English Trainers wanted: Mönchengladbach August 3 through October 22, 2009

[Torsten]

We are looking for English trainers for the following course.

Location: Mönchengladbach
Dates: August 3 through October 22
Times: 7:30 until 3 pm every day, 9 lessons per 45 minutes from Monday through Friday
Purpose: preparation for EfB LCCI, Level I

The group is very small -- there are only 5 to 9 participants and you will have a course book to work with. You can share the course with other English Team Trainers. This means, you can do any number of days or weeks, preferably at least two days in a row over the entire period of time or at least for more than two weeks.

For more information, please contact me here on the forum or via email.

Many thanks,
Torsten
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[Mich111]

Hi Torsten,
I'll send an email to you as well, but I'd like to take part of this, if not all. Need to work out a place to stay - any ideas?

Michelle

[Scott Graham]

Hi Michelle,
Let me introduce myself I am Scott Graham, part of the ‘English Team’. I will be co-ordinating the cover for our courses for the time being. I did a course in MGB at the beginning of this year and do have some suggestions for places to stay. We aim to share the course between 2 maybe 3 trainers as it’s always good for the group. I will keep you informed.
Best regards
Scott
_________________
By learning you will teach; by teaching you will learn.

[Mich111]

Hi Scott,
Thanks for your reply & glad to hear you have some places to stay in mind. Can I contact you over Email to discuss the coordination of this? Since it commences 3 August and just a few weeks from now, I'm looking to make a decision about dates/my availability within the next week.

Many Thanks!
Michelle

[Scott Graham]

Hi Michelle,
of course I will keep in touch with you via email, and I will let you know A.S.A.P. about any dates.

Regards
Scott
_________________
By learning you will teach; by teaching you will learn.

[Sushma1982]

Hi Torsten,

I am an English trainer and wanted to do this course in Mönchengladbach. I got a mail today that the couse has been cancelled. I missed a great oppurtunity to work with your team however I found this informative website.

I look forward to working with your team in the near future.

Regards
Sushma

[Scott Graham]

Hi all,
I was the trainer on the last course here in MGB, anyone wants or needs any info. or advice please feel free to let me know
Scott
_________________
By learning you will teach; by teaching you will learn.

[Torsten]

Hello Sushma,

Many thanks for your great interest in working with us in Moenchengladbach. Would you need accommation there or will you be commuting from and to Duesseldorf?

Best regards,
Torsten
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Test Of English for International Communication
TOEIC Preparation & TOEIC Vocabulary

[Sushma1982]

Dear Torsten,

I would like to commute from Düsseldorf.

Regards
Sushma

[Roberto]

Hello everyone,

now I am back in Leipzig again, because my son and my girl-friend wanted me to come back at the weekend. Well, there was an important event to celebrate here: my son is beginning school next week.
I started the new small group in Mönchengladbach at the WBS training centre. It is a motivated, kind group that consists of three ladies from this NRW-region and three other participants of foreign descent (one Serbian middle-aged man and his wife of Asian origin and a Chinese lady).
I'll summarize the main issues I covered last week.

1. Bettina Henri introduced me first to the group and I introduced her as well. She painted on a piece of paper the most important points of my and her career.
2. Then the group introduced the different participants to us, also in the same form.
3. I started out the English lesson by doing some simple exercises about spelling and grammar. The goal was to make them aware of the variety of sounds and spelling possibilities in the English language, e.g.: break, brake, mail, male; or: unit, but, sure, rule, curd; bird, sill, city, receive etc.
4. On the first day we did not have any book, that's why I gave them an introduction of the basic grammar they will have to deal with in the run of the course: simple and continuous tenses; the range of pronouns; comparison of adjectives; irregular verbs; count versus uncount nouns; adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions, idiomatic expressions, phasal verbs. Most of them have got a solid grammar foundation already and are all willing to improve their language skills.
5. On the second day, Mrs. Henri dealt out the books to the class. She lent me an exemplar too, of course. We revised the main basic grammar aspects covered on Monday: verbs in the simple and continuous form, the ending -s/-es in the 3.person singular present simple and the ending -s/-es for the plural forms of nouns. Irregular plural nouns: children, oxen, women, men, wives, mice, lice etc. The possessive pronouns: my, your, his/her/its, our, your, their. Homophones: hour and our, heir and air; the mute h: honesty, heir, hour. Construction of some feminine nouns: lioness, princess, tigress.
6. On the other three days we went through the first two units of the book "New Headway English Course" (Pre-Intermediate): Getting to know you, social expressions. Explanation of the use of some of these expressions used in the book. Words with more than one meaning: book (verb and noun); words with a different stress: import as a verb /impó:Rt/ versus import as a noun /ímpo:Rt/.
- questions, question words; tenses: present, past and future. Do/does/did.
- describing countries: we watched interesting videos about some English-speaking countries: Canada, USA, New Zealand, Australia, South Africa, Scotland, Ireland, England.
- the importance of collocations. We had a look at some online English dictionaries with pronunciation files.
- modal verbs (can, may, could, should, must), auxiliary verbs: the verbs "to be" and "to have got"/"to have". Do/does/did
- main differences between past simple and perfect. The use of "some" versus "any". Count and uncount nouns.
- creating new words: abstract nouns; common suffixes: -ness, -th, -ty, -ation, -ition, - sion, - tion etc. For example: long> length; wide > width; true> truth; competitive > competitivity; explain > explanation; rude> rudeness; persuade > persuasion
- what is English and what is German?: a brief contrastive study of both grammars.
- we did some online english-test-net exercises (Business English, elementary level)
- some "tricky" words such as: leave and let; lend and borrow; tall/high/big/large/great; false friends, synonyms, antonyms, homophones.
- for and since (perfect)
- phrasal verbs: break down, break up; get up, stand up; look up; etc.
- vocabulary lists: some vegetables and fruits; parts of the body (exercises in the class);parts of a house; some important countries and nationalities; members of a family etc.
- business vocabulary regarding one's career and legal business vocab.
- the -ing ending with verbs
- several listening exercises (book, online exercises, songs such as Born in the USA, if you don't know me by now etc. ).

I'll revise lots of the aspects covered last week on Monday.

More details on this course will be coming soon.

Regards,

Roberto
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Learn more about: Roberto Enrique Steffens Villarreal

[Torsten]

Hi Roberto,

Thank you very much for your great work and your report which I have forwarded to Sfefan Volkmann who is going to take over from you on Wednesday. Stefan will be visiting WBS on Tuesday afternoon so you'll have a chance to meet and talk.

Best regards,
Torsten
_________________
Test Of English for International Communication
TOEIC Preparation & TOEIC Vocabulary

[Scott Graham]

Hi Torsten and Roberto,
I spoke with Stefan on Sunday, he just asked me for some tips regarding this course. I gave him a little advice based on my knowledge of working with the WBS in MGB, but advised him he should register with the forum so he can read these updates. Of course it's even better now that he will meet up with Roberto.
So that just leaves me to welcome Stefan to our team, and I hope he has as much fun teaching as I do.
Kindest regards
Scott
_________________
By learning you will teach; by teaching you will learn.

[Stefan_V]

Hello to everyone, and thank you all very much for your kind welcome, it has been a pleasure to speak with Torsten & Scott over the phone, many thanks for their help and advice, and to get the chance to meet Roberto in person here in Mönchengladbach today.

I have also had the chance to meet the group briefly this afternoon, and as Roberto says they all seem extremely pleasant, and I look forward to working with them. Tomorrow I think I shall focus on revising topics Roberto has covered already with the group over the last week or so, so that I can ascertain their level of English and any specific areas that may require improvement. I'll let you know how I am getting on with the group towards the end of the week, and if I have any problems I'll let you know.

Many thanks again for all of your help to this point, and for your kind greetings.

Regards

Stefan Volkmann

[Stefan_V]

Hello to all.

Just thought I'd drop you a quick update on how we've been getting on in beautiful Mönchengladbach, and some of the topics we have covered.

My first three days from Wednesday 12/08 to Friday 14/08 were spent largely familiarising myself with the group and trying to ascertin exactly what level they were at. We looked briefly at grammatical structures that they had already covered (detailed in Robert's post above). We started to consolidate use of the simpler tenses esp. present simple and past simplem and looked at irregular forms of verbs (2nd col). We also focused on some activities specifically tailored to the work-place, such as a job interview role play in which we brainstormed topics that are typically covered in job interviews (skills, experience, motivation etc). We then developed those through exercises and group work, and then finally the students did mock 'interviews' with one another. During the course of a game of 'hangman' I also noticed that many students had difficulties with the pronunciation of specific letters in the alphabet in English, so we revised this and did exercises around this theme. On request from students, we also did some work on specific vowel sounds, /a:/ and /ae/. We also worked from the course book, completing a few reading and vocabulary exercises not covered last week.

Monday 17/08

We started briefly revising vocab from the previous week with a team vocabulary game, which helped to get students thinking again in English after their weekend off. We then look at money, and specifically how to use different amounts of money and vocabulary relating to money, especially as used in the workplace and in a business environment. This moved into a wider class discussion of money in society, and ended in a role play whereby each student took on a different persona with different attitudes to money, and had to argue their case to the other students. We finished by doing a listening exercise.

Tuesday 18/08

Began with some fairly simple warm ups focusing on building vocabulary in a specific area, in this case leisure activities. I then went onto revise the present progressive tense using Youtube (I am sailing by Rod Stewart!). However the students seemed unfamiliar with the tense and were very poor on the structural knowledge, so I gave more time than expected on reinforcing the structures and uses of the tense. The day ended with a listening and comprehension piece about a murder story, and then a class discussion on the impact of mobile phones on society.

Wednesday 19/08

We began with vocabulary building and class discusison on modes on transport, and how transport is used in society (whether it is better to commute or drive etc.) We then talked about expressing the time and date in English, specifically different forms used in British and American English, and what forms would be used in a business context. This lead into prepositions of time, which we covered in the afternoon. After that, we looked at some reading exercises from the book as well as some grammatical exercises to revise what had been covered earlier in the week.

Thursday 20/08

In the morning we looked at shopping vocabulary, and did some role plays on buying things and typical dialogues used in these situations. This lead into a discussion of prices and the value of money, incorporating some elements from the course book. Used this to lead into a revision of comparatives and superlatives, and did some online exercises practising these. In the afternoon we revise vocabulary from the past week with a couple of vocabulary games. We then focused on some pronunication work, on the pronunciaiton of the -ed endings of works, as it was something that the students had noticeably been struggling with.

Friday 21/08

We focused largely on grammar today. In the morning we briefly revised countable/uncountable nouns, and then moved into when to use no articles/indefinite article/definite article. In the afternoon we introduced the past progressive tense, focused on the structure and use and did some of the exercises in the book.

Monday 24/08

Started with revision of the previous week, firstly in the form of a vocab test and then by going over some of the grammar aspects discussed esp. past progressive from Friday. Students then produced a piece of written work on an interesting day in the life, to practice use of past simple and past progressive. We then started a new unit in the book dealing future plans and ambitions, and looked at typical verb patters like 'want to', 'like/love doing', 'would like/love to' etc.

Tuesday 25/08

Started class with an actiivty pracitising the use of comparatives/superlatives in a business speaking scenario. Students were given a sheet giving a number of criteria for a company’s ‚away day’ and they had to decide which away day was best by comparing the various options. We then went a little further in the book, talking about building on yesterdays work and looking at 'going to w/will' forms for talking about the future. In the afternoon we looked at a crossword on finance/banking vocabulary, and revised unfamiliar vocabulary that arose. We finished the day looking at the Notting Hill carnival which is coming up at the weekend, building vocabulary to do with the carnival and events generally, and finally the students produced their own piece of writing on a local carnival.

All in all they are a really nice class, the atmosphere in the class is relaxed and there is a good rapport. They have different weaknesses and strengths, but they are all extremely motivated and by and large are making good progress. Happy for suggestions / comments.

Cheers

Stefan

[Scott Graham]

Hi Stefan,
It looks like you had a great start there in MGB, at the WBS centre. As you know I have also been involved in past courses their and think it's a great place to work, with very helpful and friendly managers. I'm really interested to see what you've done over the last week or so, and will wait with anticipation for your report.

Kindest regards

Scott, Leipzig
_________________
By learning you will teach; by teaching you will learn.