Please please help!!!!!!

[Tmelton]

Hi there

I am currently working on my CELTA assignment (focus on the learner) and was looking for some advice/ help/ suggestions.

I interviewed a german student who has come to England to improve her english in order to be able to get a job back home. She is a very quick learner, very keen to participate and use newly learned vocab, though not particularly keen on listening exercises.

In her written work she has a tendency to use a lot of uneeded language- almost over extending her point. She has difficulty with using the correct tenses. she occasionally misses determiners and personal pronouns but not very often. There is also a lot of formal lexis- furthermore, usage, moreover.

A couple of sentences that stand out are-
'Ive been satisfied about my host family/ I've been satisfied about the staff.....'
'...everything is good organized. Moreover I like the bus/train/tube system in England....
'During my aupair I go to school....'

In her spoken interview, again she has some difficulties with tenses, and she spent a lot of time checking/ self correcting herself, heard via the inflection in her voice. she had a few moments where she would use the words in the wrong order.

Other errors I noticed were-
preper- prepare
cafe- coffee
'have' pronounced 'haf' (sorry cannot get phonetics to work on this!)
'because' pronounced 'bicoss'-in fact nearly all of her 's' pronunciateion, where a native would use the 'z' was used as the unstressed sound.
v/w- 'visit' pronounced 'wisit' and occasionally othe 'v' sounds the same way. she also sometimes pronounced her 'w' as a 'v'
'he is very good in english, yeah, and he musn't, only me'- speaking about her boyfriends ability to speak english and the fact that it was only her that needed to come practise.

If anyone has any good suggestions or practical advice of any other errors I should be looking for, or any ideas for activities to help her improve, it would be most appreciated! I don't want anyone to do the work for me- just a push in the right direction!

Thank you very much!

[Soup]

Originally Posted by Tmelton

Hi there

I am currently working on my CELTA assignment (focus on the learner) and was looking for some advice/ help/ suggestions.

That would be helping you with your assignment though. Sorry, and good luck.

[pyoung]

Dear Tmelton:

What kinds of strategies do you know? What materials have you trained with? What activities have you found helpful in the past?

I agree with Soup that we cannot do you work for you. We can respond to specifics, though, if you will let us know what they are..

I am not familiar with the coursework you are pursuing, but I notice that your task is to 'focus on the learner.' From what you have written, you seem to have been observant and are focused on this learner. Does your course provide a rubric or hierarchy of skills to be addressed? Is it your job to search out appropriate strategies and materials?

Please provide something specific for the forum to respond to.

All best wishes,

Petra