Around the World in 90 Minutes

The first day of teaching 8 of my 11 elementary students is over and it was not as scary as I anticipated. It's always a bit difficult (not to say terrifying) planning lessons without knowing exactly who you are planning for. The students are familiar with the classroom -- they've gone through a starter course so they know the rules and procedures quite well. They were not very excited but not overtly bored either. When I tried to engage them in a discussion about what they wanted out of their English lessons, they shrugged and said that their commander told them to come so they come. It proves they are good military men but perhaps not highly motivated learners. The topic of the day was 'countries and nationalities'. They all knew an impressive number of countries. One of the tasks had groups of four plan a trip around the world. They had to specify where they were going, what they would do there, how much it would cost and how long it would take. Group A: First they'd spend a week in Bali, then two years in Qatar studying the Koran, then two years in Israel to train with Mossad, then a month in Spain because one of the senior guys likes Messi and wants to do a photoshoot and have a conversation with him. Then they'd have a month in Portugal relaxing and visiting Nossa Senhora do Rosario da Fatima. And then they'd fly back to Timor Leste, via Singapore. It would cost $100M and take 8 years. Group B: This group would go to Bali for a week and visit Lake Toba. Then one of them (George) would fly off to Singapore to close a business deal (the others would keep relaxing in Sumatra). When George got back from his shady dealings, they'd go to Washington D.C. and Ronald would arrange a private meeting with Barack Obama, in which he'd arrange to have a big plane especially for Timor Leste. This would take $15M and take a month. Other Observations: They told me they want lots of speaking practice and information about topical countries, people and events. I noticed they had trouble differentiating between 'sh', 's' and '-tch' sounds. Air conditioning makes them shiver.