Larry TP - 5

I held my third tutoring class tonight at Rosa's and Miyra's house. I was quite apprehensive as I approached the house. Lights were off, and I thought they might have abondoned me. As it turned out, they were home and eager for the class. I had revised my lesson plans aiming to simplify in accordance with Jaime's suggestion. Additionally, I realized it is imperative of me, as the teacher, to clearly communicate subject matter, simplify my goals at the beginner level, and plan exactly how I conduct each class. I was discussing this with one of my daughters. She said, "You know you can use Google Translator". I stopped for a moment, not so much to realize what an idiot I am, but what a great idea that was! She quickly showed it to me, and I developed two handouts. One had clear instructions in Spanish for that day's lesson. The other was a simple worksheet with clear directions and examples for creating simple tense-driven sentences out of the vocabulary, personal pronouns, verbs, and articles I had previously given them. I asked if they understood (in Spanish) and they nodded. Rosa even said the word "yes". Progress!

The class went relatively smoothly compared to my expectations. We reviewed old and new vocabulary, tenses, and personal pronouns. We practiced pronunciation of the alphabet until it was time to end the class.

I feel I learned at least three important lessons; it is important to clearly communicate and prepare lesson objetives, goals, and means to realize these. Within that realization is the fact there are means by which I can do this even if I am not fluent in their language. It is important to simplify lesson plans for beginners and have realistic expectations.