Wednesday, March 12, 2014

My morning featured three great things:

1.       Skyping with a good friend from Uni and beyond!

2.       Meeting (and getting) a new private student – a Vietnamese man who owns a cafe nearby

3.       Making a delicious brunch with Patrick, featuring a warmed up baguette filled with scrambled eggs, sausage, grilled mushrooms and tomatoes, olives, cucumbers, mustard and sweet chili sauce. Mmm.

The rest of the day was also pretty awesome (albeit sweaty), too! Patrick and I went for a drive, picking up some of those fake water vapour electronic cigarettes that smell really nice (melon, USA mix and Red Bull flavours!) He showed me where he works and we drove along the canal, which is quite a nice drive compared to driving in the busier parts of the city. We stopped at a cafe and watched the canal while chatting and sipping on our drinks: iced coffee and for me, a yogurt, ice and strawberry blend. It was the first cafe we’ve been to that didn’t have a menu.  I pointed at ingredients and it worked out splendidly haha...

Here is my yogurt, ice and strawberry blend from our stop along the canal:

In the afternoon, we did some lesson planning for a bit and tried to cool down, sweating profusely from our drive. I think it went up to 38 degrees today! (Sorry, fam and friends back home! :p)

In the evening, I taught my first lesson at the primary school across the street from me! The Vietnamese teacher is asking me to teach her class of 16 students twice a month as a guest so the students have a chance to speak with a native English speaker.  Although it’s a primary school, these students are about 12-14 years old because it’s an extra class, held Wednesday evenings.  The first half hour was an ice-breaker and getting-to-know-each-other conversation activity using toilet paper. Yes, toilet paper. I went around, telling them to take however much they wanted and joking around with them.  “How much do you use? Really?! 6 pieces?!” and then once everyone had their share, I revealed that for each piece, they had to say one thing: either one thing about themselves or ask me one question.  They thought it was pretty hilarious, especially seeing who had only a few versus who had 6 or 7! To keep them all engaged while others spoke, I also quizzed them after every 4 students had spoken, asking them to recall their classmates’ answers for a candy prize. It was a great vibe, they spoke a ton and we laughed a lot. I also showed them a few pictures of me from home and from my travels abroad.  Then in the second half, I taught them how to describe, compare and contrast 2 pictures, as their teacher wants me to help them practice for their FCE, Cambridge speaking test.  I used a variety of pictures: funny, thought-provoking and interesting, such as ones of “extreme ironing” (google it, if you haven’t heard of it!), of me at the Korean trick-eye museum and ones from Hungry Planet’s “What the World Eats” photo series.  We used venn diagrams to describe and compare the photos and practiced useful expressions for comparing, followed by a race where 1 team had to say as many similarities as they could and the other team had to say all the differences.  The team to say the most (going back and forth) would win. They all did so well though, so I gave everyone a sticker at the end! Their teacher asked me to come teach her class twice a month and also s interested in having me teach some of her other classes if the schedule works out well!