Ganem TP-12

On Friday, July 1^st I had my final tutoring session with Dongsoek. We met again at the Strozier library and got ourselves a group study room. Today Dongsoek wanted to work on different areas of English. He asked me to help him with his pronunciation first. He brought a book with him; it was called The Philosophy of Science. He read a paragraph from the book and wanted me to correct his pronunciation. The paragraph was about empirical research and analysis. Dongsoek had a hard time pronouncing the word “empiricists” during the reading. I wrote out the word “empiricist” on the white board. I then broke it down into syllables so Dongsoek could get the hang of saying it. I wrote it out as”imp-ear-iss-ist” and Dongsoek repeated over and over again so he could get used to saying it.

Another part he wanted to work on was when to pause while reading sentences. He needed to understand how to use commas when reading out loud. He circled sentences from the book and that had commas in them and read them aloud. When he made a mistake I told him to reread the sentence and pause where the comma is. He had a little bit of difficulty at first so I wrote an example sentence on the board. I wrote “Strozier library is a good place to study on Fridays, there are less people here, but it closes earlier.” I explained that the sentence was divided into three parts. Dongsoek then identified them by reading the sentence aloud. He was able to pause when he saw the commas this time.

We took a small break and I asked how he was doing. He said he was doing alright but it was a little stressful for him today because he just signed a lease for a new apartment. He was going to move from Alumni Village to an apartment complex on Ocala. I asked him where it was on Ocala. He took one of the dry erase markers and started to draw a map on the whiteboard .He drew an axis and then drew a rectangle on the upper part of the axis. He then drew a rectangle on the bottom part of the axis to show that Publix and Heritage Grove were below his new apartment complex. He said he was moving to the upper part of town. He asked what it was called on a map. I said the new apartment complex he is moving to is toward the north and heritage grove was to the south.

We started talking about how to give directions to people. He told me he had a hard time distinguishing form when to say “from” when giving directions instead of “on”. He said “If you want to get to my apartment on campus you go this way.” I told him you use “from” instead of “on” when you start from a location and go towards another location.

Dongsoek looked at his watch and it was 5PM; the buses had stopped running. He needed a ride home so I gave offered to drive him. I had never been to Alumni Village before so Dongsoek gave me directions as I was driving. He thanked me and wished me good luck with what I was doing after finishing my TEFL certificate. I thanked and wished him good luck with passing his TOEFL and finishing his degree in mathematics. I’m glad he was my tutee.