According to the 2007 Instructions for Schedules A & B (Form 1040), deductible contributions

“can be in cash, property, or out-of-pocket expenses you paid to do volunteer work for the kinds of organizations described earlier. If you drove to and from the volunteer work, you can take the actual cost of gas and oil or 14 cents a mile. Add parking and tolls to the amount you claim under either method. But do not deduct any amounts that were repaid to you.”

This means that you can potentially deduct the mileage for your travels to and from your tutoring sessions. With today’s gas prices, we can all use any help we can get.

There are some caveats, however. When considering making a deduction of this nature, there are special considerations, such as whether you received a benefit from this contribution. There also may be further documentation needed if this gift (your travel for us) is of $250 or more. You should consult your tax professional about how these specific items may be applicable to you. To read the details from for yourself, you can click here to open a PDF of the instructions for schedules A and B quoted above.

The current mileage rate for volunteers is $0.14 per mile. A bit paltry when you consider that “As of July 1, if you drive for business, you can deduct 58.5 cents per mile, up from 50.5 cents per mile. Folks who drive to and from medical providers, or move for a job, can deduct 27 cents per mile, up from 19 cents.”

Thankfully, the very same month, a new bill was introduced in Congress to increase the mileage deduction for volunteers. Clearly we’re not the only ones that think volunteers deserve more to offset the expense of today’s gas prices.

For more details about making this deduction, including options for calculating the deduction and the correct way to keep records, read this concise article found on Suite101.com.

The easiest way to listen to these podcasts is to use iTunes, but iTunes is not required. You can use any music player that plays MP3s. You also don’t need an iPod. You can listen to these files on your computer or you can burn these files to an audio CD and take them into your car.

To get to the Pearson Longman podcasts, go to www.pearsonlongmanusa.com/podcasts. You’ll see a long list of podcasts with a title and author. Next to each of these is a button that says “iTunes” and one that says “Download”. The easiest way to get the podcast onto your computer is to have iTunes installed and click on the iTunes button.

There are a lot of interesting podcasts in this list including ones on topics such as “Secrets My Applied Linguist Told Me”, “The Multilevel Classroom”, “The Importance of Warmups:Why Do Warmups?”, and many, many more. All of the podcasts are free and range in length from 4 to 16 minutes or so.

What a great way to make use of your time sitting in traffic!

Other Reasources:

Podcasting defined at Wikipedia

What does this actually mean? It means that you have access to a wealth of documents that you can use in your class or for tutor development.

If you go to Scribd, you’ll see the homepage is pretty slick looking and in the upper right there is a big search box just waiting for something to look for. For my search I typed in the pretty broad term “ESL”. Within a second about 4000 results showed up, the first one being “ESL Modifications” which is a document  about how to adjust normal reading lessons to accommodate the needs of ESL learners. I found even just the opening tables explaining the needs of students at different levels to be helpful.

Admittedly, I did find myself wading through few a lot of results that weren’t what I was looking for, but the ones that I did find were worth it, like “Teaching English Language Learners: What the Research Does—And Does Not—Say“.

Looking for flashcards? How about this file “Flash Cards Kitchen“. The work is already done for you. All you have to do is download and print.

With Scribd you not only can search, but when you find a document you like, you can save it to your Scribd Favorites, email it, download it, print it, or embed it in a web site (as you’ll see below).

The content is free, so start exploring. The interface is also easy on the eyes for reading online. You can always print if you would rather read off of paper. I know I do. Remember to print double sided if you want to conserve paper.

Great American Stories I (PDF)

There are also some more current options that are not free, but worthwhile exploring for a long term addition to your curriculum.

A Year In the Life of an ESL (English Second Language) Student: Idioms and Vocabulary You Can’t Live Without currently $28.95 at Amazon.com

For Here or To Go?: An ESL Reader currently $19.95 at Amazon.com

As always, you can check out your local library to see if they have either of these books or can suggest other options. The New Milford Public Library has a special section dedicated to supporting ESL tutors.

Presenters: Arley, Anne, Christine, Jamie

Downloads:
Arley’s presentation - Tuesday 8-19-08 (PDF)
Arley’s presentation - Wednesday 8-20-08 (PDF)
Techniques with Technology presentation (PDF)
Beyond the Book handout from Sue (PDF)
How to Call Your Tutor handout from Christine (PDF)
Using Our Web Site presentation (PDF)

Presenters: Arley, Anne, Rita

Downloads:
March 2008 Session packet (PDF)

Fire safety
http://www.homesafetycouncil.org/expert_network/en_hslp_p009.pdf

Escape Planning
http://www.homesafetycouncil.org/expert_network/en_hslp_p010.pdf

Disaster Preparedness
http://www.homesafetycouncil.org/expert_network/en_hslp_p008.pdf

You can see the complete list of materials available for free download at
http://www.homesafetycouncil.org/expert_network/en_literacy_w012.aspx

• Ask your students to designate a time during which they will only speak English in their home. Many suggest the dinner hour as an appropriate time.
  • Some concerns: “This works for some students, but for students with limited time with family, dinner may be one of the few times families connect or other family time might be limited and using that precious time for practice isn’t conducive to meaningful family interactions. Also, for some families, it is important to them that they speak their native language at home so that their children become fluent in it. Or there may be other family members who can’t speak English and will be excluded.”
• Connect willing students to call each other on the telephone outside of class. This can been especially successful with students who don’t speak the same language so they have to speak English.
  • Find out from students first if they are willing to participate in this activity to respect confidentiality
  • You can also meet with the pairs in person before calling starts to ensure that everyone is wiling and comfortable
• Pair up tutors with students for a similar telephone session outside of class.
  • This might be hard with multiple students and one tutor, or it might be easy.
  • You could also develop a “team” within your organization to be part of these pairs across all students.
  • Always remember to keep safety and confidentiality in mind for both students and tutors.

It then occurred to me that it would be great to have a carbon copy of the assignment I gave to my student so that I wouldn’t have to remember to take additional notes about what I had assigned. Remembering my few days in the secretarial world, I immediately thought of the old message pads that I would use when jotting down the details of a phone call. That seemed like a great starting place for an assignment pad.

Scoping out the available forms that come with carbon copy, I found ones for phone messages, invoices, receipts, and some other Human Resources related functions. None of them were specific for an assignment of any kind, but I found the message pad to be the best. The receipt pads give you alot of numbered lines but to avoid any kind of confusion with my student or her family, I decided against anything involving money.

So far it has proved to be a welcome refresher for me and my student enjoys having something bookmark-sized that she can put in her workbook to remind her what she needs to do for the week.