Rachael TS#3

My third tutoring session (2/1) went even better than the first two! Da-som is really gaining a lot of confidence in her speaking and listening skills, and I'm gaining confidence in my teaching skills. She came to me with questions about dependent and independent clauses, as she didn't understand why her teacher had corrected her paper with a comma when she had written a period and started a new sentence. I did my best to explain how the two differ, I found an exercise/quiz online on the spot to test her abilities in identifying independent vs. dependent clauses. When she identified dependent clauses, I would have her come up with a way to complete the sentence. Finally, I had her explain the difference between dependent and independent clauses in her own words.

I had another PowerPoint presentation ready to go for this session.  On the theme of Valentine's Day, I had her describe her ideal date to me. I gave her 10 minutes to jot down ideas on what she would want her date to look like, 3 places that she'd take him, 3 activities they'd do together, and what makes a date special. After the 10 minute planning period was up, I had her tell me what she came up with! She actually had some great dating insights.

Next, we listened to another podcast on junk food, but we did some context building first. I asked her a series of questions related to junk food, and whether or not she thinks that junk food ads should be legal in the U.S. During the podcast, I had her summarize After listening to the podcast, I had her summarize the conversation, the perspectives of the speakers, and the main ideas. She did a really great job!!

We finished with a song worksheet where she filled in the blanks from Taylor Swift's "Love Story" and she answered a few comprehension questions.

Da-som seems to really like the PowerPoint, and just being that organized I believe helps both of us feel more confident in my teaching abilities. It helps keep me on track! I will continue using this method, and some activities I am thinking about for next week include using my Conversation Cards sheet I made for the Speaking Lesson Plan, bringing a deck of cards, and having her answer questions at random, only taking a few seconds to prepare. Also, my book should be coming in by tomorrow on ESL conversation activities, so I can hopefully use some of those!