Marissa_TP#3

Marissa M.
Tutoring Blog #3
9/17/14

For this session, I observed Taylor's session with two of her students.   Both Gabriella and Admir are from Brazil. Taylor started the session by checking the students homework logs for accuracy and grammar errors.  There were a few errors, mostly with the past tense and conjunctions.  One of the questions that came up during this activity was the proper use of using the word "and" to start a sentence.  Both students tended to do this.  However, together we explained that the majority of the time we do not start sentences with and when writing.  When speaking this is generally accepted, however, in more formal writing it is allowed, but not common.

There were a few words that the students were having difficulty pronouncing and/or distinguishing between.  These were read allowed to hear the difference.  Words that were difficult to pronounce were: talked, stopped, watched, called, lived, stayed, and different.  Some of these I have noticed in pronunciation with Brazilian friends.  Different ALWAYS seems to be problematic because of the d being pronounced with more of a g sound in Portuguese.  Words the students found similar sounding and had difficulty distinguishing between were waited, wanted, and fainted, as well as live and leave. 

Taylor had a very good idea that she had done to help students hear different individuals.  This was to record a video of a family member and or friend having an interview.  While discussing this topic, several new vocabulary words came up, starting with the word humble.  This was a little difficult to explain to the students, but Taylor did an excellent job.  Admir picked up on her description right away and explained it to Gabriella by saying "it's when you know you are really cute, but don't say it."  I thought that was a good description and we all got a laugh out of it! 

We spent quite a bit of time talking about the use of affix mis and the suffix ish.  The students wanted to know what they could be used with and how you could tell when to use each. Words such as misread and misunderstood were introduced.  The ish I compared to inho and inha in Portuguese. 

The tutoring session ended with a group discussion on American football.  Both students seemed to enjoy this.  They had been to an FSU game, but did not understand the rules.  It is very different from futebol!  Taylor and I both said the best part about a football game is the tailgate.  Neither had experienced that yet and so she invited both to join her for the next game.