Evan- TS#5 (Bruce)

 So, this time around, I had not done my due diligence as a tutor. I did not come prepared for this session and I had actual goals for my student, Bruce. I cobbled together a short passage from a book I had been reading to act as an impromptu listening assignment, but I did not prepare questions beforehand, nor did I help him understand the material I was reading from. It, as can likely be anticipated, did not go over well, at all. Not only did Bruce naturally not understand the material, it had no context in which to be understood, making it even more bizarre for a learner. Luckily it was at this point, Bruce realized I was going to continue working on listening with him, however he was fairly confident in that respect, and it showed. When I had a good plan for him, something to work with, he took to the material quickly. He also has no problems understanding me, outside of when I do a poor job communicating. Bruce told me that he would rather work on grammar, citing that as his major shortcoming. In hindsight, he is completely correct and I really should have picked up on his poor grammar and honed in on it more. He speaks in fractured sentences and often in the incorrect tense. He brought out some work on noun clauses, but we only reviewed the relative pronouns before our session was over. All in all, I should and could have been more prepared and receptive to my learner's weak areas.

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