I’ve been somewhat delinquent in my blogging during the past few weeks. Now that I have a few minutes – an update on what’s happening in my life. DCU’s Summer English Intensive program is in its second week and so far everything is going well. We have around 80 students, age 12 to 50-something. During the mornings our students have English grammar classes, and in the afternoon more active practice that includes sessions that focus on themes such as travel, food, manners, etc. as well as listening, reading, writing and conversation practice. Several evenings a week we have evening activities with games, skits and movies in English.
Right now we have around 20 Americans (and a few Australians) helping with the program. They come from all over the U.S., and are here for two weeks or the whole month. It’s been great to see all these people come together and work to make our program go smoothly. Its been tiring, too, since there always seems to be something to do from morning until late evening, be it answering helpers’ questions, planning a weekend excursion for our guests, or hunting down more toilet paper for our dorm residents. I’ve realized that for the month of July, I’ll be eating, sleeping and breathing English Intensive. But as long as things go well, I don’t mind too much.
Dave and I are also enjoying the company of visitors – our friends Dierdre and Ben Shetler from Phoenix are here for two weeks, teaching and helping with the English program. Some days it doesn’t seem like we see much of them, since we’re all running in different directions with different responsibilities, but we’re looking forward to a weekend of being tourists together and showing them a bit more of Donetsk and life in Ukraine.
Laura
