Hamad failed to show up, but both girls arrived early. First thing I did was ask them how their weekend went and I explained the camera was to grade me for my class --not to grade them in any way. Then I started to record.
I passed out the syllabus and explained this had been an assignment in my TEFL II class and its purpose was to teach me how to do this. It also served as a guide to what we would be doing together for our remaining time.
Next, we moved on to reviewing timed speaking and opinion speaking. Neither of the ladies had transcribed their recorded opinion speaking from last week's diagnostics, thought one of them admitted that she'd remembered that part early that morning. We all laughed and then I passed out my copies of my transcriptions. Seeing a transcription of their spoken thoughts was something of an eye opener for both of them. Linx si had admitted previously that she could never remember what she said when she had to speak in class or give a timed speaking sample. For her, looking at her transcription, she was struck by how many hesitations she had. Both ladies remarked that they had been previously told that native speakers through in hesitations like 'ah' and 'um' when they were trying to get their thoughts together, ect., though they also understood that they were using entirely too many hesitations.
Then they noticed all their grammar errors and it briefly snowballed on them. I had to stop them and explain what was really happening---they were noticing their errors and that this was a fantastic sign of how much their English was really progressing. We discussed how very beginning students would not be able to 'see' their mistakes because they simply didn't know that much English yet, whereas the two ladies had reached the more advanced stage of beginning to self-correct. I think we spent at least 10 minutes discussing how great and important this phase is. I made sure they understood that developing an error awareness was how their English was going to continue to advance because you can't correct the errors you don't notice. I also said that I'd help them continue to notice the errors. Both seemed quite happy and optimistic now, unlike the somber "I'm a failure" mood that they had in the beginning of the class.
Taboo was next on our list and the girls took to it immediately. I had them sort through the vocab cards and pick out words that they recognized. Next, we briefly went over the rules and they started to play. Occasionally I had to help them by providing suggestions of how to describe something without saying the taboo words. However, they quickly figured it out and usually played a card in well under a minute. I was shocked at how fast they got. I also notice how much smoother their English was getting as the focus shifted from "speaking English" to 'guessing the vocab card'. It was obvious that their recall speed was increasing as they continued to play.
After 20 minutes of taboo, I had them pick a topic from the syllabus and prepare some timed speaking notes. We briefly went over basic organization such as thesis statement, 2 reasons with 2 supporting details each, conclusion and so on. I did not record their timed speaking, but I did record errors that I heard and we ended the class by discussing these. Most of the time, I was able to repeat back the recorded error and the speaker immediately self-corrected the mistake. They ended by saying they couldn't wait to play more taboo again.
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