Lesson 2, Level 2 (Elementary) - Osama (ISCSE FB group) - Describing appearances

Osama is doing well, this was a tircky lesson for a number of reasons, not least because I had drilling going on by my office and I am a little deaf anyway! Also, there were some images I needed to see to interact as his practice partner and he needed to send me the PDF with the images in before the lesson (no doubt the fault of our instructions not being in Arabic).

But, we got there, and had a good session I think. What this lesson demonstrated for me was that going off the lesson plan language, as Osamadid with one question, can be problematic at this level. He asked me 'what is your ideal man?' and to someone of my background and age that is a bit of a non-question because unless we were gay we might find it a bit odd :-) Then when I asked him to explain he said 'fat or slim'...which again is not a pair of preferences that I found very easy to comment upon.

Once we got back to the language he had worked with in the lesson we were fine....I have learned from this lesson too, which is great. I have learned that the prepared language is vital for coherent conversation as it enables the learner to be understood and to form ideas and questions that their partner can understand and work with. Going 'off piste' at this stage can cause communication problems for both partners.