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Something occurred to me during our ’08 Christmas party. I was pleasantly surprised to see students of all levels giving it there best to chat away in English to each other. I was proud to see some of the lower levels mixing it with the higher levels. I realized that most of the students do have the confidence to speak to each other, if they are put in the ideal situation – such as a room full of other Smith’s School of English students!! I believe it is a bigger job to get some of these speakers actually into that ideal situation. Every one likes parties, but I could tell some students were hesitant to accept the invitation to the part as they thought I might do something horribly mean like ask them to actually speak a little bit of English in front of someone other than their teacher (either Adam or myself). However after countless assurances that I would never be so cruel, we ended up with about 20 students attend what was a most enjoyable evening.
I believe that these social situations are so very important to the development of my students English ability and English conversation confidence. Too many times I have heard stories from my students about vacations or events that are perfect opportunities to practice their English only to miss the chance due to a lack of confidence. So, believing in the old saying “practice makes perfect” I decided to provide a regular social evening of English conversation…. and the Sakai Higashi Coffee Conversation Club was born!!
Simply, one evening a month, free of charge, I let my students know that I will be enjoying a coffee at a local cafe at a particular time and encourage them to join me. It is not a lesson, but it is practice. I am more than happy to explore my local cafes, and learn from my students knowledge and experiences. I will be trying to bring a different native english speaker along with me every time, to keep things interesting.
Last Saturday was our first coffee together at Holly’s Cafe in Sakai Higashi. Seven students turned up to improve their English. I am happy with this number for the first meeting. After I promote the evenings a little more through pictures on the classroom walls I sure that numbers will grow, along with my student’s English ability. This will make me a very happy English conversation teacher.
Tim Musgrave
Smith’s School of English Sakai Higashi and Nakamozu
What a great idea, Tim. We’ve been considering holding similar types of meetings. I’m glad to hear that it’s working out for you.
I’m also completely impressed at the amount of English you reported hearing at your Christmas party. I can’t say i’ve ever witnessed that amount of enlgish at my parties…but you have inspired me to try!!
Carol – SSE Kamishinjo
Tim (and Carol),
Great idea Tim. We have been doing a similar event at SSE Ohtsu for the past year. We held a weekly “Breakfast Club” at a local cafe throughout 2008.
Our English cafe was also free and through regularity and a few faxes we managed to get teachers and students from other Smith’s schools involved. The great thing about being in the Smith’s system is that it’s so easy and quick to fax or email amongst franchisees and get things going. Multi-school events are made simple by being in this system!
Anyway, we usually get between 5 and 10 students per week. Our club is held in the morning midweek, so it’s mostly housewive and shiftworkers. From January 2009 we changed the club to the first Wednesday of every month only, which has made students more keen to come and they look forward to it more. Hope yours works out!
Edward, SSE Ohtsu
PS- We have a subpage for our Free English Cafe:
http://www.smithweb.co.jp/sub/ohtsu/sub2.shtml
That was an inspiring post. This (having a coffee evening at a local coffee house) is something that I think I can actually do and would like to do it. It would be great if some students came along, too. But at least I would get to have a coffee! Thanks for the idea!