Camille-CO2

Today I sat in on a Group 3A listening class taught by Anisa. The class consisted of 7 students, mostly females from Asian countries such as Taiwan and China. Once the class had commenced, Anisa announced the schedule for the day which included a dictation followed by an activity involving a video explaining how to talk to your college professor. The dictation consisted of an audio clip (which eventually led to Anisa reading the script out loud due to technical difficulties) paired with a slip of paper where a few of the words were missing. Some of the vocabulary the students had to fill in was on a level superior to my expectations, but that is my own fault for making assumptions. After the dictation, we moved to the CIES lounge because Anisa was having technical difficulties with the computer. Once we moved to the lounge she assigned a student to lead a discussion from the prompted questions in their textbooks. These questions included, "In your country, is it common to talk to a professor?" or "What would be a reason for you to go to your college professor?" I found myself sitting at a table with two girls from China and I observed their discussion, then they eventually prompted me with the questions and I explained to them how a meeting with a professor works and the many benefits that can result in it. They were both intrigued and shared with me how that does not work the same way in China. After that, Anisa couldn't figure out how to work the TV in the lounge either so she eventually sat down and titled the day a Discussion Day. She went around the room and asked every student how their weekend was and what they did. It was interesting to see how quickly lesson plans can change in a matter of minutes, this showed me how I always have to have a backup plan prepared just in case something is out of your control and you are able to think quickly on your feet. Eventually a CIES staff member was able to fix the computer in the classroom and we moved back to our original location. We watched the video two times, one time for just the students to observe and then another time for the students to read along with the script and underline any sort of focus words, which are found in the intonation and exaggeration of one's voice. The purpose of this exercise was to examine the intonations of the human voice in conversation, which is an aspect of English I had never realized was an integral part of the language.