Jena University Graduates

ESL Projects English Team Trainers
1

Dear Georgeta and Ian,

Here is some information on the two week intensive English course for Jena university graduates.
time: Monday through Friday from 8 am to 4 pm (they have a one hour lunch break)
number of students: 14 (aged 20 to 29, about 8 women and 6 men)
majors: most of the graduates majored in social studies, psychology, linguistics, history, some have technical backgrounds such as IT, biotech and logistics
purpose and objectives: help the learners prepare for a job at an international company, create their CV/resume/professional profile in English, compose business correspondence in English, have a job interview, write job applications, negotiate basic contracts, make telephone calls, learn cultural information, get a better idea of what the job market is like within the EU

Please note that as of now the only handouts/materials available are the Reader (which you have a copy of) and ‘In Company, Intermediate’ or ‘In Company, Upper-Intermediate’ (however, the school has the books only, they don’t have the audio materials).

Some (if not most) of the students had already several days of English with English-Team (one day with me and the rest of the days with Alexander Larie from Canada).

We can discuss the rest in our Skype session.
Many thanks,
Torsten[YSaerTTEW443543]

TOEIC listening, talks: A tour guide is welcoming her guests[YSaerTTEW443543]

2

Agenda for Skype meeting:

  • assessment test
  • methods and techniques (dictogloss, role play/pair work, project work, presentation, interview, listening comprehension)
  • ideas and structure for project work
  • reporting and documentation
  • equipment and materials[YSaerTTEW443543]

TOEIC listening, talks: An entrepreneur is talking about how to start a business[YSaerTTEW443543]

3

Hello Torsten and Ian!

This was the first day of the Jena course. I can call myself lucky to have such great students. There were 11 students, 10 women and a man. 3 were absent. They are highly-motivated and have a quite good English knowledge.

After I introduced myself and the English Team, they introduced themselves without my having to ask questions. I prepared a short PP presentation about Romania and I told them they would have to prepare one themselves, as Torsten suggested.

-asked them to list 5 strong/ weak points when they are using English;
-presented them the content of the course and asked them to mention what else they consider it should be done/ clarified during the 2 weeks.

-they interviewed their partner, as a role play activity and this gave me the opportunity not only to spot out some common grammar mistakes but also to discuss with them issues like voice tonality, body position, mood, etc.

-we discussed then the importance of speaking more than one language and the opportunities offered by knowing a foreign language when trying to find a job;

-Past Tense of regular and irregular verbs including the changes, such as, tidy-tidied, cry-cried, etc. or the pronunciation for read-read-read.

  • Present Perfect v.s. Past Tense and we solved all the exercises in the booklet regarding Past Tense and Present Perfect;

-Who am I? (short texts with verbs in Present Perfect). They did a great job and guessed all the people who were stating different things about their lives.

  • They got a copy of both Europass CV and Language certificate and I asked them to try to decide what their level was. They are supposed to bring the sheets tomorrow and we will compare their language passport with the results of the assessment test;

-at this point, I would like to ask you kindly to give me a hand: give me a few more details about the evaluation process.

-most of them are familiar with spelling;

  • I told them that on Wednesday they would meet Ian, and tomorrow, in the last part of the course I will try to prepare them for the social and cultural issues they can discuss with Ian.

-more info tomorrow night.

Best wishes,
Georgeta

4

Hello Georgeta,

Thank you very much for doing such a great job in Jena. As for the evaluation process, I suggest you give the group our TOEIC test and then we use the following table: www.english-team.com/PDF/TOEIC_Can-do-t … R_2008.pdf

More on that in our Skype session.
Torsten[YSaerTTEW443543]

TOEIC listening, talks: Announcing special employee discounts on leisure services[YSaerTTEW443543]

5

Hello!

Thank you both for all the support and for the Skype conference.

Day 2, Tuesday.

Only 10 students today. One girl was absent because she was ill.

For 2 hours the students worked on the assessment test. They seemed very confused especially during the second part of the listening test. They need more listening activities.
Job interview (how to prepare themselves for the interview/ positive and negative aspects of a given interview/ what to say/do or not to say/not to do)
I gave them models of application letters and a list of useful phrases. For Friday they have to prepare their portfolio ( CV, letter of intention, language passport).
Exercises from the Reader( prepositions and pronouns)
Reading and rephrasing.
Speaking activities: Joyce as an Irish novelist, social ,political, religious issues. I tried to prepare them for tomorrow and have them ask questions about Ireland. Christine and Stephan confessed that they had a very hard time trying to read Ulysses.I don’t know if you consider it appropriate but maybe they could watch an Irish movie and we could come up with activities based on it. Just an idea.

I wish Ian a great day tomorrow and I look forward to reading the updates and suggestions tomorrow night.

Georgeta

6

Report from Jena. Date 27th October 2010.

Today was my first day working with this 2 week advanced English group.
The group consisted off all young energetic women and no men.
The atmospheres was absolutely electric with energy.
This group understands the fact that they have only 2 weeks to improve and prepare their English, so they are clearly hungry for the challenge.

The following is today’s activity list:

  • I introduced myself and told the students a little about my background and also about my country and why I am in Germany.
  • Introductions and small Q&A about each students academic and employment history.
  • Open questioning. After each student had explained in detail what specialised training they have completed, the other students were encouraged to questions the student for more information and also reasons behind their decisions.
  • The students then wrote down in English, the key elements of their professional career.
  • The students showed a very deep interest in economic and political factors governing the World.
    So we had a very productive and fascinating debate on the pros and cons of the capitalist system and communist system. We used China as an example.
    The students then wrote a small text on what they thought would be the perfect social system for a western European country.
    This was really designed to make them not only use the standard English as they have perfected already, but to think in English and to a build complete sentences and context, that conveys new ideas.
    This exercise really opened my eyes to the true and wonderful capabilities of these students.
    -After that I explained the Elevator Pitch night and its many positive benefits.
    The students then were given time to form ideas for their own elevator pitch.
    They weren’t finished, so they will do a stand up presentation next week when I am back.
    -Brain storming, developing an business idea and presenting the idea to a business and public audience.

This group was a real pleasure to work with today.
They simply need a lot of intense training and practice with the real practical business World.
Applying, interviewing and discussion relative topics to their industry.

A very interesting and beneficial day for all.
Good luck and have fun tomorrow Georgeta. !

Best wishes.
Ian

7

Hi Ian and thanks a lot for the update.

8

Hello Torsten and Ian!

Day 4, 28 October,2010.

Number of students: 7 (Steffi, Christin and Stefan were absent)

After we discussed the test results (including a very brief explanation of the CEFR levels) we clarified a few of the questions included in the listening test.

Making decisions followed. We solved the exercises on page 32-34 in Company Intermediate and we prepared for the next activity. As Torsten suggested, I gave them the following scenario: XYZ Co. has decided to introduce English as corporate language. The students used very successfully the phrases for business meetings and the atmosphere was absolutely great. They all supported their positions with stong arguments. This exercise gave us also the opportunity to learn a little more about the business ‘etiquette’.
‘We will/ We are going to use English as the corporate language?’
In order to remember the situations in which the two ways of expressing future are used, we solved the exercises 18-20 in the English Reader.

After we made the decision, there was need to communicate it and we chose to use the phone. The students used the phrases for making phone calls and we solved the exercises on page 28-29 in Company Intermediate.

Because the students seemed a little bit tired,I didn’t want to introduce the dictogloss activity. I will do it tomorrow during the morning hours. Instead, we went on with an activity, which had an interesting outcome. They got the following scenario: A businessman, who has never been to Germany before, contacts you and asks for advice. They had to make a list of 15 things to do/ not to do while in Germany. This activity besides being fun, triggered the students’ interest on cross cultural issues.

I wish you both a nice day tomorrow and a great weekend ahead.

Georgeta

9

Torsten, you asked us to post a few ideas for next week.

  • business strategies (an introduction)
  • advertisement (create a successful advertisement for your company; design a logo; )
  • how to handle business crisis?
    -keys to success (both personal and company)

I don’t know what is your opinion on watching a movie and create speaking, writing activities.

10

Hi Georgeta and Ian,

First of all I’d like to thank you very much for all your ideas, contributions and suggestions. It’s obvious you are excited about improving our coaching techniques and materials and creating move value for our customers.

As for next week, in addition to the proposals in the spreadsheets I suggest you introduce the group to the 30/30 Challenge: english-test.net/forum/ftopi … _challenge

You can give them the main ideas orally and tell the students that if they want more details they should google the phrase ‘30/30 challenge’.

Watching a movie is fine as long as you prepare questions and vocabulary exercises in advance. As as an alternative, you can use an audio book or a podcast on a business subject. I often have used ‘The Long Tail’ by Chris Anderson, focusing on the section about Wikipedia. If you like, I can give you more details along with the listening comprehension questions I have been using.

Best regards,
Torsten[YSaerTTEW443543]

TOEIC listening, talks: Announcing flight changes at an airport[YSaerTTEW443543]

11

Hi Torsten and Ian!

Day 5, 29 October,2010.

3 students were absent (Diana, Christine and Stefan)

During the morning hours we had a dictogloss activity and again the students, working in groups, did an excellent job. They re-constructed close to perfection the formal letter I chose for this activity.

After this we reviewed the texts referring to ‘Maine’ and the students had to find on the Internet facts which are not mentioned in the text (e.g. they found statistics about the unemployment rate).

Correct the mistakes: in ‘In Company’(p.64) they had to find the 17 mistakes made by person who wrote a business letter ‘in a rush’. Pity Walter couldn’t ‘convince’ the CD to work, so I simply played the role of the CD player using the transcript on page 137 in order to finish the task. BTW, I asked Frau Goethe to lend me a book, I took it home and I will try to have it on my laptop for next week. If I manage, I will let you know and maybe the audio material can be used rather than having it just decorate the back cover of the course book.

The piece of advice given by the more experienced businessman to the person who wrote the letter mentioned above, namely,‘If I were you, I’d just putBest wishes’. led us to the next topic: conditional sentences. We solved the exercises in English Reader p.21-22 and we practiced rephrasing. There is a little mistake in C) (conditional type I), I think they meant hoover instead of hover. What would you do if…? Problem solving.

Another writing activity: writing-answering letters of complaint. (ex.1/p.66 ‘In Company’. The products chosen by the groups weren’t pieces of equipment, as suggested by the exercise,but the letters followed the steps of writing a business letter. It was great seeing them work as a team, advise each other and use creativity and sense of humor while writing.

At the end of the day,for about an hour, the students worked on their PP presentations.

Monday and Tuesday they will present them (2-2) and I told them that after each presentation they would have to ask questions and evaluate their colleagues’ work. For Thursday they have to present their portfolio.

I would like to ask if the final test should be on Thursday.

Torsten, if possible, please send me the questions for the audio material you suggested( The Long Tail) because I would like to use it.

Ian,please let me know if there’s any prerequisite I can help you with on Monday.

I wish you both a nice and relaxing weekend.

Best wishes,

Georgeta

12

Hi Georgeta, here are the questions on ‘The Long Tail’ (the answers are in brackets)

The Long Tail Questions: 350

  • Who started Wikipedia and when? (options trader Jimmy Wales, 2001)
  • What does the word ‘wiki’ mean and what language does it originate from? Hawaiian: (quick, fast)
  • What knowledge repository does the founder want to rival with? (The Ancient Library of Alexandra)
  • What is the main difference between Wikipedia and a classical encyclopedia? (From the beginning, compiling authoritative knowledge has been the job of scholars.)
  • Which authors of classical encyclopedias are mentioned? (Aristotle, Pliny the Elder, the Chinese scholar Tu Yu, n the 1700s, a few French aristocrats took twenty-nine years to create the Encyclopédie, ou Dictionnaire Raisonné des Sciences, des Arts et des Métiers)
  • Which methods did the Scottish scholars apply to create their encyclopedias? (principles of scientific management and the lessons of assembly lines)
  • When was the third edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica produced and large was it?
  • What model of an encyclopedia does Wikipedia present? (“the open collective”)
  • How many articles did Wikedia have in 2006? (more than 2 Million)
  • Why are so many people contributing to Wikipedia? (Many people find it attractive to be able to work on something very complex while maintaining almost complete freedom over their work schedules and methods.)
  • What tools does Wikipedia provide to its contributors? (watch lists, use of template and article stubs, history and unlimited undos)
  • What is the ratio between individual contributors and editors at Wikipedia? (50.000 equal one Pliny the Elder)
  • What is one of Wikipedia’s drawbacks? (no clear authority)
  • How many articles Wikipedia have in English and now many total? How many articles does Britannica have? (1 Million, 3,5 Million)

Probabilistic Age

  • Can Wikipedia be trusted?
  • What is the difference between the micro scale and the macro scale?
  • What is a probabilistic system and which examples does the author give?
  • What did the 2005 study by Nature reveal? (in 42 topics in science there were an average of 4 errors in Wikipedia and 3 in Britannica)
  • What is the main advantage of probabilistic systems?
  • What is the difference between Google and Microsoft?
  • What is the mean repair time of high profile articles? (less than 4 minutes)

The questions refer to the following recording (start replay at minute 350): www.english-team.com/PDF/TheLongTail.mp3[YSaerTTEW443543]

TOEIC listening, talks: Leaving a voice message reporting a lost wallet[YSaerTTEW443543]

13

Hi Torsten!

Thank you very much for the questions. If it is OK, I will have this activity on Monday.

Best regards,

Georgeta

14

Hi Georgeta,

You can do this activity on Monday provided you do a number pre-task exercises with the group such as dictate and explain a list of keywords contained in the recording. Based on the group’s TOEIC mock test results, they will find it very challenging understanding the contents of the recording so additional support is vital. Also, before you have them listen to the recording you can ask them to brainstorm any information they can come up with regarding Wikipedia.

Regards,
Torsten[YSaerTTEW443543]

TOEIC listening, talks: Reporting on a company’s stock price movements[YSaerTTEW443543]

15

Hello Torsten and Ian,

An update on Day 6, 1st November, Monday:

Number of students: 9 (Christin and Stefan were absent).

Today we used the room next to the IT room and this will go on for the rest of the week. The students couldn’t use the laptops.

-Students were given the names of different forms of business reporting and ,together, we worked on explaining the situations in which each form is used.
-based on previous experience, we listed the steps taken when writing a report;
-for the next activity, I used the case study on p.71 in ‘In Company’
-they worked in teams, and the activity combined problem solving with finding possible ways to make a business successful again
-discussions on principles of success
-listening activity (compare the solutions given by your team/ what happened in reality)
-students aware of the ‘niche market’ concept, explained it to their fellow trainees
-negotiation (negotiation techniques);
-I gave the students a short list of useful phrases, and we took as an example price negotiating
-we solved ex.1 on p.86 (In Company) where the students found more useful phrases belonging to the language of negotiation
-I used the negotiation scenario on p.87 and working in 2 teams they had to perform a real-life negotiation. Although there were only girls in both teams ,they enjoyed negotiating the transfer of a football player to Manchester United.

  • advice to negotiators (as conclusion to the activity)
    -Grammar: Active and passive ( the use of active vs. passive constructions in business letters)
    -we solved the exercises in Reader and I gave the students some more examples;
    -learning techniques:how can you improve your self-teaching system?
    -I mentioned and explained the 30/30 Challenge and asked them to search on the Internet if they wish to find out more details about it
    -the importance of a professionally written CV / resume
    -based on the framework on p.53, A ten-point presentation plan, in ‘In Company’, the students had to prepare a short presentation, allow the others to ask questions and get instant feedback from the group.

I didn’t manage to do the listening activity. I am so sorry, Torsten.
Another problem was that the groups supposed to present the PPs today,didn’t finish them and now they have a great excuse of not having the laptops at hand. Please advise me how to handle this.
What about the final test?

Ian, have a grand day in Jena tomorrow.

Best wishes to both of you.

Georgeta

16

Thanks Georgeta for the update !
I hope your having great fun with this group.
I will keep you updated on our progress.

Thank you again and I wish you a very relaxing evening.
Best wishes,
Ian :slight_smile:

17

Tuesday report from Jena.

I was back today with this lovely group of girls.
This is what we did today:

  • Small talk about what the girls weekend and also about what they had learnt the last days.
  • Listing the character straights of the students and what elements of themselves they can sell in an interview situation.
  • Discussing interview styles and studying both standard questions and also specialised questions, according to each students specialist field.
  • 2 minute presentation on the students straights and strongest selling points.
  • Interview style questions after each presentation
  • Training for individual and team presentation skills. Open discussion on what the students think are good and bad tactics in presenting a person in a professional environment.
  • Studying the plan for a new business product.
  • Listing the separate steps of a product development process and their according attributes.
  • Discussing brainstorming (idea generation) and creative flexibility.

Wednesday report from Jena.

Back again for my second day with this very dynamic and energetic group.

  • We started the morning with a revision of what we had covered the day before.
  • We then explored the professional approach to idea generation and idea processing.
  • Many of the students have plans to become self employed and entrepreneurs after this course and they found this training very poignant for their first business success.
  • After explaining the real system of idea generation and selection. We decided to build into this a small project. For teams to design a new product based from the specialist knowledge of the students in each group.
  • Then the students did creation generation, selection and final selection.
  • The innovative business idea or product was then selected.
  • The students were asked to create a list of important elements in a successful business and then to fill out each criteria for this product.
  • Basic marketing, demands/trends, costs, environment etc were all considered.
    This project style work forced the students to be both very creative and also use a hugh about of their vocabulary.
  • The last stage of this activity was that the students prepared a rudimentary presentation of their product idea. Segmented into critical business elements.
    The presentation was a fantastic success with a large array of very feasible products and business plans.
    -The final step was a very existence open Q&A session. Integrating the teams in finite detail of their ideas, business plans and also thought processes.

This was a day simply filled with incredibly savvy young business women with a lot of capability and simply looking for chances to use it and show it.
A real pleasure.

Good luck tomorrow Georgeta.
Best wishes.
Ian

18

Hi Ian!

Thanks a lot for the update. Please help me with something. What audio recording do you usually use for covering the listening activity on ‘Going the Extra Mile’?

I wish you a relaxing evening and a grand day tomorrow.

Best wishes,

Georgeta

19

Hi Georgeta.

Sorry I can help.
I haven’t used the "Going the Extra Mile’ activity yet.

I hope you have great fun tomorrow.
Best wishes.
Ian :slight_smile:

20

“Going the Extra Mile” is one chapter of ‘The Science of Personal Achievement’ by Napoleon Hill. It’s the most important book when it comes to business and success. You really should read and/or listen to it on a regular basis.[YSaerTTEW443543]

TOEIC listening, talks: A theater is introducing a play[YSaerTTEW443543]