Tuesday, October 09, 2007

creative esl?

This afternoon, I spent time with my Somali friend, Sadia. I love the Somali women and I serve by teaching English...or trying to teach English.

Today, I realized that one of the things that Sadia needed to know was her phone number. I wanted her to get it memorized in her head.

Now, you need to know that Sadia is in her early 60's and us older ladies don't always remember the simple things like we'd like to. My dear friend was having trouble trying to remember her phone number.

I got to thinking how I'm tying to learn Spanish - right now by listening to my grandkids Spanish songs and "song" is helping some words to sink in a bit.

So, I told Sadia to sing me a Somali song. She did (wondering what I was doing????). After I sorta got the rythym I began to "sing" her phone number. Together, with a bit of laughter, we both "sang" her phone number a few times and guess what? We, both, now have memorized her phone number...because I can't get the "song" out of my head. Sadia's happy. I'm happy. I'm really happy.

Stumble Upon Toolbar

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

loved your idea mom! so proud of you! if only everyone could be as lucky as me to actually hear you sing the telephone number. I must say it is an unusual sound for a song. Definitely nothing I have heard before. BTW- HAPPY BIRTHDAY ON YOUR BLOG!! =)

Lylah Ledner said...

thanks dear daughter

Sallie said...

Lylah -- Thank you for the offer of the free ebook! My husband would just say he's doing his job :-)

I used to teach ESL in Japan. We had fun with it, too!

God bless,
Sallie

Precision Quality Laser said...

My husband and I taught ESL at our old church. Sigh. I miss the interaction with our friends (the students). We were really blessed by blessing others!