Jordan — C03

On August 2nd, I observed Vicky Ledbetter's Elementary Grammar class. Because this was one of the last days of class for the semester, Vicky gave the students self-evaluations to fill out. These evaluations were a numerical list of everything that had been covered in class (#5 Adjectives, # 8 Questions, etc.). Students were to place a check mark next to items they felt comfortable with, and circle those with which they needed to review. Vicky had an online stop-watch running on the projector screen, counting down the time for both the class and the teacher, ensuring that everyone stayed on schedule. In addition to the timer, she also had written an agenda on the board, clearly visible to everyone. After giving the students some time to fill out their evaluations, Ms. Ledbetter started calling on students to give an item they had circled. One of the students asked about the present continuous, and using a lot of theatrics, Vicky proceeded to "call" each student in class on the "phone" and to ask them what they were doing. It was very funny, but it was also effective and soon, she had cleared up any misunderstanding on that subject and moved on. She continued to review various bits of grammar for the rest of the class, very successfully. I only hope I can have the energy she does when I'm teaching my only classroom; she has this way of connecting with each of her students to make them excited about what they're doing.

Jordan — TP12

The last time I met Silvana before I had to leave was Wednesday the 17th. She needed to get to the Center for Global Engagement to check in. I decided that instead of simply driving her there, we could make a lesson out of this, too. So, I had her find the Center on the FSU campus map she had received, then find where we were, out at Alumni Village. I had her navigate us all the way to the center using commands in English only (left, right straight ahead). We ended up taking a sort of indirect route, which was great because it gave me the opportunity to teach her new phrases like 'U-turn', 'turn around', 'miss a turn', etc. When we couldn't find parking anywhere, I taught her another term: 'parking ticket'! Ultimately, she lead us to a place to park and we made it to the Center. It was a fun lesson, but very effective!

Jordan — TP11

On our way back to her apartment, we realized we were actually quite hungry after talking about all this food. We decided to stop by Pitaria, because she says it's her favorite restaurant, or at least the only one she knows well. We go in and order, then I asked her what parts of English she needs the most help with. She told me that she needs to work on speaking, which can be hard for her because she is very shy, and because her vocabulary is not highly developed. I decided that now would be a great time to work on her speaking, so I asked her about her background. She is from a coastal town in northwest Peru, but she is getting her Masters in Physics at a University in Costa Rica. She is here to become fluent in English, and she has a brother my age, who is also studying political science.

Then we started to talk about the political things she and her brother were interested in. She relayed the heartbreaking stories of South American governments giving concession after concession to the oil companies at the expense of indigenous peoples living in the Amazon. She told me about the water privatization in Bolivia, where collecting rainwater on your roof was illegal and highly punishable. She had difficulty articulating a lot of these ideas in English, so when she would switch to Spanish to help herself, I just told her to work around the words she didn't know. I knew she was talking about concessions when she was talking about the oil companies and governments and the indigenous who were attacked by them. But instead of translating, I had her work through it until she would say something like "when the government gives the land of the native people to the oil people". I wish I could continue to tutor her when I leave, so I could continue to learn about these things from her.

Jordan — TP10

Silvana is a student from Peru who will be starting CIES in the fall session. I met her at the International Students Dinner at the close of the Summer II Session, and gave her my number in case she needed any help getting acclimated. It turns out that she did, and I shamelessly (but seamlessly) turned this help into several tutoring sessions.

On August 13th, we met because she needed to get groceries, but the FSU busses weren't running to her apartment. Before we left, I had Silvana make a list of the items she would need from the store. Then, we drove to Publix and located all the items on her list in English. She struggled with some words, but overall showed enthusiasm for trying to speak as much English as she could. She had a very long grocery list, because she does all her cooking (without a car, she lives far from 'eating places'), and it took us a while to find everything. While we shopped, we discussed the state of food in America, and the movements trying to improve it (organics, eating locally grown, etc.).

Jordan —TP9

After our standard break, we continued to work. This time I asked him to focus on the areas in which he felt more comfortable with English after the whole summer of study in CIES and tutoring with me. I asked him to explain out loud to practice his speaking skills. At first he gave his ubiquitous "Uhh, no understan..", but after encouragement, did begin to speak. He got across that he knows more words, and is at least a little more confident speaking. Then, since he would be leaving in a few days for Saudi Arabia for the break, I asked him to explain what he was going to do for the Ramadan break and what he was most excited about. He says he wants to see his son and his family. This is way more an answer than I could have gotten at the beginning of the summer, and without any Arabic!

Jordan — TP8

I met Metab at Starbucks again on August 1st, for another set of tutoring sessions. This time I had him practice speaking and writing while using the grammatical elements we had been working on in our last session. I made him practice writing sentences showing possession of different nouns by different subjects. As always, it was necessary to review the content first, but he did seem to move into the lesson faster this time, and seemed to really understand the concept we had been working on, and many of the rules (our house, not ours house; the pen is ours, not the pen is our).

Jordan — CP10

On July 23rd, Hamad, Metab, Carolina, Nick and Alex Ramos went to Sister Sinks, to show our international friends a local and more rustic tradition —swimming in North Florida's beautiful sinkholes. During the ride, I talked to Metab more about his life back home. Apparently, he has a wife (actually his second) and a son! Who knew? We stopped to buy some food at Publix (fried chicken and potato chips, for that authentic American feel) and continued on. When we had finally arrived, we went swimming and jumping into the clear pool of water. Everyone had a good time, until it started to pour. Then, we all huddled around the food laughing and trying to keep it dry. Hamad loved the spring so much, has says we must come back every weekend!