Will TS #16

12/21 Skype Feedback: Well it was our last session. I was sad. But more importantly I couldn't believe that Dojun never told me he was Prof. Kim's brother! We talked about how he had obfuscated the truth from me for a while. Then we went on to talk about how I might apply to the epic program and how we'd have to hang out when I come through Korea.

Will TS #15

12/19 PJ's house. Feedback: It's PJ's birthday! I was also really tired after having a party the night before. We started reading a passage that was about water. I never knew water was so interesting. Well I did know but I didn't know how snow worked. We watched a few science videos that helped explain the reading and then we finished up since PJ was too amped for his party.

Will TS #14

Date: 12/14 Skype Feedback: Dojun came on the line this time and we caught up. He told me about his work week and I told him that he needs to take a vacation. I think the culture in Korea is working these folks to death. Then we went on and I told him a little bit about what was going on in my life and how it's going to be my birthday soon. It was definitely a good session.

Will TS #13

12/12 PJ's house Feedback: Well it was another math session. It was once again tough for me not because the math was hard but the new way they teach the math is different than the way I learned it. We did a few regular problems then we went on to some cool word problems. I think PJ just likes doing math more than his reading book which I understand since some of those stories aren't very interesting. We then went over some social studies which was basically on the history of the conquistadors when they traveled through Florida.

Will TS #12

12/4 Place: Skype Feedback: Well it was another good session with Dojun today. We talked a little about K pop of course which was cool. We also got into a little bit of a conversation on life in Korea. We also talked about travel and how I'd like to visit Thailand. We also talked a little bit about drinking culture in Korea which was interesting I'd like to try the Soju stuff soon.

Victoria Gilbertson TS#16

<TS Blogs>

Date/Time: 12/21/2015

Location: P.J.’s house

Topic/Skill: Superheroes​

Feedback:

For our last session, P.J. and I read from his favorite book about superheroes. We read one about IronMan and one about Captain America. We also read a book that Frankie gave him. The section that P.J. chose was about Aircrafts. P.J. preferred the book about superheroes. He didn’t quite understand the concept that superheroes powers are not real. I had to explain this to him. Both books were intensive reading books. Letting him choose the stories helped to motivate P.J. intrinsically. I think that he was happy with the lesson. 

Victoria Gilbertson TS#15

<TS Blogs>

Date/Time: 12/19/2015

Location: Skype

Topic/Skill: Christmas and New Years

Feedback:

For our last session, DoJun and I discussed the differences between Christmas and New Years. I learned that in South Korea, they have a second New Years called the Lunar New Years. It is during this event that the families typically get together and have a large dinner and enjoy each other’s company – similar to the American Christmas. In South Korea, Christmas is a relationship event. It is typically only celebrated by couples. When I asked what DoJun was going to do with his girlfriend, he told me he hadn’t come up with anything yet. I gave him advice on how to make it romantic. He laughed.

Victoria Gilbertson - CO#3

<CO Blogs>

Date/ Time: 12/16/2015

Topic/ Skill: Affixes and Context Clues

Teacher Presentation: Felicia's G2 Reading Class

Classroom Management: She uses positive reinforcement. When she needs to emphasize something she raises her voice. When multiple students want to answer at the same time, she has everyone in the class answer one at a time. This gives the students opportunity and attention.

Materials: Reading with comprehension questions in the first 15-20 seconds of film. She utilizes the textbook and the board a lot.

Student Participation: Pair work and pair discussion. Group discussion based on open-ended questions. She makes every student answer.

Feedback Provided: Positive Reinforcement. She helps during pair work when needed. She always explains new words and repeats correct answers for reinforcement.

Lesson(s) on teaching you learned: Using slower speech and diction helps lower levels. She makes sure to pronounce every word in an articulate manner.

The teachers do not allow the students to not participate. There is not enough 'free time' for them to slack off. They make sure that every student is participating and truly understands the lesson.

Something that I appreciated from Felicia's class is that you can tell she really wants her students to understand the material and makes every effort to ensure they do.

Mary Phillips TS #16

Date/time: Thursday, December 17, 2015, 1:30-2:30
Location: Public library
Topic/skill: Listening, articles

Feedback provided to tutee: This session we practiced listening skills.  More specifically we practiced recognizing articles.  My tutee suggested it as she has some trouble hearing articles.   I would read a sentence from a news article or one of Aesop's fables and she would repeat all the articles she heard.  At first we were using news articles but there was too many obscure legal/business terms so we switched to fables.  (Although the fables had a number of antiquated words and grammar structures)  Usually, if my tutee didn't recognize all the articles I just repeated the sentence slower or with more emphasis on the articles.

Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: Luckily, my tutee is very good of being cognizant of which areas she needs more practice with.  It is very easy to ignore articles when listening because, often enough, ignoring the articles doesn't seriously interfere with comprehending the speech.  Also, the Aesop's fables made for better listening material because there weren't so many confusing proper nouns or background information required to understand the story.  

Mary Phillips TS #15

Date/time: Wednesday, December 16, 2015, 1:30-2:30
Location: Public library
Topic/skill: Speaking, grammar (idioms, adverbs)

Feedback provided to tutee: I introduced a few words that were new to my tutee so I usually explained the definition and gave a few sentences.  I introduced some terms that I think were a little too "low-frequency" but I was able to explain them well enough.

 Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: Once again I owe a lot to the internet.  The ability to search images and provide visual examples to unknown vocabulary immediately really enhances the tutoring.  However, when I search for pre-made questions for speaking activities, I find that many of them are not very good.  They're very awkwardly worded or repetitive.  I usually end up using the pre-made activities as a guideline more than an exact lesson plan to follow.

Rebekka Flam TS#16

Date/Time: 12/17/15 1:00-2:00 pm
Location: Astin's house
Topic/Skill: Speaking
Feedback provided to tutee: Today was my last session with Astin. I've had a lot of fun working with him these past few weeks. I developed a short speaking lesson using balloon animals. I shaped different animals and we created characters and stories for each one. It was a good way to practice creativity and vocabulary in context.
Lessons about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I've learned a lot these past few weeks. I really enjoy working with children, despite the difficulties that may arise. I learned how to modify my speech rate and use high-frequency vocabulary with lower-level students. Overall, I learned that I really enjoy teaching and I hope to find a position in Turkey or South Korea!

Will CP #6

Place: Grasslands again Tae Yuen came out to trivia to help Nicole and I try and win the pot. He also brought his friend who was in town to give a presentation on urban planning at FSU. He wasn't too useful in the actual trivia round since he really doesn't have the same background knowledge in american pop culture so we just mostly hung out. After trivia we had a good time talking and I learned a little bit more about the differences between Korean, Japanese, and American culture. Especially when it comes to dating.

Will CO #3

Topic: Speaking Teacher Presentation: Angel started with an explanation of debates and debate process that they had worked on earlier. Classroom management: Then they broke into groups and were given topics to debate. They debated the topics and Angel walked around and collected their mistakes. Materials: Whiteboard, Cellphone to write down mistakes Student Participation: The students were in groups and had lively conversations with each other. Feedback provided: At the end Angel went over the students various beautiful mistakes. Lessons on teaching you learned: It was very well done class the students were able to do a lot of speaking and the topics were current and interesting.

Will CP #5

Location: Grasslands Brewery. We mostly talked about why Tae Yuen came to CIES. We hung out on the patio of Grasslands and he told me about his career as a journalist in Korea. He was on a sabbatical for just a few weeks and is going back in December. We then went over to the whiskey bar and he introduced me to Japanese whiskey which was very scotch like.

Victoria Gilbertson - TS# 14

<TS Blogs>

Date/Time: 12/17/2015

Location: P.J.’s House

Topic/Skill: Swimming and Luisa Stories 

Feedback:

For this session, I had P.J. choose which story he wanted to read. As he doesn’t care for the textbook, I figured this was the best way to boost his motivation. After each page, I had P.J. give me, in his own words, a summary of what he just read. We went over the vocabulary words that were highlighted on each page. At the end of the reading I asked P.J. for a summary of the entire story. I let him look at the pictures on each page to help remind him of what happened. I asked a lot of prompting questions as well. These tools seemed to help him find the answers he needed. He really understood the story this time and we made it through it rather quickly. Since there was still time left, we read a short story. This really intrigued him because the story was about swimming. In the middle of the reading he asked me questions about how to float. We finished reading the story after that and he also gave me a summary to show that he understood what he read. Taking a break in the middle shows me that if he can find a connection and take a break in the middle he does a lot better and doesn’t find the activity as agonizing as he usually does.

Victoria Gilbertson-CO #2

<CO Blogs>  

Date/Time: 12/16/2015

Topic/Skill: Composition

Teacher Presentation: Cause and Effect – Ryan’s G4 Composition Class

Classroom Management: Mainly he just kept the class on topic by refocusing their attention on the task at hand. When one of the students was talking when he wasn’t supposed to he made him answer the question the boy interrupted.

Materials:  Textbook, Projector

Student Participation:  Group work to determine their cause and effect topics. Student explanation of vocabulary.

Feedback Provided: Helping to find correct vocabulary and he helped guide the essay direction. Walking around and correcting errors.

Lesson(s) on teaching you learned:  Telling students the next days tasks helps to introduce topics. Give them the tools to come up with the answer – don’t just give them the answer.

Will CP #4

Location: CIES Topics Discussed: It was an interesting event at the CIES since it was the Xmas party. I went to see a few people and it was quite interesting. We mostly talked about the fight that we watched earlier last week in which Ronda Rousey got knocked out I also ran into Tae Yuen and talked to him about the Kimchee balls that were there. Cultural Topics: We mostly were interested in the food that was brought for the potluck. The Kimchee balls were kind of amazing.

Rebekka Flam TS#15

Date/Time: 12/16/15 3:30-4:30 pm
Location: Astin's house
Topic/Skill: Writing, Reading, and Speaking
Feedback provided to tutee: Today I helped Astin with his homework. He practiced writing and tracing letters. I (again) helped Astin differentiate between lower-case and upper-case letters. We also practiced numbers and counting out loud.
Lessons about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: Astin had a lot of energy and I learned to be patient but also more strict. I tend to be a bit passive (I don't like conflict), but I can see that it is important to be firm and professional as a teacher.

Victoria Gilbertson - CO #1

Date: 12/16

Topic: Grammar/ 3 types of questions

Teacher Presentation: Vicki's G1 Grammar

Classroom Management: Vicki uses the Agenda to bring the classes attention back to the topic. She uses verbal correction if something happens she doesn't like. For example: a student spoke out of turn and so she applauded the correct answer but then said "Let's let the other students answer the question - it's their turn".

Materials: The test that was given the last class and the textbook. She also utilized the board.

Student Participation: The students answered open- ended questions when called on. Pair work was also involved.

Feedback Provided: She was very positive during any corrections. The format was find something good and then correct.
She corrected vocabulary a lot but also walks around and helps students with the activities.

Lesson(s) on teaching you learned: An agenda is very helpful and can help organize the class. When speaking she used simple vocabulary and slowed her speech. Any time a new word is introduced you should repeat it a couple of times and use it in a sentence and possibly draw a picture. This gives the first 3-4 times that they need to hear a word before it sinks in (7 times).

Lauren Gibson TS#16

Tutee: Young-Seo 8
Date/Time: Saturday, 12 December @ 12PM
Location: North-East Library
Topic/Skill: Writing
Feedback provided to tutee:  Since Young-Seo was leaving in a week, I decided to focus on her writing about what she would do when she returned home.
Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I learned that when giving a writing prompt to a young child, I should provide sample introductory sentences for her to use, such as, "I can't wait to..../ The person I am most excited to see is... because...". Initially, Young-Seo only wrote about one sentence so I encouraged her to write more by giving her more ideas and asking more questions about Korea.

Lauren Gibson TS#15

Tutee: Young-Seo 7
Date/Time: Saturday, 5 December @ 1PM
Location: North-east Library
Topic/Skill: Emotional Vocabulary
Feedback provided to tutee: Young-Seo and I went over emotional vocabulary such as being exhausted, shy, jealous, etc. 
Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I learned about some words that may be a little too difficult for someone like Young-Seo. However I also learned that repeated interaction with these "difficult" words, helped her memorize them more. For example, when I went over the list, I made sure to use synonyms with other words on the list. She looked at the pictures provided of the emotions and tried guessing and describing the emotion. She could not pronounce some of the words like "ecstatic" so at the end I made a little game of me pointing at one of the emotions and her saying which one it was. I believe, since she's small, she really likes little fun games like this.

Lauren Gibson TS#14

Tutee: Boram Kang 8
Date/Time: Thursday, 3 December @ 2PM
Location: Hecht House
Topic/Skill: Review of Essay and Good-Byes
Feedback provided to tutee:  During this lesson, I reviewed the changes that Boram made to her assignment and we said our good byes.
Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I actually learned about comma placement in this lesson because, while reviewing Boram's work, I did not know how to explain to her how to use commas in one of her sentences. So I looked it up and we both learned something. Otherwise Boram is a very talented English writer and I promised her that I would review her full essay later on, closer to the due date in March.

Lauren Gibson TS#13

Tutee: Boram Kang 7
Date/Time: Tuesday, 1 December @ 2PM
Location: Hecht House
Topic/Skill: Conclusions in Papers
Feedback provided to tutee: In this lesson, since Boram is writing her paper to submit to the FSU graduate school, we decided to focus on how to conclude an academic paper.
Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I learned that Boram likes to take a lot of notes and have helpful guides so I printed out a list of what academic readers look for in an APA style paper. We went over those bullet points. Otherwise Boram and I were really tired and our lesson was cut short because we both had to study for exams.

Lauren Gibson TS#12

Tutee: Young-Seo 6
Date/Time: Sunday, 30 November @ 1PM
Location: Leon Library
Topic/Skill: Listening
Feedback provided to tutee: Young-Seo and I focused on listening to different YouTube videos, as I asked her questions about the listening. 
Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I learned about listening material that was too easy for her (example: learning about different actions) and about learning material that might not be appropriate for little Young-Seo (I showed her a clip of an American movie, and she said her mother might not want her to watch this). Therefore I learned more about what might be appropriate for someone as young as her.

Nicole Will TS#16

12/10/15; 2-3pm
Adult Tutee

I met Arzu for our final tutoring session today but I hope we will continue to meet as friends far into the future. We talked about our future plans with our certifications and also went over some grammar notes. She prepared a lesson on the present continuous vs simple past verb tenses and did an excellent job of covering the topic from a teacher's perspective. It was a great way to review a common grammar lesson as well as practice in speaking for Arzu. I learned a lot from the lesson, actually, as she included several points I wouldn't have considered as a native speaker.

I am excited to see where Arzu goes next. She will visit her family in Turkey this summer and then perhaps work in a pre-school setting, take some computer courses at the university, or find another subject she is passionate about. With her dedication and courage to tackle whatever comes her way, I'm sure she will succeed in whatever project she takes on next! Good luck, Arzu!

Nicole Will TS#15

12/11/15; 5:30pm
Skype w/ Child Tutee

I gave Jun an assignment at the end of last week's session to record himself talking about any topic of his choice for two minutes. He seemed resistant last week but agreed to do it. He did not do the assignment. It has been tough to keep him engaged via Skype and I've learned how invaluable a parent's involvement in the tutoring process can be. I haven't pushed for his mom to be involved but, this week, I did write an email requesting the speech sample from Jun as a wrap up to our sessions together and I am hopeful that this will result in the completion of the assignment over the course of this week. Our final session together will not be recorded for this class since it is beyond the "due date" for our certification but I wanted to make this final appointment for the purpose of closure with Jun.

As usual, he was playful and seemed to enjoy chatting about random subjects. He has been very open to correction in the moment throughout our time together and it seems that the biggest benefit to him was the chance to chat with a native speaker. He said that his grammar scores have improved and that he wants to continue working on reading in the future. I will leave him with some book suggestions next week and hope he continues to practice and improve his English skills far into the future.

Mary Phillips TS #14

Date/time: Monday, December 14, 2015, 1:30-2:30
Location: Public library
Topic/skill: Speaking, grammar

Feedback provided to tutee: This session we did a lot of speaking practice that focused on specific grammatical concepts.  I found that this made error correction very easy because I was able to anticipate which errors to look for.  It also made it slightly easier for her because she had a general guide to how to structure her replies.  For instance, we would briefly review type two and three conditionals and then the speaking prompt would be something like "if you could travel anywhere, where would you travel?" or something else that would trigger the use of the subjunctive.

Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: We were able to talk about a lot of fun cultural aspects of language this session.  I talked a little bit too much about history because I am very interested in how history shapes language.  For instance, we were trying to think of a word that referred to a very unrealistic dream.  I suggested "pipe dream" and explained that it originally referred to opium use.  Sometimes knowing the etymology and history of a word helps me remember its meaning and usage.  For instance, in Spanish, words of Greek origin tend to be masculine even though they end in the letter "a".  So knowing that a word comes from Greek helps me remember that it takes a masculine adjective.

Mary Phillips TS #13

Date/time: Wednesday, December 9, 2015, 2:00-3:00
Location: Public library
Topic/skill: Speaking, error correction

Feedback provided to tutee: As always, I corrected every error that my tutee made because she has such an advanced grasp of the English language.  Also, with the error correction, even if she didn't know the right answer immediately, she was able to answer correctly after I gave her more time or a hint.

Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: It really helps that my tutee is incredibly self-motivated! She is very quick to understand things and very motivated to work on the areas that are most difficult for her.  We are able to talk about a lot of cultural issues as well, which makes the session more interesting.

Mary Phillips CP #6

Date/time: Thursday, December 10, 2015, 2:00-3:00
Location: Catalina Cafe

Topic discussed: We actually talked a little bit about politics this time.  Since this was our last session I was reasonably sure we had similar political beliefs and I wasn't going to wildly offend him or anything.  We talked about Donald Trump and the upcoming presidential elections.  We also talked about how relative the terms "liberal" and "conservative" are depending on the country.

Cultural and/or linguistic topics you and your partner learned:  We both knew a little bit about the United Kingdom political system so we were able to use that as a reference point.  He explained how some candidates that would be called liberal in the United States are much further right on the political spectrum than, for instance, the Labour Party in the UK.  We talked about what a contentious issue gun control is, as well.  I explained how much power lobby groups like the NRA have in American politics.  Obviously, political beliefs are much more personal and subjective than other aspects of American culture so we more learned about each other than our respective cultures.

Mary Phillips CP #5

Date/time: Wednesday, December 8, 2015, 3:15-4:15
Location: Catalina Cafe

Topic discussed: We talked about a number of different things during our hour.  We talked about our holiday plans.  Also, we talked about different cultural things such as learning to drive and driving laws and also drinking.

Cultural and/or linguistic topics you and your partner learned: We compared experiences learning to drive.  I explained that I believed it was relatively easy to pass the driving test in Florida and he agreed.  I also explained that, while some people take classes to learn to drive from professionals, I was taught by my father.  We talked about the relative ease of driving around in Tallahassee and Madrid.  I thought that Gainesville was an especially easy city to navigate because the streets are numbered based on a grid system.  He explained that this was very different from Madrid which was more like Tallahassee.  Also, I learned that if you have a foreign license you don't need to start from scratch when obtaining a license overseas.  For instance, my conversation partner had a Spanish driver's license and he only needed to pass a road test in order to get his American license.

Victoria Gilbertson TS #12

<TS Blogs>

Date/Time: 12/12/2015

Location: Skype

Topic/Skill: Jeju Island, Cell Phones, Highways

Feedback:

DoJun went to Jeju Island with his coworkers/friends. They ate, had some soju, and hung out at the beach. They drank a little but not too much because they had to drive back to Seoul. We also talked about cell phones and the black market. DoJun just got a new cell phone and he seems very happy with it. He prefers android over iPhone. I told him a little bit about the Florida 'seasons' - or lack there of. We spoke about driving on the highways versus in the city. Finally we talked about different fruits in South Korea and the US. DoJun mentioned that oranges are very rare in South Korea, and I told him that my hometown makes Tropicana orange juice. 

Victoria Gilbertson TS #13

<TS Blogs>

Date/Time: 12/14/2015

Location: P.J.'s House

Topic/Skill: Greek Mythology/ Poetry

Feedback:

P.J. and I read two Greek mythology stories. The first about Zeus and Prometheus, the second about Athena and Poseidon. The topic was fire and water. Before the reading, I gave P.J. a brief overview of what greek mythology is. He did not like the reading at all. He was very confused that people could believe that there were half human and half snake gods out there. I think it might have scared him a little. We changed topics and started to read some poetry. As we were breaking down the meaning of the words P.J. got very upset and started to tear up. When prompted, he wouldn't tell me what was wrong. It seemed as though he was upset that he couldn't figure out how to convey his thoughts. He know what the material meant he just had a hard time reiterating it to me. After a minute he wanted to continue. We finished the poetry readings and then I taught him how to make a paper snowflake to cheer him up.

ARZU TS#16

ARZU TS#16

Date/Time: 12/12/2015   2.00-3.00 pm (with Nicole)

Location: Nicole’s office

Topic/Skill: Future Plans/ Conversation 

In our last session, we talked about our future plans after TEFL program. Nicole will spend this summer working in Ecuador. If time permits, she is planning to teach ESL there as a volunteer in order not to forget the things we learned in this program. Furthermore, teaching ESL in South Korea is also one of her future plan where she can have opportunity for saving.  

Feedback provided to tutee: Nicole was a great tutor for me and I think she will be a exceptional ESL teacher. I really enjoyed and learned so much from our sessions and wish her best of luck for teaching ESL.

ARZU TS#15

ARZU TS#15

Date/Time: 12/11/2015   2.00-3.00 pm (with Nicole)

Location: Nicole’s office

Topic/Skill: Grammar/ Past Tense & Present Perfect Tense

Nicole asked me if it is possible for me to have one session as grammar lesson where she can observe the methods of teaching grammar. I am not an expert about teaching grammar but I studied grammar for a long time during my English journey.

I have chosen “Simple Past” and “Present Perfect” tenses for this lesson that students having difficulty to use properly. We have started our lesson by discussing some examples as well as the structure of these verb tenses. We have gone through some worksheets and found out some guidelines that can be helpful for teaching these tenses.

Feedback provided to tutee: Nicole found this lesson very helpful that she has got some new ideas about teaching grammar. 

Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I think if a native English teacher learns a second language, this would be very helpful to make empathy with students which is a very important point for teaching language.