Language Camp Continues

More fun at language camp. I continue to enjoy the  students in my individual class very much. I'm working hard on having them make complete sentences. For example, if I ask if they have a pet, they will often answer with just one word. I'm trying to get them to say instead, "I have a dog." I start every class too with completing information about what is the day of the week, what is the date, and what is the weather. I know from experience the students learn the words hot and cold in the school English classes. I try to extend their vocabulary by adding the words warm and cool. I tell them they must save cold for the days when water freezes and there is snow on the ground. Likewise we will save hot for temperatures in the high 80s or 90s (as temp is measured in Fahrenheit). They continue to like my bringing a Bingo or Jingo game for the third lesson of the day, a bit of relaxing after I've had them working so very hard in making sentences.

For the 4th English lesson we have been doing classes altogether. On Wednesday I did a presentation for all the campers during the 4th hour language lesson about Minnesota. On Thursday the two volunteers from Seattle gave a wonderful presentation about Seattle and also showed pictures about their individual adventures. For example, these volunteers, who are a married couple, rode their bicycles across the United States, starting in Yorktown, Virginia and ending in the Seattle area. This trip took them three months.On Friday we all sang together some popular songs.

On Friday evening the student activity was a game we call Blind Date in English. In Polish this has another name, Randka w Ciemno. When I pointed out to some of the campers that the R was backwards on the sign, well the K is backwards too, they told me it was not a mistake, that this did this to make the sign funny.

The game involved a boy or girl being placed on one side of a screen. If it is a boy then there are three girls -- called candidates on the other side of the screen. The candidates answer questions. However, to keep the boy guessing about who is on the other side of the screen, the girls whisper their answers to a camper acting as a game MC, and so all answers are given by one person who is not in the game. This year, too, this game was played in a bilingual fashion with all questions, answers, and announcements about the game given in both Polish and English. The questions and answers can be very funny. One group of girls was asked how they would greet the boy's parents if she went there for obiad. One girl answered she wouldn't go, she would go shopping instead!

When the "dating" couple is announced they get to draw a prize award paper out of a hat. One prize that  two campers liked was being excused from morning exercise on Monday.

Four of the volunteers went into Warsaw for some or all of the weekend, three of them went with the campers on a trip to Warsaw Zoo on Saturday, and two volunteers walked to Kotun on Satruday and had a wonderful time eating pizza at the new DaVinci pizza place there. So I was alone a good bit of the time on Saturday -- I chose to stay here because my sore knee doesn't allow me to great deal of walking yet. I had a wonderful day, taking both a morning nap and an afternoon nap. I also enjoyed doing some recreational reading.

Today Sunday is a day when parents and grandparents come to visit for a bit. Two of the counselors took several students to church. There are many visitors who make the trek to the ice cream bar located in an underground area of Reymontowka. It is just a relaxing day. 

I'm having a great time again being a teacher at language camp.