Thursday, August 11, 2016

Marissa TS#9

My second tutee was a medical student in Mexico named Edoardo Stephen Figueroa (he usually goes by his middle name with English speakers) who I tutored over Skype. Stephen is finishing up his fifth year of med school in Monterrey but plans to move to the US to practice once he graduates and passes the certification exams. He mentioned to me that he was concerned about correcting his pronunciation, because he’s worried that American patients might not trust a doctor with a strong Mexican accent. Stephen had a good idea of what areas he would like to improve on, so I was largely able to do needs assessment simply through our conversation and asking what skills he wanted to focus on. He is already very proficient with reading and listening to English, as he consumes a lot of British and American media, but has some trouble with pronunciation and correct sentence formation because he rarely has the opportunity to speak English in his everyday life.

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