My student’s name is Corrado, he’s 42 years old and his L1 is Italian. He is an entrepreneur. In fact, he owns a bar where he works with two friends. However, he doesn’t need English at work as I thought. He loves to travel and that’s the main reason for him to learn English: he’s been to London many times and he would like to travel to the US as well. Also, he likes to organize his own trips so he needs English also to book hotels and flights online.
Despite only studying English in school and having an uninspiring teacher, he never felt the need to speak it himself while traveling due to always being accompanied by fluent friends. However, despite his enjoyment of speaking activities and sociable nature, he often makes mistakes when speaking freely, including simple structure errors like saying “I have 42 years old.” Nonetheless, he is fully aware of this and his performance improves when he has a specific target language to focus on during class.
The individual harbors a distaste for writing and grapples with significant self-doubt in this skill. In fact, within the writing piece he provided me for his assignment, he opted to alternate lines in Italian accompanied by their English equivalents. His intention was to foster a sense of security; however, this approach resulted in numerous errors as he translated verbatim (e.g., “da 2 anni non riesco ad andare in vacanza” becoming “last 2 years I can’t go on holiday”). Nevertheless, when it comes to Part B – Speaking, he exhibits a willingness to embrace mistakes and derives pleasure from conversing in English. Prompted appropriately, he demonstrates proficiency in employing the target language accurately.
Despite being an elementary student, his vocabulary is quite good, although he struggles with tenses. He has a thick Italian accent, but his pronunciation is still understandable. When it comes to writing, he is not accustomed to doing so in English, leading to a strong focus on grammar “rules.” This often results in numerous mistakes, particularly with tenses. Although he desires to use complex structures in his writing, he often resorts to creating his own “personalized” solutions, which are usually incorrect. Nevertheless, the vocabulary he selects is spelled correctly and generally appropriate for the given context.
Listening: He has good gist comprehension and can ask for clarification when he doesn’t understand. This skill likely stems from his effective communication ability and habit of traveling. However, he struggles with using specific tenses correctly, such as using present continuous for planned future events.
Reading: In class, I’ve noticed that he doesn’t enjoy reading tasks very much. During pair work, he tends to make up jokes and becomes easily distracted.
However, when Corrado participates in the activity after the reading, he becomes more engaged and concentrated. It is important to note that Corrado is an elementary student and often makes mistakes due to his attempt to use complex structures, such as present perfect and relative clauses. Despite this, Corrado’s enthusiasm is his standout quality. He is a natural leader in the group and has the ability to captivate the entire class when he enjoys an activity (except for reading, which may not be his favorite).
I believe that my colleagues and I often choose him as our “volunteer” for demonstrations because he isn’t afraid to make a fool of himself, and instead, he enjoys laughing at his own weaknesses. Regarding grammar, there are two issues: 1) I was born in Verona. The problem lies in the form because he understands the meaning of this structure, but he translates it directly from Italian (sono nato=am born). 2) I started working in 1992. Here, the problem is both about form and meaning because he knows the past simple tense, but once again, he translates directly word for word, resulting in “ho iniziato” becoming “have started.”
Probably, he has heard about the present perfect tense before, but he does not know how to use it correctly. Additionally, in the sentence “I have open a bar with 2 friends,” he made a mistake by translating “aperto” as an adjective and using “open” instead of “opened” as before. When it comes to pronunciation, like many Italians, he pronounces the word “interesting” as “interested” due to word stress. He also struggles with rhythm, tending to speak syllable by syllable, and has difficulty with weak forms, particularly in questions. For example, when asked “where are you from?”, he separates each word, resulting in stressing each one. Although he is not fully aware of his incorrect pronunciation, he responds well to correction and can immediately repeat words in the correct manner. In terms of vocabulary, Corrado uses the words he knows correctly, unlike tenses. In Part C, it is important to clarify the basics of present simple, present continuous, and past simple tenses because Corrado knows the forms but lacks understanding of how and when to use them. Furthermore, he needs practice with writing as both activities selected are written activities.
When he becomes more confident with tenses, he can begin practicing speaking. The first activity focuses on clarifying and practicing the difference between the present simple and present continuous. I believe the teacher would be able to draw a lot of information from him, which would be beneficial since he is a communicative and competitive person. I think he would enjoy getting the correct answer. After explaining the difference between the present simple and present continuous, I would provide him with a controlled practice exercise using gap fillers, which I have included for reference.
As I mentioned before, he struggles with accuracy in both speaking and writing. Some mistakes have become ingrained and he needs to practice the target language in a highly controlled environment. When he is given too much freedom to speak, he tends to use complex structures and makes numerous errors. Activity 2 – Past Simple VS Present Perfect: clarification and controlled practice may be a bit challenging for Corrado, but I believe it could be beneficial for him to grasp the differences between these two tenses.
Considering the complexity of this subject, particularly for Italian students, my approach would involve utilizing the whiteboard extensively and incorporating timelines to illustrate the distinction between the two tenses. I would suggest creating two columns on the board, featuring adverbs and specific structures that are employed with each tense (such as “last,” “ago,” “when I was” for past simple, and “ever,” “never,” “already,” “yet,” “today,” “this week” for present perfect). Additionally, I would provide a controlled practice exercise similar to the attached one.
