Internship Hours

As I've mentioned before, I'm doing my field study as a part of my Internship for the TESOL program, teaching English as a foreign language.  I am in that programs internship class right now.  Many, really most, of the students in the class are currently doing their internship and so we get the class to discuss how it is going for them, different problems or successes they come across and resources they are using.

Because the class is required before (or during) the internship and I will be gone during mine so must be in it now, I'm also required to do a few internship hours while I am in the class.  Yesterday I met with a woman at the Selnate (click to find out more about what they do), school in Provo.  I will be set up with the study buddy for about an hour a week.  They not only want us to work on their assignments with them, but if possible do some cultural activities, watch a movie, go to the grocery store and practice buying things.  These are great activities that help students to learn in real life experiences things they may want to use.  In this way it will be very different teaching than what I can do in India.  As I've taught Tagalog we have a similar issue, but we have created situations that simulate some of these experiences as closely as we can.

Part of my project will include a lot of this work before I go, setting up a curriculum and finding ways to teach to their needs with potentially limited resources.  These internship hours, and maybe some other opportunities that will come up through this class, are going to be vital experiences to give me ideas and help me get a little experience about how to best teach before going and setting up my programs.