I just finished a lesson with a green level student. I always enjoy the classes with him because he has a really nice personality and is always ready to communicate.
I prepared a news event (Hotdog Eating Contest) as an item and Restaurant 2 for routine. But we ended up only having enough time for the item because it took longer than I thought for the student to understand the article. In the middle of the lesson, I thought about cutting the news event short and move to routine, but the student was rather focused on the news event and apparently wanted to get to the bottom of it. Since he was the only one in the class, I decided it would be a good idea to answer any questions he had regarding the material and not worrying about the routine. His listening ability is quite high, so whenever he heard something that he was not sure about, he’d write down the most part of the sentences and ask me about it when we finished one paragraph. On a few occasions, he didn’t quite understand my explanation the first time. So I made sure to use simple English and explained with examples until he nodded with comprehension. Nothing feels more rewarding than seeing that expression of “yep, I got it” on a student’s face!
Our one-point today was “ I can’t be bothered…. because…”. It only took two examples for the student to guess the meaning and nuance of “can’t be bothered”. We both laughed when he said with a bit of guilt that he couldn’t be bothered coming to class today because of the weather! I ended my class with a compliment on his good work today as well as his effort to come to the class.
-Wendy
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