We are looking for English language trainers who want to take part in the following training project:
TOEIC prep course
location: Nordhausen
period: October 6 through December 14, 2009
time: from 7:30 am to 3 pm, (8 units 45 minutes each), Monday through Friday
purpose: preparation to take the TOEIC Test
The group consists of about 10 people who want to increase their job chances by improving their English. The course is funded by the labour agency.
If you are interested, please contact us here on the forum.
Hi Torsten,
As soon as I return from my holiday at the end of October, I would like to be involved in this course. After a 3 week holiday I will be itching to get back to work and of course I’m familiar with the centre as well as Nordhausen itself.
kindest regards
Scott
Many thanks for the additional offer of the work in Nordhausen. Although i would really appreciate the extra longer work, I am actually moving flat on that very day, 6th October, and of course then there will be the exhastive process of settling in, so the Magdeburg work if still available, would still be my preferred choice.
But in addition to my previous message, my move etc will all be sorted and ok by monday 12th October. I still very much hope to have the Magdeburg work starting on 2nd November, but i have nothing at all booked for October - so if a job share on this one were workable and practical, then i would be delighted to offer Monday 12th through to Friday 30th October.
Many thanks for that. Have you checked the other Nordhausen course reports for accommodation and other useful information? I’ll be starting the course tomorrow and will let you know the plan for next week. So far, there is only Scott and me booked for this course but Scott returns from holiday only early November so I look forward to sharing the work with at least one more trainer.
Please watch this space.
Regards,
Torsten[YSaerTTEW443543]
TOEIC listening, photographs: A stork nest[YSaerTTEW443543]
I’ve just sent you invites for Nordhausen for October 26 and 27 and November 23 through 25. Along with the pay rate. I’ll post an update with my weekly report soon.
Many thanks,
Torsten[YSaerTTEW443543]
TOEIC listening, photographs: A green valley[YSaerTTEW443543]
Ill be taking a short break after the end of the Mönchengladbach job but would be available from Monday 9th November for this job. I’d be delighted to work in Nordhausen, please let me know if you need me.
Many thanks for the two offers for this post. I have already replied with a “yes” to the October invites. With the November dates, I was just wondering what your plans were for the Magdeburg work ? If i were to accept the November dates for Nordhausen, would that get in the way of me being able to do the Magdeburg assignment for you, or do you have other plans for that ?
I’ll await your response Torsten - and I with this being important to me, i will be online tomorrow. Thanks, Noel
Thank you very much for your swift response. I really appreciate that, especially since you are now moving house. As for the Magdeburg course, it hasn’t been confirmed yet so we haven’t made any plans regarding the schedule. At any rate, Scott and I would like to share our courses with you.
I’ve booked you in for Nordhausen October 26 and 27 and as soon as Magdeburg gets confirmed I’ll send your email invites with the dates.
So tomorrow I’m jetting off for my voyage visiting London, Brunei, Dubai and Australia.
Even though i have no intention of making it a ‘Busman’s’ holiday, I will possibly still stay active on the forum when I have the chance. I wish you all lots of fun with this new group and hope all the new plans are productive, I will watch this thread with great interest.
A quick note for Noel, when you’re in Nordhausen I strongly recommend staying at ‘Pension Lapp’. It’s cheap and no-thrills but very well equipt for a short stay and its also only 20 minutes walk to the training centre. Please find the link below:
Hi Torsten or Scott,
In preparation for the work i have booked here for next week starting wednesday, I was wondering if you could specify what book/s are being used here. It is vital for me to have time to both purchase the necessary materials and go through them carefully beforehand. I think i read in a previous mail somewhere that this was an A2 class ?? Would that then be the second book in the Fairway series ?..or what ? Advice here would be much appreciated. Thanks, Noel
Hello Scott, Noel, Richard and all English-Team trainers,
Our new Nordhausen group is a brilliant group consisting of 3 men and four women. They are different ages and have different professional background but they all have one common goal: They want to find a new job and that’s why they are practicing and improving their English with us. To gauge their current level of English we took the ‘Mini TOEIC test’ from this book: TOEIC Bridge Book
There are 100 multiple-choice questions in that test and here are results:
One person scored 84.
One learner scored about 70 points.
Two members scored about 60 points.
Two scored about 40 points.
This means that team work and an individual approach are vital to every team member’s success. Here is a run down of what have covered so far: english-team.com/Getting_to_know_each_other.pdf
Noel, on Wednesday please be prepared to answer a few questions the group will ask you about you, your job and your life in Germany. When I introduced English-Team last week, I put your name and Scott’s name on the blackboard so the group know that you are part of our team. Also, please continue working with ‘Business Basics’ and concentrate on the basics such as the alphabet, the numbers, the question words, the time, basic prepositions, etc.
I’ll have the group answer the following questionnaire which I’ll give you tomorrow: english-team.com/Learners_Profile.pdf
Torsten (one of the group members) is going to pick up on Wednesday morning. See you tomorrow.
We have been progressing through the business basics book and i have occasionally been tieing that in with corresponding exercises in the Murphy book 1, e.g. page 19 in the business basics book corresponds to unit 38 in the Murphy. Plenty of games have been thrown in but this group, largely being older has not responded so enthusiatically to games as the younger groups have. There have been some really peaceful contented moments for instance when we have been going through the Fairway book 1. Even though for some this has been very easy indeed, there is something about the pace, the content and the colours etc that this group takes to very well indeed. And indeed although the early parts of the book may be too easy for the middle ranking learners, the end would be a challenge for most.
Klaus popped his head around the door on thursday morning to say that he was dropping out because he has found a job ( he wasn’t here wednesday so that was the first time we met ), and because of illness etc, today is the first time the remainig 6 have been all together. The group dynamic today has been positive. However, this is an older group and i have found that they repsond vey well to a personal gentle approach - this group has been around the block too many times to be inspired by group games which younger groups might respond enthusiastically. They have enjoyed most personal stories from me about life in england, or personal narratives i have to tell about life in general. As an example of how the group operates, the most humorous moment was as an exercise in talking about companies, we had to create a company, name its directors, state its mission etc. We have two teams, the duck team and the garden team, and the duck team said they were called the duck company, their founder and managing director was Donald Duck, and they produced rubber ducks for the bathtub !! The class broke down in to prolonged hysteria at the self obsessed narcissim of this theoretical company.
The main purpose of the course is the business basics book, but then the Fairway enjoys second place, and least enjoyed is the Murphy. The group also very much enjoys the game of pelmanism, and another game they responded well to was one i made up myself, whereby each team finds five words for the other team to spell out loud correctly. They also respond well to stand up walk around activities.
Good morning Noel, how are things with you and the group in Nordhausen today? Thank you very much for your great work and your detailed report. It’s good that you did a lot of team work activities and had the group create their own companies. Please tell them to prepare a short presentation of their companies, products, tag line, target markets, price strategy, distribution channels, etc. for me tomorrow.
Also, please remind them of the project work we are going to start this week.
Regards,
Torsten[YSaerTTEW443543]
We had a very successful day today where i finally seemed to tap into what this group really wants - which is hard concrete grammar ! They want substance - not so much games and fun. It was last night while looking through what might be appropriate for today, when i came across a really weak and poor presentation of grammar in the business basics book.
It was so bad it had my brain in knots never mind a learner ! I took to thinking of an independant presentation of the words “much” and “many” - but in fact added on to that was “some” and “any”. The day started with presentation of countable and uncountable nouns. We then had a game or something and i then taught the word “much” as an uncountable. This took some time, but eventually the learners understood the concept. We then did some othe material, probably the fairway book, and then came back to “many” which as a countable was far easier to understand.
Then it was lunch, and after that we dealt with “any” and all its possibilities, and then finally “some”. I had concentrated on the comparison of much and many, and then the contrasting usage of some and any. There was much throwing of the ball and asking each other questions and prompting the appropriate either negative or positive answer - any or some.
The time taken from first presentation of uncountable nouns to the cross comparison of all four words was actrually most of the working day. But we finally got to the weak area of the business basics book and all learners sailed through it with no problems at all. A great success ! A day well worth repeating. And the group REALLY appreciated me stepping outside the course books and taking control of an aspect of the language personally. They were very responsive and mutually helpful, and where one learner had not 100% understood the concept, the permameters or the process, then other more advanced learners would step in and explain thoroughly in german what i had given in english.
They REALLY appreciated it and the day ended with warm smiles and farewells till next monday.
Here is a rundown of what we have covered in the past few days:
review of the alphabet
personal pronouns, possessive adjectives, object pronouns
countable vs. uncountable nouns, some/any, much/many (Thank you, Noel for explaining this to the group – it was easy for me to do the review!)
translation of the following text (I gave the group this text in German and they had to translate it into English: Bill Gates is the founder of Microsoft.
He is also the main programmer.
His wife works for the company as marketing director.
Microsoft creates two new software programs every year and sells them to customers from around the world.
The company creates its products in the USA.
They also employ the services of programmers in India.
Bill Gates and his wife live in a house in the centre of Nordhausen, not far from their office.
They are not often there because they both travel a lot.
How do they relax?
I do yoga and my wife plays chess says Bill.
At the weekends they play golf together and eat out at local restaurants with their children.
I work as a purchasing coordinator in an international company which assembles bicycles for Western European countries. Usually my workdays are all the same. I wake up at 7 o’clock, eat my breakfast and prepare myself for work. I start at 8 o’clock with reading emails and answering these related to the most urgent matters.
During my working hours I often have meetings where I discuss with my staff all short- and long-term issues which we need to focus on. I try to end at 4 p.m. but since many things happen each day sometimes it’s very, very difficult.
I find my job very interesting and that is mainly because of the fact that it gives a great opportunity to meet a lot of interesting people - not only from Poland - but from all over the world.
And how about you people? What do you do?
Rgs,
M.)
have got vs. have
Business Basics pp 28/29
introduction to the English tense system (time vs. tense, German tenses vs. English tenses, which tenses are most frequently used?)
Noel, can you please do the following with the group:
review of the simple present (positive statements, questions and negative) – please use the Murphy Grammar book
review of the alphabet
the numbers from 0 to 100
giving phone numbers
telling the time
the days of the week
the months
Also, if possible please give an introduction to the International Phonetic Alphabet and phonetic transcription symbols used in German/English, English/German dictionaries. You might also want to use some elements of music teaching to teach pronunciation, stress and intonation.
On Monday a new person will join the group. At this point this is all information I have. As you know, Peter will fetch you from the Lapps on Monday morning.
