future, her family. She's already got a job she finds too restricting (it's factory work, packing) and has enrolled on an accountancy course. So she wants her spoken English to reflect her capabilities and intelligence.
[Her friend, also Polish, is doing the same course and says how easy it is. Only English students find it hard. Could this be a reflection on how British students approach academic work?]
11am By now we have discussed a Powerpoint presentation on Greetings and I email it to her so she doesn't need to write down all the new phrases. Viva la laptop.
11.05am We look at pictures and think about 'what is he doing?' and 'What does he do?' This turns out to be really good for increasing her vocabulary as well as grammar practise.
11.15am
M comments that I was right when I said 2 hours was too long for an
individual lesson and 11/2 hours is going to be long enough. I think
students can underestimate how tiring individual work
is................there are no rests whilst someone else is
asking/answering a question and no group work to help you along!
11.30am
we end this week's lesson and she leaves with a cheerful 'See you
next week'.
http://lookingaftertheoldies.wordpress.com
Week 3
We start this week with more 'what does he do, what is he doing' pictures. One is of a nudist who's in prison for refusing to wear clothes ever, thus causing a public nuisance on occasion. We discuss this and 'in the north' and 'north of' crops up. I point out the difference.
Continue with the first chapter from English for Business Life by Badger and Menzies, pub. Marshall Cavendish. It's revision of present simple, statement and question forms, and introductions. She works through it steadily.
We discuss things as we go along. the 'ow' sound in though comes up...I'll have to find/do a worksheet to help with this.
It's a beautiful day so we head into the garden to do some vocabulary work, looking at flowers and trees. She enjoys cooking so I'll get herbs for next time and teach her the English names.
WEEK
2
My student is half
an hour late and I'm just beginning to wonder if she's coming at all
when the bell rings and there she is, out of breath and apologetic.
She begins by
saying she has thought about what I said about the length of her
lesson and she has to agree that 1 hour is actually long enough.
Originally she wanted a 2 hour lesson but I had pointed out that in a
one-to-one lesson she would not learn anything during the second half
because she would not be able to concentrate for that long. She had
one and a half hours last week but she found that really tiring, so
it's back to my original suggestion, one hour.
10.35am we start
with revision (she needs practise after all) of what is he doing/what
does he do.
10.45am use BBC
`English at work, Doing lunch'. This follows on from last week's
work on introductions and M enjoys it and can understand the
different accents. We discuss the issues arising from the audio
clip. I love the BBC resources.
11am Grammar
practise... we work through a worksheet on present simple/
progressive/continuous noting Americanisms where they occur and
discussing how and when we use these forms.
11.20am we look
at a sheet of drinks vocabulary, where I have listed as many
colloquial phrases connected to drinking as I can think of. We add a
couple more I think of.
We discuss what
has been useful in the lesson and what was useful last week. I am
pleased with her feedback.
She requests help
with....guess what....present perfect so it's out with the Murphy for
next week.
Week 3
We start this week with more 'what does he do, what is he doing' pictures. One is of a nudist who's in prison for refusing to wear clothes ever, thus causing a public nuisance on occasion. We discuss this and 'in the north' and 'north of' crops up. I point out the difference.
Continue with the first chapter from English for Business Life by Badger and Menzies, pub. Marshall Cavendish. It's revision of present simple, statement and question forms, and introductions. She works through it steadily.
We discuss things as we go along. the 'ow' sound in though comes up...I'll have to find/do a worksheet to help with this.
It's a beautiful day so we head into the garden to do some vocabulary work, looking at flowers and trees. She enjoys cooking so I'll get herbs for next time and teach her the English names.
No comments:
Post a Comment