private lessons

moon unit · Post by **moon unit** » Sat Mar 24, 2007 6:26 pm

Hi

Sorry if this is in the wrong area.

I have just qualified as a TEFL teacher but as yet have no experience. However an acquaintance of mine has asked me to start giving him private lessons. He is Russian and has no problem conversing or communicating at all but where he needs help is grammar. His grammar is very bad.

I really have no idea where to start or what to do as in my course we mainly learned about teaching in a classroom, games, group activities etc.

Does anyone have any idea how I could approach this? I really want to do a good job.

Thanks in advance for your help.

Sally Olsen · Post by **Sally Olsen** » Sun Mar 25, 2007 3:32 pm

Something that might be fun for both of you is to get a book on Systemic Functional Grammar. I would highly recommend the one by Beverly Derewianka. You would learn something while teaching him.

There are books availalbe in Australia but quite a bit on line as well. Read the Systemic Functional Grammar thread in the Applied Linguistics section.
http://www.eslcafe.com/forums/teacher/v ... functional

Actually, any thread in that section would be interesting to follow up. You can just find a few of your student's mistakes in writing that he brings you and then search on the thread to find a discussion on that particular point.

moon unit · Post by **moon unit** » Wed Apr 11, 2007 5:21 pm

thanks for your reply.
is the book you mean-A Grammar Companion for Primary Teachers
by Beverly Derewianka

thank you

Sally Olsen · Post by **Sally Olsen** » Thu Apr 12, 2007 2:42 pm

That would be a good starting point. We call it the Green Book because of the colour of the cover.

rusmeister · Post by **rusmeister** » Sun Apr 15, 2007 9:08 am

Sally Olsen wrote:That would be a good starting point. We call it the Green Book because of the colour of the cover.

That wouldn't have anything in common with the book referred to as "The Green Book" by C.S. Lewis in his work "The Abolition of Man"?

Sally Olsen · Post by **Sally Olsen** » Sun Apr 15, 2007 8:17 pm

The green book cover was a good distinction from the pink book cover
Derewianka, B. Exploring How Texts Work, Primary English Teaching.

There is also the "Wee Green Book" that give you instructions on Scottish dancing.

rusmeister · Post by **rusmeister** » Mon Apr 16, 2007 2:26 am

Thanks, Sally!
FTR, Lewis's "The Abolition of Man" is a work that I'd make mandatory reading for people who consider themselves teachers. "The Green Book" is a pseudonym for a textbook that he refers to in the beginning (it was a negative stimulus for his short book).

Sally Olsen · Post by **Sally Olsen** » Mon Apr 16, 2007 4:13 pm

Yes, I looked it up and you can read some of it on line. Very interesting. I remember a number of my textbooks being green, a cloth cover with a dark green colour. Our university library has a collection of our old school books and it is amazing when you go back over them. My favourite of course is D*ick and Jane because of Baby Sally. She was always in trouble. But how sexist, racist and middle class they were! Glad that we have progressed some.

rusmeister · Post by **rusmeister** » Wed Apr 18, 2007 1:37 am

Actually, D+J was a huge regression from the McGuffy Reader and other readings that were far more highbrow than D+J.

My personal take on that is that D+J was designed more to kill interest in reading than to encourage it. Dr Suess is incredibly lowbrow, too, even though he was touted as 'an antidote to the weary world of D+J'. When I compare it with what Russians read their kids I cringe. Suess doesn't hold a candle to Marshak or Chukovsky. (My kids are growing up half Russian so I have an excellent base for comparison.)

In terms of reading and writing ability we have regressed enormously from late 19th cent levels, imo, and computer and TV are rapidly worsening that. See the thread over the in job forum where some 'teachers' actually say that spelling is no longer important (it's called 'semi-literate teachers' I believe).

Read that book by Lewis. Really.

Heads Up English · Post by **Heads Up English** » Wed Apr 18, 2007 10:33 pm

Take a look at Raymond Murphy's English Grammar in Use. Each "chapter" is two pages: page one has an explanation of the grammar point, and page two has writing exercises. I've used the book before, assigning a page or two as homework. For the next lesson, we practiced the grammar point in drills, and then moved into freer, conversational activities.

You might also want to take a look at Michael Swan's Practical English Use, which is a good guide to quickly look up grammar points. The explanations are usually pretty clear, and contain very practical English.

Good luck!

Chris Cotter
www.headsupenglish.com

rusmeister · Post by **rusmeister** » Thu Apr 19, 2007 9:10 pm

Heads Up English wrote:Take a look at Raymond Murphy's English Grammar in Use. Each "chapter" is two pages: page one has an explanation of the grammar point, and page two has writing exercises. I've used the book before, assigning a page or two as homework. For the next lesson, we practiced the grammar point in drills, and then moved into freer, conversational activities.

You might also want to take a look at Michael Swan's Practical English Use, which is a good guide to quickly look up grammar points. The explanations are usually pretty clear, and contain very practical English.

Good luck!

Chris Cotter
www.headsupenglish.com

My lengthier post was swallowed up by the internet gods, so I'll just say Round-Up (Longman, by V. Evans) is way better than Murphy.

Heads Up English · Post by **Heads Up English** » Thu Apr 19, 2007 9:44 pm

I'm not familiar with Round Up. I took a look at Longman's website, and it looks like the series is for older children. What's it like? Does it work for adults?

Chris Cotter
www.headsupenglish.com

rusmeister · Post by **rusmeister** » Sat Apr 21, 2007 6:00 pm

Heads Up English wrote:I'm not familiar with Round Up. I took a look at Longman's website, and it looks like the series is for older children. What's it like? Does it work for adults?

Chris Cotter
www.headsupenglish.com

Yes, it works fine. Its advantage is (esp on the lower levels) a good balance of # of exercises vs illustration. Murphy elementary requires far too much decoding without illustration for beginners, although it is fine on the intermediate level. The other relative weakness of Murphy is that it has a hundred (no exaggeration!) divisions of grammar that aren't really connected. R-U does some connecting, at least in verb tense stuff. You can use it ages 8 and up.
The weakness of all the American grammar texts that I have seen is that they have a great photo or pic, and a mere 3-5 sentences (hardly one full exercise) on a page!

The recent editions of R-U have been cleaned up for non-politically correct content - to the point of ridiculousness - and the advanced levels are a lot more poorly developed, but it has the best tables for verb tenses and quantity in the universe. (The author didn't figure out a simple and systematic rule for prepositions of time (on/at/in), although I did - TM pending!)

Heads Up English · Post by **Heads Up English** » Tue May 01, 2007 9:59 am

I agree with you on Murphy: The divisions of grammar are pretty extensive, and they don't connect with one another. If the book were used as the main part of the lesson, it wouldn't give the student much opportunity to use the language, or connect the language with past lessons. I usually use the book as a reinforcement tool, assigning a page or two as homework from time to time.

I'll have to stop in the local bookstore and see if they have Round Up. It's always nice to find new, effective material. Thanks!

Chris Cotter
www.headsupenglish.com