FSU TEFL Certificate 2021 Summer 1

Date/Time: 06/30/2021 10:00 p.m. Location: Conversation over Line Topic discussed: Taiwanese traffic, School and work, State of the pandemic Cultural and/or linguistic topics you and your partner learned: Today's conversation was actually a bit surprising to me. We I had first spoke with Zhang Zhewei last week I was already impressed  with his speaking ability, but this week blew me away even further. I guess he was just a bit nervous the first time around because this time his fluency, confidence, and breadth of vocabulary had all massively improved. To start our conversation, Zhewei asked me about my upcoming trip to Sarasota. He was a bit taken aback by the fact that my car ride would take about 5 hours, since you can get to anywhere in Taiwan by train in less than three. This led us to compare traffic between America and Taiwan. Unlike America, the streets of Taiwan are not packed with cars but thousands upon thousands of mopeds. Because of this, and the fact that the dri...

 Emily CP#4  Date/Time: June 18, 2021 11:00 AM to 12:00 PM  Location: Zoom  Topic discussed: Areas in Tallahassee, Hobbies, Films, and Sleep Patterns  Cultural and/or linguistic topics you and your partner learned: In this meeting, we talked about a wide range of aspects of American and Korean culture. The conversation began by talking about places in Tallahassee. He noted in prior conversations that a part of Tallahassee he likes is the nature. I suggested different places to visit like The Sink and Alfred B. Maclay Gardens State Park. I expressed that these were both places in nature that I love to visit. We also talked about sleep schedules in Korea and the United States. He talked about how he feels like people in South Korea tend to stay up much later than in the United States, which I could understand considering he lived in a major city. We also discussed different genres of films. He talked about different notable American actors that he knew. I mentione...

Emily CP#3  Date/Time: June 11, 2021 11:00 AM to 12:00 PM  Location: Zoom  Topic discussed: American and Korean culture  Cultural and/or linguistic topics you and your partner learned: An area I found interesting was him expressing food in the United States, but not in the traditional sense. In prior meetings, we talked about American and Korean food, but he noted how food in Korea was something he really missed. He said that even though he tried to make the food he would make in Korea, it would never taste the same. I had never actually thought about that before -- how food, even made with the same ingredients, still could not taste the same. It was a really enlightening conversation. He also talked about his experiences with miscommunication. His area of miscommunication came from a car accident he had in Tallahassee. The communication pattern following a car accident is quite different between the United States and Korea. Communication patterns are always incredib...

 Emily CP#2  Date/Time: June 4, 2021 11:00 AM to 12:00 PM  Location: Zoom  Topic discussed: American and Korean Culture, Academia, Personal Interests  Cultural and/or linguistic topics you and your partner learned: In this conversation partner session, we continued to discuss ourselves. The central part of this meeting was talking about sports. Although I am not a particular fan of sports, we discussed FSU sports and Tallahassee. We both agreed that basketball is one of the more entertaining sports to watch. Something I did not know prior was how big baseball was in South Korea. It is always interesting to hear about Korean culture because I am not that familiar with it. It makes me want to visit. Nonetheless, we talked about how he wants to find time to travel the United States and how he wants to attend a football game. I gave my own suggestions, but as noted prior, I am not much of a sports fan. We talked about how football is a large part of American culture...

 <TS Blogs>  Date/Time: Monday, June 14, 2021 8:10 AM to 8:35 AM  Topic Skills: Speaking, Writing, and Grammar Skills  Feedback provided to the tutee: My tutee was late to this tutoring session so it was shorter than usual; however, as always, we began by reviewing material we covered in the prior tutoring session. For this session, we reviewed directional phrases and vocabulary terms. He learned these concepts rather fast based on how well he was able to respond to the activities we did in the last tutoring session. I was very impressed, as always. We did a smaller activity with directions that was the same as the activity we did in the last session, but it was with a different map that included street names. After this activity to conclude learning directions, we moved on to family terms. Based on diagnostics conducted in the beginning of tutoring, I knew he had some understanding of family-related vocabulary; however, it was not extensive knowledge. The poin...

 <TS Blogs>  Date/Time: Wednesday, June 9, 2021 8:00 AM to 8:45 AM  Topic Skills: Reading and Writing Skills  Feedback provided to the tutee: In this tutoring session, we branched off of the last session we had together. In the last session we discussed adverbs of frequency, which I began this tutoring session reviewing. We also briefly reviewed different types of questions (When, Where, What, etc.); however, both of these aspects were not the central focus of this tutoring session. The main focus was introducing vocabulary and phrases related to directions. His mother gave me his English textbook and one of the areas he was learning was directions. Thus, it was very important for me to cover this area of English. I began this lesson by introducing important phrases related to directions. For example, "Where is..." and "How can I get to...". I feel as though these are questions that are extremely useful in a real-world circumstance, which is another reason I f...

 <TS Blogs>  Date/Time: Monday, June 11, 2021 8:00 AM to 8:45 AM  Topic Skills: Reading and Writing Skills  Feedback provided to the tutee: Je-won did an excellent job at understanding different types of questions as well as dealing with adverbs of frequency. This tutoring session I was first introducing him to adverbs of frequency. For example, words such as often, sometimes, never, and always. After introducing these terms, we went over an activity that applied these words. I asked him basic questions in which he would respond with a frequency-related term. In this activity, I asked questions like "How often do you paint" and other questions he could understand. After this activity, we worked on a reading section that used these adverbs of frequency. The goal of this reading was to give exposure to the use of all of these terms. I also gave him a few comprehension questions after reading it together to measure how well he understood the text and the new terms...

 Date/ Time: May 6th, 2021  Location: Zoom Topic/Skill: Grammar Teacher Presentation: Dr. Angel Rios Classroom Management: Very High  Materials: Zoom, Worksheet, Tes sheet, Documents for Zoom students Student Participation: Dr. Rios began by going over the past verb tenses that he would be quizzing them on later in the class. Students participated highly during this pre-quiz activity and would raise their hands or be picked on to answer the question. Every student had the opportunity to answer practice questions. After they were done, students also asked clarification questions as a last-minute review before the quiz. The rest of the class was spent with students completing their tests. So, the participation was high only for the first half of the class. 

Date/ Time: May 4th, 2021  Location: In-person Topic/Skill: Listening Teacher Presentation: Olivia Classroom Management: High Materials: Zoom, Google Docs, Youtube video of Ted Talks, Listening Prompts Student Participation: High. Students participated in an activity that was meant to structure how to listen in and give verbal and non-verbal cues that you are paying attention to a conversation. In pairs, one student would answer the question "who is the most important person in your life?" while the other would ask questions and practice the conversational cues. Every student had the opportunity to answer and be the one asking questions so everyone had ample opportunity to participate and learn. 

 Date/ Time: June 27th, 2021 (3pm- 4pm) Location: Zoom Topics discussed: Hussam and I discussed the topic of critical incidents and the IELTS exam and our love for New York City. Cultural and/or linguistic topics you and your partner learned: I learned more about the towns in Hussam's home country and how they differ in accents and certain phrases. I explained the cultural dynamic of New York City and how there are many ethnic neighborhoods such as Chinatown and Washington Heights. We spent time talking about the beauty of the New York public transit system in comparison to Floridas terribly awful one. Hussam also learned about the cultural dynamic of Miami in reference to Hispanics. 

 Date/ Time: June 13th, 2021 (1pm-2pm) Location: Zoom Topics discussed: Hussam and I discussed how I am moving to Spain and the soccer team FC Barcelona which is his favorite. We also talked about our favorite Olympics events.  Cultural and/or linguistic topics you and your partner learned: I taught Hussam some of the great American Olympians such as Michael Phelps, Simone Biles, Misty May Treanor, and Kerri Walsh. Hussam taught me some fun facts about his soccer team from Saudia Arabia and I learned about how much the sport means in his home country. 

  Date/Time: 06/27/2021 11:00 a.m. Location: Conversation over Line Topic/Skill: Introductions, Needs assessment, Speaking Feedback provided to tutee: Zhang Zhewei( 張哲偉 ) was the second person that my friend Zhou introduced to me. He mostly wants to improve his English thanks to his own personal prerogative. He had previously studied English in school but really slacked off on his studies while he was completing his masters program. So, now he would like to build up what English he still has mostly for the sake of communication, but also to help him at his job. Zhewei's English overall is not bad, especially considering he hasn't really sought out practice since high school. Although, he does have a few problems. While his fluency and pronunciation are both good, his vocabulary and listening ability are both limited. These are the two areas that I think I will focus on most. Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: This was actually a lesson for me in just...

Date/Time: 06/27/2021 10:00 a.m. Location: Conversation over Line Topic discussed: To start,  Zhou and I went through our normal routine. We discussed how things have been in America and Taiwan, how our own lives are going, if we've done anything interesting, etc. I learned the Taiwan is stepping up their quarantining procedures  again since they've had a spike in cases but a delay on vaccines. After that we talked about the people Zhou helped get me in contact with to help complete my tutoring sessions. He was eager to here how they were doing and I was happy to tell him that they were doing well. Both are on a lower level than him but show great promise. Then we talked about television for a while. Zhou told me about how excited he is for the new season of Rick and Morty  to come out, but how sad he is that he has to wait to watch it. He also introduced me to this new Taiwanese drama series that is all about firefighters which I definitely  plan on checking out...

Date/Time: 06/24/2021 9:00 p.m. Location: Conversation over Line Topic/Skill: Speaking, Needs Assessment Feedback provided to tutee: This was my and Tina's (谢渝婷) first tutoring session. Tina was one of the two people I was able to meet thanks to my Taiwanese friend Zhou. She recently graduated with her bachelors in business management and has decided to work with me because she would like to improve her test scores and language ability as she looks for jobs. We started by giving brief introductions and then moved into the needs assessment. Her speaking ability is a bit limited. She doesn't have a particularly broad vocabulary and she does have some problems with fluency; However, her pronunciation and listening ability are both quite good. After figuring out what her English is like and getting to know each other we went over a few of the TOEIC speaking questions. Even though she still had problems with fluency and vocabulary she still replied to the questions fairly well...

Date/ Time: May 3rd, 2021 (1- 1:50pm) Location: In-person Topic/Skill: Speaking Teacher Presentation: Ryan Flemming Classroom Management: Very High  Materials: Zoom, Powerpoint Presentation, Youtube Student Participation: Moderate, students were learning about their speaking presentation and were mostly listening and asking questions about the assignment

 Date/ Time: June 4th, 2021 (10am-11am) Location: Zoom Topics discussed: Hussam and I discussed our majors and the fields we want to work in in the future. We also discussed important vacation destination spots in both our hometowns.  Cultural and/or linguistic topics you and your partner learned: I learned a lot about the progress Saudi Arabia is making as a more inclusive country especially for women. I also learned about islands surrounding Mainland Saudi Arabia that would be great to visit. Hussam also learned about some of my favorite spots in Miami. 

 Date/ Time: May 26th, 2021 (12 pm -1 pm) Location: Zoom Topics discussed: Hussam had recently arrived back home from a trip to New York so most of the session was spent discussing his experience.  Cultural and/or linguistic topics you and your partner learned: Hussam learned about the importance of New York as a melting pot for most cultures and groups you'll find in the United States. Hussam also asked many questions about the criminal justice system in America. 

 Date/ Time: May 7th, 2021 (4:30pm -5:30 pm) Location: Zoom Topics discussed: In the second half of this meeting, we continued our in-depth conversation about religion and how it ties to culture. We discussed how America does not have an official religion, but religion is still tied to many laws, cultural practices, and holidays.  Cultural and/or linguistic topics you and your partner learned: We talked about American holidays and the religious background of some like Christmas as well as continuing to talk about Ramadan and Eid. I learned how to pronounce various words in Arabic and he learned many things about Catholicism and Christianity. 

Date/ Time: May 7th, 2021 (3:30 pm -4:30 pm) Location: Zoom Topics discussed: Hussam and I began the session by discussing our thoughts on the article given "The Elephant and the Blind Men". We talked about the main idea of the story and if we agreed with the message the author was trying to convey. We then moved on to discuss our "Who Are You" worksheet and spoke about our identities and favorite things.  Cultural and/or linguistic topics you and your partner learned: We talked about American culture when I discussed my responses on the Who Are You worksheet. Hossam learned about my birth city, Boston, and where I grew up, Miami. I also learned a lot from Hossam because we discussed Islam and the religious holiday Ramadan. 

  Date/Time: June 24th, 2021 (11am -12pm) Location: Zoom  Topic/Skill: Idioms  Feedback provided to tutee: For this tutoring session, I provided feedback mostly on Hang ah's pronunciation. To begin the lesson we held a short discussion and then watched a short video together. After we went over the idioms and I corrected her pronunciation throughout the rest of the lesson.  Lessons about tutoring and/or tutee you learned:  Hang ah found learning about idioms very exciting and even knew idioms with similar meanings that she could use as well. It was very easy for her to learn the idioms and use them in context.

Date/Time: June 21st 2021 (4:45pm- 5:35pm)  Location: Zoom  Topic/Skill: Diagnostic Feedback provided to tutee: For this tutoring session, I conducted the diagnostic with Hang ah to gauge her level of English and hear from her what she is interested in learning about. Because it was only the diagnostic session, not much feedback was given to Hang ah during the lesson. I took what I learned from the diagnostic to create her future lesson plans.  Lessons about tutoring and/or tutee you learned:  Hang ah arrived during the Pandemic to the United States from South Korea. Hang ah is learning English to be able to communicate better with foreign teachers that she works alongside back home in South Korea. Hang ah is very interested in advancing her speaking skills when it comes to conversational English and wants to be able to have a naturally flowing conversation with an American Friend in English. 

  Date/Time: June 25th, 2021 (1:30 pm- 2:30 pm) Location: Zoom  Topic/Skill: Grammar, Past Tense  Feedback provided to tutee: At the start of the tutoring session, Shatha had questions concerning her reading homework so went over them together. I provided feedback on her homework answers and then we moved onto the grammar lesson where I provided her feedback on her answers to the lesson check.  Lessons about tutoring and/or tutee you learned:  I learned that verbs tenses can be very confusing for the tutee and there are multiple ways of saying the same sentence. It was very easy for Shatha to pick up on grammar in use. 

Date/Time: June 18th, 2021 (1:30pm -2:30pm) Location: Zoom  Topic/Skill: Speaking, Longer Sentence Structure Feedback provided to tutee: For this tutoring session, Shatha expressed to me her disappointment in receiving a lower score on her recent ILETS Speaking session than she had scored previously. To go over this, we had used sample ILETS Speaking prompts and Shatha practiced as if it was a real exam. I took notes of what she needed to work on and used the ILETS rubric to compare. Our lesson was focused on present verb tenses.  Lessons about tutoring and/or tutee you learned:  I learned that it was easier for Shatha to learn about 2 present verb tenses and compare the two. It is really easy to make a fun grammar lesson out of verb tenses! 

  Date/Time: May 19th 2021 (2:30 pm- 3:30 pm) Location: CIES Building  Topic/Skill: Diagnostic Feedback provided to tutee: For this tutoring session, I conducted the diagnostic with Fahad to gauge his level of English and hear from him what he is interested in learning about. Because it was only the diagnostic session, not much feedback was given to Fahad during the lesson. I took what I learned from the diagnostic to create his future lesson plans.  Lessons about tutoring and/or tutee you learned:  Fahad recently arrived in the United States and is very interested in learning English. Fahad finds that grammar lessons are tedious and at times very difficult to understand. However, Fahad said that he wanted to work on his grammar skills and from his diagnostic I knew he needed assistance using the correct verb tenses. 

  Date/Time: May 19th 2021 (1pm-2pm) Location: Zoom  Topic/Skill: Writing & Grammar in Use Feedback provided to tutee: For this tutoring session, Shatha and I looked over her revised Introduction paragraph to focus more on grammar errors. I provided Shatha with feedback on proper word/verb tenses and feedback on punctuation use.  Lessons about tutoring and/or tutee you learned:  I learned that it is slightly difficult to correct grammar in writing if the tutee does not have a sufficient understanding of the grammar rules beforehand. I had to go off on several mini-lessons to offer explanations but then had to stop, to refrain from overwhelming her, and wrote down the areas of struggle for future tutoring sessions. 

Date/Time: May 14th 2021 (1pm -2pm) Location: Zoom  Topic/Skill: Writing, Thesis Statement  Feedback provided to tutee: For this tutoring session, Shatha and I watched a short video discussing whether graffiti should be considered art or vandalism. Shatha took notes on the video as she watched and then wrote an introductory paragraph including a thesis statement on her stance. The feedback provided included correcting her paragraph organization, I.e. how to structure an intro paragraph. The feedback also included asking her to elaborate or write more on sentences that were short and lacked depth. There were also minor corrections on grammar mistakes.  Lessons about tutoring and/or tutee you learned:  I learned that Shatha has many ideas but struggles to translate them onto paper. I need to work with Shatha on improving her sentence structure and filling in missing gaps of information. Shatha also needs to work on proper word tenses. 

Date/Time: May 7th 2021 (1pm -2pm) Location: Zoom  Topic/Skill: Diagnostic Feedback provided to tutee: For this tutoring session, I conducted the diagnostic with Shatha to gauge her level of English and hear from her what she is interested in learning about. Because it was only the diagnostic session, not much feedback was given to Shatha during the lesson. I took what I learned from the diagnostic to create her future lesson plans.  Lessons about tutoring and/or tutee you learned:  Shatha is studying English partially because she is looking to pursue a PhD in Art Theory. Shana is highly interested in working on her academic writing and speaking skills. Shatha also has difficulty using correct word and verb tenses in both her speaking and writing so that is something we will need to work on. 

Date/ Time: June 23rd (11AM-12PM) Location: Zoom Topic/Skills: Ending discussions/ feedback/ opinions Feedback Provided to tutee: For this last lesson I gave Hannah some overall feedback on her English skills and some things to continue doing to keep her English strong. I told her to watch more TV in English and to read more because the more you read, the better your writing skills will be, and that is what she needs the most help with. Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I learned that Hannah like the lessons that I taught that were the most relatable to her. She told me that she liked the way I tutored her and that she appreciated all the help in English that she got from me. She especially liked the slang and restaurant vocabulary, which she will now be using more on a daily basis with speaking to others. This made me very happy and glad, since this is the first experience with teaching English that I got. I will miss tutoring Hannah, but I told her that I would s...

Date/Time: June 22nd  (11AM-12PM) Location: Zoom Topic/Skill: Restaurant Vocab cont./ writing/ speaking Feedback provided to tutee: Since Hannah really wanted to learn restaurant talk and vocab I continued the past lesson and kept the same topic. I had her write a role-play of a server and customer at a restaurant and gave her feedback on her dialogue as well as her pronunciation.  Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I had Hannah write a role-play of a server and customer, but I gave her a twist, something has to go wrong with the food and the server has to deal with the problem. This made the task a bit more challenging for her, but she did a wonderful job. I learned that Hannah didn’t know that a menu meant just the paper that has all the different plates and dishes written on it. She thought that “menu” could also be used as entrée or dish. This I corrected her on and she was very grateful. She really liked this lesson cause she got to use the restaurant ...

Date/Time: June 18th (11AM-12PM) Location: Zoom Topic/ Skill: Restaurant vocabulary  Feedback provided to tutee: Hannah asked me to specifically teach her some lessons on restaurant talk and greeting and how servers speak. She wanted this because she just recently got a part time job at a restaurant. So, I gave her new vocabulary that she could use on a daily basis. I answered the many questions she had about why servers talk this way and what to say if something goes wrong.  Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I learned that Hannah wants to know all of this new vocabulary for her new part-time job at a restaurant. I went over a list of things that servers say and possible customer responses. I also gave her example scenarios in a restaurant or even talking over the phone for a takeout order. She really appreciated this lesson and had many questions and things to input when I was teaching this. 

Date/ Time: June 14th (11Am-12PM) Location: Zoom Topic/Skill: Speaking/ Problem Solving Feedback provided to tutee: For this lesson I had Hannah do a problem-solving speaking assignment. So, as her feedback, I made sure she spoke for at least 45 seconds for each response and that she answered each prompt correctly (or in an acceptable way). I made sure that she was speaking for most of the time and that she solved each problem. She really enjoyed how interactive this lesson was.  Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: This lesson taught me a lot about Hannah’s morals and values. The prompts for the problem-solving were things like: woman was harassed in the street (what do you do). That is just one example. So, the way Hannah responded each of these told me a lot about her and it taught me that she really cares for others, but also takes careful consideration in every decision that she makes. Hannah is very talkative, so this lesson was great. As she spoke I also co...

Date/Time: June 11th (11AM-12PM) Location: Zoom Topic/Skill: revising and writing Feedback provided to tutee: I taught Hannah in this lesson that it is always important to revise an essay, not only for mistakes but to make it a stronger paper. There is always something that could be better within each essay. So, we read through hers together and she even knew some things that needed to be fixed, which was great because that means she recognizes her mistakes! Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I learned that explaining revisions to foreign students is very difficult. They ask “why isn’t it correct the way that I wrote it” and this is a question that is very hard to answer. It took me a minute to figure out how to respond to Hannah when she asked me this, but this just taught me to be more prepared for each lesson. I also learned that Hannah thinks students should have jobs while in school, with limits, however!

Date/Time: June 9th (11AM-12PM) Location: Zoom Topic/Skill: Writing/ Opinion Essay Feedback provided to tutee: I told Hannah that for this lesson we would be working on writing again because this is her weakest point in English. She agreed, so I gave her a few topics to choose from and finally she chose the topic about having a job while still being a student. I gave her information on this topic and examples of an essay written for this topic as well, so she could be provided with some background knowledge. Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I learned that Hannah likes to discuss things and ask tons of questions, which I like a lot. I like this because then we don’t sit in awkward silence; she always has something to contribute to the lesson as well. She asked me questions about the essay topic and the examples I provided her with, which was great. Then while she started writing her essay she asked me questions on if her wording was correct for some of her sentence...

Date/Time: June 7th (11Am-12PM) Location: Zoom Topic/Skill: Reading/ Covid in the work life Feedback provided to tutee: Since this is a ongoing situation (Covid), I thought this would be a good topic to talk about and read about. This is also because my student is more advanced, she could understand topics like these. I gave her feedback on the comprehension questions after the reading as well as her pronunciation throughout the reading.  Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I learned that Covid did affect Hannah’s work life because she is a teacher, so she was forced to teach online, rather than in person. This is something that many teachers struggled with and she was telling me about it. She really enjoyed reading about this because it was so relatable to right now. This taught me that students like when the topic is something that they can relate to, so this will help me in my future teaching. She read the article and answered the comprehension questions after...

 For my last tutoring session with Dave, I attempted to quickly correct his grammatical errors from the writing prompt practice of our previous tutoring session. After we were done with corrections, I gave him a list of grammatical concepts that troubled him the most throughout all our tutoring sessions. These included commas, particles, uncountable nouns, verb tenses, and transition words and phrases. Once we were done with that, I made sure to reassure Dave about his progress and level of English knowledge. He was a very bright student, and I am sure he will naturally become fluent within the next few years due to his age and involvement at school. Since he has a long summer outside of school, I offered him fun ways to improve his English. I suggested that he should begin reading popular book series for his age like Harry Potter, Percy Jackson, and The Hunger Games. All these book series have movies as well, and it can be a fun way to spend the summer, especially since he told me...

 For this tutoring session with Dave, I was mindful how I was at our last two tutoring sessions and made sure to do an activity that was both interesting and could spill over to the last tutoring session. I found another infographic YouTube video about introverts vs. extroverts. After we watched the video, we discussed whether we consider ourselves to be introverts or extroverts. After the discussion, I found an online personality quiz that would measure if you're an introvert, extrovert, or ambivert. We shared our results with each other and discussed why whether we resonate with it or not. Towards the end of the session, I gave Dave an extensive writing prompt: "Do you consider yourself to be an introvert, extrovert, or an ambivert? Give an example of why you are one over the other personality type. Do you have an example of someone you know who has a different personality type?" I then write my own personal response and shared with him my writing and thought process. I...

Date/Time: June 4th (11AM-12PM) Location: Zoom Topic/Skill: Listening: Boyfriends/ Girlfriends/ Friends the Tv show Feedback provided to tutee: In this lesson we did some listening and comprehension with a part of a Friends episode. Hannah likes Friends, so she liked this lesson. I gave her feedback on the comprehension questions after the video and on her mistakes in speaking when we had our beginning discussion. Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I learned that it is very difficult to have a full class over zoom. Sometimes things glitch problems happen. This time right in the middle of our lesson my wifi went out and it kicked me out of the zoom, so I had to text her and then rejoin once my wifi came back. This was crazy but things like this happen. Despite the technical issues, I had Hannah watch a video and do a dictation exercise, then she answered some comprehension questions. 

 For this tutoring session with Dave, I went back to grade 7 level reading comprehension practice. Additionally, I asked him to briefly skim through the passage and questions, and list the vocabulary he was not familiar with. Before we began reading the passage, I defined all the unknown words along with their parts of speech and example sentences. My goal was to read the passage and answer all the questions at a faster rate. This was very successful, and we often had to refer back to our vocabulary list when they came up during the questions. 

Date/Time: June 2nd (11AM-12PM) Location: Zoom Topic/Skill: Reading/ Mardi Gras Feedback provided to tutee: This lesson I decided to do some reading and comprehension with Hannah. She really liked the idea of doing this because she doesn’t normally work on reading. I had her read the passage out loud and corrected her on any pronunciation mistakes made throughout reading.  Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I learned that Hannah had absolutely no idea what Mardi Gras was. This was very shocking, yet exciting to hear because I got to teach her everything she now knows on the subject. I showed her a video of what Mardi Gras looks like to get her engaged. I then gave her a list of vocab that would be in the reading passage along with a matching assignment. Then we read the passage and answered some comprehension questions. She really like this lesson because she got to learn something new. Hannah said she wants to go to the next Mardi Gras in New Orleans.

Date/Time: May 31st (11AM-12PM) Location: Zoom Topic/Skill: Ted Talk, vocab, writing Feedback provided to tutee: Hannah provided me with a list of things she didn’t understand from the Ted Talk after she re-watched it, so I took this time in the beginning of our session to explain each of them to her and answer any of her questions on the matter. She really appreciated this and understood the Ted Talk way better after my explanation of these phrases. I felt better after this because I was worried about this. Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: After I went over all of the things she didn’t understand, I had her write me a short summary about the video and if she agrees with the speaker or disagrees. I learned that Hannah thinks that the education system is becoming more inflated in the sense that we are requiring more and more schooling to get certain jobs. I also learned that she believes that arts should be more appreciated in the school system as well. 

 During this tutoring session with Dave, I decided to attempt another reading comprehension practice, but from a grade 8 level. I figured it was appropriate to advance the reading level in order to challenge him. This was not as successful as I expected. The reading passage was about fleas and included scientific terms that he was not yet familiar with like acid, theory, coincidence, artery, hypothesize, and speculate. A lot of the new vocabulary words did not even come from the reading passage, and instead they came from the reading comprehension questions. Dave was therefore not able to confidently answers the questions because he either did not understand what he was being asked, or he did not understand the multiple choice options. We took our time going through this passage, but I made sure to ask how he felt about it after he finished. He admitted that it was too hard for him, and I promised I would tone it back down in the future.

Date/Time: May 28th (11AM-12PM) Location: Zoom Topic/Skill: Listening/ Ted Talk Feedback provided to tutee: I told Hannah that during this lesson, I wanted her to take some notes on this ted talk that we watched about if schools kill creativity, which was a very interesting topic. We watched the video and she took notes because after I asked her some questions on the video and she answered them all very well, with a few minor mistakes in her speaking, but I corrected her. Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I learned that in a Ted Talk there are lots of advanced vocabulary that a foreign student would not understand. I realized this once she asked me about certain terms that were mentioned within the video. I felt so bad because I didn’t realized there would be so much that was difficult to understand, but she assured me that it was mostly the jokes the speaker made that were difficult to comprehend. So, since we ran out of time, I told her to watch the video again a...

 For this tutoring session with Dave, I went back to the website englishforeveryone.org and chose a different resource. I chose a grade 7 level reading comprehension worksheet because Dave has just finished sixth grade. We went through a reading passage about the Eiffel Tower, and took turns reading it aloud. I started first and encouraged him to pay attention to how I pronounce any words that he is not familiar with. After reading every paragraph, I would ask if he there were any words he did not know. These became new vocabulary words that I added to our shared google doc, along with their definition, part of speech, and example sentence. After we were done reading, we answered the reading comprehension questions together, and I helped him with the technique of finding the answers directly from going back to the reading.

 Before this and the previous tutoring session, Dave's mother reached out to me about how they could not to the normal meeting times last week because they went on a family vacation. This immediately gave me the idea to make another writing prompt where Dave can recall his family vacation. For this writing exercise, I provided the prompt and then I wrote out my example response with him. I explained my writing and thought process as I wrote, and pointed out verb tenses and transition words and phrases. After I was done, I wanted to monitor Dave's writing process so we wrote it together on our shared google doc. By doing this, we were able to write a longer response, fix grammatical errors as he wrote, and finish by the time our session ended. We did this by me asking guiding questions and going through his response sentence by sentence.

Date/Time: May 26th (11AM-12PM) Location: Zoom Topic/Skill: Writing and Speaking/ Slang and idioms Feedback provided to tutee: Since I had taught Hannah a bunch of new vocabulary slang and idioms that Americans frequently use I wanted to “test” her on these new words. So, I had her do a writing assignment with them and then we ended with a discussion about them. I made sure she used each of the vocab terms correctly and if she did not, I corrected her and told her how to fix it. Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I had my tutee write a text dialogue between her and a friend, making sure to use the new vocabulary that we had learned. I learned that it takes much longer for a foreign student to write a simple role-play dialogue rather than a native speaker. I had to take that into account when I gave her time to write it because originally I had given her less time and she said she wasn’t done and needed more time, so this is something I learned for future sessions.

Date/Time: May 24th (11AM-12PM) Location: Zoom Topic/Skill: Idioms/ Phrases/ Slang Feedback provided to tutee: Hannah had specifically asked me to give her a lesson in slang terms and idioms. She wanted to learn the way Americans spoke on a regular day to day basis. So, I dedicated this whole tutoring session to working on slang terms with Hannah. She really enjoyed this because It is what she mostly wanted to learn within these lessons. Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: So, for this lesson I researched the most common slang terms and phrases and used ones that I already to compile a list to teach to Hannah. I started out the discussion by asking her if she knew any slang terms from the top of her head, and she couldn’t really think of any, so I shared my screen with her to show her my list of slang words. I first asked her if she recognized any and knew what they meant. For the ones she did I had her give me an example of it being used in a sentence to make sure s...

 For this tutoring session with Dave, we picked up from where we left off with our writing prompt exercise from our previous session. His response was very interesting and very comical, because he posed a lot of open-ended questions in his response. I thought this was pretty well-done on his part, and enjoyed going over grammatical rules for posing questions. We went over how he should avoid using contractions in academic writing, and then went over some commonly used contractions and why they are more acceptable when speaking. Additionally, the difference between "it's" and "its" was an important concept to go over. I suggested that he should think aloud how "it's/it is" sounds in a sentence to determine if it is being used correctly. Dave is a very bright kid, and he is able to understand and apply these grammatical rules quickly.

Date/Time: May 19th (10-11 AM) Location: Zoom Topic/Skill: writing revisions/ speaking Feedback provided to tutee: During this session, I had Hannah share with me her essay that she had written from our last session. She warned me that her writing wasn’t that good, and she was worried, but after seeing her paper, there were only a few grammatical errors. I went over these grammatical errors with her and explained why they were wrong and how they should be fixed, and she really appreciated that. She asked me a few questions about some phrases she used as well for clarification.  Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I learned that Hannah thinks books are more educational than television and she gave reasons to prove that in her essay. We also did some speaking after I gave her feedback on her paper. We discussed a variety of topics in relation to the essay she had just written. This way, she could practice her speaking after having done the writing assignment. I lea...

Date/Time: May 17th (10-11 AM) Location: Zoom Topic/Skill: Writing/ Compare and Contrast Feedback Provided to Tutee: In the beginning of the session I explained to Hannah what we would be working on. I then went over a list of transition words to make sure she knew all of them, and I explained to her what a compare and contrast essay is and gave her an example. I then gave her the topic of the writing assignment that she would be completing. Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I learned that Hannah didn’t know some of the transition words that I showed her, so I explained them to her and gave her examples. I then showed her an example of what a compare and contrast essay should look like and if she had any questions. We then discussed the topic a little bit to give her some brainstorming ideas for her essay. The topic was comparing and contrast television with books, which do you think is better. She really liked this topic because she loves reading but she also love...

Date/Time: May 12th (10-11 AM) Location: Zoom Topic/Skill: English level assessment, introduction Feedback provided to tutee: Hang-ah-Kim, or Hannah, has very good English skills. She is very advanced in her English skills, although a few minor mistakes with writing, which I corrected in the assessment. Throughout the sessions I told Hannah that I will try to correct her speaking if she makes any mistakes and of course in writing as well.  Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: This first session was of course nerve racking because I had never tutored anyone before, especially in English. Once Hannah got on the zoom, it was super easy to talk to her. We started the meeting with getting to know each other. Hannah is from South Korea, but now lives in Tallahassee with her husband and is a teacher. She told me she wants to study and better her English to help with any future jobs. I also asked her if there is anything specific, she wanted me to teach her or help her wi...

 For this tutoring session with Dave, I wanted to continue with the writing prompt exercises, but I wanted to make it more interactive so that the entire session is not spend on waiting for Dave to finish writing. I used the TEFL textbook to find an interesting topic to write about and landed on veganism. I figured that Dave might not be familiar with this trending topic, so I found an infographic YouTube video to give him background information and engage his listening skills. After we watched the video, we practiced his speaking skills by engaging in a discussion about his thoughts and opinions on veganism. I could tell that this was fun for him because he had never heard about it before, and he was so confused as to why people would restrict their diets so radically. After he verbally explained his opinion on veganism, I gave him the following writing prompt: Is it better to be vegan or non-vegan? I encouraged him to summarize what we discussed in order to speed up his writing p...

 For this tutoring session with Dave, we continued with the writing prompt exercise from our last exercise. In this exercise, Dave's response was more like what I was expecting from him so me providing an example response was essential. This is a common piece of feedback that I receive from my lesson plans, and now I can see why. While we were correcting the grammatical errors, we discussed the two different meanings of "to lie," and how to use punctuation with words in quotation marks. We got stuck, however, with one sentence where I thought he was trying to use figurative language, but Dave was being literal. I spent a long time explaining what figurative language is and when to use it. Afterwards, I felt bad because I bet he was confused since he was being literal. In order to prevent this in future writing exercises, I will make sure to have him verbally expand on his response for me to understand what message his writing is trying to convey.

 For this tutoring session with Dave,  I attempted another writing prompt with him. The writing prompt was: Tell me about your oldest memory. With this, I wanted to practice writing all in past tense. Keeping in mind how he answered my last writing prompt, I provided my own example answering the same prompt. I read it to him aloud, and then I asked him to start writing his. He would write his response outside of our shared google doc, so I was not able to see how he rights it out and why he takes so long to write a paragraph. Similar to our last writing prompt exercise, Dave took the until the end of class to write this paragraph. He did mention how it takes him a while to translate, and it made me realize that he is probably writing it in Korean first, and then translating it to English.

 For this tutoring session with Dave, I decided to try a new resource with him to help improve his grammar. I found a website called englishforeveryone.org that offers free prints of ESL practice material. The category that most caught my eye was the paragraph correction. The paragraph correction practice sheets gave a paragraph with substantial grammatical errors. The grammatical errors are underlined and numbered, and there are options at the bottom of the sheet for the student to pick from. I began this practice by asking Dave to read the original paragraph aloud, so that he can hopefully hear out the grammatical errors. I chose an intermediate level sheet, and he was able to understand the grammatical corrections with minimal difficulty. I was able to teach him, though, about the Oxford Comma and why it is acceptable to add or not add a comma at the end of a list of actions or nouns. 

 For this tutoring session with Dave, we picked up from our last session where he answered a writing prompt about his favorite holiday. He chose Christmas as his favorite holiday, and I was excited to see how he would describe how his family celebrates and any cultural differences that we could discuss. His response, however, was a bit different than I expected. The reason he loves Christmas is mainly because the winter break starts after a quarter test at school. He mainly wrote about how much he has to study for it, and Christmas means he does not need to worry about school for two weeks. Besides that, his other reason for loving Christmas is because it is the day that Jesus was born. At the end of his response, he wrote that Christmas vacation is the best prize that school gives him, and I thought this was so funny. I realized that I should have provided an example with me writing about my favorite holiday to give me an idea of the type of response I am looking for.

 During my last conversation partner session with Shatha, she told me about how she is no longer looking to take the TOEFL exam. The told me she already took another similar exam, but I forgot the name of it. With that exam, she scored a 5 but FSU requires a score of 6.5 from international students. She enrolled in an online course to prepare her for a second attempt of that same exam. With this course, however, it teaches British English rather than American English. Although British English is taught in Middle Eastern schools, Shatha's accent is more American and she is having a hard time to understand the course. While this is our last session, I reminded her that I will be in Tallahassee until December and that I am willing to continue practicing with her. She told me that she does want to keep in touch and finally meet in person when I come back for my fall semester. Besides that, we finished our conversation discussing cultural differences in America that make her feel isolat...

 During this conversation partner session with Shatha, I was out of the country in Colombia. It was harder to coordinate a meeting time because I seldom have WiFi while I am here. Additionally, I had gotten a cold the day before our meeting, and Shatha was able to immediately recognize it in my congested voice. I assured her I was able to do this session and our conversation began. We shared our love and longing for being around a big family, since we both live in the U.S. away from the majority of our families. She asked me about the Colombian riots and the overall safety of the country, a common question asked by foreigners. I shared my screen to show her the map of Colombia and explained the history of the multiple regions, and which continue to be plagued with violence today. Before we could continue with our conversation, she admitted how bad she felt for me as she watched me struggle to talk while I was sick. She offered to end the session earlier than usual, and I graciously...

   Date/Time : Monday, June 21st, 4:30 p.m. Location : Zoom  Topic/Skill:  IELTS writing Feedback Provided to Tutee:  for our last session, Hussam wanted to practice IELTS writing again. He has really enjoyed doing these exercises since he is still trying to pass his IELTS exam. We did another writing task were he needed to write 250 words describing observations from a graph or data set. This data set was showing information about weather patterns in England over the past 50 years. He did a very good job brainstorming and collecting his ideas and observations. While executing the observation, he had several cases where the articles and verb tenses were not matching the subject, similar to the issues he has had in previous sessions, but there has been improvement! Lessons about the tutoring and/or the tutee that you learned:  I am so sad that this was my last tutoring session with Hussam! I have seen so much growth with his writing and comfortability with E...

 For this conversation partner session with Shatha, we focused on discussing our own critical incidents in the pass. She was not familiar with the concept, so I explained it thoroughly and included an example that was shared in our class. I then offered my mine. My critical incident happened when I went to Turkey over a summer when I was 14. I was not familiar with the culture at all and spent the rest of my trip visiting Western European countries, so the only clothes I had were short sleeved and shorts. My exposed clothing was not acceptable in many historical and religious sites, such as mosques. I had to buy scarves in an attempt to cover up more, but I did ultimately feel bad for not being more prepared. Shatha's critical incident happened when she visited Washington D.C. two years ago, and she entered an elevator where an American mother and her child were in. Shatha explained to me how in her culture, it is normal for older strangers to touch and compliment children they see...

   Date/Time : Thursday, June 17th, 6:30 p.m. Location : Zoom  Topic/Skill:  Listening, dictocomp Feedback Provided to Tutee:  I showed Hussam a video of a very popular episode of a reality TV show (The Circle). He was shown the clip and then asked to write some of the main ideas and tell me what was going on in the scene. Then he was asked to listen to the clip again and try and write a script of it while it was playing. It was expected that he would not be able to finish a complete script, but we went over it and then I showed him the clip again. Finally, I presented him a handout of of the script with some of the key idioms and slang missing. I then showed him the clip again for him to fill the worksheet out. Then we discussed all of the vocabulary and slang used in the clip. Lessons about the tutoring and/or the tutee that you learned:  Hussam was excited to learn some more English slang and terms used in casual conversation. The circle is a new reality...

 During this conversation partner session with Shatha, we began our conversation mentioning our families as always. The reason this occurs is because right after she asks how I am doing, she then asks about how my mom is doing as well. I think this is a very sweet gesture, and I make sure to ask about her daughters too. She told me about how she wants to put her daughter into a summer camp, but they are too expensive since she is only a student without her own income. We then began to talk about the hardships of being a student who relies on governmental and institutional financial aid. She mentioned a discussion she had during an CIES class about whether or not teenagers should work while they're students. She shares the same opinion of my mom which is that it is more important to focus on your education. Another student responded harshly at that and accused her of having "handouts" and not having the need to make her own money. She was very upset by this because she has...

   Date/Time : Tuesday, June 15th, 6:30 p.m. Location : Zoom  Topic/Skill:  Analyze a reading passage and correct Feedback Provided to Tutee:  Hussam was provided an extensive reading passage about a species of feline that is going extinct. There were several different types of grammatical, spelling, contextual, and capitalization errors. Hussam was given 15 minutes to go through this passage to find these errors. He was not able to find all of them. He had a hard time finding the contextual error which were usually when a word with incorrect meaning was used. Lessons about the tutoring and/or the tutee that you learned: Hussam was very good about finding grammatical errors like verb tenses matching, but I could tell that when the words were not matching the intended meaning of the passage, he had a harder time finding them and correcting them. He also enjoyed reading a passage that had some STEM technical knowledge that he was able to learn. 

 Something that I did not get to mention in my first reflection, but is relevant to all my conversation partner sessions with Shatha is her motivation and determination to attend these while she is exhausted. In our previous session, Shatha was participating in Ramadan and our session occurred right before the sun went down. I was truly amazed by her perseverance. Even though this session was after Ramadan, she is calling after a long day of CIES and has to take care of her two daughters. We were able to hold a substantial and interesting conversation regardless. Her favorite conversations revolved around family, and she loved learning about my mom because she is on the same journey. Afterwards, she invited me to the CIES cookout on Friday so that we could meet in person. Unfortunately, she was too tired on Friday to attend, but she still invited me to eventually meet in person so she could introduce me to her daughters.

   Date/Time : Monday, June 14thth, 3:30 p.m. Location : Zoom  Topic/Skill:  IELTS Writing Feedback Provided to Tutee:  Hussam and I worked on a lesson about short response writing. This lesson consisted of an activity that resembled a writing portion of the IELTS exam where students are prompted with a controversial idea and must defend their opinion on the topic. Hussam was given a topic prompt about if he believes the use of technology in education is beneficial or harmful to academic growth. We talked through his observations and during his composition. Most of the corrections during this portion of the lesson where minor grammatical corrections with his observations and looking into the transitional words and phrases that were used to ensure that they felt natural and were as correct as possible. Lessons about the tutoring and/or the tutee that you learned:  This was a great opportunity to see Hussam approach a question with controversial writing promp...

   Date/Time : Thursday, June 10th, 6:30 p.m. Location : Zoom  Topic/Skill:  transition words (conversely, consequently, as a result, etc) Feedback Provided to Tutee:  The lesson started with a presentation about transition words and phrases. Hussam is fairly familiar with a lot of these types of words and phrases (firstly, then, after, etc.), but he had requested a lesson to expand his knowledge on this topic to help with his writing. The biggest correction made during this lesson was reminding Hussam that a comma goes after introductory phrases like the ones that are created when using transitional phrases and words. Lessons about the tutoring and/or the tutee that you learned:  I often forget how easy writing is from a native English speaker's point of view is and how naturally these words come. The addition of these more complex transitional words really elevates a piece of academic writing to another level of fluency that is very noticeable. Hussam rea...

Date: June 23rd (1-2pm) Location: Facetime Topics Discussed: Brazil, Carnival, summer plans           When we were talking yesterday, Beni reminded me of how much she wanted to go to Brazil with my family. I remember her always mentioning that she wanted to go, but specifically with us. So, when we were talking and she mentioned this, the memories flushed back. She had told my family that she wanted to go during Carnival in Rio de Janeiro. I was telling her that there is no way we can go to Brazil anytime soon because the Covid situation in Brazil is very very bad right now. It is not advised for anyone to travel there right now. Plus, we both agreed that we were too busy with school. Beni said that once she finishes law school, she would be able to go, we just need to figure out when that will be! Then we just finished up the conversation by talking about what her upcoming plans for the summer were. She told me that all her exams are in July, so her summer...

Date: June 21st (1-2pm) Location: Facetime Topics Discussed: Boyfriend, friends, birthdays           Beni started off this meeting by telling me that she just got a boyfriend! This was such exciting news to me; I was so happy for her! She showed me some pictures of him and told me a little bit about him. She really likes him and is very happy! She told me that she also texted my mom a picture of him for her to see. Then we went on to talk about boyfriends and friends, and I had to inform her that I, unfortunately, am single. She laughed at the way I said it. I then brought up my friends that she met when she lived here and she was happy to hear what everyone is up to and what everyone is studying. We also talked about my 21st birthday, which is coming up in October. She asked me about my plans and if I was going to have a party or not. In Italy the drinking age is 18, so they do not celebrate 21 like they do here in the United States, so she wanted to know ...

Date: June 18th (1-2pm) Location: Facetime Topics Discussed: Family, United States           I started off our conversation by asking Beni how her family was doing as I have met them before and know them fairly well. She was telling me how they are both doing fine, her dad is still teaching at University, but obviously had to switch to online teaching. She also asked me about my family, since we hosted her for 6 months at our house 3 years ago. I caught her up on how the family is doing and what everyone has been up to and she was happy to hear everything. She was telling me how much she misses us and that she wants to come back to visit us, but school and Covid make it hard. I told her to wait until things cool down a little and then to come! She said she wants to explore the United States a little more the next time she comes cause she has only been to Florida and Texas with my family. She wants to visit New York and Washington, DC. Just the thought of ge...

Date: June 16th (1-2pm) Location: Facetime Topics Discussed: School, Covid in Italy           I started using my Italian friend Benedetta Milazzo (Beni) as my new conversation partner because Maher stopped responding and we could not find meeting times. So, my friend Beni is from Catania, which is located in Sicily, Italy. I facetimed her and we got to catch up on things since I haven’t talked to her in a while. We got to practice her English, which is most important in these meetings. I asked her about her school and what she is studying and doing. She told me that she is studying law and going to law school. She talked about how busy she was with studying and exams. We also talked a bit about how the covid situation is in Italy and she said it is getting better but it is “not like in Florida.” She said they still wear masks everywhere and some towns even have curfews too. I thought this was very interesting how they still have curfews set in place. Beni a...

 Date: May 18th (12-1pm) Location: Zoom Topics Discussed: Religion, holidays, family           Maher and I met the next day after our first meeting because it was the only time he was available. On this day we talked about his religion and the different holidays he celebrates. Maher is Muslim and he recently participated in Ramadan. During Ramadan, Muslims have to fast between sunrise and sunset, meaning they can’t eat until the sun goes down. Maher was telling me that this was extremely difficult to do in Tallahassee, specifically because the sun sets very late as opposed to in Saudi Arabia. Here the sun sets around 8pm, so him and his family could not eat until then. He told me that his whole family participated in Ramadan even his four kids. I asked him if it was difficult to get the kids to participate and he admitted that it is difficult for the kids, especially the little ones. I think that this is amazing though, the determination and will power...

Date: May 17th (12-1pm) Location: Zoom Topics Discussed: Introductions           My conversation partner is Maher Alsulami and he is from Saudi Arabia. This was our first meeting, so we talked mostly about introductions and getting to know each other. Maher told me that he came from Saudi Arabia to study here in the United States. He has a wife and four kids, which I didn’t even expect because he looks so young! He is a math teacher to elementary school kids. Our meeting mostly consisted of small talk, which is pretty normal for the first time you meet someone. His English was not bad! He is upper-intermediate level I’d say, so this made it easier to make conversation with him. He talked about his family back home and how he misses them, but he also enjoys living in Tallahassee. I asked him questions about him and his life, just to get to know him better, and to get him speaking too! This was a great first meeting to practice Maher’s English.

          For my third class observation I observed Felicia Ciappetta’s speaking class. I really enjoyed observing this class because I got to help Ms. Ciappetta a little bit with her lesson. This was a low- intermediate level class, so she decided to have the students look at a map of FSU campus and they had to give directions. She sent the class into breakout rooms, so she split them in groups, and each group had a map and a list of questions on how to get to certain places on campus. She put me into one of the groups and had me administer the assignment, so I had to ask the students in my group how to get to the Stadium from Hecht House, for example. This was a great speaking exercise because the students were engaged and not only got to speak, but they also had a map for reference. Overall, I loved the lesson choice for the level and thought it was super fun and engaging for the students. 

          On May 13th, I observed Felicia Ciappetta’s grammar class. Unfortunately, when I observed this class it was the celebration of Eid for the Muslim students, so there were only two students in the class this day. Despite this, Ciappetta still taught the class. In this class the two students worked on a past presentation that they did not have time to finish, so they continued it in this class. The presentation was on the “Past Perfect Continuous.” They were given some time to work on it, then they presented it to us. After this, Ms. Ciappetta went over some phrasal verbs with them. Since there weren’t many students, it was hard to teach a whole new lesson to the students, so Ms. Ciappetta took this time to have them continue a past assignment, which helped them with their grammar. I think she did a great job at accommodating, since her full class was not in attendance. Ms. Ciappetta did a wonderful job at teaching such a small class and keeping them...

            On May 7th, I observed Ah-young Kim’s listening class. Ah-young Kim is an excellent professor who teaches foreign students wonderfully. She has a great speaking voice for the students and her lesson was clear and appropriate for the level of the students. One thing that I think Ms. Kim does very well is that she is able to teach in person and on zoom at the same time, which is a very difficult task. She does this while keeping the students very engaged in the lesson as well. Because these classes are only 50 minutes long, there is only so much one can teach, but Ms. Kim showed the students a video about if murder is moral or not. She paused throughout the video, giving the students time so that they could write down vocabulary they did not know. I think this helps the students a lot in learning new words. By giving them time to listen to it and write it down students will remember the word and later be able to use it. To finish off the clas...

Date/Time:  5/11 8:00 AM EST Location: Zoom Topic/Skill: What we do during the week and weekend Feedback provided to tutee: Jeah has fabulous reading skills, so we are continuing to build her ability to respond to things in English. Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned:  The session began with us taking a look at the homework in her English workbook. The lesson she worked on was a dialogue between two people who chatted about their schedules for the week and if they had time for each other. I asked her some comprehension questions about the dialogue, which she was able to answer easily. I then transitioned to our lesson where we explored weekly schedules. After some schema building we began to fill out a weekly calendar with what Jeah does each day. I used pictures and visual to aid in her understanding of the activities we listed. We were only able to fill out Sunday-Tuesday. I asked her to think about the activities she does over the next...

   Date/Time : Monday, June 7th, 3:30 p.m. Location : Zoom  Topic/Skill:  reading comprehension Feedback Provided to Tutee:  In our session, we focused on an intensive reading passage that will resemble what he will see when he takes any kind of English comprehension test, the IELTS test in specific. The passage we went over was about lab testing for a new beauty product. I chose this because I know Hussam wants to work in a STEM field and picking materials that will introduce him to more technical knowledge and that will be a good exposure. He got most of the comprehension questions correct, the only ones that he needed some assistance on where general theme questions that were talking about the passage as a whole. He was able to answer specific information question well. We went over vocabulary and specific terms that he was unsure of as well. Lessons about the tutoring and/or the tutee that you learned: Hussam seems to enjoy lessons that are simulating IELTS ...

   Date/Time : Thursday, June 3rd,  6:30 p.m. Location : Zoom  Topic/Skill:  Modal auxillary verbs continued - could, would, should Feedback Provided to Tutee:  As a continuation of our lesson last session, I went over a presentation about modal auxillary verbs. The focus during this presentation was on could, should, and would. The hardest part of this lesson for Hussam was that some sentences can use any of these words and they would be grammatically correct, but with the implied context of the situation, one of the auxillary verbs would be more appropriate. It took Hussam a couple tries to find these patterns in the meanings of the words and apply them to the sentences correctly. Lessons about the tutoring and/or the tutee that you learned: Hussam has told me that he enjoys lesson where he is learning English concepts that will improve his casual and professional speech. Since some of these modal auxillary verbs are used to give advice or imply meaning ...

  Date/Time : Tuesday, June 1, 6:30 p.m. Location : Zoom  Topic/Skill:  Modal auxillary verbs (advisory)- ought to, need to, has to Feedback Provided to Tutee:  I prepared a presentation describing these specific modal auxillary verbs and how they are properly used in English sentence structure. Hussam was very excited to be learning more about these expressions because he notices how much they are used in everyday communication among native English speakers. the presentation then provided some examples and activities where Hussam could pick which auxillary verb is appropriate for the sentence and situation. He generally did well with picking which verb to use, but needed some correction with the tenses of the verbs necessary after the auxillary verb. Lessons about the tutoring and/or the tutee that you learned: It is really nice to leave a tutoring session feeling like I also learned a lot about English. If I was asked to describe modal auxillary verbs prior to taki...

   Date/Time : Thursday, May 27th, 6:30 p.m. Location : Zoom  Topic/Skill:  Listening to a passage, summarizing what was heard Feedback Provided to Tutee:  We watched a short Ted Talk today about procrastination and Hussam wrote a summary about the video after. After the video was played, we spoke about it and the ideas it was trying to share. Then he took those ideas and had took about 15 minutes to write a summary. After he was finished, He showed me the summary and we went through each sentence and corrected any grammatical errors. The most common errors were the use of articles and making sure the verbs were correctly matching the pronouns they were describing. He did a good job with rephrasing things that were said during the video and putting them into his message.  Lessons about the tutoring and/or the tutee that you learned:  I am glad that I was able to have a session like this because it was good experience helping a student find and clarify ...