English Teaching

It has been a stretch for us to do our English Teaching.  Now we have a book with an outline for both classes but it seems to get a bit boring to just do the exercises. We always try to think up some other interesting activities to go along with the material.  Our assignment is supposed to be to teach Conversational English so our aim is always to try to get them talking in English!!

All the students at the BioMedical University take an English Class, ours seem to be some of the better speakers.  They have lots of programs to promote the learning of English.  In fact there is an ETC Club.  (English Training Club).  This week they have posted an English Typing Competition and last week there was an "English Singing Competition".  It was a big event with 25 competitors each singing a song in English.  We were asked to be one of the judges or to find one from our friends!  Now that would have been a stretch but we got our translator to represent us.  She has a great musical background having won singing competitions herself and being an expert pianist.

The Judges

There were three judges, Ulziika, an American who teaches English at the school and a famous Mongolian composer.  The participants were judged based on choice of song, suitability to their voice, singing ability, costume or dress, and English pronunciation.  Each judge had cards and raised their number for every song.  It was a challenging assignment to be a judge (sure glad we delegated)!!  After they had all performed, the top seven were chosen and then each sang again, with a different song.  It was a three hour night but very interesting!  There were numbers from Rap to Romance and everything in between.

The winner and our sponsors

One thing we did not expect to attend in Mongolia was a High School Alumni Basketball tournament. Last night Ulziika invited us to go to her old High School (a Japanese School) to watch some games.
She played and so did her brother.  The girls games were two 6 minute halves and the guys were two 8 minute halves.  It was fun to go and see that Basketball is much the same world over!

This weekend we are watching Conference - all the sessions are broadcast at the Church with them dubbed in Mongolian in the Chapel and shown in English in another room.  It is great to hear all the messages and realize that no matter where you are in the world, we all face the same kinds of challenges!  We are grateful for the opportunity to be some of the "wave of missionaries" serving through out the world.

Life is Good and All Is Well!!
(I had done this a week and a half ago but it did not get posted!  Lots has happened since then.)