The Adult Learning Experience from the eye of a rookie tutor : Post 2 "Getting to know you !"

So here it is post 2. I am glad I am not slacking off  and am following up on my previous post. These posts are a mere reflection on my tutoring sessions. Don't go looking for the right way of doing things here.

At the ALC (Adult Learning Center) I am obliged to conduct two sessions of two hours each every week. I hop in after work from 6 pm to 8 pm for these sessions. Hunger and the cold are generally on my mind when I head out of office.

On the night of my first ALC group session I had a familiar tune in my head.
"Getting to know you! tu du du tuoooo...
getting to know you! La la la!"

Ever since I had labeled this session "Getting to Know You" on my tutor file these were the exact thoughts that were going through my my mind on the train ride from work to the library. If you don't get what I am saying just watch the embedded youtube video below.

It was essential that I established why the learner has approached ALC to get tutored. As I mentioned in my last post, the motive of these learners is very different from that of a learner enrolled in a school or university curriculum. Their needs are more immediate, for instance : writing a check out, reading the weekend subway plan changes, filling out a government form or job searching.The main aim is to have motivated learners and the trick is to find out what motivates them and incorporate that in my lesson plans for the following few weeks. The ALC program doesn't have a fixed curriculum, teaching is need based. Learners often leave after they have acheived their immediate goal.

Assessing their current proficiency was a main takeaway from this session. This wasn't easy. I used an ice breaking technique. Thing in the bag. [won't work on your potential date :)] I asked them to take out an item in their bag that they would never leave home without. I picked out my MTA card and gave five reasons why it is important to me. Then I asked the two of them to tell me about why the mobile phone or the little bag in the bag the two had picked were important to them. This got them talking more to each other and share a few anecdotes about the thing in the bag. After getting the ball rolling, I got them to read out aloud different levels of materials, write a sample piece and do a little Language Experience. I will elaborate more on Language Experience and my take on lesson plan on my next post.
Handing them different levels of reading material to read out I looked at a few key abilties that make it easy for me to assess them. These are Sight word recognition, Letter name recognition and  decoding abilities. Looking at their writing sample helps too. I see misplaced capitals, misused punctuations, poor letter formation techniques : all very actionable and a definite on my lesson plan.

Last but not the least I ask them about their BackStory. What? Why? When? Where? Who ? How? were my friends on this session. This helped to find out wether they would be able to take time outside the two weekly sessions to work on their take home assignments. I could gauge to some extent a reading material that the learner would use in real life. The kind of support from a spouse or the family is also another thing I found out about. 

Some words I used here which I was clueless about before attending Tutor training -

Sight Words - words that can be recognized by the learner without sounding them out. i.e. recognizing words the same way that they recognize familiar faces in a picture. 'EXIT' , 'STOP', 'Coca-Cola', "McDonald's" etc.

Letter Name recognition - The ability to say the names of the alphabet

Decoding - The ability to break printed words into segments. This is a slower process than sight word reading as the reader has to disect a word by producing sounds and then combine the segments to form words. Non native english learners might be able to read the word correctly but not understand what they are reading.

During the course of tutor training I actually compared these aspects with my experience with Tamil. I have pretty much forgotten how if I hade any problems with English and Hindi. I was too young to recall anything now. But I started learning Tamil the summer before my parents planned to move to Chennai. I vividly remember my Grandpa instructing the two of us(sister and I) first on the alphabet and then the possible sounds and combinations on words. Till date I can read tamil at most times without understanding what I am reading. Largely because the language used in written tamil (books, periodicals and poems)are notches above Chennai Tamil [completely basterized by english,hindi and telugu words seeping in a-plenty.]. Well atleast I have graduated to watching Tamil movies without english subtitles now.

So that was my agenda for the session.

"Haven't you noticed Suddenly I am bright and breeeeeezy"

Getting to know you !

Ajay