JALT Event

Event Speaker(s): 

Azusa Matsumoto & Leigh McDowell

Wednesday, June 28, 2023

Meet the Members is an interview series aiming to get to know our chapter members better. These interviews are released as Youtube videos and podcasts. In the fifth episode of the series, we talk with Nara JALT member, Azusa Matsumoto. Azusa is one of our newest members and we are happy to share her journey to becoming an English teacher with you. Enjoy!!

This series will appeal primarily to Nara JALT members but may also be of interest to others curious about our diverse range of members and their journeys through the language teaching landscape.

Come join us in Minoh Park by (and possibly in!) the river to cool down, connect with old and new friends, and wind down the semester while helping raise awareness and some funds for a good cause. We'll have some refreshments to share, but please bring a bento if you like, snacks, beverages, a ground sheet to sit on, and a rubber duck if you have one and would like to participate in the rubber duck race! It's 100 yen to sponsor a duck, or pitch in whatever you like, with all proceeds going to support Kodomo Shokudo, a volunteer group that provides free or reduced-priced meals for underprivileged children in Minoh and throughout Japan.

Meet at Minoh (Minoo) station on the Hankyu line (about 30 minutes from Osaka-Umeda station via Ishibashi Handai-mae) at 2:00 pm, or join us on the east bank of the river about halfway to the falls whenever you can, for as long or as short a time as you like as you enjoy all that the park has to offer. All are welcome, and the more the merrier! 

If you miss the group get-together at 2pm, simply come up the walkway towards the waterfall. Walk past the Insect Museum and after walking under the red bridge at Ryoanji Temple you will see Yamamoto Coffee shop on your right. Go down the slope towards it, cross the rustic bridge looking at the "Monsoon Cafe" blue tarp, take a left, and keep walking along the river until you find us near the next bridge and public bathroom.

RSVP here to give us an idea of how many to expect, and to get emails of updated and more detailed information, or simply stop by if the spirit moves you on Sunday.

Please join Osaka JALT for our Summer Eikaiwa Forum! Current, former, and prospective Eikaiwa teachers as well as any and all language professionals can meet, network, and grow professionally in this series of presentations from Eikaiwa teachers. The event is online and free. All are welcome!

About the presenters:

Paschal Orjika has been teaching English in Japan for half a decade and holds a B.A. in philosophy and a master's in human resource development. His field of specialization is adult education with an emphasis on self-directed learning. 

He will be presenting Self-directed Learning in the English Classroom.

Olivia Allanson is from Sydney, Australia, and now resides in Shiga, Japan where she works as an Eikaiwa Teacher. She graduated from The University of Sydney with a bachelor's in English along with a master's in TESOL where she gained experience teaching practical English to international students. Born in the middle of a cultural hot pot, she developed a passion for language and its ability to connect and unite people of different backgrounds. As such, she places great value on language as a communicative tool, rather than as a summative assessment.

Olivia will present a condensed version of her master's thesis which focuses on Communicative Language Teaching (CLT). In this she will touch upon the key principles, goals and benefits of CLT through an interactive approach.

Teaching Critical Thinking with Film

This workshop is on how we teach critical thinking at International Business (IB), and adding my recent experiences of teaching it this semester to Japanese students at Yamagata University. As an IB team we have been developing these courses over the last 6 years and are also up for one of the three National awards for best higher education teams of 2023. 

Critical thinking education starts with teacher training, and in this workshop,  I would love to try out a few activities with you. We are also developing the website “FlickThink” where we have an open-source online course on how to teach critical thinking with film, and toolkit activities about how to practically implement this into your classroom – It will be live soon and you can already sign up for the waitlist.

Our motto is that "thinking we do together" so please join to put that into practice.

Wypkje is a senior lecturer from The Hague University of Applied Sciences (THUAS) - The Netherlands, teaching critical thinking using (documentary) film to international business students. In addition to that she is a researcher for the research group Change Management, weaving research of critical thinking and film education into the business context.

At this moment she is at Yamagata University (YU) for one semester on a staff exchange mobility pilot, teaching and doing research into critical thinking and film education in Japan. In her free time, she loves reading, watching movies, and doing some running. However, most time is spent with her family and three daughters - and every day enjoying eating great Japanese food together. 

As part of our annual State of the Chapter event, we are very happy to welcome Christopher Saarna and Yukiko Yoshihara as our featured speakers. Following a brief chapter meeting, during which we will announce officer election results, there will be an EdTech workshop on MALL applications.

These EdTech practical workshops are for language teachers who want to know more about EdTech and look for different ways to implement new ideas in their teaching. Each presenter will demonstrate an EdTech tool and give the audience some hands-on experience.

Abstract:

Faced with an ever advancing environment of technology in the classroom, research on mobile assisted language learning (MALL) has been lacking, particularly in a Japanese EFL context. The present study surveys 189 Japanese non-English majors in two women’s universities in Japan. The study finds that although most participants had little motivation to study English outside of the classroom, they had generally favourable views on learning language via MALL applications and games. Additionally, more than half of participants reported engaging in autonomous learning via MALL applications outside of the classroom. However, most students did not engage with the applications for a long period of time.

Speaker Bios:

Christopher Saarna is a graduate of the Temple University Japan TESOL program. He has been working for 8 years in universities and vocational colleges in Japan. His research interests include CALL, Content and Language Integrated Learning, and vocabulary acquisition.

Yukiko Yoshihara obtained the Master's degree in TESOL from Temple University Japan. She has taught English at several universities. Her areas of interest include Content and Language Integrated Learning, coaching in teaching, extensive reading/listening, shadowing, Communicative Language Teaching, and learner motivation and autonomy.

Announcing the return in September of the popular Nara JALT MyShare event.

Like its namesake, the long-running column in JALT’S The Language Teacher, the Nara JALT MyShare event is a great forum for the exchange of practical teaching ideas.

The event will be held online, as follows.

Date: Sep 10 (Sun)
Time: 10:00–12:00
Venue: Zoom
Cost: JALT members free; non-members* 500 yen 

Note* JALT Members are allowed to bring invite non-member guests for free

The event theme is: What has worked well in your classroom this year?

There are no designated presenters; discussions will be shared among participants in a round-table discussion format, so come and share your best teaching ideas.

To access the event link, please complete the following pre-registration form.

Pre-registration: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScTwYtyPrPYri5utyagjzmcojg3idg8mV9Ect8AxZfQZaOMwQ/viewform?usp=sf_link

Join us for a special South East Asian edition of our annual language festival!

This event will feature short classes in Thai, Vietnamese, Tagalog and Indonesian. They are aimed at complete beginners, so absolutely no experience is necessary. 

Join us to pick up a few useful phrases before heading off on any trips this summer! 

This is also a great opportunity for language teachers to put themselves in their students' shoes and gain a deeper understanding of the challenges learners face in the language classroom. 

This event is free for JALT Members, and 500 yen for non-members.

Venue:　Nagoya Kokusai Center　4thFloor　No.3　ROOM　第３研修室

6:30-8pm

Abstract 

This presentation aims to assist teachers in improving their skills and increasing their confidence in adapting and creating teaching materials that suit a variety of learners. EFL/ESL classes include a wide range of students. We teach visual learners, auditory learners, kinesthetic learners, and others. Among the topics to be covered are adapting textbooks for students with different learning styles by augmenting texts with realia (e.g., maps, catalogs, newspapers, YouTube videos, songs, etc.), personalizing topics, and using techniques that stimulate students' imagination, memories, and physical responses. Participants will work together while actively sharing their ideas and experience in creating and adapting teaching materials. Many procedures and concepts apply to classrooms for children and older learners, so there should be something for everyone. The presenter requests that attendees bring teaching materials they would like help to adapt.  

Speaker:　Greg Goodmacher

Creatively Adapting Teaching Materials For Our Students

Bio：Greg Goodmacher's passion in TEFL/TESL is educational materials development. Over thirty years, he has written seven textbooks, contributed to others, and continuously revised teaching materials. 

Speaker bio: Eucharia Donnery is one of the coordinators at the World Language Center (WLC), Soka University. Her main research areas are drama in Second Language Acquisition (SLA), intercultural communicative competence (ICC), Computer Assisted Language Learning (CALL), as well as colonial and feminist discourses in literature. She graduated from National University College Cork, Ireland with a BA in English literature and sociology, an MA in drama and theatre studies, and a PhD in process drama in second language acquisition. 

Abstract: As teachers, we all conduct problem-solving research in our respective EFL classrooms. This presentation-workshop describes how drama can help address these issues by demonstrating creative problem-solving through collaborative and creative methods. When students are expressing themselves in a dramatic role, they experience ownership over English, and therefore are motivated to speak and write. This is important because it goes against the grain of Japanese culture to speak out, even in Japanese. 

The initial short presentation addresses the challenges of shyness and demotivation in the classroom. It then moves into the workshop, which actively demonstrates how collaborative learning in the form of drama activity can help students both socially and linguistically.

This presentation will provide tips and strategies for individuals who are interested in pursuing a career as an English teacher at a Japanese university. Attendees will learn about the qualifications and requirements for these positions, as well as how to effectively prepare their resumes and cover letters. Additionally, the presentation will cover interview tips and techniques for successfully navigating the hiring process. By the end of the session, participants will have a better understanding of what it takes to secure a job as a university English teacher in Japan.