It's Been ... A Week?

Not a lot to talk about this week.

Perhaps I should make a list of ideas for "filler" material I can talk about for when this happens. I'm already thinking of doing a few more video game blog posts, which is the whole reason I started writing here.

It's not that there hasn't been anything interesting or exciting going on, just that everything I've been working on has been personal, private or deeply boring. Things like arranging vet visits, figuring out banking stuff or just doing busywork.

I had Monday and Friday off today, which was nice, it was a shorter work week and I got to rest a little bit on Monday. I did laundry and I went to the gym. Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday were spent at work reading some articles for the research project and tidying up the office.

I did get some good news, a student I've been tutoring with IELTS stuff got a study-abroad placement for the university she wanted to go! It's the one I studied at too, so I'm especially excited for her. I think most teachers agree that the most rewarding parts of their job is seeing their students go on to do cool stuff that they're passionate about. This particular student worked really, really, really hard on the IELTS exam and I'm very proud of her.

I have a very simple history but very complicated emotions about the IELTS exam.

The short version is that I hate it.

For those who don't know, the International English Language Testing System is an English proficiency test used mostly by Commonwealth and countries (the UK, Australia, Canda etc.) to determine whether someone's English level is appropriate for living, working or studying in the country. It is divided into a speaking portion, a reading portion, a listening portion and a writing portion. Compared to exams like Eiken or TOEIC (which is entirely multiple choice!) it's more complicated and a little more intensive.

When I was teaching online for a variety of different online tutoring platforms I was either teaching Business English or IELTS prep, and when I first started at NUFS I was also teaching an IELTS class.

I think there's two kinds of people who want to learn IELTS: The first are people who want to improve their English to a specific point and need some kind of evidence or certification to prove that they've reached that point. The second are people who think that because IELTS has a reputation as a difficult exam they can improve their English via osmosis of a difficult English exam.

Which, understandably, frustrates those students when they're not able to pick anything up quickly. It's honestly refreshing when I get to work with the former kind of student.

(Alright, I can cross "IELTS thoughts" off of that list of ideas for filler blog posts)

The weekend was probably the best part of the week (when isn't it, right?). We went to Japanese class, I'm very close to finishing the book me and my teacher use. This is a bit of a problem for me, because although I'm used to finding appropriate textbooks and resources for learning English but I'm not good at finding them for learning Japanese.

If anyone has any suggestions, I'm open!

We also went and played D&D in a new campaign. I'm playing an actor being chased by an angry knight who is sending him cease and desist letters and my wife is playing a girl scout paladin. Becasue, as always, she's the funniest person in the room. As well as D&D we've been playing a few more games together, foolishly I bought a Chromebook which can't run steam but it can run Minecraft which is astonishingly addictive.

So uh ... I guess nothing's going to be getting done next week either.