1.I will give at least a 10% tithe in addition to any other giving I will do.
August was a strange month with having a two week holiday, However I have already given half my tithe away from the summer school money and shall do the next part soon.
2. Making Prayer a stronger habit.
In all honesty my prayer habits have been a mixture of success and failure [yet again]. On the whole I have actually been praying more than I was, though I have noticed that these prayers have been very self-centred [mainly focused on travel, settling and my new relationship]. Whilst there is nothing wrong with prayer for ones self and I am very glad I did pray for these things I still want to push on and increase the amount for other people.
3.Use skype more to chat to people back home/Britain
There has definitely been an increase in use since I've returned to the Ukraine and also during my time at the summer school. This has largely been due to a previously mentioned fact that I have a new girlfriend who unfortunately is now 2000 odd miles away. Luckily Skype does help with this distance barrier. Using the Touchpad has also been a great device for skype and much more convenient that the slightly more cumbersome laptop.
4. I will improve as an EFL teacher.
Apart from the obligatory week introduction at the school I also did some serious reading whilst travelling on a couple of scott thornbury books. Teaching Unplugged and How to teach speaking. Finally I have also signed up to do two new International House teacher training courses on 1-2-1 Lessons and Buisness English...despite not having a single Business or 1-2-1 class...at the moment.
5. I will improve my Russian.
The work over the summer clearly came back as despite having a slow start my fluency and accuracy seam to have improved! A few people have commented [and I share the feeling] that I am better at speaking than before I left. I also had a wonderful moment of suddenly knowing how to ask a student if they had finished their test in russian despite never having learnt the verb "to finish".
6. I will write more songs.
Whilst I was back in the UK I had great fun experimenting with my latest instrument, a Kala Ukulele and wrote a few little ditties on that but nothing properly, in addition this aim has been half dropped in the past.
7. Host a weekly meal at my flat.
I have just returned to my flat and so haven't really had a chance to host a meal. Despite this I did assist in cooking whilst back home and recently cooked for a fellow teacher who crashed in my flat whilst he waited for a flat to be sorted for himself.
8. Regular and higher quality blogging.
Again this month [well last now] was a very quiet month. To be perfectly honest I was too busy! However I hope that this month will prove more productive, especially with a more established timetable. On top of this I would like to take this moment to announce my new TEFL blog called A noobs guide to TEFL this is an attempt to both reflect that I am still learning and reflect what I learn along the way and also to help people starting out with these same issues. Please do come and visit it.
9. I will get involved with some form of charitable work in the Ukraine.
Having just returned to the Ukraine I have yet to get back involved with things. This shall change soon.
10. I will make a Public video each month.
Well I made the promise to wait until I had 5 responses to the last challenge....I'm still waiting for 3 but I shall publish a new video anyway. No new challenge until people respond to the last one!
Well I made the promise to wait until I had 5 responses to the last challenge....I'm still waiting for 3 but I shall publish a new video anyway. No new challenge until people respond to the last one!
