Meet The
Teachers
This is the first in a regular feature, Kaplan teachers are interviewed by students, to find out a bit more about them and their lives. In this issue, Renato Moraes meets Kalypso...
You can call teacher Kalypso Perentidis by Kalypso or Kaly, but she does not like being called teacher. She says teacher is what she does, not what she is. She told me that she goes to bed late at night wake up at four o clock during the week – on Saturdays she sleeps a lot. I was reminded of a famous film with Sidney Poitier – To Sir, with Love – great story, nice music (What can I give you in return, it said). Like Mark Thackeray, the character of Poitier, to be a teacher was not what he has intended to do. It had been a job that, in some moment in the past, looked to be an interesting option while she has following her own way. Now she cannot imagine herself doing anything else.
England has a big cultural diversity and the same happens at Kaplan. In the classes Kalypso and her students can learn about different cultures comparing their habits and customs with each other while studying English. She recommends her students creating friendships and finding themselves. How? She gives us three tips: be open minded, study, and have fun. The facilities that Kaplan offers are very useful for that, and students should take advantage of them. The teachers who have created the study groups put a lot of effort into them and the student’s timetables can easily accommodate these tasks. They really help the students to improve their English and, also, they are free cost!
The social activities – tours, meetings and trips – are excellent opportunities to interact with people in an informal way. At these times the students do not worry about speaking without any grammatical error, and can learn about colloquial language.
Kalypso encourages her students to learn about the language and the country in and out of the classroom. Teacher is not only what she does; it is also what she is.
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