13oct Monday Class

We had a slow start.  Ye, Ya, and G.  We need to the review this piece for comprehension and dictation.  We read the passage aloud for the Computer Lab work.  Including vocabulary list presentation.

http://classlabs.wordpress.com/2014/10/13/homeless-people/

Homeless People

Los Angeles is a big city. There are millions of people here. But thousands of people have no home. They are homeless people. They live on the sidewalks. They sleep on the sidewalks. They are called street people. They don’t have cars. They have shopping carts. They fill the carts with their belongings. They put their extra clothes into the carts. They put their blankets into the carts. Many homeless people live downtown. They live near the newspaper building. They live near the courthouse. They live near fancy condos. They have no money. They sit on the sidewalk all day. People walk by them. They ask people for money. People say they don’t have any money. There are missions downtown. These missions feed homeless people. They give them free lunches. They feed them every day. Some missions have beds. Homeless people sleep in these beds. But there are more homeless people than beds. There are not enough beds for the homeless people. So most homeless people sleep on the sidewalk. They sleep next to their shopping carts.

Do the following exercises: http://www.rong-chang.com/ne/es/es113.htm

Read and listen to the story.
Review vocabulary, fill in the blank – Cloze, crossword puzzle, word order and dictation.

Vocabulary       Cloze       Crossword        Sentences        Dictation

 

24 Sept Class

Kinda zoned today.  But ready to groove!  I couldn’t access my site to prepare as well as I’d liked to.  Lesson learned, backup in place.  Today O, G, and B were here.  It’s great to have O back! 

Paragraph

Last weekend I went to the park.  I went to the park on Sunday at 11:00 a.m.  I went to meet a special group.  They learn to sword fight.  I want to learn to sword fight too.

We did present, future, substitution for verbs.

Grammar

We reviewed/learned past, present future: To Be/ To Go

Explained Present Tense as “in general” with examples.  And throughout the class session as it came up.  Also compared to Present Continuous -ing.

Discussed: Broken/To Break – something is broken vs. to break something.
Some other things I don’t remember.

Stuff:

Need to review in, at, on in time.
Went to the wall map to see where everyone came from.

Reading

She dropped her phone. She picked it up. She looked at the screen. She gasped. The screen was cracked. She was upset. Her phone was important. She texted on her phone regularly. She frequently made phone calls. She had internet access on her phone. It was her world. The phone was not cheap. It had costed her a pretty penny. She had to buy a new one. She did not have enough money. She went to the store. The store sold cell phones. She talked to the salesperson. She told him that she had dropped her phone. He asked to look at the phone. She handed it to him. “Can you fix it?” she asked. He said yes he can. She paid to repair it. It costed less than a new phone. Her cell phone was repaired. She bought a protective case for it.

 

Each student read segments aloud, so we practiced -ed pronunciations.

Went through each sentence for meaning – without literal/dictionary translations.

 

Word List  we discussed from story:

Drop – not throw

Pick up

Gasp

Upset

Her world

Not cheap

Pretty penny

Enough, not enough

Sold – in context of this story

Salesperson 

Ask

Hand – verb

Fix/repair

Cost less

They all knew “protective case”

 

Reading passage above about a cellphone with computer exercises: http://www.eslfast.com/begin3/b3/b3092.htm

Computer exercises next week 

 

Pronunciation check : They were way off on meanings

Cheap

Chip – cell phone and small missing fragment (They knew cellphone chip)

Ship

17sept class Follow Up

I veered from the plan.  “More Better” came up.  (That drives me to distraction)

Grammar

We covered Superlative, Comparative, Nouns, Verbs, and Adjectivess.  (Explained “state of being” To Be with much better results than before – repetition pays off)

So…

Good   (much) Better (than)  (the) Best

Easy  Easier  Easiest, etc.

Note:  I had to listen and clarify carefully what the Best, Easiest, etc meant.  Stressing that there is nothing above the Best, the -iest.

Paragraph

Edna printed the passage with a nice, good-sized, American flag – in color.  They were used for the rest of the class and lab.

We read the Flag passage.  

Discussed the symbolism – as I had hoped, Ynt was there to say “the 13 original colonies”.  I talked briefly about what the colonies were, colonies in general, being a part of Britain, and breaking free through the R war.  No details.  Just to illustrate how young America is, in contrast to the great ancient cultures of Mexico and especially Iraq.  (I avoided pre-Columbian US History for now.)

Discussion

I looked up their countries’ flags in my flag book.  Mexico and then Iraq.  We learned what the state emblem of Mexico is and what it stands for.  The story of Mexico’s founding by the Aztecs.  Including the god whose name I mangled.  Also the recent Mexican Indepedence Day (I did not know that) – and the date of independence.  We learned about the script on the Iraqi flag.  Allah Akbhar.  The permeation of religion in every day life/culture for Arabs.  Mentioned Mesopotamia, Cradle of Civilization, etc.  Cool!

Computer Lab

We spent the last half of class on the computers.  It went very well.  Even the sentence scramble that I thought would be too difficult.  Fantastic!  We shall be doing more.  There are lots of passages and exercises following that format at various levels.

 

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21 May, 2014 Class

It has been quite warm, almost hot.  But not yet Texas Hot.

Memorial Day – civics http://www.elcivics.com/memorial_day_lesson_1.html  Would be nice to go through on computers together.

print:

• Memorial Day Worksheet
• Memorial Day Vocabulary  Answer Key
• Memorial Day Crossword  Answer Key

The Paragraph – Vocabulary/Grammar

This morning I went to the park.  I had a picnic with Joanna and Anya. We sat on a bench by the lake. We sat in the shade.

Anya made food for us to eat.  We ate and talked about many things.  I had to go to teach class today.  Anya and Joanna stayed in the park.

1. Read aloud
2. Discussed or translated words in orange.
3. Conjugated and translated words underlined.
4. Went through story.

Memorial Day Worksheet

1. Read aloud.
2. Discuss and some translation.  The meaning and importance of Memorial Day, the Indy 500, and summer activities.
3. True/False exercise.
4. Writing – What will you do on Memorial Day?  With an eye on spelling, grammar and punctuation.

Next week we will go through some more material on the site and complete more exercises.

Verbs List

Continued with Eat, See, Speak.  In addition to verbs done in The Paragraph.

We are establishing a pattern for verbs, yes!:

•  – ‘s’ on HE, SHE, IT.
• Simple Past tense – all use same exact word
• Future – will + infinitive

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9apr 2014 In Class Plan

Today I am adding things that we will likely not have time to do.  I will adjust what I present spontaneously – as usual.

Notes from last class:

• Forming questions with To Be
• To Have
• Unit 2 continue
• Something interesting – computer activity  http://classlabs.wordpress.com/2014/04/09/easy-vocabulary-practice/
• The Paragraph

 

Tongue Twister

A tutor who tooted the flute
tried to tutor two tooters to toot.
Said the two to their tutor:
“Is it harder to toot,
Or to tutor two tooters to toot?”

To Toot – make short sharp sounds eg. on flute or horn

Tooter – one who toots

Tutor – private instructor or coach

Grammar

To Be 

• Forming questions with To Be – basic word order
• Worksheets today – Simple Present, also with “not”.

 

Save To Have for next class:

• To Have:  Simple Past, Present, and Future
• To Have worksheets

Aesop’s Fable

The Lark and Her Young Ones

A LARK had made her nest in the early spring on the young green wheat. The brood had almost grown to their full strength and attained the use of their wings and the full plumage of their feathers, when the owner of the field, looking over his ripe crop, said, “The time has come when I must ask all my neighbors to help me with my harvest.”

One of the young Larks heard his speech and related it to his mother, inquiring of her to what place they should move for safety. “There is no occasion to move yet, my son,” she replied; “the man who only sends to his friends to help him with his harvest is not really in earnest.”

 

The owner of the field came again a few days later and saw the wheat shedding the grain from excess of ripeness. He said, “I will come myself tomorrow with my labourers, and with as many reapers as I can hire, and will get in the harvest.” The Lark on hearing these words said to her brood, “It is time now to be off, my little ones, for the man is in earnest this time; he no longer trusts his friends, but will reap the field himself.”

 

Self-help is the best help

 

computer activity

http://classlabs.wordpress.com/2014/04/09/easy-vocabulary-practice/

 

Post Class/Next Class  

• We did everything planned for the day.
• We need to continue the computer work.  Clothing vocabulary, 2 sets of games.
• Review the story more slowly.  Plus 2 students were absent – so we will need to start over.
• We need to continue To Be worksheets – word order and questions.

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19mar 2014 Class

On this beautiful Spring day we need a poem! 

(Note: I posted this before, but it is not here.)

Reading and Vocabulary:

Hello Spring!!

© Sal
The cold winter has passed and now comes Spring.
The newly hatched baby birds will cause the mother birds to sing.

The warm sun comes out, little cherry blossoms are in bloom.
Beautiful roses will open up and smell of sweet perfume.

The winds soft breeze passes through the tall trees.
There will be plenty of work for the busy honey bees.

From flower to flower, they fly & buzz all day.
Spring is that magical time during March, April and May.

Source: http://www.familyfriendpoems.com/poem/hello-spring#ixzz2wLIYYns6
Family Friend Poems

• They copied the poem
• I handed out a printed copy afterwards

Vocab/Flashcards:

Poem, flowers, animals, insects, birds, honey bees, weather,  cold, winter, warm, sun, soft, winter, sun, breeze, hatch, new, bird, to bloom, smell, busy, plenty, fly, magical.

• I showed them how to use the cards.
• They created their own cards the rest of the class, unprompted!

We will not be so meticulous with small words eventually.  For now I want to build up a basic vocab to keep the class on the same level.  And they like the cards – the process and results.  I must watch translating of course, but at this level it helps immensely.  

Start Unit 2

We started by discussing the picture on pg 18. 
I explained ESL

We practiced full sentence answers to my questions about the picture. Need to continue that:

• First I asked, they answered
• Then I gave them the complete sentence – plus written
• Had them answer same questions with complete sentences. (I blocked the board.)

Class Rating per students:  good class.

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5mar2014 in class

Good class!  G and Y.  We finally started Flashcards and got to the computers.   School printer was not working, so we did not do the worksheets.  The sheets are printed versions of the computer exercises.

 

A).  Paragraph about weather.  Combined ‘last Sunday’ and ‘today’…I erased everything before recording it.

• We changed the tenses from past and present to present and future.   Went well.
• Made Flashcards from words in the Paragraph.  Forgot to write the paragraph and word list! Get it from G’s notes.

B).  We did the exercises listed in Computer Lab – Basic Simple Present.  Went very well.  I had the pages on the big wall screen as we went through each page.  Should have done that long ago.

Note:

Flashcards –

• I need to show them how to use Flashcards!
• Watch that the blank and lined sides remain consistent for English on one side – Spanish or definition on the other side.
• Translation is okay for now – ideally move to definitions, pics or other non-translation cues.

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19feb class

We have , M, and G. A full class!

We started with an Aesop’s Fable: The Goat and the Ass.
I decided to transcribe the story.  Mule, not ass!  And write it on the board.  Maybe not the best idea, it’s longer than I thought.  But writing is good…punctuation too.  They were keen to write it down themselves.

I). The first hour of the class was preparing for the story:
Writing. Vocab mainly.  To make sure they understood all of the words.

I explained periods and quotation marks.

Vocabulary: Phones and dictionaries in hand
fable, jealous, treat, badly vs bad, grind, mill, carry, heavy, pretend, seizure, ditch, hurt, lungs, moral, told, lie, should, kill, help, veterinarian

Grammar: To Tell and To Take – Simple PPF only.  Gave examples of Take.  Take a bath, take an exam, etc.  Each spontaneously gave me great similar examples of Take.

II). The Fable:

  

• We each read the story aloud.
• I went through it line by line, clarifying with their help.
• I told the story.
• I had them tell me the story in their own words.
• Conclusion:  The goat was bad. She told the mule to do something bad and ended up dead because of her bad idea.

At the end of class I was applauded!!  Big satisfied smiles and good words from everyone.  So awesome.  We rocked it!

* I made sure they knew what a fable was before leaving class.  Not just a story.  Our conclusion: a moral story, ideas about conscientiousness.*

Next Class:

Finish Chap 1.  Start workbook too?

Computer Lab ideas:

• Quiz about the story?  Some vocabulary q’s? Using their notebooks.
• Exercises for Chap 1 that accompany the book on computer – Ventures site.  Maybe the following week – after the Workbook.

More Lab Ideas:
Again: Set up gmail accounts.  And/or get email addresses.
Spend a few/couple of minutes in lab writing to me.  Punctuation important!  One idea per sentence to start.

•  Perhaps about class that day…likes, dislikes, more of something.
•  How do they feel today?  Tired, happy, worried?  Present some mood words on the board first.  Review To Be.
•  Desires. I want to…I would like to….  Present their suggestions on the board first.  Stress infinitives – I want To Do something.

 

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6feb class

Today we said goodbye to Ania and Alma.  They and Joanna are advancing to level 3.  Ania had brought a cake she baked. Incredible as always.  We chatted for some time.  Ania and Alma worked on reading a piece about Eng and Chang, the 19th century Siamese twins – with follow up questions.  They were waiting to take the placement tests.

Class

Officially we did The Paragraph. (TP)  super simple to start:

“Today we are in class. We study English.  We have 2 new students, Guadalupe and Yesenia.  Guadalupe is from Mexico.  Yesenia is from Honduras.”

Verbs conjugated Simple Present, Past, Future: to Be, to Study and to Have
Then TP: past and future.  No person changes.  The concept of matching the noun to noun change with the verb change was not clear for one (We are to we were, not we are to I was) – a simple matter of practice.

Next Class

Siamese Twins reading – Guadalupe is interested in the Siamese Twins story.  So we will do that.  It is advanced, but interesting.

Vocabulary – Check the Siamese Twins story. 

Prepare for something on the computer.  Yesenia is extremely keen to get started.  So awesome!
 – Create simple exercises matching person to verb with verb tense changes.

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transition, and class plan

We have talked with the advanced students – my gals! – to moving on. They are quite ready for the next level. I will miss them dearly.   I am in contact with them, so it will not be cold turkey. 

We will be getting new level 2 students soon.  I have been told there is no level 1 class currently.  Likely the new students are not computer users…yet.  I will take care of that.  And email accounts.  Vital basic skills.  The keyboard, mouse, text boxes and double clicking are daunting for first time users.  This time I shall write everyone’s email and password. 

Where shall we start?  With the book a bit – verbal descriptive.  As much as I can figure out how to use the book. Very complicated teacher directions in it. Grammar is not presented in a helpful fashion, so that is number 2.  Present a list of nouns and verbs with definitions.  Do The Paragraph exercise – switching out person and tenses.  Then computer exercises. 

1. *Remember books.
2. Notebooks – make sure they date session notes and use for computer work.
3. Grammar – review To Be, try to explain nouns and verbs.
4. *Create online quizzes – determine if a word (from the presented list) is a noun or verb, and To Be – Simple Past, Present, Future.
5. Set up Gmail accounts – allow for extra extra time for this. Use my address for back up – lost pwd retrieval. 
6. Make sure they write down their login info in their notebooks, correctly!
7. Perhaps introduce Flashcards – they will create some each class?
8. *Buy notecards for Flashcards. 

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