home tuition – Living Learning English Reviews

Wunderful stay with Daniela Thake in Cambridge

August 3, 2016 by Romana Reingruber

Hi it´s Romana here. I´m 18 years old and I´m from Austria. I staying in Cottenham – near Cambridge – for two weeks with Daniela and her family. I stay here with another LLE student called Estelle. We are very glad to stay with really nice family.

Family

The family is very polite and we love to stay with them. We learnt a lot of new vocabulary while we were here. The children (6-years old girl and 10-years old boy) talk a lot to us so we learnt to understand English child language. We felt very welcome here so our stay was better than expected.

Accommondation

I was really impressed when I arrived .I went upstairs and I saw my room the first time it was a ‘wow-effect’ , because the room is very big and we have our own bathroom. I have to share the accomondation with Estelle(my collegue) but there is more than enough space for both of us. Our bedroom looks very friendly and there are three windows so the room is nicely lit up the whole day.
But not only our bedroom is really comfortable. We live here in a big house, the sitting room as well as the dinning room are quite big.
Estelle and I have the luck that this is a house with a spacious garden, so we can stay outside whenever we want. Most of the time we have dinner in the garden. I prefer this because it is a absolutely marevllous habit.
(I have already been to a host family in England with different agency five years ago and it wasn´t a good experience. I had to stay with two other girls in a very small room and we had to share the bathroom with seven other people.)
I was extremely glad when I saw our accommondation .

Lessons

In our first lesson Daniela told us how she will teach us and if we want something to be changed we only have to inform her. We were allowed to choose the topics we prefered.
In our lessons we work from the book as well as free talk about many different topics.It is a god fun!
Daniela records our spoken texts and plays it again so we can correct our own mistakes. In this way we are able to listen to our first recording ( the beginning of our stay) and we can see the progress we have made is extremely good . The main reason for this improvement is that we have no other possibility than speaking English all the time.
I think I improved my English very much because of the fact that everybody around me speaks English so I began to think in English.
I have been to England twice before but both times were with other Austrian students. We didn´t talk to each other in English so the progress was not as good as this one.

Hi it´s Estelle here. I´m 18 years old and I´m from Switzerland.

Food

It´s been over a week now that I´m in England and I like the food at Daniela´s home very much. We have three meals a day and we eat a lot in the morning. The breakfast consists of cereals and toast with a cup of tea and some juice. After lessons we have lunch. Most of the time we eat sandwiches but we had the possibility to get a omelets or pasta for lunch. If we are hungry in the meantime we are able to take fruits.
For the dinner Daniela cooks homemade healthy food. Every dinner was different to the others and it was delicious so we asked for the recipe not only once. We had meals like abergine, fish, chicken, pizza, pasta and many other delicious dishes.

Excursions

I´m very happy because we had almost every day an excursion. One time we were in London and the other days we stayed in Cambridge.
In Cambidge we visited many different Colleges. For example the St. Johns college impressed me because it looks a bit like the Harry Potter’s college. We had many activities in Cambridge, like visiting the Botanic Garden, where we listened to a concert, the Fritzwilliam Museum, a Shakepearepake’s Play , an indoor Swimming area, the Grand Acarde Shopping Centre and I really enjoyed the Panting tour on the river near the Universities of Cambridge.

When we went to London we had the possibility to decide what we want to visit. So we decided to go on the London Eye. At the top of London Eye we had a fantastic view of

the city. After this attraction we did a boat tour which was very exciting. We left the boat near the Big Ben so we took some awesome photos and went by bus to the Brithish Museum. The excursion to London was absolutely lovely.

Once we went ice skating an hour away from our home. It was a really good experience because we had a lot of fun with the children and I learnt how to skate without any help.

Amazing stay in Upton Magna!

July 27, 2015 by mb16

Hi!

I’m Morgane and I come from France. This year, I decided to stay for 3 weeks in England to improve my English. For this stay, I was in a little village called Upton Magna, with a Spanish girl named Cristina. Actually, we didn’t know each other before but we became really good friends! In the family there is the mother, Julieanne, the father, Mike, the children, Emily, Ben, Dan and Sian, the dogs called Peaches, Paddy and Percy and finally the crazy cat, Nevis.

Julieanne taught us English every morning. We began the lesson at 9, so it wasn’t too early. We made lots of different things like presentations, talking

Then in the afternoon, we made lots of different things. We went to a dog show and the dog, Percy won a 2^nd prize! We saw dance, made delicious cookies, tiles, corsage, bunting, modelled clay, painted a about different subjects, writing response letter and transforming songs with other words. I find it wasn’t boring at all, but very interesting and varied. I didn’t really realize that we did 4 hours every morning. One time, the cat decided to join us! It was very funny because she answered the questions!

picture, went shopping, went to the cinema, to a musical, into a wood, to museums…

We discovered new foods: the roast dinner, thechicken pasta bake, the best chocolate cookies and much more. We also cooked it with the family and especially with the daughter, Emily.

We didn’t realise that we did so many activities before we wrote a journal. We wrote all the things we did and then I thought “ Wouah! We did so many things!”

In the evening, we often watched films on TV or played with Emily and Cristina in the garden. I never got bored because we always did something different, every day.

Finally, this stay was a great experience. Before I came I didn’t have any ideas of the things we would make and the family I would meet. I was never worried about anything because the family is very relaxed. I like it! If I had the opportunity to do this again, I wouldn’t hesitate!

My stay in Shrewsbury

January 4, 2018October 30, 2014 by $$$FoGo$$$

My name is Bohdan. I have study holiday in Shrewsbury for two weeks with my teacher Julieanne and family. The time was very quick and I had great time. It was amazing.

I play computer games for vocabulary and grammar and it is better now. I like the lessons on the computer. It is fun. Speaking and listening is in the lesson, but we cooked meals and I had snacks if I want and was not hungry. I had wifi so I could play games and skype family, but it was not in bedroom.

I enjoy the family visits to Shrewsbury Town football game. We did bowling and went to Bridgnorth and Shrewsbury so I got presents for my family and fixed my phone. It was a study holiday and I go back to boarding school so I get a haircut. I want that I can come for study holiday another time..

London Homestays

September 8, 2014August 30, 2014 by David Cannon

LONDON HOMESTAY EVALUATIONS

MY BEST LEARNING ENGLISH HOLIDAY IN BRIGHTON

September 8, 2014August 30, 2014 by Arnold

MY LAST HOLIDAY I SPENT MY TIME LEARNING ENGLISH WITH THE BEST ENGLISH TEACHER IN BRIGHTON.THE BEST ENGLISH TEACHER NAMES GILL STEPHENS. GILL WAS VERY HELPFUL FOR ME AND THANKS TO HER I LEARNT A LOT. IN GILL’S HOUSE I FELT AT HOME AND I ENJOYED A LOT LEARNING ENGLISH.I REALLY RECOMMEND GILL TO OTHER STUDENTS WHO WANT TO IMPROVE THEIR ENGLISH.I’M LOOKING FORWARD TO LEARNING ENGLISH WITH GILL ON MY FORTHCOMING HOLIDAY.

An extraordinary week in Margate

September 8, 2014August 29, 2014 by Augustin and Philippe

We are Augustin and Philppe, aged 11 and 10, from Brussels. We spent one week with Ella, Jim, Alexandra and Betsy the dog in Margate. We arrived at Ashford Station, and Ella drove us to Margate. For the rest of the day we played Jocari in the garden. Then our lessons stared on Monday. We had our breakfast at 8am, and our work began at 9. We had three hours of lessons every mornng, with two breaks of fifteen minutes each. Every lesson began with a warm-up game, then we worked on grammar and new words, corrected our homework and played more language games. In the afternoons we did different activities. It was raining very hard on the first day, so we went to the swimming pool. On the next day we played badminton. Wednesday was a sunny day, so we went to visit Dover Castle. It’s a really huge castle with secret wartime tunnels and the Great Tower. We saw two more castles on the fourth day – in Deal and Walmer. Walmer Castle has a pretty garden with giant games to play. Friday was the last day of lessons – so no homework!! Every evening we chose a film to watch, like Madagascar, How to Train your Dragon and Kung-Fu Panda.

We learned a lot of grammar, like present simple and continuous, the same for the past, and the present perfect. We enjoyed ourselves, and ate well – the food was very, very good.

Staying Near London

August 29, 2014August 28, 2014 by Lyne Rolph

Hello, my name is Kyoko. I’m from Japan. I’m 11 years old. This is my first time in England. I stayed with Lyne and Stephen Rolph and it was a very nice time. One day I went to London and I saw “Mamma Mia”. It is a musical. It was very funny. I like this musical and I want to look this one more time. This homestay is my first time but it was a lot of fun. I think I don’t forget this time! And i want to go to England with my family.

Sunny days in St. Albans

August 21, 2014August 4, 2014 by Nina & Ana

Ana (14) and Nina (15), respectively from France and Germany:
We spent three weeks at Kate's house in St. Albans, a lovely Roman town twenty 
minutes by train from London. Kate lives in a modern house (built in the 1960s) 
with her husband Peter. 
They have three children (Jonathan, Lucy and Hannah). 
Each of us had a tiny yet comfortable room where we liked to relax in the 
afternoon after the lessons in the morning. We also enjoyed watching films and 
Nina loved running in the evening in the nearby park. 
The lessons were absolutely fitted to our needs - as our English level is quite good we wanted to 
focus on speaking and pronunciation which we did.

We went on a few excursions to London, to visit the British Museum and the National Gallery, to go shopping in
Camden Market and Oxford Street and to see Let It Be the musical (Nina is a
crazy Beatlemaniac and was close to tears).
On one day we went on the Harry Potter Studio Tour which was a truly magical experience. We even tried
Butterbeer but it was a huge disappointment as it was strange. Obviously we
spent lots of money in the shop and around London, so by the end of the second
week we each had only about £30 left, but that wasn't a problem.

We went on a one day excursion to Brighton where we got temporary tattoos, had
fish and chips on the Brighton pier and Nina had a swim in the cooling sea. It
was a very hot day and the city was crowded but absolutely lovely.

We met the rest of the family (Kate's children and their partners) on our very
first day here for a belated birthday meal in a pizzeria as Peter's birthday had
been the day before.

The family was very warm and welcoming so we didn't feel homesick at all.

We met lots of the family's friends and chatted with them which helped us
improve our speaking skills.

Peter is a walking encyclopaedia and was always happy to tell us about the
history of various buildings we saw on our way through the city.

The weather was awesome and really warm, which was amazing as we actually got to
tan a bit.

Despite the stereotypes the food was very good and we gained a few pounds.

We had lots of activities but also enough free time to relax in the garden.

Ana and I became friends after initial insecurity/shyness and loved laughing,
talking and watching films till midnight.

Our summer in Bristol!

August 21, 2014August 4, 2014 by Julia and Solene in Bristol

We are Julia, from Spain, and Solene, from France, and we have spent two weeks in Bristol. We lived in Lesley’s house, and we had English classes every morning. In the afternoons we visited the city, four days with our teacher. We went to the science museum, where we saw two actors, one from Homeland and the other from Harry Potter! We explored the SS Great Britain, the first iron ship to take people to America. We also visited two museums, two houses, a cathedral and, of course, the Clifton Suspension Bridge. On Saturday we went to Bath and, in the fashion museum we dressed up like Victorian women, The dresses were so heavy !! We walked around the narrow streets and the abbey. And of course we did some shopping, Julia gives the shops 8/10 ! We were both worried about the food in England but It wasn’t so bad after all ! The people were nice, we met some of Lesley’s friends. Although we had only 3h of lessons, we spoke all day in English. And now we are starting to think in English !

My lovely trip in Brighton

August 21, 2014August 4, 2014 by Johanna Gautier

Hello, dear readers.

I’m Johanna, a french who is 14 years old and I will tell you about my trip in Brighton, a town just near London in England. I took the plane the 13rd July and it’s was the first time I traveled alone. It made me very anxious and stressed…

But everythings was easier than I thought. I didn’t loose me in the airport, I didn’t miss my plane and Kate, my new teacher was so nice. Since the first day, I have been very welcome. My partner, a spanish girl who had the same age as me, became a very good friend. Each day in the week, we had 3 hours for the course. In fact, these 3 hours passed very quickly. We had different kind of learning like games, role-playing, listen music to understand the lyrics… and of course we worked with a book but it was very helpful.

We made loads of excursions in Brighton or in the country-side like canoë, paddle, museums, shops, shopping, walks, beach… We were very lucky, Gemma (my spanish partner) and I, because the weather was very lovely : sun, very warm a little bit of clouds sometimes and never rain ! We met Kate’s family and friends and all of them were very nice with us. It was a pleasure to met them. We could taste news foods like the scones for the afternoon tea, some cakes and sometimes food very strange like “Marmite”. Now, I drink tea each day like a British ;).

So, if you want to improve your english, meet new people, discover new places and have lot of fun, do like me. I’m sure you will love it. I came back yesterday in France and it was a very great experience in my life. I will not forget this great trip.

I was so lucky to meet a teacher as Kate very attentive and friendly. I will miss Brighton, my lovely teacher and her family !

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