Interviews, Games and Goodbyes

Today was Ali's last day.  So, after lessons, reading passages, and defining words that the class didn't understand and writing teaching goals, Nora and Ali engaged in a dolorous version of the Hokey Pokey, took class photos and said goodbyes.   At lunch, Ali showed us her fabulous scarf, and Baoli decided she wanted one too. Everyone gave Ali a big hug, and then she flew off to face the floods in Beijing.

In Frances and Dia's class, they discussed class goals, and Dia was interviewed about what primary school is like in the US. Of course, Dia’s vision of primary school may or may not resemble what grammar schools really like, but the class enjoyed her answers anyway. Then the teams divided up and answered questions. Dia led a session of Simon Says, and Heads Up, Seven Up. Then they discussed next week's goals and Friday's closing ceremony.

Tom and Geni asked their class what they wanted to do, and they asked for ways to study vocabulary. So we divided up into the usual two teams, and played some different word games. The first was the fluency game, naming as many words as one could that began with a certain letter. The second was jeopardy, and the teams would fill the letters to make words from a common phrase. We were able to do idioms again, like "jump down your throat," and "out of your mind."  We also did a spirited version of the Hokey Pokey.

School was out at noontime, and after lunch the Gualtieri's got ready for their fabulous trip. It was definitely a last-minute affair, but at 830 we finally left the hotel to go to the train station.  We were off to LiJiang.  Baoli decided to stay in Kunming and work.

-Tom