In this ongoing case study I review lessons I volunteer tutor in Beginner English for an Vietnamese elderly woman who has lived in Melbourne for 18 months without knowing how to say more than hello, good bye and thank you. In the first lesson, we looked at how to complete a Needs Analysis to ascertain what this student knows already and what she needs more help with.
One of the things Binh was able to do was write cursively and yet when she wrote English, even though the alphabet is the …

Commencing tutoring of a student whose English is the equivalent of only hello, good bye and thank you provides a unique opportunity to provide a case study for a new English teacher to see how they too may develop the English skills of their first time English learner students.

The unique aspect of AMES as an educational body is that they have given the tutor total education freedom to teach their students how they see fit. This is both a good thing and bad. Good for the experienced teacher like myself to guide the student gradually but bad for the inexperienced teacher who fumbles their way through. What they do offer is a fantastic array of teaching resources but what lacks is the how element to teaching. This is what I hope to explore in this ongoing case study of my Vietnamese elderly student, Binh.

Every now and again I come across a brilliant website, a blog, a useful web-tool or simply something I love… today I’m featuring: Fluent in 3 Months