Language Bridges Program, an experience to remember

For this blog post I will talk about my experience at Language Bridges Program.  To me this club was not only about teaching English to workers, in fact I learned as much as the workers did. I know how English is important to them, and so my primary goal was to teach them English, but at the same time I wanted them to have fun and enjoy their time in class. In the first class, I was able to know all the students, their levels and a little about their lives. 

So, my group and me decided to watch a movie for one of our classes so that they can come the next class and write about it. The movie was English Vnglish and it talks about an Indian woman who went to America to visit some relatives there but didn’t know how to speak English. She faced some problems with communicating with people, which made her want to learn English even more. I think this movie has a take away lesson, because being in a foreign country where no one understands you language is hard. You will eventually find a language that will allow you to communicate better with people around you. And this is what we told our students, is that learning English is important or otherwise you will not be here learning it. Its not easy but not impossible. The students actually liked the movie very much and in the next class, which was a writing class we asked them to write about the movie and they all talked about the importance of English. 

 We’ve decided to tech them things that will benefit them in their daily lives. So, we asked them to write down on a paper the things they would like to learn. And almost all of them wanted to learn how to deal with costumer and what are the vocabulary they should learn that would make them better with dealing with costumers. In the following class we arranged the class where every student will have to sit with a teacher and play the role of the security guy and teachers were the costumer, and vice versa in the second round.

This experience with LBP has developed skills in me, such as teamwork. We (the teachers) as a team worked so hard to give the students the best education we could in a limited time. We also wanted them to enjoy being here and want to learn even more. So, this teamwork experience I believe was beneficial for me as much as it was for the students.  

Experience at Language Bridges.

Building a strong foundation of any building is the most important, and indeed the most difficult as well. At language bridges, most of our students did not know the basic A-B-C-D. Teaching them instilled elements of patience and perseverance within us. Their confidence after understanding, resulting from hard work, was our motivator. The experience taught me instead, the wonderful design of the  human being. Sight, sound and listening conglomerate to develop a language and to decode funny looking signs into meaningful words. The feeling is inexplicable. Only at Language Bridges!

 Poor Shumi could never get their inside jokes, which I of course enjoyed and laughed along hysterically. Plus, Shumi's confused face would make it perfect. Although native languages were hardly spoken, but when they were, we made sure every word spoken was worth saying.

Devlaal; one of the brightest students I had at Language Bridges. His face always gleamed with confidence, and he indeed achieved milestones along the way. I would miss these guys a lot.

Language Bridges- An Awesome Experience; By Dana Al-Hail

The Language Bridges Experience

From students to teachers:

Spring of 2013 with Language Bridges is turning out to be a wonderful and life-changing experience, 

for not only the students who have demonstrated the courage to participate but also for us, (Dana Al-Hail, Alaa Khader and Rayan Mahmoud ) at the beginning we had a class of five students and in the 

mid-semester we merged with Masha and Mehreen on Sundays Class. Initially we were trying with 

some difficulty to get the hang of teaching for a long period of time in front of students we never knew 

before, yet once we played some Ice breakers all was smooth. 

Here's a picture of the students keenly listening to our explanation of some english grammar.

Teaching English; speaking, reading and writing:

We started the semester with a mix of all the forms of communicating and interacting in english. 

Speaking was the easiest to do for all our students and as the semester progressed the level and amount of communication between us and our students increased; in a broad overview we covered how to talk about yourself, your family, and job in professional and personal life using a variety of different verbs and adjectives that they learned and hopefully retained.

Students playing a synonyms game 

Another fun interactive part that helped strengthen and support the students' mental store of words for writing and speaking was playing games that demonstrated the differences and similarities between words. Here, the students were given a computer generated word and were asked to look at a list of several words and select the word with the closest meaning.  Together we had lots of laughs and at the end it was a diverse way of learning that enhanced their understanding of english words and their meaning.

The last Sunday Class! :

The day came when we had to wrap up our Language Bridges experience, it was quite a bittersweet moment, but in the end an appreciated moment that we will all value. 

An enriching experience never to be forgotten ! :D

Week 7

Last week, we were so busy with our homeworks, papers and all other stuff. Our language bridge class is on Tuesday. Hassan and I were so busy doing our tasks, and suddenly it is 6:35 pm. We comprehended that its Tuesday, our language bridge class, and we didn’t prepare anything for it. We kind of got panic attack We saw 2 of our colleagues asked them what are they going to do for their LB class, and they said some grammar lesson. We went quickly to the classroom, trying to figure out what are we going to do. Hassan turned on the computer, tried to find any helping videos. And I cut small papers, wrote down some words. My idea was to let each student pick up a paper and tell us anything about it. It was a speaking lesson.

Students arrived around 7 pm. We started with this exercise. We gave them 5 minutes to think about the words they have, and then each of the students talk about it. Then, we played Hangman game, they have to think of a word that is exist in the classroom. Then we used a video “5 important phrasal verbs for English learners” to teach them 5 different phrasal verbs and how and where they can use them. After that, we had 4 online pictures, we numbered them from 1 to 4. Each student had to choose a number and write a story about the picture corresponds to that number. The students had to include at least one of the 5 phrasal verbs that they learned earlier in the class. We thought it is good thing for them to apply what they learned in this exercise. The students had 15 minutes to write a story about the pictures they had, and then they share their stories with the others.

At the end, we had 10 minutes till 8:30. We showed them a video that explains “Common English Errors: I or am? She or her? They or them?”. It was very useful, and we explained it very quickly, and the class was over. Thank God we toke care of it without any plans or preparing for it, it was such a dilemma. The class went well and the students enjoyed the class and learned new things.

Unusual Fun Lessons

Language Bridges Program is designed to bridge the communication gap between the migrant workers and locals. Through this program, volunteers like us (students) teach workers english by providing them with english worksheets, communicating with them and using helpful websites or videos. 

Usually, english grammar is taught by giving grammatical rules and the students have to follow them when writing exercises, whereas communicating in English comes by practicing talking. In my lifetime, I experienced different ways of learning english, by taking english subject in schools and by going to English Learning Centers like ELS and British Council, but I honestly didn't learn proper english as much as I learned through watching movies and reading articles. 

What we students did to change the weekly routine in teaching english, we showed the workers a movie about a woman who was struggling with her life because she didn't know the english language, but she did not give up and she was able to learn good english in the end. The movie's audio and subtitle were both in English, which helps the student workers to link what they hear with what they read. After viewing the movie, the student workers wrote essays describing what they have watched and highlighted what the have liked the most in the movie. This movie might act as inspiration for them to continue on trying to learn good english, they also were able to develop reading and writing skills when it came to writing their essays. Here is a photo from that day.

Another lesson was all about vocabulary and games, the workers need to learn new vocabulary, one of the games played was scrabble-like game. The workers had some sort of competition, we wrote the scrabble board on the white board and gave them few minutes to find as much words as they can. And then each one shared the words they found, hence, they were able to grasp new vocabulary. Here's a photo illustrating the board game.

It feels really good sharing the knowledge you have with people who don't have the resources to learn and be more successful in their life. Language Bridges Program gave them the opportunity to learn, meet new people and have fun. It also gave us the opportunity to teach, work as a team and communicate with new people.

Language Bridges: A Humbling Experience

Two months ago, I received an email from members of the Carnegie Mellon Community inviting students to participate in teaching foreign workers English. At first, my friends and I were eager to jump aboard the bandwagon and take the chance because we knew that this would easily earn us a lot of PSP points, which are a requirement for all Business Students at CMUQ.

However, upon the arrival of our students, we were surprised to see that the task at hand was not as easy as we thought. Although we were just teaching the foreign workers basic English, we discovered that there is way more to being a good teacher than simply knowing the material you are responsible for passing on to your students.

During the first two classes or so, our students were a bit tense, and we struggled to make them talk and reply back to us. Whenever we called their names, they would instantly rise from their seats and stand solid straight, like they were in the military or something. We solved this problem and freed them of the tension they had by gradually making them feel more comfortable around us and by boosting their confidence.

By fast forwarding to last class, however, we can clearly see that this is no longer the case, as my next example will demonstrate. As our students were eating some snacks in the middle of their break, one of them slipped away from the rest, grabbed a chair, pulled it next to me and sat on it. He then pulled out a pen and a paper and gave me a brainteaser that had me spend the next twenty minutes trying to wrap my head around it. When the class was about to end and he saw that I was struggling with hopelessness, he came by, told me the answer, and then said: "See Sir. I confuse you Sir", with a wide grin on his face.

Overall, this experience was quite humbling for me, as it taught me a lot of things. It also made me aware and appreciative of all the hard work my teachers and professors go through when teaching me. I now look forward to my next class with my students so I can learn something new from them.

The First Class

It all began when my friends told me about the experience that they had with teaching the students in the language bridge program. They told me that it was fun, exciting and they enjoyed it. From that point I had the dream about me teaching the students in this program, so when I woke up in the morning I decided to sign up for language bridge program. I needed some one with me so I told my colleague Amna about it and she was happy to join me. We were wondering how would we teach students when we are students in the same, we thought that teaching need skills that only teachers with high degree would have. The only way is to try.

The first week had come, Amna and I were nervous. We were waiting for the students’ arrival in the parking lot. We prepared the teaching materials, and some snacks as well. We’re supposed to have 5 students in our class, but only 3 students arrived. We took the students to the classroom.  We introduced ourselves and the students did as well. We taught the students and we did some games for them like hangman. At the end of the class we gave them the placement test to see their level in English.

After the class Amna and I were happy that we managed the class and had fun talking and teaching the students. Moreover, we couldn’t wait for the next class to see them and teaching them again.

The Teaching Experience (Spring 2013)

When we (Juan, Anas, Allam and Hamza) first joined the Language Bridges program, we weren't sure what to expect from it. People were telling us that it would be a happy experience but as it got closer to the teaching day, we began to get scared about the whole thing. But once the 12 students came in and we introduced ourselves, we felt comfortable and knew we could teach them.
On the first day we mostly just talked and tested them. We offered them drinks (something we've done each week). They were enthusiastic to be there. Surprisingly for us, they seemed to know English better than we thought.
The second week though, it was disappointing to see only 3 students returning. Some couldn't come because of their night shifts and work obligations, and others seemed to have not enjoyed it as much as we had hoped. But these 3 students seemed committed to learning English and we were happy to teach them.
We mostly went over grammar in this class and even though they did great on their tests, we came to realize that they have more trouble actually speaking English. It's easier for them to write than it is for them to speak, it doesn't come quickly to them. We realized that our goal should be to make them better speakers than anything else. We used websites to give them exercises and go through grammar.
We spent most of our time teaching and helping them do exercises, but we also saved a bit of time at the end to just have conversations with them. They responded strongly to this and enjoyed talking with us.
The third week, we were glad to see the same 3 students return to us. They had even completed the homework we assigned to them. They were more dedicated than we thought. We did a little bit of the same as the week before: a mix of exercises, teaching, and talking.
By the end of the class, they appeared to have learned at least a little of what we spent 2 hours talking about. And that was enough to leave us satisfied.
We're still getting used to this and understanding what more we can do to make this experience better for them. We learn as we go. We hope to incorporate some games in the future class and make it a bit more fun for them. But so far, the 3 students seem to enjoy learning from us!