Last year I was asked if I could teach English to five people who worked at the Crisis Management Center in the municipality (town hall). My main focus was on my school last year; so I did not have any time to start teaching adult English lessons. Then when the school year started in September, we were working on getting the library up and running. Then October came and here in Resen October is taken over by apples so I knew I could not start teaching then. But now it is November, and I have finally gotten the adult English classes started. I had my first lesson last week. There are 5 people (4 gentlemen and 1 lady) and they all have different levels of English. One gentleman lived in Ohio until he was in 2nd grade. He can speak very well, but does not remember how to write. Another gentleman has taken seminars and classes. Another gentleman, the one who approached me to start teaching these lessons, lived in Australia until he was 4 or 5. He said that then he just knew English and did not know any Macedonian; and then his family moved to Macedonia and he lost all the English he once knew. It is also funny because he is married to one of the English teachers at the other primary school in Resen. And the other gentleman and lady do not know much if any English. In school they all learned French, because that was the main language they needed to know back then, but now they realize that English is more useful to know than French.
Our classes are once a week for an hour. Peace Corps has a manual on how to teach English to adults; and they also have a workbook to go along with it. When I walked in the room, all of my "good "students were ready to learn with their workbooks. I try to speak only English or mostly English during our classes. Last week we started with the basics: hello, good morning, good afternoon, good evening, good night, and good bye. After they learned the greetings, we started with the alphabet and then went on to personal pronouns and the verb "to be" (I am, you are, he is, etc.). By the time I got through those ,I started to notice that they, just like children, were getting a little restless. So we ended the class there. This week we will pick up where we left off and start learning "where are you from?" and the names of some other countries. We had a good time and I am excited to continue it.
Our classes are once a week for an hour. Peace Corps has a manual on how to teach English to adults; and they also have a workbook to go along with it. When I walked in the room, all of my "good "students were ready to learn with their workbooks. I try to speak only English or mostly English during our classes. Last week we started with the basics: hello, good morning, good afternoon, good evening, good night, and good bye. After they learned the greetings, we started with the alphabet and then went on to personal pronouns and the verb "to be" (I am, you are, he is, etc.). By the time I got through those ,I started to notice that they, just like children, were getting a little restless. So we ended the class there. This week we will pick up where we left off and start learning "where are you from?" and the names of some other countries. We had a good time and I am excited to continue it.
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