[STCrowley]

Hello, all!

I'm coming to you again with a bit of difficulty I don't really know how to address. I have a student who's been 'with me' for a long time. . . and now his English is quite good in a communicative sense. (I really need to practice teaching more discourse markers.)

The problem is that he thinks that he's plateauing with his English. There are words he forgets, but he knows he knew. And he realizes that he's making the same mistakes now that he made a while back.

Let me say this: I've told him that doing homework wouldn't hurt. (He doesn't have time. And, I teach a lot of his employees and they say he's a busy guy. I don't blame him.) And I've told him that the important thing to do is to focus on the vocabulary he needs, not all the vocabulary in the world. MY point was that he should try to spend time describing his day-to-day in his head, at least, to find the words he doesn't know. And not to worry about the words he won't use, anyway.

Anyway, any other ideas? Anything I can tell him--honestly--to keep his spirits up. Believe it or not (my school would be upset to hear this) I told him that his English is great and he doesn't need to keep spending money on small talk with me, but it's what he wants.

Thanks!