Private lessons for an Upper-intermediate student

[bizt]

Hi,

I live in Japan and have recently started teacher a student from home who speaks good conversational English and a good knowledge of English words. This is stark contrast to my schools where I teach very low level English. So, I'm a little unsure the best way to plan lessons for this student.

My student likes things such as movies, travel and fashion so I've tried to theme lessons around these such things. So far my lessons have just involved me sourcing a news article and asking her to read through it and identify words and grammar she is unfamiliar with - during the lesson we can focus on those words and sentences and work from that. Does that seem adequate? I've also, on occasion, asked that she writes up a review of a film she watched of a film that she really enjoyed in her life and why that film was important. We spend a lot of time discussing these and ultimately just English discussion seems to be helpful but maybe I can do more. She has said that she wants to build vocabulary but it is difficult for me to identify which words she doesn't know. So, the above seems like the best idea.

Can anyone give me some good tips of teaching adult students with a higher level of English? How can I identify vocabulary words that she doesn't know? What kind of activities might work well during the lesson? What kind of homework assignments would be good to give?

Thanks
Bizt

[Tdol]

If you look at this site, you might get some ideas on what can be done with news texts:
Breaking News English Lessons: ESL Plans Teaching Current Events