FSU TEFL 120

  Tutoring Session #19 Date/Time: Monday, March 25 th   3-4:30pm  (new notebook) Location: Student Union Topic/Skill: Speaking Feedback provided to tutee: We discussed video game related vocabulary, COSTCO, and using an article before using an adjective to modify a uncountable English noun Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: Using English “counter words” with uncountable nouns is confusing. It’s hard to determine what the rules for using articles with adjectives are or what patterns exist for them.

Date & Time: 3/21/24, 3:00-4:00pm Location: CIES  Topic/Skill: speaking, spring break trips Feedback provided to the tutee: Over spring break, Aras went to New York City for the first time, and said it reminded him of his hometown in Turkey, both with huge skyscrapers. He told me about his visit to the Museum of Natural History, the Empire State Building, and Central Park. His hometown is known for its chaotic traffic, and New York’s heavy traffic also reminded him of home. When he told me he had taken the subway rather than a car to commute during his stay, I mentioned how cool that seems as I have never been on a subway. He was shocked! I explained that there were no subway systems in Florida because of Limestone, aquifers, and high water tables; therefore, Florida basements are rare but Florida natural springs are by the dozen! Lessons Learned: I’ve never experienced a very strong feeling of homesickness while being in a city that looks like where I am from, but I can rat...

  Tutoring Session #18 Date/Time: Wednesday, March 20 th   3-4:30pm Location: Student Union Topic/Skill: Personal Life (Speaking) Feedback provided to tutee: I corrected my tutee’s grammar errors. Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: We discussed why Geena chose her college major, countries she’s visited and the process of attending college in Korea.

Date & Time: 3/20/24, 12:00-1:00pm Location: CIES  Topic/Skill: Speaking, pronunciation, understanding subtle jokes in contextual-charged texts Feedback provided to the tutee: We practiced the Z sound again, this time, while learning the word “Azalea.” We spoke about how nice the weather has been lately, perfect conditions for blooms around campus, like the azaleas right outside the CIES building. In talking about recent weather, I mentioned that this morning was “chilly” and Wei asked what I meant, I explained that chilly is between comfortable and cold temperatures. I had a newspaper with me, with a headline that read “FSU baseball makes it out of the swamp alive, topples #8 Gators,” I thought this headline was very clever (I used to be sports editor of the yearbook and a writer for the newspaper, so I especially appreciate the thought behind the headline). Lessons Learned: I watched in real-time, the joke behind the headline not land, and realized how much cultural and reg...

Date/Time: March 18th, 12:00pm Location: CIES building Topic/Skill: Sport expressions Feedback provided to tutee: Sultan and I observed games of ping pong played in the lounge downstairs and I provided various sport expressions and terms commonly used in English culture. Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: Sports are a great example of something that almost needs no linguistic understanding to comprehend. Excitement, disappointment, anger, and suspense are very raw human emotions that can be understood almost regardless of the language used. 

Date/Time: March 15th, 2:00pm Location: FSU campus Topic/Skill: Parsing online language Feedback provided to tutee: Sultan and I browsed Twitter and the like to look at examples of internet and meme culture slang. I taught various idioms and language patterns that these newer forms of communication are riddled with. Lesson(s) about tutoring and/or the tutee you learned: Language as its used online is paradoxical in the way it is both idiom rich but also somewhat universal - a wide variety of cultures seem to take part in and replicate English speaking meme culture. The result is a sort of premature understandability; even if someone doesn't know the dictionary definitions, they can understand the message.