Summer Project

The other day, I was thinking about my growing frustrations with Miki. On the one hand, she's become more open to being tutoring. While she's never been unfriendly, it was clear at the beginning that she resented my presence. Now she's much more laid-back, and she even enjoys herself occasionally. On the other hand, though, she continues to resist learning English. She won't speak English unless it's repeating or reading something. I know her English level is low, but she is able to make simple sentences. She just refuses to try.

I thought a possible solution to this would be to make her write a journal. I would have her write a little bit every day or perhaps every other day in English. I think I would use an online journal - perhaps Livejournal or Blogger - so I could check it and comment outside of our tutoring sessions. I would also have Yuki do this as well. Yuki doesn't refuse to speak English, but she's just so darn shy that she hardly speaks at all.

I haven't figured out the details (for example, will I give them prompts to respond to, or could they just write about whatever they like?), but I'm excited. It seems like an excellent way to finally get these two girls to use a lot of English.