LinuxLefty's personal blog - English

Special Projects and Coffee Hour

nospam@example.com (LinuxLefty) — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 18:00:06 -0600

The students with the lowest English levels go to special projects so that they can be in a smaller class and more personalized attention. I am teaching special projects and I've been really enjoying it. Today we went over body parts and the students practiced tagging each other and labeling each other's body parts. It was a lot of fun

Today we also had coffee hour where we invite the students over to the teacher dorm for coffee and time to visit. Here is a picture that I took of Laura's class

Praise and Prayer

nospam@example.com (LinuxLefty) — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 18:00:06 -0600

I had a good conversation with a student today at dinner. He was talking about the Olympics and mentioned the Beijing Olympic slogan of "One world, One dream". I asked him what the world's one dream was. We talked for quite a while and he told me that I have a lot of wisdom. I told him the source of all my wisdom.

I have one prayer request: please pray that I have a good attitude about things. God reminded me that every moment is a choice. Everything that happens to me I have a choice on how to respond to it. Please pray that I will choose to have a positive attitude. Thanks!!!

Teaching Science Club

nospam@example.com (LinuxLefty) — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 12:00:12 -0600

Every weekday night during a TIP session, we have clubs. This gives the students a chance to focus on a particular subject and learn vocabulary pertaining that subject. I usually teach Science club . When I first started TIP, the clubs were 5 days, but they have now been boiled down to three days to allow the students to go through more clubs.

Here is my usual lesson plan:

Day 1: Robots - We watch clips of robots and discuss various facets of robotics
Day 2: Robots (again) - The students design their own robot and present it to the class
Day 3: Bridges - The students build a bridge using chopsticks and then we see which bridge can hold the most books

Most of the students that come to Science Club don't like science and think science is boring. But many of the students leave having a renewed interest in science

Here are some photos that I took from last week's Science Club

Back in China, Starting Teaching

nospam@example.com (LinuxLefty) — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 23:11:50 -0600

I arrived safely back in China and right now I am back in China. I was able to spend one day at the CLE (Chinese Language Education) having one last day of classes. I was also able to spend some time with Aunt.

Beijing has changed a lot in just the three weeks that I was gone. One of the major changes is that they have opened a lot of new subway stations and subway lines. This makes getting around town a lot easier. However, I wish that they would open up some subway lines to Changping. It still takes about three hours to get to the Beida Fen Xiao -- the school that I am teaching English at.

Yesterday I made the trek from Aunt's house to Beida Fen Xiao. Most of the college students who attend Beijing University have been moved to a closer campus, so the campus is quite deserted. I believe TIP is the only major group left on campus.

The campus is quite overgrown, but it gives a nice "in nature" feel. One thing I really like about this campus is that they have birds. In downtown Beijing, there are hardly any birds. I've heard that the locals ate them all. Also, I'm sure all the people have drove the birds away.

It is so nice to be with a group of believers, during my time at CLE, I felt a little dry spiritually. However, being around strong believers, constantly being soaked in the Word, it is so refreshing!

Yesterday I had an idea, during the TIP breaks, maybe I go back to CLE and keep learning Chinese. When classes are in session, we aren't allowed to speak Chinese to the students or even the workers since we are trying to create an all-English environment.

8月5号我回中国来了. 6号我去我的中文学校还有一天客. 7号的时候我去北大分校开始教英文. 现在北京开了很多新的地铁所以在北京旅行很方便. 可是我去昌平的时候还有3个小时 . 现在北大分校的学生挺小的. 多数学生去别的校园. 现在TIP是最大的团体. 我题别喜欢跟别基督徒住在一起. 我们可以每天深谈Bible. 现在我打算我的学校休息的时候我可以还学习汉语.