Molly McQueeney TS#1
Thursday May 7, 2020
5:30 PM
Topic/Skill: I wanted to use this first tutoring session to get to know my tutee, Ahmad, and determine what areas he wanted to improve on. Ahmad has a very high level of conversational English and is eager to continue improving by speaking to native speakers. We spoke about his interests and his goals for English and for his career in the United States. I learned that Ahmad feels very confident in his speaking and writing, but he says he often struggles with reading and finds long books overwhelming sometimes. While confident in his writing abilities, Ahmad discussed how he hopes to expand his vocabulary so he can include a greater variety of words in his papers and is not so repetitive. He is hoping to work with Ms. James on a research paper on social engineering and has ambitious goals for how to incorporate his experience as an English learner in his future career as a computer engineer.
Feedback provided: I shared information about myself to Ahmad too and we had fun discussing music, the few Arabic words I know, and the social engineering. I told him I would try to find fables that we can read, as he said he enjoys reading "short passages with wise messages".
Lessons I learned: While getting to know each other, Ahmad taught me about instruments from his culture and differences between American music and Saudi Arabian music. He also taught me some new words in Arabic and I think reversing the teacher role for just a few minutes helped him to feel more comfortable and become excited about sharing his culture with someone new. I was surprised at how well Ahmad spoke English and really didn't struggle to make conversation. I am hoping that this means we can really focus on building his reading and writing skills. Since Ahmad shared some of his interests with me, I am planning to incorporate those into lessons in the future as much as possible to increase engagement and interest in his least favorite subjects.
Feedback provided: I shared information about myself to Ahmad too and we had fun discussing music, the few Arabic words I know, and the social engineering. I told him I would try to find fables that we can read, as he said he enjoys reading "short passages with wise messages".
Lessons I learned: While getting to know each other, Ahmad taught me about instruments from his culture and differences between American music and Saudi Arabian music. He also taught me some new words in Arabic and I think reversing the teacher role for just a few minutes helped him to feel more comfortable and become excited about sharing his culture with someone new. I was surprised at how well Ahmad spoke English and really didn't struggle to make conversation. I am hoping that this means we can really focus on building his reading and writing skills. Since Ahmad shared some of his interests with me, I am planning to incorporate those into lessons in the future as much as possible to increase engagement and interest in his least favorite subjects.
Comments
Post a Comment