FSU TEFL Certificate Course_Spring 2025

 2/27  Yesterday's Session with Karim went very well. We met and ended up just chatting like normal for the first portion of our meeting, and I would correct any errors he made. I continue to be pretty nitpicky with his mistakes just because he is a relatively advanced speaker who wants to become perfectly fluent. As such, I will point out pronunciation errors or offer alternative suggestions when he makes a lexical or grammatical error. The second part of our lesson was some more reading comprehension. He still says that this is one of his weaker aspects, and wants to improve. He sometimes reads too quickly, forgetting an article or an 'ed' in the past tense so we work together to comb through the article after and answer some reading comprehension questions.

Date & Time: February 9 1:30 PM - 3:30 PM Nejoud and I met for two hours at Ground Ops Cafe in Midtown. I created a lesson plan on Google Docs so we could both view and edit the document together as she was working on it. For the first part of the lesson, we reviewed vocabulary. I incorporated some vocabulary from the previous tutoring session as well as some new words. After going over the definitions, she completed a fill in the blank activity I created and used five of the words to create a short story. She grasps vocabulary very quickly, and there are a few grammar errors but she self corrects rather quickly in writing.  We took a short break before moving on to the next part of the lesson. I found a YouTube video by CBS Sunday Morning News about Japanese-Americans making mochi. I had some comprehension questions ready that were related to the video. We discussed mochi and where it can be found in the US. 

 Date & Time: January 28 2:00 PM - 2:55 PM Topic/ Skill: Listening During my final class observation, the students had a listening quiz. Dr. Felicia shared the course materials with me and explained that since there are two different levels in the class, she created two different quizzes for them. The first was a lecture about memory for the level two students to listen to. The second was a prompt for the level one students to work on introductions and descriptions of people. The students worked independently on their quizzes and asked few questions. 

 Date/Time: Sunday 2/23 @ 9:00am Location: Zoom Topic/Skill: Grammar in the workplace/English Idioms #2 We started the day's session with a little catch up and talked about our weeks. For grammar, we started going over grammar in the workplace and focused on modal verbs. For our practice activity, I went with a complete sentence approach, rather than fill in the blank like we've done in the past. This might've been too much of a jump, so next week I will do half FITB and half short answer. For vocab, we learned 8 new idioms, but ran out of time for an activity. We will practice using those next week and review all the idioms we've learned. He really enjoys learning idioms because of how funny and strange some of them are. Next week will be more grammar in the workplace, plus idiom practice and now low-frequency vocab.

 2/21/25 In today's tutoring session Karim and I continued working on reading comprehension as he still believes this is his weakest skill. For the first portion of our session, we typically just chat -- about current events, what all Karim is doing for hobbies in Tallahassee etc. -- and I will jump in whenever he makes a mistake. Since he is relatively advanced, I'll chime in at little mistakes. I've continued helping him practice his pronunciation including the minimal pairs he struggles with -- P and B. During the second portion of our session we read an upper-intermediate reading passage with T or F questions to help build his reading comprehension skills.

 During this session we mainly focused on conversational skills. We would go back and forth telling a story and sharing aspects of both of our cultures. This tutoring session feel around Lunar New Year so she taught me about her traditions and different cuisines. I learned about how Koreans and Americans age differ and how she is a different age in America than she is in Korea. She told me more about her plans for Lunar New Year and how she was planning on celebrating. I would make corrections to her speech and ask for clarifications on words I was unsure of. We practiced different vowels and consistence. 

 Session three was still introducing one another. The session consisted of some speaking, listening and talking. We focused mainly on her homework assignments and learned some new vocabulary based off unfamiliar words on her homework assignment instructions. Words like, "bullet points," and various forms of citations were vocabulary she wasn't familiar with and needed assistance with understanding.  We reviewed how to cover Chicago style citation and drafted an email to her professor about questions she had regarding the assignment. I passed along information on how to format and we corrected her original drafts citations. 

My last observation was with Prof Felicia again. This was the first speaking class I observed. She sent me a whatsapp message with the reading they were discussing that day. She then asked the students to tell me about the reading. They all gave me detailed aspects of the reading they were assigned to do. They then got to practice speaking with me. Afterwards I would summarize what they said to see if the words aligned to the right message. Each student was tasked with reading out loud and discussing what they read and analyzing. The article had very advanced language as it was a scholarly article. Very impressed with how they all did.

This was the first time I observed Prof Felcia class. She was very enthusiastic about the content matter and made sure that I could see what she was working on and why she covered what she covered. The class was centered around writing. She had students write on a shared document and she would go back and make edit suggestions. She was very insistent on not giving students the answers, rather leading them in the right direction to have the realization on their own. She gave very thorough and detailed comments about improvements to the students' writing. Much of the class was quiet and reflective but she made sure to walk me through what she did as a teacher.

This was the first time I observed Prof Ryans class. We largely focus on reading and grammar. Much of the work was done independently and was a quiet time to reflect and ask questions. The students were engaged in the material. Prof Ryan started the class with reviewing the agenda, assignments, expectations, and material content. The students then were able to work at their own pace and ask for guidance as needed.  There wasn't a lot of me to observe in this class that was new to me. The unique part was seeing how the teacher conducted class. I was able to see what independent study looked like, accompanied with homework

 I had my second class observation today with Dr. Rios again. This class was a little more relaxed as it mostly focused in independent reading. The class read along to the fourth chapter of the book they had been working on. The class then talked a little about the book and went on to do an independent reading quiz/check in. This wasn't used as a grade but more of a comprehension mark for comparison with the test later.     Overall the class was very relaxed and I appreciated the idea of independent study/work time. I feel like it was relaxing for both the teachers and students. Students were able to work at their own pace and ask the teacher for questions need be.

 My second tutoring session was with Seunghye again. We began out session with a little more talking and getting to know each other. I feel like this was beneficial to have her practice speaking with someone casually. She could ask questions about her speech without embarrassment. We spoke slowly enough to let each other have a chance to comprehend what the other was saying.     The rest of the class was primarily focused on more pronunciation and home work help. Homework help consisted of reading and understanding instructions. Some things that were confusing to her were the definition of bullet points, Chicago Manuel of Style citations, and foot notes. She was originally not familiar with these terms. Her essay for class required this information when it came to formatting. I was able to help her understand what this meant.     My job after this was to help send her examples of Chicago Manuel of Style citations and footnotes to contribute to her completin...

 My first class observation was with Dr. Rios in grammar. I really liked him as a teacher, and found his teaching technique to be a little unique. He is very fun and energetic, and I could tell this transferred to the students and their enthusiasm to learn.     He made sure to correct the mistakes the students made. If a student claimed to understand an idea he made then give him another example to make sure they were telling the truth and not just saying they understood. He made the whole class participate and went through many examples thoroughly. He really understood the content and was able to answer hard questions.     I did my observation on a review day which was helpful to see. It was interesting to see other students thought process and how Dr. Rios corrected their mistakes. He also made sure to include some American ways of  speaking and spelling, for example, "pretty good". This is a made up term by Americans that doesn't really make a lot of sen...

 My first tutoring session with Seunghye Kim went very well. Our session was mainly reviewing needs and areas of struggle. Her english was good to begin with so conversation was easy. She expressed that she needed help in all aspects including, reading, writing, making sentences, pronunciation, and general vocabulary.      The first half of the session mainly consisted of talking and getting to know each other. Finding common ground while also being able to correct some aspects of speech. While talking she was able to ask me question and ask for corrections to words she was either mispronouncing, or having a hard time figuring out.     The other half of the session was beginning to practice specific things. One of which was assistance with pronouncing "L" and "R", she found the word "April" to be particularly difficult. We also worked on spelling of words that sound the same but are spelled differently, like "bye" and "by" and what each...

 Date/Time: Wednesday, February 19th 6:45pm-8:30pm Location: Tutee's home Topic/Skill: Conversation practice, past and present perfect tense, pronunciation Feedback provided to the tutee: Today, I provided more reassurance and praise to further build her speaking confidence. Every time she made a mistake I would make sure to wait until she finished her though before correcting her. During the grammar worksheet, I would point out the incorrect conjugations and ask her to try again. Lessons learned: Sometimes if the student seems disengaged or uninterested in a certain activity that you planned, it is acceptable to switch it up according to the needs of the student in that moment.

 Today we went over tenses and I showed her many irregular past participles. It was a fairly simple lesson she appeared to understand everything I said. 

Date/Time: Tuesday, February 18th, 2025, 12:00-1:00 PM Location: Online on Zoom Topic/Skill: Grammar (Future Tenses) Feedback provided to the tutee: Today's tutoring session was so productive? Today, Livio and I went over all four of the future tenses in a lesson and through an activity. The feedback I provided Livio mainly had to do with our activity: planning his next trip to the United States in the future tense. Any time he would use one of the tenses when he should've used a different one, I would ask him to read the sentence again, and if he didn't catch his mistake, I would ask him about the action of the sentence (is this action ongoing or are you talking about a prediction? Is it connected to a time? etc.). Lesson(s) about tutoring: I learned that it's really important to remain consistent and motivated as a tutor despite the hardships you may face in previous lessons. While I wasn't entirely unhappy with our last session, I wasn't entirely satisfied ei...

 2/17/25 Yesterday Karim and I worked on reading comprehension. The session prior, I had given him a practice test that was roughly upper-intermediate level. It contained a reading passage and 10-12 reading comprehension questions, ranging from True or False, Synonym vs. Antonym, Placing events from the text in chronological order and so on. He completed this before we met, so I graded it first thing and he only got 1 wrong. He also said that he took a TOEFL practice test and that reading was his weakest subject, so we began working on more TOEFL practice questions. At first we struggled to find an appropriate difficulty. He is advanced, but the first text was a little too difficult. We were able to find questions that suited his skill level and finished out the session practicing these. To wrap up, we did some practice on minimal pairs centering around 'P' and 'B' as he still struggles to properly pronounce these correctly sometimes.

 Date/Time: Sunday 2/16 @ 9:00am Location: Zoom Topic/Skill: Signal Words review and English Idioms We started today's lesson with a little catch up chit-chat about our weeks. I've made an effort to spend more time on this every week so we can practice real-life conversational skills. For grammar, we reviewed our topic from last week- Signal Words. Dojun felt comfortable by the end. Next week, we'll do a short review before I introduce a new grammar topic. For vocabulary, we learned ten common English idioms and how to use them. This section was fun, because a lot of them have very strange origins and explanations. Next week, we'll review and learn some more. Next week's topic will focus on office life/workplace culture.

 Date/Time: Friday, February 14th, 2025, 12:00-1:00 PM Location: Online on Zoom Topic/Skill: Grammar (Difference between 'to' and 'for') Feedback provided to the tutee: Today was Livio and I's first session in a week, not to mention our first online session after he traveled back home to Italy, so I wanted to make it a little lighter in terms of content. Today we focused on the differences between 'to' and 'for' as prepositions because he tends to use them interchangeably. First I explained the difference between the two to him and also modeled how to use them in sentences by showing him examples. Then we worked together to create sentences using each of the two prepositions correctly. Any time he made a mistake, I would ask him about the grammar of the sentence (ex. there is a verb there, so would you use to or for?). Lesson(s) about tutoring: I learned that just because I think a lesson will be easy, doesn't mean it will be. I thought that this...

Date/Time: Wednesday, February 12th 6:30pm-7:30pm Location: Tutee's home Topic/Skill: Speaking in past tense, conversation practice, past perfect tense, continuous vs present partiple Feedback provided to the tutee: When working on Stephanie's pronunciation, I repeated words that she pronounced incorrectly in a clear and loud manner. I found that it helped her "understand" how to pronounce a certain word when I slowed down and overexaggerated my mouth movements when creating the sounds. Lessons learned: Stephanie needs more support with learning the past tense, so next time I will bring a formal lesson so that we can practice it together further. I also learned that lowering the affective filter of the student is extremely important for fostering a productive and fluid conversation. 

January 17, 2025 Date & Time: January 17, 2025; 10:50-12:30 Topic / Skill: Controversial Topics and American Government Presentations  Teacher Presentation: Dr. Rios began his speaking class by introducing me to the class. Dr. Rios then began a rapid-fire speaking exercise. There was a list of 33 controversial topics; students picked a random number and had to give their opinion on the topic that corresponded to that number. After the students had answered, other students could also share their views. After a few rounds of rapid-fire questions, Dr. Rios worked with students on their American Government presentations.  Classroom Management: Dr. Rios maintained a very well-structured conversation that gave space for students to answer the questions sufficiently. Dr. Rios encouraged all students to participate as much as possible, and maintained a very calm and relaxing environment throughout the class.  Materials: Computer and Projector  Student Participation: Dr. ...

 2/12/25 Yesterday's tutoring session with Karim went very well. We first began with a mock interview, as he said that CIES student's are set up with interviews with the FSU career center and so we decided to practice. I found some advanced ESL/EFL interview questions and we did that for about 30 minutes. His English speaking skills are very advanced, minus some pronunciation issues with Ps and Bs. But I can tell that he is able to articulate advanced sentences and give thoughtful responses with a wide vocabulary in English. We had planned to do some reading comprehension questions, but for the last 20 or so minutes we just talked. We talked about the differences between the US and Saudi Arabian governments, and cultural differences. He wants to study for the TOEFL exam so we will continue with this for our next few sessions, but yesterday I felt was very valuable, as we were able to have a conversation that was very interesting and from which we both gained lots of information...

January 15, 2025 I had my second tutoring session with My Phuong right after our first meeting during Dr. Felicia's listening class. Since, during our first session, we went straight into working on material, our second session was focused on learning about My Phuong and her English learning goals. My Phuong is from Vietnam, and she moved to the US six months ago. My Phuong lives with her niece, who has been living in the US for a few years and is fluent in English. My Phoung explained that her niece has acted as her translator for the past six months and has been extremely helpful in guiding her around the Tallahassee area. So far, My Phuong has really enjoyed her time in the US and enjoys going to the farmers market with her niece on the weekends. My Phoung said she learned some English in school in Vietnam but hopes to improve her English skills through the CIES program. So far, My Phuong has really enjoyed all of the classes she's taking in the CIES program, though she find...

Date/Time: January 15th, 2:00pm Listening Group 1 - Dr. Felicia  Topic/Skill: The family, classroom, and memory/motivation vocabulary listening review Teacher Presentation: Dr. Felicia began the class by introducing the TEFL students observing the class today to her students.  Classroom Management: Students worked independently, reviewing vocabulary listening sections and completing a worksheet corresponding to the listening vocabulary videos Dr. Felicia posted. While students were working independently, Dr. Felicia walked around the classroom, making sure students were staying on track, answering questions, and making corrections as needed.  Materials: Computer and Projector  Student Participation: For today's class, students worked independently on their laptops with their headphones on, reviewing the listening vocabulary and then completing the corresponding worksheets.  Feedback Provided: Dr. Felicia was walking around the classroom while students were worki...

 02/12/2025 10-10:50am -- Grammar  Students have a grammar exam today. The topic and skills tested were adjectives and adverbs as well as simple past tense and future tense.  The exam included creating 5 sentences that that and adjective or adverb (simple past), writing irregular past tense verbs, watching a movie and describing what happened in past tense, and telling plans in the future.  Professor is helping students out loud with the exam. These students are lower level so she is giving them linguistic support. There are two levels in this class, so she is having the more advanced students create longer sentences. She uses a movie as part of the exam but this also lowers affective filters. She is also providing formative checks throughout while they're taking the exam by walking around and looking at answers, giving hints when needed. Did not put on captions during video, allows students to not see these written.  Feedback: given after exam  Materials: ...

  02/11/2025 8pm  Topic/Skill: Talking about yourself  Warm up: find the difference music worksheet  Linguistic support:  I like… I do not like… My hobbies are… My name is… I am ___ years old.  I was born in… I was born on…  I work as… I live in… My favorite…  Activity: create a dialogue Corrections given to tutee: did not write to in front of infinitive, otherwise he just needed some aid in finding vocabulary words Feedback for tutor: find the difference worksheet was a really good way to lower his affective filter. It took a few examples of the activity for Je-Won to understand - keep in mind

Date/Time: Friday, February 7th, 2025, 12:30-1:30 PM Location: CIES Classrooms in the Kellogg Building Topic/Skill: Grammar (Past Tenses) Feedback provided to the tutee: Livio and I went over the four different past tenses and did an activity together with them. I first demonstrated the differences between the four by demonstrating the contexts in which they are used, example sentences of them in use, and the general grammar structures of each tense. Then, for our activity, I showed him a variety of images, each one at a time, and asked him to describe the images in different tenses depending on their circumstances. If I found that he was using the wrong tense, I would ask him about it or ask him to explain what he meant. If he was still confused, I would ask him to look at all of the tenses again and try to use the correct one. We did this until our session time was up! Lesson(s) about tutoring: I learned that activities that are truly engaging for a specific student or meet a student...

 The teacher is talking to the students about various things before the class starts. They like her she is entertaining and gets them excited to come to class. They have a test tomorrow and she is describing to them the format of the test and what to expect. To start the class the teacher starts by teaching them a listening strategy. The teacher applies outside ideas that were discussed before the class to help students understand better and does a good job applying ideas to their lives and giving the students context. Now is she giving them a ted talk on the listening strategy and explaining what he's saying to the students' levels. The teacher does a good job commanding the classroom getting them motivated when they stop paying attention. It also plays perfectly into the lecture as it is a listening class. The teacher is now having the student's group together to practice the listening method. She is monitoring to ensure they understand and are doing the listening method ...

 02/09 on zoom; 8pm  The topic of today's activity was "Common Classroom Phrases." I had planned to watch a clip from Stranger Things, however, the audio would not work on his end. I tried sending him the video in the chat and he said he still could not hear it. Unfortunately a lot of this lesson was based off this video. I showed some of the clip with no sound, and did my best to explain what happened in the video. He seemed to understand most of it. The video was Eleven in Stranger Things giving a presentation in her classroom. We went over new vocabulary that was in the video, as well as phrases used by the students and teachers. I gave him another slide of examples classroom phrases that weren't in this video such as "I have a question" and "I do not understand." We went over those for a while and di not have time for a role play activity i had planned.  This was the activity  Write a dialogue between a teacher and a student.  After, we will re...

02/04 on zoom; 8pm  I began our session with a review of our last session -- crossword puzzles. We reviewed definitions and wording in defintions.  The main activity for today was focused on building skills to talk about personal interests. The topic chosen was music; the activity was to come up with five words related to this topic. After, he was to write a definition for each word. As he did this, I came up with my won words and definitions. I gave him linguistic support by listing phrases he could utilize in writing his definitions, for example "this is used for..." Unfortunately Je-Won misunderstood the directions and he wrote sentences just using the phrases i had given him as linguistic support.  Since we didn't have much time left, I explained how he misunderstood the directions and he was then able to grasp it. We went over the sentences he had written and corrected a couple grammar points.  For my own improvement, this might have been too advanced for Je-Won...

Date & Time: January 28 1:00 PM - 1:55 PM Topic/ Skill: Speaking Teacher Presentation: Mr. Ryan began by covering the class agenda for the day and the week. He let them know what they'd be working on for the day and updated them about his expectations for their presentations they would be giving soon.  Classroom Management: The environment for the listening class was very relaxed and a little less structured than the other classes I observed because each student was working on individual assignments.  Materials: computer, projector, headphones, phone Student Participation: Each student was working by themselves using headphones, laptops, and phones to record themselves speaking. They were also working on a project to present to the class about their "Secret City".  Feedback Provided: I asked Mr. Ryan how he evaluates their recordings. He explained to me he listened to them in his office either by himself or with the student and he would make notes to correct students ...

Date & Time: February 9 1:30 PM - 3:30 PM  I met with Nejoud for two hours at Ground Ops Cafe in Midtown. I prepared a lesson plan for the session on Google Docs so I could share it with her and we could both view and edit the document simultaneously.  For this lesson, I created a vocabulary list which incorporated vocabulary from the previous lesson as well as some new words. After reviewing the definitions, I had a fill in the blank activity for her to complete. Then I had her use five of the words in a sentence. She grasps vocabulary very quickly, but her grammar needs work. We took a short break before moving onto the second lesson I had planned.  The second part of the tutoring session was a listening activity. I found a YouTube video created by CBS Sunday Morning about Japanese Americans making mochi. I had several comprehension questions for her and afterwards we had a discussion about mochi and where it can be found in the US. 

 Date/Time: Saturday 2/8 @ 9:00am Location: Zoom Topic/Skill: Signal Words and Low Frequency Vocab (Travel) Going off of our pretests from last week, I made a grammar lesson discussing common English signal words. These included words denoting cause and effect, sequences, summarizations, and listing words (ex: in addition, in summary, first, second, finally, therefore). I also prepared a special session focused on using due to versus since. I learned a lot putting this lesson together. I intuitively know when to use due to or since , but now I know the specific rules behind it. Due to  is an adjectival phrase and must precede a noun, whereas since can be a preposition or conjunction and cannot precede another preposition. I tailored the low frequency vocab to his interests; he wants to learn English to make traveling easier. We learned uncommon, yet relevant words like concierge, gondola, caravan, and  carpool. I was able to highlight the differences between some similar ...

Date/Time: Friday, February 7th 12:45pm-1:45pm Location: On campus; outside next to HCB Topic/Skill: Composition: Essay outlining and topic sentences Feedback provided to the tutee: When Letizia made a composition error, whether it be a spelling or grammar mistake, I would point it out on her screen and asked if she was sure that was what she wanted to write. She quickly caught on and adjusted the mistakes as we went through the exercise.   Lessons learned: Today, I learned that sometimes students need reasons behind what they are working on. Of course, being teachers, we know how a certain lesson or assignment may positively build the students' English skills. I tried to convey the importance of what we were doing today to my student in an attempt to boost her intrinsic motivation to do English homework.

 Date & Time: Thursday, February 6th, 2025, 2:00 PM - 2:50 PM Topic/Skill: Listening Skills Teacher Presentation: Miss Olivia's listening lesson plan revolved around three different Ted Talk  videos that covered the content of their textbook (music therapy). First, she asked the students some review questions to jog their memories of the content they learned about. She was then able to play two of the three videos in this session and frequently paused the videos to ask the students questions and start discussions about the videos. She also took the captions off of these videos for this specific group level and spoke with lots of gestures to indicate what it was that she was speaking about. Classroom Management: Olivia managed the class largely by continuing to ask them questions, start discussions, and just overall keep them verbally engaged. She also gave the students worksheets to refer to during the class that contained a vocabulary list as well as a list of questions t...

Date & Time: Thursday, February 6th, 2025, 1:00 PM - 1:50 PM Topic/Skill: Speaking Skills Teacher Presentation: For Dr. Rios' speaking lesson, he gave the students two different articles about COVID-19 vaccines (one with the benefits, one with concerns; integrated reading) and asked them to record themselves speaking about the similarities and differences between the articles (compare and contrast activity). The students were given 40 minutes to learn about the activity, hear Dr. Rios' explanation, read the articles, and take notes. Then in the last 10 minutes of class, the students could go and take their recording for Dr. Rios to review and give feedback on. Classroom Management: Dr. Rios managed the class by providing very clear instructions for the students that included his expectations (in addition to an extensive rubric, which he made sure to repeat and remind the students throughout the class to keep them focused). Any time a student needed assistance or had a quest...

2/5/25 Strozier Library In yesterday's tutoring session, Karim and I went over the writing submission he wrote during our first week of tutoring. He expressed interest in improving his writing skills, and so following corrections that Professor Kim and I made on his paper, he and I went over the revisions. This took nearly the entire session, as I would incorporate tips and pieces of advice at points during the revision to explain what his mistakes were and how to fix them. I learned that many of the mistakes he committed were related to verb tenses or the correct verb form when writing in the past tense. I was able to correct these mistakes, explain to him why they were incorrect, and go through new examples of the correct option. He continues to pick up on things really quick and responded very well to yesterday's session.

 Date/Time: Wednesday, February 5th, 2025, 5:30-6:30 PM Location: Dodd Hall at FSU Topic/Skill: Grammar (Learning vowel sounds) Feedback provided to the tutee: Today, Livio and I focused on practicing different vowel sounds and their pronunciation. He explained to me that vowels are much simpler in Italian which is what makes them so difficult for him to use. I explained to him many of the different grammar rules with vowel sounds and then we took turns making sentences with target vocabulary words (a list he brought from class). I carefully guided him to the right pronunciation and made sure to positively affirm him when he pronounced a word correctly! I also sent him the worksheet we worked on together so he could continue practicing on his own. Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: I was reminded that learning a new concept or idea can be very overwhelming, especially for something like vowel sounds where the concept comes with a lot of rules and exceptions. How...

 Date/Time: Monday, February 3rd, 2025, 5:30-6:30 PM Location: The Student Union at FSU Topic/Skill: Help with a presentation for a class Feedback provided to the tutee: Livio and I spent the entire tutoring period reviewing and revising a presentation he was preparing for class on Tuesday (the day after our session). First, Livio had presented to me his entire presentation from start to finish and I took notes of feedback and mistakes we could work on. Then we went through the entire presentation together and I asked him questions about the things he made mistakes on. For example, in one sentence, Livio wrote, "... this wood has not imperfections," and I asked him what he meant by that sentence. Livio was able to figure out the errors on his own most of the time after I asked about them only one time, but in other instances, I would remind him of certain grammar rules or give him examples that would lead him to the answer. This way, Livio was able to improve his presentation...

 02/04/25 8pm zoom  Topic practiced: talking about topics the is familiar with - instruments, music; making definitions similar to the ones in crossword puzzles  Corrections given to tutee: corrections on tenses of verbs -- saying "im finished"not "i finish" ; Je-Won misunderstood the assignment -- we were gonna write definitions and then guess each others words (by giving definitions) as a game. He wrote sentences based on phrases i gave him as recommendations to use in his definitions. Phrases you can use to define :  You use it for… You find this in… You put this… You play this… This is a… This is something you…  He wrote these sentences:  you use it for play instrument                         2. you find this music instrument store      3. you put this be shaped into long rectangle                           ...

 2/3/25  Strozier Library In our most recent tutoring session, Karim and I worked on reading comprehension, as he had an exam coming up that he wanted some help with. More specifically we worked on reading comprehension techniques -- for Karim, top-down processing. He provided me with an article assigned to him, so I created some pre-reading questions and some vocab words to look out for. With these questions and words in mind, I then had him quickly scan the article to corroborate with the main ideas in the questions. He then had a nearly perfect understanding of the article and the previously unknown vocab words. We then read a news article about the USA imposing tariffs on Canada and Mexico. With the same top-down processing techniques with his prior knowledge of current events and broke down the article. I would stop us periodically whenever he got to an unknown word, and I'd guide him to finding the definition himself given the context. Additionally, I would stop him and ...

 2/4/25 11:00-11:50am Room 331 Today in Dr. Rios' class there was a test, so aside from answering a few questions, there was no teacher presentation or classroom management. Everything was self explanatory. Materials today included a test packet with an article, and reading comprehension questions. Student participation was high, but obviously due to them taking an exam today. They would ask for advice on the questions they didn't understand, and Dr. Rios guided them in the right direction. Minimal feedback in class today, seeing as it was a test day. But I was able to read through the test packet and learned a lot from it. I learned what types of questions are appropriate for level 3 reading quizzes, and how to apply the format to lesson plans I will create.

  The teacher is friendly with the students and tells them the schedule for the day before class. Today there is a quiz but the teacher is helping them practice. The teacher is making the practice fun by spinning a wheel to see which sentence they will be using a vocabulary word for. The teacher randomly picks a student by handing them cards, it makes the students more engaged and excited to be picked.  The students are answering out loud so they can help out their classmates and see where others made a mistake so they do not. Answering out loud also gets everyone involved even if they were not selected. After he paired them up in groups to practice the vocabulary words together. The teacher also walks around helping them. After the quiz the teacher has them practice more while he monitors the practice. He also tells the class how they did on the quiz after.

 Today, I gave her a passage to work on her pronunciation and learn new words. The passage I gave her seemed to be a little too difficult for her but she was able to keep up and I was impressed. She gets some simple sounds mixed up, but the more that we work together the better she is beginning to understand how to pronounce these words. 

  Date & Time: Monday 2/3, 2:00-2:50pm Topic/Skill: Listening Teacher Presentation: Professor James played two videos relating to music and its effect on the brain. She would pause periodically to discuss themes and have students predict what would come next. Classroom Management: Professor James allotted 10 minutes to review for a quiz, 10 minutes for the quiz, then 30 minutes to show the class two videos and ask questions about them. Materials: Projector, laptops Student Participation: Professor James asked students to make predictions about the video. Feedback Provided: She would discuss the student's predictions and whether they were likely to happen. Lessons on teaching I learned: A lot of learning can occur just from absorption of material. For a listening class, students must be challenged on the amount of info they can absorb and understand at a time- something necessary especially in a college setting.

 Date & Time: Monday 2/3, 1:00 - 1:50pm Topic/Skill: Speaking Teacher Presentation: Professor Flemming laid out plans for the week and reminded students about the course-long assignments. After reviewing scores, he had a short presentation on breakfast foods with pictures and had the students decide if his verbal descriptions were true or false. Classroom Management: Professor Flemming allocated 5 minutes for review. He then allowed 5 minutes for a short interview session with his students who were conducting a survey on American culture. Materials: Projector, laptops, Canvas with scored posted, Google images Student Participation: Students have been working on a semester-long Culture Survey project; they spent the first few minutes of class interviewing me to record and incorporate my answers. After reviewing grades, students compared their marks from a previous assignment and discussed them with partners. This required them to practice casual speaking to discuss the...

 Date & Time: Monday 2/3, 11:00-11:50am Topic/Skill: Reading Teacher Presentation: Dr. Ciappetta read the intro of an advanced research paper with the students before turning them loose to read the Methods section on their own. Classroom Management: Dr. Ciappetta allotted 25 minutes to read the intro of a research paper together, then let students read the Methods section on their own for the remainder of class, answering questions as they arose. Materials: Projector, laptops, research article shared via Google Drive Student Participation: Students read the intro of the paper  along with the professor, then they read the methods section on their own. They asked questions about the material as they came up. Feedback Provided: Students had a high level/advanced knowledge of English, so Dr. Ciappetta could correct mistakes as they came up due to their infrequency. When the students came across a low-frequency vocab word they didn't know, she would ask them to use ...

Date & Time: Monday 2/3, 10:00 - 10:50am Topic/Skill: Grammar Teacher Presentation: Dr. Rios introduced a new chapter on Adjective Clauses. He used the check-up questions from the textbook and had the students practice by describing example photos. He corrected and assisted them with forming their thoughts during their answers. Classroom Management: The instructor dedicated 5-10 minutes at the start of class to review for the day's quiz, then 10 minutes to take the quiz. The remainder of class was spend on a lecture with heavy student engagement. Materials: Projector, laptops Student Participation:  Dr. Rios engaged students throughout the lecture, having them provide examples and respond to prompts throughout. He also fielded student examples and helped tweak and correct them. Feedback Provided: Dr. Rios corrected students at the time of making a mistake. The students were advanced enough that mistakes were not abundant and corrections wouldn't overwhelm them. ...

Date & Time: Monday 2/3, 9:00-9:50am Topic/Skill: Composition Teacher Presentation: Today's class was all activities. Dr. Ciappetta presented the interview questions and clarified any questions the students had. Classroom Management: The class was very small (2 students). Dr. Ciappetta was able to answer questions as they came up. Materials: Projector, laptops, shared Google doc to see students' responses and make corrections easily. Student Participation: To start class, Dr. Ciappetta went straight into composition activities; she had the two students use pre-written interview questions to ask me basic information like my name, hometown, where I live, etc. I answered verbally, allowing them to practice listening and writing. I answered in the simple present "I go to bed" and they had to conjugate it in the third person "He goes to bed". Next, the students alternated stating their morning routines while the other wrote down their responses.  The followin...

 02/02/25 8pm zoom  Je-Won and I worked on a crossword puzzle -- topic: clothes. The crossword puzzle has basic definitions, and had the ability to give a hint of the first letter.  This activity was great for practicing speaking skills. I had my tutee read the short definitions and try to guess the word. If he needed I would give him hints. What was great about this activity was that even if he didn't know the specific word in English, he could tell what it was based off its definition.  I gave him corrections on his word pronunciation when needed. He had difficulty with the word wrist. He became familiar with the words: belt, boots, coat, dress, gloves, hat, jacket, ring, shirt, shoes, skirt, socks, suit, tie, and watch.  Next session we will practice a definition game where he will be able to form these definitions with help. 

Tutoring Session #3  Friday 1/31/25 at Strozier Library For our third tutoring session, Karim and I continued to work on the Past Perfect Tense. We reviewed the usage and conjugation structure of the verb tense and he took a brief quiz to review what he learned at our last session. From there we began the past continuous tense. We watched a couple videos about the verb tense in practice and then did a few fill in the blank exercises, as well as some where you take the Simple past tense and change it to past continuous. Additionally, Karim expressed interest in working on reading comprehension, so this is what we will be building on for our next sessions. He has a midterm next Tuesday, where they must read an article and answer questions about it, so I will help formulate a lesson plan for his reading skills. Karim is progressing very well, and continues to show a high understanding for many concepts, and picks up new information pretty quickly.

(I posted this to the wrong blog at first, oopsies!) Date/Time: 1/19 @ 9:00am Location: Zoom Topic/Skill: Pre-evaluation  I met with Dojun for our first tutoring session. We got to know each other and determine our short term goals for the tutoring sessions and our long term goals for language competency. He speaks with excellent grammar and vocabulary, albeit slowly. I was very impressed. He was a bit bashful when I tried to tell him this. He wants to improve his grammar as much as possible and increase his comfort with speaking and listening at faster paces. I told him that I naturally talk fast, so he will get plenty of practice with that. We both work full time and in opposite time zones (+14hrs in Seoul, South Korea), so we will be meeting on weekends going forward. Our next session will likely be Sunday at 9am EST. I enjoyed getting to know him and figure out his comfort level. I think our best path forward will be a few grammar-in-use activities to perfect his grammar, plus ...

 Date/Time: Sunday 2/2 @ 9:00am Location: Zoom Topic/Skill: Grammar pre-test/progress monitoring I used some TOEFL practice grammar activities to gauge Dojun's comfort level with grammar. I also timed his responses. He speaks very well, albeit slowly. Out of three practice tests, he got 1-2 questions incorrect. Points of further emphasis will include conditional tenses and low frequency vocabulary. One question he got wrong was: The new movie performed very poorly ____ the low ratings it has received by the viewers. He chose "since" rather than "due to". This was my first "Oh no, I only have implicit knowledge on this" moment. I tried to explain that the preposition "to" in "due to" helped to tie these two parts of the sentence together. For that reason "because of" would also have been correct if it was listed, but it wasn't (multiple choice). Hopefully it made sense to him! For future sessions, I plan to move away fr...

 Date/Time: Friday, January 31st 12:45pm-1:45pm Location: Outside of Strozier Library Topic/Skill: Business English; Fill-in-The-Blank Reading Homework Feedback provided to the tutee: When we worked on her homework together, Letizia wanted me to give her the answers directly and move on quickly. To combat this, I instead led her in the right direction so that she could still come to the correct answer herself. I also made sure to correct her verbal mistakes gently and have her repeat the corrected sentence back to me before continuing. Lessons learned: Today, I learned that students may see homework as a chore and not as a tool to learn. I brought a worksheet for her to do that was about a topic that I know interests her---business. Unlike when she was doing her class homework, she was engaged and willing to learn when it came to our lesson. I will keep this in mind for our next session.

Date/Time: Saturday, Febuary 1st 12:30pm-2:00pm Location: Tutee's home Topic/Skill: Conversation practice (We worked mostly on using the past tense, as this is Stephanie's problem area) Feedback provided to the tutee: As Stephanie made mistakes, I would correct her by repeating her mistake as a question. ("We go to Destin last week"--> "Oh, you went to Destin last week?" --> "Yes! We went." Lessons learned: Today, I learned that building our students' confidence, making them feel comfortable, and fostering an judgement-free environment to practice speaking is extremely important. In Stephanie's case, she feels embarrassed to make mistakes, which impacts her ability to speak freely. As we become more acquainted, I can see her confidence building and her speaking skills improving, as she trusts me more.

 01/31/25 Flemming 9-10:45am Speaking  Topic/Skill: group 1 and 2; presentation, true or false questions, Pictionary   Teacher Presentation:  start with breakdown of class that day: presentations, break, and Pictionary. Professor made his own presentation and true or false questions as an example for the class (showed in the class before so I didn't see his)   Classroom Management: highlighted the difficulty of speaking to lower level English students, interesting to see how he spoke to them -- spoke to them like children, which I didn't really like  Materials: Used canvas dashboard as an outline for schedule for the day -- I did like that. Flashcards he made for Pictionary    Student Participation: students presented a powerpoint of their "secret city", explaining the weather, the people, where the city is close to, and other students had to guess what city it was. -- I felt this was a really good example of how to get all the students to partici...