April 25, Wednesday 四月二十五日星期三 - B Day

I was absent again for B-day. Didn't mean to, just received a call from the daycare that my son was sick and threw up. I had to ask to leave to pick up my son and take care of him. Therefore, the 8th period students didn't learn the words that 3rd period students learned last time. They just watched the video named Children of Hangzhou.

April 24, Tuesday 四月二十四日星期二 - A Day

For 1st and 2nd period students, we learned new words today with PQA, whiteboards, and a standing-up game until most of students can tell their English meanings. We also did the 'dictionary form' the front page - first 5 words.

社shè 區qū = community, , neighborhood

太tài 鬧nào 了le = too annoying, too loud, too bustling

太tài 吵chǎo 了le = too noisy, too loud

安ān 靜jìng = quiet, silent

安ān 全quán = safe, secure

方fāng 便biàn = convenient, available

不bú 錯cuò = not bad, nice, good

And the 3rd period students we also learned new words today with PQA and whiteboard. After that we watched the video named Children of HangZhou.

April 23, Monday 四月二十三星期一 - B Day

When I was ready for work, I found that my son had a fever, so I took a day off to take care of him. Therefore, 8th period students were asked to watch a video and to trace Chinese characters.

April 20, Friday 四月二十日星期五 - A Day

Today it was early out. Short classtime but so slack-off students. I had to get out of classroom to calm down at the 1st period because students took AT LEAST about 20-30 minutes to make their 3 pages into 24 small flashcards. I didn't give them scissors and would like them to do this task on hands as I thought it would be faster without using scissors. To my surprise and I was really shocked, it took them so long. I had to say that I was so frustrated that I had to get out of the classroom to take a deep breath. So you can tell our 65 minutes class time and there were 20-30 minutes at least on making the flashcards. Well, anyway, after the flashcards, we played games with them. Students received extra points when they won over the game.

April 19, 2012 Thursday 四月十九日星期四 - B Day

8th period students went to Syracuse Elementary to help them get rid of weed in their garden. Most of students greatly helped and worked hard while a couple of students were naughty and mean to their good friends such as kicking the friend's injured angle. As a teacher I had to admit that 8th period students are friends to one another and this made the instructions a little bit hard to deliver or across to their mind/brain because seems they paid more attention to their friends than the teacher and than the language.
After we visited Syracuse Elementary, we used whiteboards to practice sentences with the words we learned.

Gage 很hěn 懶lǎn 惰duò
Gage不bù 打dǎ 掃sǎo 他tā 的de 房fáng 間jiān
Gage的de 房fáng 間jiān 很hěn 髒zāng
Gage的de 媽mā 媽mā 要yào Carrick打dǎ 掃sǎo 他tā 的de 房fáng 間jiān
Gage打dǎ 掃sǎo 他tā 的de 房fáng 間jiān
現xiàn 在zài Gage 的de 房fáng 間jiān 很hěn 整zhěng 齊qí

April 18, 2012, Wednesday 四月十八日星期三 -- A Day

Today 3 periods had their 3 different activities and content.

1st period - After Luke and Alex did their calendar introduction, we set the class into 2 groups. One group did the time reading and the other did the time writing. We first set the group who did the time reading into pairs. Partner A read aloud the story about Andy想要體格健壯 in 3 minutes and then Partner B read it to PartnerA. After 3 minutes, they needed to work on finishing reading it in 2.5 minutes and then 2 minutes. While the time-reading group was reading, the time-write group was using the laptop to type and create their story. The only request is they had to use the words we learned in the past two weeks. Oh, by the way, Ren did his calendar presentation at the end and won the whole class applause. 15 minutes before the class dismissed, we learned some new words -
特tè 別bié = special
別bié 的de = other
痛tòng = hurt, ache
疼téng = hurt, ache
肚dǔ 子zǐ = stomache, belly

2nd period - we went to Syracuse Elementary to do some activities with Mr. Law's students who are Chinese immersion program. First, Mr. Law and I sat in front of the classroom, Mr. Law explained and demonstrated what we were going to do. He drew my head, eyes, nose, and ears on his paper and I did his on mine. And then we assigned one of my students to one or two elementary students and they were assigned to draw one another just like what Mr. Law and I did. After the drawings, our students helped them with math like 3+2=? Since we didn't come back until 20 minutes before the class dismissed. Plus after we came back, we discussed a little bit about the activities we did in the elementary and would like to have some feedback from them to improve our future plans. Therefore, we didn't have much time to do what 1st period students. However, we had Tommy, Alex, Amina, and Scott do their calednar presentation.

3rd period - we used the flashcards today. We set students as pairs. First students studied their flashcards for 3 minutes, and then Partner A and B took turn to quiz each other via flashcards in 5 minutes. Partner A showed Partner B flashcards one by one. When he/she showed one, he had to read the word aloud to his/her partner, and the partner had to say what the word means in English. If the partner didn't know the word then he needed to say "不bù 知zhī 道dào " and Partner A had to tell Partner B what it mean and put the flashcard aside for later use. If they got it right, they earned an extra point for that word. And then Partner B's turn. After both are done, students had another 5 minutes to review the words they don't know or not familiar with, and then we did it again in 3 minutes. After that, we used whiteboards to review the words we've learned in the past two weeks. The reason we reviewed it because we didn't reach the goal that 80% of students are able to recognize the English meaning of 80% of words we've learned. We used sentences such as the follwing sentences --
Carrick很hěn 懶lǎn 惰duò
Carrick不bù 打dǎ 掃sǎo 他tā 的de 房fáng 間jiān
Carrick的de 房fáng 間jiān 很hěn 亂luàn
Carrick的de 房fáng 間jiān 很hěn 髒zāng
Carrick的de 媽mā 媽mā 要yào Carrick打dǎ 掃sǎo 他tā 的de 房fáng 間jiān
Carrick打dǎ 掃sǎo 他tā 的de 房fáng 間jiān
現xiàn 在zài Carrick的de 房fáng 間jiān 很hěn 乾淨jìng
Carrick的de 房fáng 間jiān 也yě 很hěn 整zhěng 齊qí
Patrick很hěn 勤qín 勞láo
Patrick整zhěng 天tiān 做zuò 運yùn 動dòng
Patrick有yǒu 結jiē 實shí 的de 肌jī 肉ròu
Patrick體tǐ 格gé 健jiàn 壯zhuàng

我的未來不是夢Chinese Song lyric fill-in Package

Some students haven't turned in this package but lost it and asked for the package. Here it is. Please Here to access the Chinese song 我的未來不是夢 Fill-in package.