A reaction to short story "Sonny's Blues" by James Baldwin

For those of you who are not familiar with the story Sonny's Blues, here is a link.

http://ja.scribd.com/doc/7086554/Sonnys-Blues-by-James-Baldwin

For more information on the author Baldwin, click here.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Baldwin

This story was used in a workshop I attended today at ICU on how to teach literature in liberal arts. The special workshop was given by writer and professor Kathleen Hill, who I've introduced previously on my blog.

Kathleen has repeatedly stressed that literature, both in reading it and writing it, forces us to honestly look at what it means to be human, and what makes us "us." That is the value of including literature in liberal arts study, even in a foreign language. I think my students can learn a lot from reading stories and asking themselves what they feel about it, just as they can when they write about personal topics and share their thoughts and emotions with each other.

It was my first time to read this story, or any story by Baldwin, and I felt the impact of the writing grow on me as we discussed it.

The short story is about two brothers, with the older brother narrating the story and expressing his love and concern for his younger brother who ran away from home, joined the navy, and after returning pursues his dream to be a jazz musician, with some difficulty with drug abuse along the way.

To me, the most powerful theme in the story is the importance of "listening with an open heart" to those you love. When we love someone, brother/sister, parents, husband/wife, son/daughter, or anyone, it is easy to forget to listen. We know what is best for the other person, and because we love them so much and want them to be safe, we either do not, or can not, really wait for them to open up and tell us what is happening in their hearts. I know that from my own experience as a son, father, brother, husband.

I had a very valuable inner conversation, reading Sonny's Blues.

A good reminder of Presentation Zen and Stickiness principals

Yesterday I filled in for a colleague who was away and couldn't teach his class, and we watched the DVD of Presentation Zen by Garr Reynolds for part of the class with the students.

I had read the book, but the DVD is definitely a good way to introduce the concepts to students. It was also a good review for me.

My favorite formulation of good presenting came in the form of The 6 SUCCESS principles of Stickiness, quoted from the book by Chip and Dan Heath.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Made_to_Stick

The book's outline follows the acronym "SUCCES" (with the last s omitted). Each letter refers to a characteristic that can help make an idea "sticky":

• Simple — find the core of any idea
• Unexpected — grab people's attention by surprising them
• Concrete — make sure an idea can be grasped and remembered later
• Credible — give an idea believability
• Emotional — help people see the importance of an idea
• Stories — empower people to use an idea through narrative

Good stuff. As an educator, my goal is to make important things stick and stay for a long time and I have much to learn from this.

Promoting international exchanges on campus - One success case

This week I had an "exchange class" between my Academic Reading/ Writing class of 22 Japanese university students' and 23 international students studying Japanese at our university.

It went really, really, well, so I wanted to share what we did and how the students reacted.

For the past four years, I've done joint sessions like this once a term with another professor in charge of teaching Japanese to international students. My Japanese students have commented for years that the exchange class is the most valuable and stimulating 70 minutes in their language study experience, and today's reaction was just as strong.

I hope to propose that this type of exchange become a regular part of the university curriculum. The benefit is not only that the students on both sides can stimulate each other in terms of language and culture learning, but also establish connections that will extend beyond the joint session and enrich their university life.

-----------

2012 Autumn Exchange Class Summary

Who: 19 students from ELA section 4F met up with 23 students from JLP level 4 in H-352. Both groups had a few absent students. Ms. Suzuki and Ms. Hosaka from the JLP and Mark Christianson from the ELA facilitated the session. The JLP students mostly came to ICU in September as OYRs (one year regular students) and have been living in Japan for 7 weeks now. JLP Level 4 is low-intermediate, and most studied Japanese in their home institutions for a year and a half to two years.

When: 2012/10/22, Monday 2nd period. Planning started at the beginning of the term to compare schedules for the two classes and find good timing. JLP classes are basically only held in the morning, so 2nd period is the most common time for exchanges.

What: The first 35 minutes were in Japanese. The last 35 minutes in English. An even exchange. In the Japanese part 日本語の部, all students did self-introductions in Japanese and then JLP students led discussions about things they found were interesting or strange in Japan and interviewed the ELA students about them. In the English part, ELA introduced their 2nd ARW essay research questions and outlines and led discussions to ask the JLP students' opinions on the issues.

Survey Responses: At the last 5 minutes of the session, the students filled out an anonymous questionnaire regarding their reactions, especially focusing on what they gained and whether they felt such exchanges should be done during class time or not.

Q1: I enjoyed this exchange class:  Strongly Agree = 17 out of 19 for ELA, 21 out of 22 for JLP. Two ELA students and one JLP student chose "Agree".  The two ELA students commented that they felt frustration because they wanted to communicate more effectively but did not have enough English skill yet.

Basically, all who attended enjoyed it. The energy in the room was overwhelming.

Q2: This type of exchange is a valuable use of class time for my communication practice: Strongly Agree = 18 out of 19 for ELA, 22 out of 22 for JLP. Agree = 1 ELA student, frustrated with his/her ability.

Basically, all felt it was a valuable experience. Most explained their main reason as because they were able to practice communicating with native speakers and able to learn about the others' culture from peers. They were also able to see how the other side is making efforts to learn their language (or a third language, in some cases) and were able to make new friends. For some ELA students this was the first time to ever talk with a non-Japanese student on campus.
Q3: In your opinion, how often should ICU have exchanges like this during class time per year? Write a number of times per year you feel would be best.

JLP students' average = want to do it 17 times per year.  (Many wrote weekly or biweekly exchanges are best)
ELA students' average = want to do it 9.2 times per year. (Many wrote 2~3 times per term are best)

Q4: Free response: How was this exchange? What was the main benefit or gain for you?
       (Pasted from the Excel form. Original responses were hand written.)

From JLP Students
--------------------------

1. It was really fun. This "exchange" should be our speaking class. I'm glad I got to practice Japanese more and try to communicate more. Very useful.    Experience. Practice.
2. I really like it and think it is good to have classes like this twice a week or three times a week.    This kind of class is more useful than the usual class because we can learn speaking and listening more.
3. 楽しかったです。    日本語を良く使いました。
4. I found this to be more useful than our projects, so I think having more of this and less projects would be beneficial. Fun and useful.    Speaking and listening practice.
5. I loved this! すごく楽しかった！ I found this very helpful for my Japanese. I learned SO much. It was nice to use my Japanese in a real setting. Once a week or once every two weeks would be great. It was helpful to converse in Japanese, then in English. I made lots of friends.    Now that I've met Japanese friends, we are planning on meeting up again and practicing languages.
6. I think it would be helpful to have this every other week. I think it was really enjoyable. It is fun to meet with other students your age who are just as eager to practice speaking.    Because both groups of students know what it is like to study another language, its more comfortable to practice.
7. It was a good way to meet people practice real Japanese/English. It was interactive and challenging.    I feel like I was challenged to speak more than I normally would in class, so it was more useful. Also, I had to form sentences about things I would normally want to talk about.
8. It was awesome. Very, very useful and interesting. It should be done at least once a month.    Speaking with people in a different environment than the usual class.
9. I really enjoyed! It was very fun. I can have this kind of class every week in one semester.     The exchange of ideas between Japanese and JLP students.
10. It was a very fun and valuable experience.     I was able to exchange ideas from Japanese students and tell them about my opinions about their projects.
11. I wish we had more time. It was extremely informative and fun as well.    I have a better understanding of Japanese culture and learned about issues that are important to ICU's Japanese students.
12. It was amazing. It should be done once a week at least.    Language practice
13. It was really fun! I got to know more Japanese students and more about Japanese culture.    人間関係！I finally got to talk to Japanese students, one of my goals of studying abroad.
14. It was beneficial to my education, and very helpful. Can we do it again please?    Practicing speaking about topics we've done in class with real Japanese people.
15. It was very fun getting to talk about various topics. I would appreciate doing this kind of exchange once a month.     Sometimes when speaking to my own classmates, I'm not inclined to utilize Japanese because English is easier to use. Speaking to Japanese students feels more purposeful.
16. I reall enjoyed it. I made some great new friends. I learned a lot of new language and improved my speaking ability. Fun and useful practice for everyone.    Improved speaking ability and new friends.
17. Very interesting. I want to talk to more Japanese students. We should have more exchanges. The more the better!    To utilize what we learn in class and apply it to real life situations / conversations.
18. It was a valuable experience. I've got lots of new idea from Japanese students, which I have never heard before. It is a really good practice for me in both Japanese and English.    Getting fresh ideas, speaking Japanese. Talking to Japanese people is the most effective way to enhance my speaking skill, as long as I assert.
19. It was fun talking to my Japanese peers. I enjoyed it very much.    Practical usage of Japanese and the comparison of cultures.
20. Today was fun. It was helpful for me to be in actual conversations and not only doing role play situations. Meet once a week!    Experience with talking and listeing. Also learning how others think.
21. It was very good.     I practiced how to paraphrase in Japanese. Even when we couldn't understand each other, everyone tried their best and explained it until we understood each other.
22. It was good vocabulary, conversation, and plain language practice.    Good practice for casual conversation.

From ELA Students
----------------------------   

1. I'm excited. We should exchange every day!  
2. I enjoyed this class. I never go abroad, so I never speak English with native speaker except ELA teacher, but it was so interesting!    Even if I mistake the grammar and words, we can communicate actively!
3. I had a great time! This is a great opportunity. I could make good friends and enjoyed. I can learn a lot of things.    "Don't be shy" is very important
4. とても楽しかったし、良い刺激になった。It was so fun and inspiring because we can experience "real" English/Japanese communication.    英語に自信がなくても伝えようとすれば伝わる。
5. グループの人々と楽しく話せた。頑張って日本語を話しているので僕も頑張ろうと思った。Very enjoyable. It is good for me to know another country's culture.    私たちがJLPの学生に分かり易く話すようにJLPの生徒も分かりやすい英語を使ってくれた。様々あn国から来ているので、いろんな考え方に触れられて勉強になった。
6. 本当に楽しかったし、英語を話しているなと感じた。    自分と異なる価値観を持っているので本当に良い！！今まで自分が気づかなかった視点から話してもらって本当に楽しかった。毎日この授業が良いです。
7. Very interesting for me. I could exchange opinions in the class.     I should get more strong opinion because my ideas are ambiguity.
8. I enjoyed the class! I want to take it again, every term. I could talk about my essay, so maybe I promoted my topic. ELA students are all Japanese so sometimes we talk Japanese. But in this class we have to speak Japanese all the time.     JLP students learn Japanese only two or three years but they speak Japanese fluently!
9. It was very valuable. I enjoyed it because I never had a chance to speak with JLP students before.    It was difficult to listen to English. To speak in English with JLP students was very difficult for me but I thought this is the best way to improve speaking skill.
10. I really enjoyed this class.    実際に話すのが一番英語が身に付くと思う！それはとても楽しいこと！
11. 同じくICUで学んでいる外国の学生さんと初めて話した。I can speak English with enjoy. It is nice plan.    自分の国のことや自分の意見をはっきり伝えたいと思った。
12. "いろんな視点でディスカッションができて有意義だった
13. Once or twice a term would be best."    "自分のスキルのレベルが分かった。英語も日本語 も同じだということ。I enjoyed, but I was frustrated very much. My topic was very difficult. I wanted to speak better! I felt I had to improve my English skills more. It was interesting that　each people has each opinion. I could think about my topic more deeply."
14. とてもためになったし、お互いに英語をしゃべりづらいStream4には必要だと思います。    もっとJLPの人達と仲良くなりたいです。
15. "いろんな人と話ができてすごく楽しかったです！We should exchange two times per semester.
16. "    みんなの興味とかが共通していることが多かった。アニメとか健康。
17. I couldn't speak English. I want to communicate in English! If we do it every term, or every writing essay, we will get more information about topic.    If language education in English is good, we can speak more good maybe. We should more speaking practice.
18. Very interesting. Once per term is good.    I talked about my essay. I could hear many opinions. JLP students' question was very interesting!
19. It is good opportunity! It is very fun and useful for me!!    It is very interesting that Japanese culture about hentai should be more hidden.

以上、簡単な国際交流授業の報告でした。 -Mark

My 2nd year teaching "Leadership English" for Global Leadership Studies

Last year's 2011 GLS program was an excellent experience (link), and I was very excited about doing the 2012 program.

Here's the website for this year: http://subsite.icu.ac.jp/gls/

This year was equally good, and perhaps even better in some ways.

First, I want to congratulate the fellows for their dedication and final performance on the group project presentations. It was a pleasure working together with these experienced Japanese business professionals and non-Japanese graduate students to help them present their ideas for reinvigorating a simulated Japanese company by initiating various global expansion projects.

As with last year, the GLS Leadership English module was focused on activating the ability to communicate persuasively regarding critical issues in English. We did discussions, debates, negotiations, and presentations at a pace of about 7 hours per week. It seemed like the participants enjoyed and benefited from the training that we provided.

The two most interesting sessions were when the participants made short speeches and led Q&A regarding the topics:

1) (Week 1) What is one thing you want to change or improve in your current company or department?

and

2) (Week 3) What is the most valuable idea that you picked up from the various lectures, coaching sessions and English sessions?

The ideas such as the need for more global, entrepreneurial initiative in their companies, or the need to reduce the fear of failure and increase the amount of frank opinion exchanges between team members or with superiors was very impressive.

In addition, the improvement from Week 1 to Week 3 in terms of
1) English communication ability,
2) confidence in presenting and supporting ideas, and
3) self-awareness of own strengths and weaknesses and needs for continuing effort in weak areas
was tangible and a encouraging result of the efforts that they had made in the 3 week live-in immersion program.

I wish I had taken videos of the Week 1 and Week 3 speeches so that the participants could see their progress. I will recommend that for next year along with the possibility of creating an online file of comments and feedback for each person, filled in by coaches, English instructors, the person himself or herself as well as peers.

Once again, it was a pleasure everyone!

YOU: A Course of Personal Writing -- My Reflection

After autumn term, the break flew by with various conferences and family obligations. I wanted to look back at my new course for ICU 2nd year students called YOU: A Course of Personal Writing.

Here's the link to the course blog.

http://you-personal-writing.blogspot.com/

It has the various course materials and links to student blog and writings.

This was a very fun course to teach, and I learned a lot. There's a saying that "the best way to learn something is to teach it" and this was very true, once again.

Basically, I allowed students free choice of topic, genre, and deadlines, and they just had to complete 20 blogs of free personal writing, and 3 published pieces that were drafted, revised, edited, and published on our blog.

The creativity of my students was very impressive. I also wrote a few pieces for practice, but since I have done very little creative writing since...high school, it was a very new and anxious process for me. I was very honest about that with my students, that I am not a professional creative writer in any way, and I was just one of the writers in the class trying to discover what is meaningful to me in terms of themes, and trying new genres.

How can the course be better? Students made excellent suggestions in their final reflections including adding a group project, introducing more examples of good writing, and ways to evaluate more transparently, and ways to help them squeeze out their creativity a little more efficiently with deadlines of some sort--so that not everything will be done at the last moment just before the end of the class.

I'm looking forward to teaching it next year!

How was ARW Autumn 2011?

Winter term is starting, but I hadn't had a chance to look back at Autumn yet. My Winter term ARW course (Academic Reading and Writing, 3 hours a week for 10 weeks) is going to have similar learning activities, so I want to write down my thoughts on what went well and what needs to be improved.












This Autumn ARW was the first time that I had students write one longer essay and also do a presentation based on it. It was also the first time that I used blogging as the main reading reaction method in Autumn term.

One longer essay: Usually ARW starts the one longer essay in winter term, but I felt that students would benefit from focusing on just one topic, and really going into the process deeply and carefully. I think I was right. Most Program B students are ready to write 1500 word essays on a topic, and impressively, we did it in exactly 30 days, from topic selection to outline to draft to final paper. After the final deadline, we had a few days for me to give final feedback and require students to do English/format/citation editing as well.

The main drawback of this method was that a few students got stuck and had difficulty with developing the topic that they chose into a thesis and supporting paragraphs. For some students, perhaps 5 or 6 out of the 40 I taught, it is true that two shorter essays may have been better because they could have "reset" their topic and tried something that would be easier to research or write for them. However, this happens for any longer paper, so I still think one longer, or at least one medium length paper is better than two essays. For quality writing, an intensive approach seems to be better than an extensive, write-a-long, write-many-essays approach.

Perhaps the ideal flow of autumn is to start off with a very simple, short 500 word fixed topic essay that uses three or four required sources. That essay could be drafted and polished in two weeks. Then we could spend the rest of the term focusing on one essay.

Presenting Essay Ideas: Each student did a 20x20 Pecha-Kucha format presentation on their essay content, and these were very well done in almost all cases. A 20x20 is 400seconds long, with 20 slides shown 20 seconds each.  I rushed the process, and only a few students did the optional full rehearsal with me, but even students who did not do the rehearsal presented their ideas visually in a concise way with good rhythm. The challenge of doing this is to fit it into the busy terms we have at ICU. The 20x20s took 3 periods, or 10% of the class time we have. However, I think it was worth it.

I strongly believe that, for their future development as international professionals, being able to orally explain ideas is just as important as being able to explain them in writing. The research essay 20x20 is a good platform for developing presentation skills, and students get to learn from the research that their classmates have done. We may want to build in a requirement for this in all ARW classes from next year. It may not need to be a 20x20 presented in front of the whole class; perhaps it could be...a P&D that uses visuals?

Using a Blog for Reading Reactions: This continues to be experimental, and I still want to ask my student what they felt about doing it. The good thing about the learning blog is that students can see their own thoughts in an organized way, and they own their own learning. Classmates can leave comments as well.

The drawback of the blog method is that it does not force students to read before class...the worksheet method is better for that. Most students write their blog after the discussion, which is more natural, so maybe it is fine.

Two ways to improve the blog homework are 1) make evaluation criteria clearer from the start by defining what a good reading reaction is, and 2) make commenting groups so that all students will receive peer comments on their blog entries.

I hope the students will enjoy these activities and find them more meaningful when I do them in future classes!

The Potentials of "Flipped Learning" in EFL

I've been seeing this "Flipped Learning" movement evolve over the last year or so.

I think I blogged on the TED video about Khan Academy, which is one of the leaders in this movement to move INSTRUCTION OUTSIDE of the classroom, and move APPLICATION (like homework problems) and INTERACTION INSIDE.



I believe this change in education is positive and that this flipping trend is going to grow. It just makes sense. This should be the same in EFL.

One-size fits all lectures or monologue explanations by the teacher should be moved online in a movie or interactive form so that students can access them at their convenience, play them over and over, and watch them at their own pace while checking resources for words they don't understand. Interactive quizzes to pre-test their understanding before they come to class should be helpful as well. Lectures in class, where students are forced to come and listen in a non-interactive, not self-directed form, are going to become extinct.

A monologue in person, frankly, has no value over a video. The video is superior because it allows replay and convenient access. The video is superior because it allows annotation, subtitles, and other production techniques to develop understanding.

The value of school/class time is 1) interaction, 2) pressure/atmosphere to be challenged to apply knowledge to a higher level, and 3) opportunities for personal expression-asking questions, stating opinions, making presentations. Students should come to the physical school to interact with the teacher and classmates.

In EFL, lectures about grammar, vocabulary, how to do assignments, and other videos about how to communicate well, format essays etc., the that things that have been traditionally communicated by explanations by the teacher should basically be moved online. Students should access them outside of class at a certain schedule, or at their own pace, and come to class ready to ask questions and work in groups to apply the knowledge.

So, in my current courses, in my current English language program, where do we begin the flipping. I realize that I spend a good 10~20 minutes or so of my class time explaining skills the students may need, or explaining assignments such as how to prepare for the next discussion or how to prepare a writing assignment. Those explanations, ideally, and hopefully, can be moved to a YouTube video...right? Need to give it a try.

What the Best College Teachers Do by Ken Bain (Harvard University Press, 2004)

Based on interviews and other information gathering such as observations, colleague/student comments, and course materials from 63 "excellent" college teachers in the USA, Ken Bain presents his conclusions on how the best college teachers create exceptional learning in their college courses that stimulates and challenges their students.

"Exceptional learning" (p.189) is defined in two dimensions: intellectual development and personal development. Intellectual development includes acquiring subject knowledge, learning how to learn independently, reasoning from evidence, employing abstract concepts, engaging in conversations/communication in speaking and writing about that field, asking sophisticated questions, and developing the habits of mind to continue to employ those abilities. Personal development includes 1) understanding one's self (history, emotions, dispositions, abilities, limitations prejudices, assumptions, passions, 2) understanding what it means to be human, 3) developing a sense of responsibility to one's self and others, including moral development and the ability to exercise compassion and understand and use one's emotions.

I think that list above covers what I aim for. I hadn't thought about the "personal development" side of exceptional learning very deeply before, but feel that I aim to help my students with their personal development through the liberal arts academic English courses I teach, especially when I am able to include a sufficient amount of personal choice and reflective writing in the learning curriculum so that students can explore their interests and create meaningful learning experiences for themselves.

The book can serve as a good introduction to what good college learning should be, and has much value there, especially for college professors who may have never studied recent learning theory and methods and are stuck in traditional lecture and test-giving models of college courses that fail to stimulate intellectual engagement.Unfortunately, for teachers who are already conducting teaching according to the "learning-centered" principles that the book introduces, it lacks well-developed specific examples of good practices, and primary goes on and on about abstract descriptions of what good teachers seem to do, supported only by a few rather vague quotes. When some interesting practice was mentioned, I kept wishing for more details, or at least a reference to some documentation that could shed more light on how to carry it out.

Some interesting practices that I want to explore (more) in my teaching are:

1.Writing a syllabus as an inspiring list of invitations to a learning environment and promises for discovery and personal development based on adherence to community guidelines, rather than requirements with penalties. What abilities can you learn/develop in this course? Why are those abilities important? (Who gives a damn?) How can we work together to make that happen? How will we assess whether you are being able to develop those abilities? How will we assess whether the course is optimally helping you develop those abilities?

2. Write a book like this on "What the best college English teachers in Japan do?" employing research methods similar to his. Has this already been done? Who might be interested in working with me on this?

3. Students must learn to judge their own quality of work. Best grading is to some extent based on a final reflective essay that explains what they learned or developed and how they want to improve further.

4. Create an archive of student research results that other students can see (Richardson case, 1999 Texas University). ICU really, really needs this. Students each year are doing very inspiring work, but their work is rarely ever made available to peers or the world. We need a system for publishing student work--some kind of balance between requiring all students to publish and only publishing student work that is exceptional--publishing work that student/teacher/peers have worked together to polish and engage readers should be a standard practice for this learning community, especially in the end of the first year + second year of ELP, as it should be in the major courses as well. And how about senior theses? Are those available easily online, and why not?

5. Expect personal development from students - mention this explicitly as a learning objective - compassion, find new passions, responsibility, understanding oneself, human society, and one's community.

6. Ask an inpartial third party consultant (Director? Staff member? Another student?) to come into the class around mid-term (and also at the end, possibly) to ask students their honest views of the learning in the course and any suggestions or expectations.

7. Building a convincing teaching portfolio each term - Class materials, observations, student reflections/evaluations, quality of student work. I guess my blog can act as this, but what would help organize the process more effectively?

Nice ideas to explore and experiment with in the new term. Good stuff.

The first ICU Global Leadership Studies' "Leadership English Module"

Today was the last day of the first ever GLS program at ICU and I finished my job as instructor/coordinator of the month-long Leadership English component with a strong sense of fulfillment thanks to the dedicated efforts of the director Dr. Pogosyan, his staff, and my fellow instructors and coaches, and the "fellows" (participants) themselves. The fellows were 24 mid-career professionals from leading corporations in Japan such as Sony, IBM and Honda and two non-Japanese graduate students studying at ICU. It was a great pleasure working in this program and I am glad that I signed up to do it even though it kept me busy for a month of our summer term. I hope I will have a chance to do it again next year.

For details of the program as a whole, see: http://subsite.icu.ac.jp/gls/index.html

The Leadership English component was designed to help the students activate the English that they already know and use their voice, body, and vocabulary with impact, professionalism, and persuasiveness in discussions, debates, negotiations, and presentations. We were glad to hear that the English component was well-received based on the evaluations that were collected by the GLS office. Although most of the participants were using English fairly regularly in their work, many had never had a chance to practice or receive formal training/feedback in how to lead discussions/debates, exchange opinions critically but politely, or make presentations with effective visuals, use of voice/body and phrases such as those for facilitating Q&A.

For next year, I have several ideas for improving the program further. These include:

1) Making a "Learning Record" for each participant that records key information such as the student's goals, the instructors' assessment of English level etc., performance on key assignments such as presentations, individual coaching records, and feedback comments from peers and instructors for future improvement. This year a number of documents and channels were used to keep track of the above information, but ideally all information about one participant should be consolidated in an organized way. For example, English instructors were taking notes on presentation rehearsals and giving advice to participants orally based our notes, but that often left no record for the participant to refer to later except in their memory or quick shorthand notes that they took. To make this work, I envision all instructors and coaches having access to one online file (a shared Google Document, for example) or profile for each participant, and inputting information electronically on the spot in the class as we watch a presentation or observe a negotiation or debate.

2) Teaching and demanding evidence based arguments with focus, organization, and documentation in their final presentations. The presentations this year were full of creative ideas, and the presentation skills of the participants improved a good measure each week, but the content of the final assignment, the proposals for how to kick start Japan, failed to be persuasive and would not be acceptable as a proposal in business, as Mr. Kitashiro, current chairman of board of trustees of ICU and former president and board chair of IBM Japan, aptly pointed out in his final comments. His words have the most weight as an extremely experienced global business leader, and I'm glad he said this openly and frankly because it was what most of the audience members (and possibly the presenters themselves) were thinking, and I know I felt it. Next year, I hope there will be more coordination among the program planners, instructors and coaches to design a process of building final presentations that will be much more persuasive. We need to treat the final presentation just like a college assignment, give written criteria, give library research time, give feedback along the milestones of outline, draft, rehearsal, and design a schedule that can allow the teams to meet with English instructors or coaches or professors to get necessary feedback.

I think those two changes are the highest priorities and will have the biggest impact in terms of the satisfaction of the participants.

Some other small ones may include: 1) Setting a minimum TOEIC score to exclude students who may not have enough basic English ability to benefit from the program, 2) requiring the Learning Summary from all students as a completion requirement (and making a system that allows comments on the postings), 3) putting more learning materials for English such as handouts and recordings online so that the participants can preview and review the materials, and 4) attracting more non-Japanese participants--Thi and Nathalie were invaluable additions to the program. I'm sure more ideas will come out when we have the program evaluation meeting to look back at what we did and the comments that the participants gave us.

Also, I hope there will be an official series of events for GLS graduates and their colleagues to have regular follow-up training sessions on key skills that they want to keep improving such as debate, presentations, negotiations, reading/discussing business ideas and case studies etc. Perhaps something can be done in a downtown location once a month for those who are interested?
Looking forward to it.

The Pursuit of Happiness: The OECD Better Life Index

http://www.oecdbetterlifeindex.org/

An article in the Japan Times today led me to find out about this OECD initiative.

According to the recent rankings, Japan is No.1 in safety, and also very high in education and income.

However, they are relatively low in "Satisfaction with life" and "Work Life Balance".

Overall, Japan is a very fortunate society. I am very lucky to be here with my family..

All of my students should see this and develop a vision for how they want to contribute to well-being in Japan and other countries one more step.

In particular, since I will be teaching business professionals an intensive program this summer, I'd like to discuss the Work Life Balance point with them.

http://www.oecdbetterlifeindex.org/topics/work-life-balance/

Sitting on the other side of the interview

This year is my first time to be on a personnel committee. It is a interesting experience to be on the other side of interview.

I am getting a sense for how CVs are screened for interviews. I got a packet of a very large number of CVs for a job opening that was recently posted and had to create a short list very quickly under pressure before a meeting to compare my short list with the other members of the committee. It is VERY important to have a resume that is easy for the committee members to scan quickly and find the main things we are looking for: final degree with a MA in TESOL or something related, teaching experience especially at the college level in Japan, research interests and publications related to what we do in the ELP.

Some resumes are hard to read in terms of not putting priority information or a summary at the beginning.

This weekend I'll do my first interviews. What will I ask? How can I probe whether a candidate will be effective here in the ELP?

Big History by David Christian

A fascinating presentation on the mind-boggling scale of time and space that led to our current complex human civilization, and of the fragility of this complexity.



The Big History Project that Dr. Christian refers to seems very interesting to take a look at. Perhaps we should integrate this into the "Visions of the Future" unit we do in winter term?

英語と就職、出世、お金 President誌 2011 4.18

企業の英語公用語化の問題に興味があったんで買ってみた。
完全公用化は無理があるようだが、部門によって英語・国際会議など部分的な仕事機能において英語を公用語にする企業が増えてくる気がする。

すると早稲田国際教養学部、秋田国際教養、明治国際日本学部などと共に「英語虎の穴」大学の一校としてICUが紹介されていた。

p. 105
「国際基督教大学　設立’５３年　偏差値６６　教養学部のみの単科大。教育水準はトップレベルと称される。英語は英語教育プログラム（一年次のほとんどと２年次の一部）によって学ぶ。英語が得意な学生でも恐れをなすほどスパルタらしい。」

確かにそうである。来るヤツは恐れをなしてこい！

しかし、「英語得意になって就職する」ことでICUに来ない方がよい。ここは注意が必要である。
まずICUの教育は「お金のいい就職をする！」ということを目標していない。
そういう気持ちで入学すると場違いになると思う。

英語のための英語は学ばないからである。入学のレベル分けでTOEFLを使うが、TOEIC・TOEFLの点数目標もなければ良い就職を意識した英語資格の授業も殆どない。スコアは身のある学術英語・教養英語(English for Academic Purposes, English for Liberal Arts)をやることで自然と伸びる。

でもどんなに英語が得意でも、社会問題についてじっくり調べ考え、自分の分析や意見を文献に基づいて論じる能力・意欲がないと単位はとれない。綺麗な英語を書いたかどうかの評価は成績のかなり小さな部分でしかない。

リベラル・アーツ「自由人の教養教育」は社会へ貢献する責任のための学びである。そのために必用な基礎知識、思考力、研究力、問題解決力、そして書面・口頭の表現力を鍛えている。中世の欧州で政治などを通して社会を動かす責任をもつ階級の「自由人」の教育は言いつけられた仕事をこなすための専門教育を習う「職人の教育」と目的・内容が違っていたことに由来する。

ICUで英語に力を入れているのは学生が日本と世界を結び、リーダーとして日本と世界の発展に貢献することを願うためである。そして英語教育の内容は英語環境でも日本語と同様に思考力、研究力、問題解決力、そして書面・口頭の表現力を発揮できる力をつけるためのものである。

ーーーーーーーーーーーー
もうすぐ春学期スタート！学生も私のような講師も必死な毎日がやってきます。楽しみです。

Starting up a new school year in ICU's English for LIBERAL ARTS program

Time for a new year to begin!

This will be my sixth year here at ICU and I am very excited about meeting the new first year students next week.

I am immensely fortunate to be working here in a university that attracts some of the most motivated and talented young people in Japan. I feel excited about meeting my students and working with them and can look forward to not only a meaningful teaching experience but to learning a lot from the research and insights that my students bring to our classes.

And I think it is OK to leak this mostly? official decision that we are considering a change of the name of our program to English for Liberal Arts, or ELA from the current ELP, English Language Program. This is a very natural change for us, really, since this name more closely reflects our focus. Our primary goal is not just to help our students be good at "English" but more specifically help them develop English skills that can form the foundation of liberal arts studies in English.

The most recent Faculty Development Newsletter at ICU included a reevaluation by Dr. Steele of our mission as a liberal arts university. In it, he lists a 6-Point Definition of Liberal Learning that I want to introduce here in a slightly shortened form:

Liberal Learning
-------------------

1. Develops critical thinking necessary to make informed decisions in an age cluttered with information.
   
2. Calls for moral and social responsibility in an age of contending world views and confusing ethical choices.
3. Liberates students, making them free, able to take charge of their own thoughts and examine often contradictory ideologies and traditions that exist today.
4. Encourages students to engage in active, rigorous inquiry. Have a critical curiosity.
5. Requires students to be open minded and embrace a diversity of ideas and experiences.
6. Inspires students to want to serve in society, and challenges students to develop skills and knowledge that will help them be more effective in identifying and solving problems in society.

An ambitious list of goals, but my students each year impress me with how well they develop many of these. Looking forward to meeting you all next week!

Japan Times: What became of the Meiji spirit of Japanese young people?

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/mail/eo20110217hc.html

Hugh Cortazzi, former British ambassador to Japan writes:

Japan's future lies crucially in the willingness of young people in Japan to develop individual personalities, to be ready to speak out and debate with others, but above all to think in international terms.

He feels that Japanese young people recently do not have enough ambition or English communication skill to go abroad, learn new ideas, and come back with the intention to change their country.

At ICU, at least in the English Language Program (which is more like a liberal arts core curriculum than a language program) we are doing quite a bit of training for our students to think critically, ask key questions politely, and not be afraid to speak up when they think something is wrong. I believe our students are developing the needed skills to work with persons from around the world to face difficult domestic and global issues.

However, in many high schools and universities around Japan, education to stimulate initiative to learn, critical (constructive) thinking, and communication skills in speaking and writing (in Japanese) is lacking.

High school and college students in Japan need to be undertaking research and writing projects, even if on a small scale, both in Japanese and in English.

Academic Speaking Class with Video Self-Analysis - The 2nd Round

The new term at ICU starts tomorrow, and I'm mulling over some final syllabus items before I make copies for my classes.

I want to focus on my Academic Speaking class here. Last year was the first year that a video recorded assessment task was used, and I've been watching last year's footage to try to get a sense of what I want to do differently.

Basically, last year's system worked well. Students came in groups of three to my office, took turns leading a 4-5 minute discussion recorded by web camera, and watched their video file in a lab and set some goals for improving their speaking. We did this at the beginning and end of the term to compare, and got fairly good improvement results in spite of making the final questions more difficult.

Easy: Should all ICU students live in the dormitory or not? (List of 10 like this)
Difficult: Should all Japanese universities become liberal arts colleges like ICU? (List of 10 like this)

So, will we go with difficult topics for both the initial and final? Or give students a choice? I'll consider that later below.

1) Workload: Make some parts optional:
Last year, one main problem we identified was that the workload for students exceeded reasonable bounds a bit because we got too ambitious with adding the peer review task and transcription. This year, I will make those optional, so the homework burden should be fairly light. Just watch your 4 minute video two or three times to fill in a checklist of criteria for a good discussions (which we will study) and write a paragraph or so on what is noticed. I want to make the self-analysis form an online submission if possible to get data on what students feel about their own speaking.

2) Use Fewer Classes:
Another issue was the need to reduce the number of class hours that are used. This can be done by using two or three cameras instead of one--with students operating the cameras on their own, but that may get too complicated. It would be fine for me, but how would part-time teachers manage that, for example. Doing only one recording instead of two by cutting the initial "goal-setting" recording is one way, but...I want to stick to two recordings to assess their discussions skills before and after, preferably on the same topic or a topic of similar difficulty. I think I can cut the orientation class - double up by using the discussion skills classes to introduce the schedule and what will happen.

3) Topics:
That leads to the issue of topics. Should the same set of topics be used for the first and second recording? Is that too easy, or is it fine because we are focusing on discussion skills rather than opinion content. Should students be allowed to choose their own topic from the list?

4) Grading Scheme:
Last year it was 50% of the total grade with 20% for each recording and also a teacher's assessment of the final recorded performance. This year, at the course meeting, the teachers wanted to reduce the weight of the assessment, so, we have:
40% for attendance/participation (A=volunteers, helps others,
30% for quizzes, skits, and other homework (5 quizzes + 1 skit, each is 5%)
30% for the recordings and self-analysis--breakdown could be:
10pts for 1st self-analysis (Do checklist, write goals according to directions)
10pts for 2nd self-analysis (Same thing exactly)
10pts for teacher assessment (20 item checklist)
In the syllabus, just say more information will be given.

Decisions, decisions. I need to discuss these again with my colleagues.

Another thing I need to decide is what kind of quizzes to have to encourage students to review and learn functional phrases for controlling conversations, leading discussions etc. Last year, I used paper quizzes where students filled in sentences based on prompts such as "What is a good phrase for introducing a topic?" and they would write one from the list in the textbook such as "I'd like to lead a discussion about the issue of..."

Writing 5 sentences like that at the beginning of class keeps students reviewing for sure, but takes time and is not a "spoken" assessment. So, here are some ideas for brainstorming's sake:

1. Shorten it by making it fill in the blank or multiple choice. Still is paper, but shorter, and can lead to a mid-term or final test of knowledge of main functions for speaking in different situations.

2. Have students ask each other in pairs and peer grade. But peer grading could be seen as an inaccurate and potentially unfair way to grade.

3. Have students keep a blog and post a short dialogue (or solo recording of the key phrases) using several of the key phrases. They would go as a pair to a media lab and record it as homework and post it on a blog to show they tried to use the phrases in context. This may be fun, but students may hate the time burden for work outside class. Of course, if the classroom has 10 computers with audio/video input, it could be done...

新学年スタート！

ICU's 400m row of cherry trees from the main gate is truly stunning. We had nice weather for a few days and it was a pleasure riding through them on a bike.

Nice Online Learning Resources / Learning Centre (University of South Wales)

We should have something like this at ICU.

http://www.lc.unsw.edu.au/olib.html

Nice lists of key skills and suggestions for writing, reading, discussions, presentations, and exams.

Is ICU creating life-long English readers and writers?

ICU is a leader in English education in Japan.

People from other universities tell me this, and I feel it as an instructor in the ELP here. The students show generally high satisfaction on surveys, and companies seem to appreciate the quality of our graduates. ICU's leadership in the field also seems supported by the fact that many top universities like Tokyo U. have recently initiating programs similar to ICU's ELP and college of liberal arts. We get good students and drive 'em hard with a demanding curriculum similar in many ways to a college writing class in the US, and most students thank us for what we do.

ICU is doing many things well, but one question I asked myself today was: Are we nurturing lifelong writers and readers? After students leave the ELP, are they independent readers who know the joy and reward of reading in English and seek out new books on their own? Are they independent writers who know the value of writing for various life purposes (not just university assignments)? Or are we creating students who see English as something they do only as needed for grades or job requirements??

This question was born from a research group on reading/writing I am part of, and weighed heavily on my mind today as I attended a faculty discussion on the future direction of English education at ICU.

I want to do a survey of ICU students to see whether they have really developed as readers and writers in English. Where and when would I do that? One idea is to send an email survey to some of the seniors who I taught several years ago in the first year program.

Are you a regular reader of English books? Why or why not?

Are you a regular writer of English in any way? Why or why not?

I wonder what they would say. If many of them answer "No" and have no identity as a reader or writer in English, can we really say that are English language program at ICU has been successful?

Also, I wonder what they will say about their identity or awareness as readers and writers in Japanese?

Hm...

Technology and ICU Students - Should more technology be used to engage students?

This 7 min. video came around today to all instructors in our English Language Program from Rab, a colleague who is active in introducing new technologies into our curriculum. I have great respect for teachers like him who are constantly updating methods of research and teaching and sharing new ideas. I tend to be a bit more conservative "wait and see" type before I adopt new tools and systems, and even more cautious about proposing changes that will affect other teachers, but my cycle of innovation and experimentation has been getting faster over the years thanks to some very progressive type colleagues I have had a chance to work with.

Basically, the message in the video is that teachers using "traditional" methods of teaching should consider using more networked technologies such as blogs, wikis, and podcasts to engage and stimulate learning. The message suggests that our students are bored by traditional methods and want more interactive and more individually-relevant and customized learning.

So, what do I think about this?



Most importantly, I agree with the point that learning should always be relevant to the lives of students. If instructors cannot convincingly persuade students that what they are doing is strongly relevant and valuable to their personal goals and future development, there is something wrong with the learning or with the communication about the learning. Withing a standardized curriculum, especially one that has a "one size fits all" or "everyone must do this exactly the same way" kind of approach, making required content relevant to students can be a big challenge for instructors. Some may argue that "good students" just accept what they have to do and make it meaningful for themselves. I agree that students like that are nice to teach and make our lives easy--we enforce that on them by GPA systems and so on, so they often have no choice but to be nice. But, ideally, learning systems should incorporate a large number of choices for students which they make to customize and personalize highly relevant learning based on informed discussions with their instructors.

They should be defining what they need to learn by themselves and discovering the answers on their own, using a variety of resources including the instructors. Assessments/evaluations of learning should be more flexible and dynamic to help students find their goals and needs, and to encourage them to be resourceful, thoughtful, and reflective.

The Reading/Writing Workshop Method, with some variations for college level learning, is one promising way for achieving this, and I have enjoyed researching and incorporating elements of the method into my own teaching where I can.

I also agree with the idea that teaching methods should keep up with the communication methods and learning methods that young learners enjoy using. As the video argues, teenagers today are used to learning through networks, through Googling searches when they want information, through blogging when they have ideas, text-messaging or twittering when they want feedback or comments from friends, and accessing online audio/video/textual information that teaches them on demand.

As long as all of my students have somewhat equal access to such tools, I am more than willing to incorporate their use when I am teaching. I only worry about inequality of access. Not all students have iPods or high-tech cell phones, or even Internet access at home. Most do, but not all, and that makes me hesitate somewhat.

Of course, I also know that if most students have it, it is valuable to just jump in and try it to experiment and develop new ways even if some students may be inconvenienced...they will find ways to survive. I have seen colleagues go ahead and impose some new and experimental system on students only to lead to a high amount of technology-related stress at the expense of other learning that the students should be focusing on. I usually try to find a balance by making new tool use optional rather than required.

For some reason, the program that I am teaching in now does not seem to completely match what I wrote above. My own teaching does not completely match it either. I want to keep working on making learning activities relevant and meaningful for my students.