Amy's short post

- your education background

: I teach my students who are all elementary school students. When they come hakwon, they listen their tapes twice and record their voice one time. And they write one paragraph and some words on their books. Finally, they memorize all of them; paragraph and words. While they study, I check their attitude and grammar.

- your current teaching situation

: There are about 40 students in my class. All my students are different grades and different levels. They usually study 1 hour and half. End of the class, all of students should take a test. The test is their speaking and writing. Then, I check their pronunciation, spelling, and grammar.

- how you teach reading and writing now

: When my students record their voice, I usually say them, “say more loudly, and don’t be shy.” However, only a few students do like this because almost students don’t have confidence. And my students don’t learn about grammar yet, so they make many mistakes when they write. At that time, I say, “when you write with wrong spelling, the mean will change completely.”

- your vision of your teaching 5 years from now

: I may teach other kind of students like disabled students. From ten years ago, I was interesting in social welfare. I always wanted to help them. Now I would go rehab facility once a month. I don’t teach them yet. If they want to learn English, I am willing to do.

Grammar Girl2 - Everybody: Singular or Plural

Everyone and everybody can be used the same meaning, you can use everyone instead of everybody. There are some people who use everyone when they write something and everybody when they talk with other. The reason why someone think everyone is more formal than everybody.

Then, everyone is one word, but every one is sometimes one word and somtimes two words. When you use everyone, it can use with singular verb. And when you use every one, every is adverb, so it usually use with plural verb.

Grammar Girl says 'Everyone are happy' is wrong because it's pairing the singular noun everyone with a plural berb, are. It means everyone should be used a singular noun. Then, I think everybody also is a singular noun.

Everyone and everybody can be used a singular noun, but the meaning is a plural. "Everyone is happy" in this sentence, some or many people are happy, not one person is happy. So using he or she instead of everyone is wrong. In my opinion, "everyone is putting a smile on their face." is right.

In Britain, it's standard to use everyone and everybody with a singular verb and plural pronoun. I think it is not a big deal about everyone and everybody is a singular pronoun because many grammarians decide to make sure yet.

Who says "fun" can't be an adjective?

‘Fun’ can be used as a noun, an adjective, or verb. But I could not find the case as a verb. And people usually use ‘fun’ as a noun or an adjective. For example, 'It's a fun story.' This 'fun' is an adjective here. If you use it before a noun, usually it is an adjective. And 'The party is a lot of fun.' This 'fun' is a noun here. So the meaning is enjoyable or entertaining.

At the comparative form, ‘fun’ changes to ‘more fun’. Someone would use ‘funner’, but it is wrong. Likewise, ‘fun’ changes to ‘the most fun’ at the superlative form.

CIP template

·            What happened?

Nowadays, I teach only elementary school students. They are very noisy. Sometimes, I was confused

because I have no idea how to teach them. After last TESOL class, I am reminded of one thing. One girl
told me few days ago. "Teacher, I told a boy that Amy teacher is funny and tell us interesting story.
When I take her class, I am unaware of the passing time." Then, the boy told her. "Did she? She wasn't
funny. And she never tole us any interesting story. Why did she tell only your class not mine?"

·            Why did it happen?

The ratio of boys and girls is each half in the class that she belongs to. And they are quiet. In their
class, I told like this "the next question is...", they would look their books soon. However, there are
6 boys and 2 girls in the boy's class. In addition, when I told "please be quiet!", they didn't see and
they was getting into mischief even walked around continuously. Then, they liked silly games. I hated
them. So I never told them funny story. I often had trouble focusing in their class time.

·            What might it mean?

If I were in the girl's place, I would think Amy liked us, so she told us interesting story and gave her
smile. But if I were in the boy's place, I would think Amy hate us, so she didn't crack jokes and yelled

us.

·           What are the implication for my practice?

Finally, I am a bad teacher because I dicriminate. Frankly, I did. I was worried how to change my mind

and how to like the boy's class. One day, I had a chance. It was white-day(14th, March). "If you hate

someone, give one more rice cake," as the saying goes. It means if you hate someone, you should try to

make a favorable impression for him/her even you give more rice cake. So I gave candies to them that

day. And I didn't yell them. Although they still like jokes, but they also change. We talk to each other

and play a game together. I think the most important thing is communication with each other when we

teach students. We should greet, talk, and smile earlier than your students.

My thesis topic

I want to write about pronounciation change of multicultural students. Nowadays there are many multicultural students around us. When we pronounce English, their pronounciations are different. They live with different countried parent, so they would learn two different languages. But when they become 10 years old more, almost children will choose one language(I just heard, so this one is not exactly). I wonder why they did. And then, if they have some problem, I will look for the solution. Now I just pick the topic, so I will survey more.

Academic Writing

Academic writing has correct topic and supported sentences. There are a form of the introduction, explanation, comment, and conclusion. It is formal, so you should use formal words.

There are many important things; audience, purpose, organization, style, flow and presentation for academic writing in Swales article. This article was fun and difficult for me because of too many tasks. Something was easy, but something was difficult. In my case, when I do academic writing like homework, I usually miss flow part. It means some sentences in my writing had no consistency. After read this article, I think I should practice to check spelling, sentences, and context two or three times.

No Boring Class Anymore

Some students may think the class time is boring. And one day, before I teach the class, my students complain and told me that the purpose of school and academic was to give a pain to all students. It was ridiculous. When I was young, I never think like this. They were genius. To avoid the boring class, first, you can play some games like bingo or hang man. When you use a game, your students will be brisk, happy, and smile. And other method is to use some pictures. They like to see something. In this case, it is better to use colorful pictures. When you pick up a picture, your students will concentrate once. The other way is to use your gestures. If you use only body language to your students in class, they would be curious soon. Some students will follow you. Like these, there are many things to teach enjoying. When we use these ways, we can get out of the boring class. Think more and be active.