12/8 Meeting and Bonenkai
On Sunday, December 8, 2024, Tokai University lecturer and Shizuoka JALT member Susan Laura Sullivan will present on The Importance of Names (see abstract below). We will also confirm our 2025 officers. All chapter members are encouraged to attend. Following the meeting we will have our regular end-of-year dinner party, which is always a great time!
RSVP for the meeting and/or dinner party here: https://forms.gle/Yo8kRXKQd66i3RvMA
Location: https://maps.app.goo.gl/CWXaXz5HpW6MNmyy8
Title: The Importance of Names
Presenter: Susan Laura Sullivan
Affiliation: Tokai University
This presentation explores the importance of students knowing each other's names in a classroom situation and that this knowledge encourages interpersonal communication, community, a sense of identity, and psychological safety within a class. This knowledge also can be a factor leading towards academic and social success. Drawing on US-based works exploring both identity and the use of "name tents" in establishing a sense of belonging for students, feedback-responses from students in compulsory tertiary English courses have been reviewed. Focusing on responses to activities whereby students remember their classmates' names through the use of mnemonics, the author found a number of student evaluations highlighted a sense that study environments were enhanced in a number of ways due to knowing class member names; a finding which correlates with the results of overseas studies. Time permitting, the presentation will also touch upon notions of identity, taking into account the generational gap between many instructors in Japan and their students. This research is ongoing, and the presentation builds upon prior work presented at CUE 2023.
Bio: Susan Laura Sullivan has a pretty good memory and enjoys learning students' mnemonic nicknames and likes. She is a co-editor of the award winning, Women of a Certain Age (Fremantle Press, 2018), and her research areas include creativity, student autonomy, cultural studies, gender, and communication. A holder of a Master of Fine Arts (University of Wollongong), and a Master of TESOL (University of Southern Queensland), she is an assistant editor for the GALE Journal, and currently works for Tokai University.
