Divide and conquer

Last night was a great experience. We divided into two groups which was very beneficial. The advanced group was reading Sandra Cisneros and are starting the novel "Stone Fox" for homework. There are five of them in that group and I am so proud of them. They are motivated and working hard. Working equally as hard is the beginner group. We have three students, although one was absent yesterday. We worked on interviewing partners and sharing what we learned about them. Thankfully two other teachers came so the student/teacher ratio was excellent. It was nice to work one on one. I discovered that one of the students studied English years ago for a brief time, so this is his first formal instruction in years. Also, another student has been in the U.S. for years and has never had any formal instruction. That explains the difficulties she is having. I am so excited to be working with her though. She deserves to progress and improve her English language skills. I am hoping that if I can encourage teachers to come and stay each week, then we can continue this one on one instruction/tutoring and see real progress.