Scavenger hung

Today we did a scavenger hunt, and I heard one student say, with a little sadness in his voice because his team lost, "And this is the first time I really tried in this class." I conclude from that comment that the event worked with some of the kinesthetically inclined.

We used the last 50 minutes of the class to hunt around the campus for the following items and information:

1. What is on the door to Mr. Kirk's office?
2. What color is the "Gokuri" (a soft drink by Suntory) can?
3. How many sculptures are in front of Professor Yoshimura's office?
4. How many benches at the bus stop (under the roof)?
5. How many silver balls (not apples) are on the Christmas tree on the first floor?
6. How many paintings are there in the lobby of building #9?
7. How many floors in the library?
8. What time is the mail collected from the mailbox in front of the Administration Bldg?
9. There are five kinds of garbage collected at this school. What are they?
10. What is the tallest building on campus?
11. Who is in room 9507?
Bring back a stone, and a dry leaf.

I think they had a good time figuring out what the English meant, collecting the items, and then presenting the information. Another student said, "Teamwork is really important with this." I said that teamwork is important in language learning, and that if they learn best in a team, that they should make one for that purpose.

Next year this is one activity that I would like to do at the beginning of the year to emphasize that point. That if teamwork works for you in other activities, then maybe it would help in learning language.

Mastery orientation

From the beginning of the year, I have been orienting students to mastery rather than getting enough points on quizzes to pass. I posted about this on April 10th, 2004. My reasoning at the beginning was that students oriented toward mastery learn better.

Yesterday was a case in point. I was teaching the class of students repeating the first year English course that they had failed to get credit for. We had a quiz on the unit we had just finished. The students in the first period came in and began the quiz. Actually one student, from now on "student A", came in first, and it looked like there would only be one person. A few more trickled in later.

The format of the quiz is a listening section, followed by a vocabulary section, and finishing up with a speaking evaluation. The students work at their own pace, listening to the tape as many times as they like, and doing the speaking when they have earned enough points on the other two sections that there would be a possibility of passing. When a student has done as much as they can on the written part of the quiz, they give it to me to be graded. If they do not earn enough points, they take it again until they make at least a 90% or better combined score for the written and spoken sections.

No one finished the quiz the first time. Everyone had to take the quiz at least two times. Two students did not finish in the first 90-minute class period, and stayed for the second period. Student A finished the quiz at 20 minutes past the end of the second class period, meaning that he had been there, learning for over three hours. Yes, there are better ways to study a language, but if he is not willing to do it on his own, he has to do it during class time. I gave him ample opportunity to leave. He took a cigarette break between class periods, but otherwise struggled away at the quiz.

My assessment of the class was that the students don't study on their own, outside of class, and as unfortunate as that may be, at least they are doing some learning during class. At the beginning of the quiz period, they complained that they would never be able to get 90%, but they did. They achieved something big, not just a pass with a minimum of points.

My grade report that I hand in this year is going to look strange. Everyone who passes will pass with high A's. Everyone else will be a repeater again next year.

Last English Communication class for the year

This morning is the last class for the English Communication class for repeaters this calendar year. There will be two more next year and then exams. This morning is a unit quiz.

I met one of the class members the other day at a shop, a forth-year student. He says that he found a job. His next big task is going to be passing the class. If he passes all of the unit tests and the final exam, I'll think about it. Otherwise his attendance is so bad that there is no way I can pass him. I imagine that this guy is going to be quite an asset to his employer. He has a great personality for business.

Should English be compulsory in elementary schools?

An article in The Japan Times Online discusses the political and social environment surrounding the debate about whether to make English language classes part of the elementary school curriculum. It sounds as if it is not so much a question of if but now one of when.

My guess is that it will happen and teachers saddled with the responsibilities will be woefully unprepared.
The Japan Times Online

Public elementary school offering English class

An elementary school in Kanazawa has begun English classes from the third grade. The change at this school came as a result of Koizumi's initiative to pass some decision making power back to local school districts.

An English teacher has to applaud the initiation of such an ambitious program. You can read about it at the Japan Times Online. You can also have a look at the "curriculum" at the Kanazawa Board of Education site. I have translated some of the contents if you are curious about the contents but cannot read the Japanese

Elementary and Middle School Consecutive English Education Curriculum and Structure<>

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1st and 2nd grade Elementary-- Instruction ContentEnglish: speaking and listening centered instruction; Ability Aims-- English sound system and basic greetings, 10 contact hours

3rd and 4th grade Elementary-- Instruction Content English: speaking and listening centered instruction; Ability Aims-- be able to name familiar objects and simple self introductions, 35 contact hours or more

5th and 6th grade Elementary-- Instruction Content English: speaking and listing ability, progressing on to reading and writing, Ability Aims--to be able to introduce a person familiar to you and read and write simple sentences, 35 contact hours or more

6th grade Elementary-- move on to first-year Middle School materials

Pretty rough translation, but enough to get the idea.



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Jenkins may become an English teacher

What a day for the profession. Charles Robert Jenkins, a deserter from the American Army in 1965 who now resides in Japan after a slap-on-the-wrist sentence for desertion, is back among the Japanese population. In an article, US army deserter begins new life in Japan, it says that one option for the future is to teach English

Soga already has a job as a health worker in Sado and Japanese officials have suggested that Jenkins could teach English, although he left school at 15 and has a heavy drawl.

I'm sure he would be very good at showing young learners in Japan how to appear in propaganda films and how to effectively give up sensitive military intelligence.

Failing forth-years

It is happening, the forth-year students ("seniors" where I came from) in my class for students repeating first-year English are all failing. This is a situation that I would like to have avoided, but they just don't show up. And when they do, they just kind of sit there and do as little as possible. This strategy is not one that I encourage, mostly because it doesn't work, but also because it is not any fun for anyone at all. It can't be fun. It would be a much better way to spend 90 minutes to just play a little bit with the language. It would probably help them learn something as well as get them a passing grade.

I don't want to deal with sobbing 22-year-olds who finally realized that I have never been joking, and that the job that they have found, which necessitates a degree from a four-year university, will go to someone else.

A beautiful day in the neighborhood

Another beautiful day at the foot of the Suzukas. It was a wierd warm day yesterday, but today it is back to its seasonable chilly. There ws sleet on the car this morning, actually. As I was driving to the U, there was a beautiful rainbow over the town that I live in. Just magnificent.

"Kanji alive" useful for kanji study

"Kanji alive aids language learning"

This looks like a great language learning tool for all you kanji learners out there. Here is the Univeristy of Chicago site., too.

"Kanji alive"

Like rarified air?

My students are becoming like air at 30,000 feet, rare, but more valuable. Several students have stopped coming to class. My guess is that they have given up on getting a credit in English this time around. I am having more fun with the people who are left, though. They really are a kick sometimes. One of my Chinese students, struggling to come up with the word flight attendant, blurted out, "hikouki sister." (hikouki is airplane in Japanese)

cool web tricks

I was just over at hmmn..., and there was a post there about trying to access the georgewbush.com from abroad. I guess you can't do it. I tried, too, but couldn't, either. In the comments one from Dragan suggested that we use an "anonymizer site." I didn't know what that was, so I tried his hint and tried the URL he suggested. Got right in. For all you expats who need your Dubya fix, try it here.
http://www.anonymization.net/http://www.gop.com/News/LatestHeadlines.aspx