Day 7 - 2nd day of Teaching

Day 7

Wednesday, July 9

Today was my 2nd day with my students at No.17 Middle School in Baoding, China. Today we did the following:

1) We had a brief discussion about the date. Then they practiced with a partner saying "Today is...", "Tomorrow will be..." and "Yesterday was...". I walked around and asked students "What is today?" to assess their ability to answer in English. Most students did very well, but about half had to refer to the prompts written on the board. It's difficult for me to be too critical because I am so in awe of their ability to speak a 2nd language. Most of them could come to the US and get by fairly well. I can't do that, and I'm much older than them. It's quite impressive.

2) Did the same thing as #1, but with the time.

3) Next we did a yarn web. I started out holding the ball of yarn. I told them my name, what I did last night, and then threw the ball of yarn to a student. They had to tell me their name, what they did last night, and then ask me one question about me, the USA, English, my school, my students, etc. I had some very interesting questions:

•  2-3 students asked me to tell them about Ivy League colleges, such as Yale or Harvard. It was too funny, because obviously I have little to say. Those schools were never on my radar. I just told them that they were very good schools, and that you had to be very smart to get into them. I said I wasn't smart enough. They laughed :)
• One student asked about Chinatown. He wanted to know if Chinatown was much like the real China. I told them about my experiences in Chinatown of NYC. I said that actually it did look a lot like the big cities of China, but I couldn't speak to the food. The student, Ender, said he hopes to visit Chinatown one day. I thought it was very cute that of all the things in the USA, Chinatown topped his list.
• Another student asked what I thought about middle school aged students having girlfriends/boyfriends. Everyone laughed. I told him the truth - it's a waste of time and distracts from school and learning. Of course, middle schoolers can't help but be interested in the opposite sex. It's what they do. Even the Chinese ones.
• I had a few questions about my school schedule. They were so impressed that my students get out at 2:25 every day. However, when I told them that the students only get a 20 minute lunch, they were shocked. Chinese students and teachers get 2 hours.

4) The next lesson of the day was about American money. I gave each student and my 2 assistants a quarter, dime, nickel, and penny. We discussed each coin, studied the pictures and presidents, and looked at the year. They took notes about the value of each coin. The students (and I) loved this lesson. I enjoyed it for 2 reasons. 1)it's so fun to teach when your students are excited. none of them had ever seen US money and they were doubly excited to be able to keep it. and 2) It was a math-ey lesson. I love that kind :) The students took many pictures of the coins and bills and some of the students were doing coin rubs in their notebooks.

5) Next, we did a money activity. The students had a worksheet with pictures of american coins in various combinations. They had to work together to count the coins in dollars and cents.  I loved this activity because of it's practicality. One of the hardest things about visiting a foreign country is figuring out their currency. Hopefully this lesson put them a step ahead if they ever come to the US.

6) After lunch we played outside for awhile. I had my students stand in a circle and try to move the hula hoop around without letting go of eachother's hands. They loved this game. Then we did a team relay race.

7) For the final part of the day we did a song study of "Happy" by Pharrell. I am thinking we will use this as a performance song for the end of camp ceremony. I am really loving the song study concept so far. The students enjoy the videos and exposure to american culture, and are learning pronunciation, definitions, and slang without even realizing it. Definitely planning to keep doing this activity :)

Me helping a cute group of girls try to spin the hula hoop without dropping it.

Relay Race!