There are 193, 195 or 197 countries in the world, depending on how you count them.

You probably know quite a lot about your home country. You might know quite a lot about other countries, but you probably don't know all that much about most of the countries in the world.

If I asked you to tell me something interesting or unusual about...Djibouti...would you be able to? Perhaps, but unless you are from Djibouti or have some connection to it, you probably wouldn't. I certainly wouldn't.

This was the idea behind our most recent member-only session, on countries of the world.

The idea was simple:

Before the event, everyone who registered was given three countries that were different to their own.

Their homework was to do some (short) research on the three countries given to them. This can include:

• A famous person from the country
• A city from the country
• An unusual fact about the country

During the event, we broke up into smaller discussion groups of 3-4 people, and everyone had the chance to talk about their assigned countries.

I moved around the discussion groups and learned a huge amount. I even had the chance to share one of my favourite facts about Canada:

I learned about the Timgad fort in Algeria, about the history of Bangladesh, Slovakian independence, dogs in Mexico City, and more.

As always, it was wonderful to see some many curious English learners enjoying an interesting discussion. I'm already looking forward to the next one...

If you're a member of Leonardo English, keep a lookout for the next session.

And if you're not yet a member but you'd like to join in the fun, I'd love for you to check out our membership options.