We are happy to announce our upcoming My Share event. This event is an opportunity for teachers in Nagano to show case the work, research, activities or learning tools they have been conducting or using. For all the latest on Nagano pedagogy, we welcome anyone and everyone to attend.
A Collaborative Approach to Teaching Elementary English – Trent Abbott and Shiho Kuramitsu
With the recent change of English as a primary subject in elementary schools, Japanese homeroom teachers have faced difficulties. This presentation will describe the teaching circumstances between a Japanese English Teacher and an Assistant Language Teacher. As two teachers who have experience and understand the curriculum goals, lesson planning and delivery appear to be more efficient than with a homeroom teacher. Compared to the situation from another school, students overall enjoyed and learned more English.
Trent Abbott studied Global Studies with a focus in East Asian language and culture at Ohio University, where he also received his TEFL certification. After graduation, he moved to Nagano in 2013 and has been working as an ALT ever since. He currently works at Hara village’s elementary school and part-time at the Hara kindergarten school. He also works as the Japanese Language Coordinator for the Nagano Chapter of JALT.
Shiho Kuramitsu has licenses for kindergarten, elementary school and junior high school. She has a J-SHINE license too. She studied about education for children at 3 different universities. She wants to know more about children. Shiho has taught English at elementary school for about 4 years.
An Investigation on Student Perspectives on Online Learning – Miguel Mision
Is teaching via zoom here to stay? The presenter will share the details of quantitative and qualitative research of student attitudes on online learning after 2020. Participants were all university students enrolled in the same course – the research involved surveys and one-on-one interviews. While some students found online learning ineffective, there were a considerable number of compelling positive points. This presentation will share what learning online was like from a student’s perspective.
Miguel Mision is a lecturer at the University of Nagano, Shinshu University and Seisen Jogaukin College. He has an MA in Education majoring in TESOL with the University of Wollongong. His research interests include both Computer and Mobile Assisted Language Learning.
Introduction to Socrative – Henry Christopher
Socrative is a digital learning tool that makes it easy to poll students anonymously and create fun quiz games. We will be using the free version of Socrative, which is quite robust in and of itself. It is useful for both online and in-person classes.
Henry is a fifth year ALT from Texas living in northern Nagano. He teaches primarily at the high school level, and enjoys playing kendama and Pokemon Go.
Singlish! Applications of Music Pedagogy in the ESL Classroom – Kirk King
What is the relationship between music and language? Which came first: singing or speaking? How does music relate to teaching English? I address these questions at the outset with an overview of the origins of human sound and speech. Drawing important conclusions from this history, I then discuss practical applications of music pedagogy in ESL education.
Kirk King is an English teacher with a musical background, having completed a Bachelor of Music Arts at the University of Manitoba, and a Master of Arts in World Music Studies at the University of Sheffield. He is currently writing a dissertation on Okinawan folk music for a doctoral degree in ethnomusicology (University of British Columbia). Kirk is an ALT and a part-time lecturer at Shinshu University, and he also pursues research interests in the relationship between sound and language.
Extensive Reading – Mark Brierley
Presentation details TBA.
Mark Brierley teaches English at Shinshu University in Matsumoto, Nagano prefecture. He edits the JALT ER SIG newsletter and works on the Extensive Reading Foundation Placement Test. As well as Extensive Reading he is interested in Low Energy Building.
