October 5, 2007 – 2:36 am
The two students that I had last night were very eager to get the lesson started. Given the fact that they were best friends, getting them to communicate with one another was a piece of cake.
ET- Both students were ready to go with the review of their one point. The first one said, [...]
October 3, 2007 – 8:32 pm
The other night I ran into two of my students outside the elevator of Smith’s School of English on my way home. They were still chatting about the contents of the lesson and invited me to walk with them to the station. We took a route that was different than the one that [...]
October 3, 2007 – 4:06 am
I had a lesson with 1 red and 1 orange student recently. When they arrived I noticed that 1 of the students was drinking a bottle of cold green tea. After asking her where she bought it she replied that it was from a convenience store. I was also amazed when she mentioned that she [...]
October 1, 2007 – 4:17 am
It was my first day teaching here at Smith’s. I was nervous for probably a week before my actual first day, which was a waste of energy because it turned out to be all good and, as everyone had told me, I really didn’t have anything to worry about. I had thorough training thanks [...]
October 1, 2007 – 3:56 am
The much anticipated cheese and wine party kicked off here at Kyobashi on Saturday.
The day prior we’d acquired oh-so-much cheese, bizarrely enough in pairs. In fact as commented at the cash register, it was like the Noah’s Ark of Cheese. So we had quite the delectable and plump spread covering many surfaces when students began [...]
September 24, 2007 – 2:10 am
ET: I hadn’t seen this student in a while since she had been taking business training for the past few months. So, understandably, she could not remember her previous one point. We instead did a bit of chatting about her training and the short vacation that she took last month. I was [...]
September 19, 2007 – 4:17 am
I just came out of a lesson where idioms were the game. What kind of game, you ask? A story-telling game! I wrote the idioms on the board, and asked the two students to try and explain what they meant. They guessed a couple, I explained the rest, and then the game was on. All [...]
September 18, 2007 – 2:22 am
My first lesson of Saturday was with 3 students. Two of these were red level regulars, paired with an orange student who has been very busy for the last two months.
E.T.
This meant that the orange students had their one-points fresh in their minds, and gave thanks to a friend and sister for being helpful during [...]
September 17, 2007 – 11:53 pm
I just finished my lesson with a man who is well known at Smith’s School of English Kyobashi. Not only is he a very talented singer (having played some demos for myself and fellow teachers in the lounge), but he also seems to be quite skilled in the field of acting. He always [...]
September 15, 2007 – 12:20 am
Today I was ready to teach the item ‘ making requests ‘ to a brand new English school student. As there was no one point from a previous lesson I decided to explore the student`s level a little by getting to know him.
Very soon I realized that the lesson that I had planned to do [...]
September 14, 2007 – 11:06 pm
ET
My usual Saturday afternoon student was right on time today. She came into the classroom looking really cheerful. Apparently, one of her old friends had contacted her out of the blue (I made a point of teaching her the new expression ‘out of the blue’) for a class reunion. So, she used [...]
September 13, 2007 – 4:05 am
As soon as I noticed my next student in the lounge, last week’s lesson flashed through my memory. I remembered it being quite energetic, and that student in particular had made a comment at the end of the lesson. She had thanked me for the lesson and had said that she had had [...]
September 11, 2007 – 2:45 am
ET
This English school class had three students so there were two different one points to review. The first I elicited by asking two of the students if they knew what the population of Toronto, Canada was. They answered, “I have no idea.” For the third student, I asked her to make an [...]
September 11, 2007 – 12:55 am
I’m just sitting here in the lobby of the Kyobashi English school doing some work at the computer and two students come in for their 5 O’Clock class. They don’t usually come at this time of day so I was a bit surprised and also happy to see them. After chatting with them [...]
September 8, 2007 – 1:20 am
ET: I was invited to (A) but couldn’t go because (B)
After a bit of a ‘Long time, no see. How are you doing?’ conversation, I asked her if she remembered her one point from the last class. She recited it without any hesitation, “I was invited to a tea ceremony but couldn’t go [...]
September 7, 2007 – 8:11 pm
Today’s English school class was a lesson for 2 students who were pink and orange.
ET
I jumped straight in and asked whether the students remembered their one points from the previous class. Both of the students were able to do it with no problem at all.
ROUTINE
For this part I wanted to review the questions from routine [...]
September 6, 2007 – 7:35 pm
E.T.
B28 – (a) is famous for (b) because (c) – from Smith’s School of English one point series
The first item on the menu was a review of the one point from last lesson. The red student quickly said Kyoto is famous for temples because there are a lot of them. I was impressed with her [...]
September 5, 2007 – 2:21 am
ET: I’ve never heard of it
I start by telling the student that there’s a new restaurant in Kyobashi called “Smith’s English School BBQ”. The student looks puzzled and then remembers his one point. He replies in a loud, confident tone, “I’ve never heard of it!” We had a laugh.
Routine 8: Shopping
We go through the [...]
September 4, 2007 – 9:32 pm
Last week I had a lesson with 2 red intermediate level students. Both had been doing very well lately so I decided to challenge them a little with the post intermediate restaurant 2 item. But before starting this we tried a review of the routine 8 shopping story. I was happy to see [...]
September 3, 2007 – 2:03 am
One Point – Bless you.
Easiest One point to review in my opinion. After greeting the student I simply sneeze. The English school student immediately responded with the last lesson’s one point: “Bless you.” She has a smile on her face from passing the impromptu quiz and I know that we started the lessons [...]
August 31, 2007 – 12:56 am
Last Monday I had a great time going on a picnic with some students and another staff member, Tim, from the Kyobashi School. We were all able to take the day and go out to a natural river area as it was a national holiday. This is actually the [...]
August 30, 2007 – 10:51 pm
A particularly enthusiastic student decided to book in a second lesson this week. She had something particular in mind that she wanted to learn, and so came in earlier than usual with this goal in mind. She works at an izakaya in the evenings, and a few days ago an English-speaking customer came in. The [...]
August 29, 2007 – 6:43 pm
Today was my first Saturday back after a little break. I was glad to see on the schedule that my first student was one that I knew rather well. It allowed us to have a good 5 minute chat about our respective holidays. I was able to tell him about my time back in England [...]
August 23, 2007 – 7:25 pm
Yesterday I had the opportunity to coach a lesson for a student on working through Smith’s Travel Course. This is one of three short term courses that are focused on one specific area of English conversation. This particular student will be traveling abroad at the end of September so she has a specific [...]
August 20, 2007 – 7:23 pm
Since I hadn’t seen my first two students today in over a month, they were visibly nervous about getting into the lesson. We got into talking about movies and that’s when they started to warm up, really getting into the topic.
One student told me that her favorite actor was George [...]
August 18, 2007 – 2:27 am
Last night, I had a terribly frightening experience with a rowdy cicada that happened to leap and bounce into my path. Up until my second class, it seemed like nobody would be able to sympathize with my phobia of the screeching insects.
When the lone student from my second class [...]
I had a class with two orange level students this evening. One of them is a very cheerful mid-aged guy and has practically done everything from basic to intermediate more than once, the other only signed up recently, but had been taking classes with students lower than her. When I saw the combination, I thought [...]
Another hot and happening summer day at Smith’s School of English!
My first lesson of the evening was two pre-intermediate students with two very different personalities. One was just winding down from holiday mode, while the other was just beginning to wind up. They were both interested in various summer festivals, so we chatted about the [...]
August 6, 2007 – 10:57 pm
Maybe I`ve been spending a little too much time in the classroom recently, but one points are sticking in my head. I find myself analyzing my everyday conversation and noticing each time my utterances reflect a one point. In a class with an orange and red student it reached a crescendo today.
After [...]
August 1, 2007 – 12:43 am
I had a lesson with three regular pink and orange level students today. We went through the loop smoothly as they had been used to our style of coaching and were quite comfortable with each other’s company.
As I heard two of them talking about movies in the lobby before the [...]