Julia TP #10

Yesterday, I used part of the material for my Speaking Lesson Plan, the Interview part, with my tutee, Divino. We started with a reading exercise. I had brought these two short interviews of local people, that is, Tallahasseans, one woman and one man. With the first one, I asked him to pose the questions, and I answered as the woman. In the second one I pretended to be the interviewer and he read the answers of the interviewee. Divino’s reading skills have become so much better, however, he still tends to pronounce some past participles/simple past tense incorrectly, an example would be “picked”. Instead of just reading it in one syllable, he adds a second-one: pick-ed, so that before we continued with the interviews, that is, before we started with the real Speaking Lesson, our own interview process, I reminded him of the following:

Pronunciation of –ed

If the final consonant of the root is “voiceless” (k, p, s, f, sh, ch, …) the –ed sounds like –t: looked = look + t.

If it is “voiced” (g, b, z, v, …) the –ed sounds like –d: cleaned = clean + d.

After t and d it is pronounced as –ed (with the –e sounding indistinct): needed = need + ed.

The interview, which I had prepared for the Speaking Lesson, included, among other thing, the following questions:

-       Do you have any special talents or interests? (Please share something that is unique about you, what you like, a special talent, etc.)

-       When I was 10 years old, I wanted to be…(Think back to your childhood. What were your dreams and aspirations?)

-       What I want to learn to do…(Learning is lifelong. Is there something still on your list that you want to learn to do?)

-       Etc.