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

Who is this guy "Mark"? Who am I?

Mark who ami-10x10 from markc0908

I should add a bit of commentary on this.

I assigned a slide show for a self-introduction to my Sophomore class titled You: A Course of Personal Writing and created one for myself.

Below are some notes to match the slides above.

The first slide shows an old passport photo of my mother Eileen with my older brother Chris (right), myself (left), and my first younger sister Jeannette. My second younger sister Karen wasn't born yet.

The second slide shows all of us, including my father Warren, standing in the fields of Asashina in Saku in Nagano. That is where I grew up as the son of protestant missionary parents, attending Japanese elementary school and one year of junior high school.

For my high school years, I attended Christian Academy in Japan (CAJ), an international school in Higashi-Kurume in Tokyo. The photo where I hold the loudspeaker shows one of the activities I directed as student president in my senior year.

The cherry blossoms are a photo taken off the net showing University of Washington, where I majored in International Studies with a focus on China and also Chinese Language and Literature.

Next is a photo of Megumi, my wife, who I met in Shizuoka when I was working for the international business department of a Japanese car systems manufacturer. We got married in 1999 and she is the love of my life.

 We have two children, Michael born in 2003 and Mei born in 2007, and playing with them and helping them mature is the most important and most enjoyable thing I do.

Anxieties...am I doing a good job as a father? The picture shows Michael when he got a little carried away playing with his cousin Colton putting on the black stuff used by baseball players under their eyes.

 The future...I plan to just keep doing my best to develop as a language educator, with a future goal of doing teacher training. A doctorate degree is also a possibility in the near? future. Step by step.

For fun, I run marathons and enjoy hiking and kayaking among other things such as hanging out with Megumi and my kids, or a cold beer with friends.

So, that's a bit of who I am. Any questions?

Will ChatBots become a main form of English conversation practice?

I am curious how natural this conversation can be, and how accurate or useful the speech recognition software is. I want to try it.

The obvious advantage is the cost, and 1500yen per month is quite affordable, so I can see it catching on.

I suppose this method has a lot of potential for routine conversations as AI develops.

However, will the program push the speaker to develop communication strategies such as asking for a repetition, paraphrasing, asking for an example etc.? If not, the speaker will not really be developing communication skills that will be useful when speaking with real humans from other cultures and language backgrounds.

20 Questions: Can Pecha-Kucha 20x20 Help Students Improve Presentation Skills?

1. What is Pecha-Kucha 20x20?
   Pecha-Kucha (PK) 20x20 is a presentation format that asks the speaker to make a presentation using 20 slides shown exactly for 20 seconds each, with slides advancing automatically. Pecha-Kucha is a Japanese onomatopoeic adverb based on the sound of chit-chat and used to describe chattering or jabbering on in an energetic way.
   
   Official website and explanation = http://www.pecha-kucha.org/what
   
   Note: In Japan, the phrase pecha-kucha has a bit of a negative connotation meaning noisy, mindless and even annoying jabber, which may have been lost on the non-Japanese inventors when they chose that name...but oh well, it is the official name and it has stuck to a cool presentation format that I like. My Japanese students find it an awkward name to use for what ends up being a well-prepared presentation and we just use "20x20." Another problem is that most people around the world never know how to pronounce pecha-kucha, so personally I feel PK 20x20 or just "20x20" may be a more practical and informative name to use in the long term. But at the same time Pecha-Kucha is quite a unique sounding and mysterious word for non-Japanese people, and can be fun to try to pronounce, so I guess it may stick.
   
   
2. When, how and why did it start?
   PK 20x20 was invented by two architects Astrid Klein and Mark Dytham in Tokyo in 2003 as a format for young architects and artists to showcase their recent work in a concise, visual way. Given a microphone on stage, some speakers can get a little too carried away and take too much time explaining their concepts, so 20x20 was devised to help "liberate" the speaker (and the audience even more) from that type of over-explanation and force the presentation to be highly visual and to the point. That's the genius of 20x20. My own experience made me a fan. When I tried creating and delivering a 20x20 myself as a pilot and sample to show my students, I found the constraints of the format very helpful and fun to work with.
   
   
3. Who does 20x20s today?
   Today PK 20x20 presentations are made at events called PK Nights in hundreds of cities around the world. See pecha-kucha.org for event details and many examples of voiced over slideshows in the 20x20 format. After we did 20x20s in my ICU class, some students decided to go check out a PK night in Roppongi and said it was a cool experience.
   This video here doubles as an example of a 20x20 and an invitation to a PK Night sponsored by Speakers.org (click to see video).
   
   
4. What are people saying about it?
   Scott Gross of Forbes.com (Dec. 10, 2010) has called it "An amazing cure for death by PowerPoint" and Garr Reynolds, professor of Kansai Gaidai, presentation consultant, and author of the best-selling Presentation Zen books has labelled it an "art of liberating constraints" that helps presenters keep their talk focused and concise, much to the pleasure of the audience (Sep. 28, 2007). See also Wired Magazine Aug. 21, 2007 and www.pecha-kucha.org for what people think about 20x20 presentations.
   
   
5. How long have you (Mark) used it in your classes and in what ways?
   In January 2011, I was introduced to the concept by my highly artistic and innovative colleague Sylvan Payne (See/listen to his cool PK night presentation here) when we team-taught a presentation skills course at ICU . This year I have used it for a total of 100 students in two different English language courses at ICU and in one course in the engineering faculty of a national university called TAT where I teach part-time. I'm going to focus on describing the results from my core ICU class.
   
   
6. What did the ICU students present on?
   In Feb. this year, I used PK for academic research paper summary presentations at International Christian University (ICU) in my Academic Reading and Writing (ARW) course. 1st year ELP students finishing up their academic year presented their 1000 word research paper results in PK 20x20 format. Each student had 10 minutes including the 6 min. 40 sec. for the 20x20 and Q&A time. Topics = Death penalty, suicide, commercial surrogacy, child labor etc.
   
   
7. Did the ICU students like it? What do your surveys show?
   Almost all of my ICU ARW students (n = 32 survey respondents) rated it very positively both for being:
   "enjoyable" (31% Strongly Agree, 56% Agree, 9% Disagree, 3% Strongly Disagree) and "good as a format for improving presentation skills (69% Strongly Agree, 22% Agree, 3% Disagree, 6% Strongly Disagree).
   Judging from the comments, 3 students out of the 32 seemed to have had a negative reaction due to struggling with the PowerPoint requirement and the demands for preparation and rehearsal.
   
   
8. What did the TAT students present on and how did they react?
   My 2nd year TAT engineering/biology students did "Team 20x20s" in teams of three for a final presentation on a social issue (problem/analysis/possible solutions) at the end of a required English Communication course. Each student spoke for 6 or 7 slides, or a little over a minute. Topics included the need for volunteers in Tohoku, child abuse, food poisoning etc.
   
   Student reactions at TAT were mixed--one of my classes really liked it and did a fabulous job on their team 20x20s. In my other class, several groups had difficulty with team work and energy level and really struggled to make it work. I'm still tabulating those (n = 60) and may present them at an upcoming conference. 20x20 is a quite challenging speaking task and imposing the format as a requirement may not be ideal for some types of students or presentation projects.
   
   
9. How do students make a PK 20x20? What's the most difficult part?
   If I have enough time in the course, the 10 steps are 1) topic selection/goal-setting, 2) background research, 3) outline, 4) draft of script/visuals in 20x20 format, 5) creation of visuals with timed slides, 6) rehearsal, 7) delivery, 8) peer feedback, 9) criterion-based self-assessment and self-grading after watching one's own video on YouTube, 10) instructor feedback. If time is limited, I make some steps optional.
   
   The most challenging part of a 20x20 is adjusting one's content to fit the 20x20 format - Showing 20 slides 20 seconds each. To help students, I give two types of documents:
   1) A 20x20 .doc planning outline (Click to Download)
   2) A 20x20 .ppt template (Click to Download)
   
   Credit due: The original forms of both of these documents were created by my cool, innovative colleague Sylvan Payne.
   
   
10. Overall, what are the main benefits as perceived by students?
    The three biggest benefits seem to be that PK 20x20 forces students to
    1) focus on what they really want to say,
    2) use visuals effectively, and
    3) prepare/rehearse well
    and as a result of those, end up making a more interesting presentation for the audience. Some other benefits are easier time-management because speakers cannot go over their time limit, and no problem with speakers rushing to finish their conclusions. Rehearsing with the timer forces the speaker to prepare a just-right amount of ideas for each slide.
    
    
11. Benefit 1: Forces students to have more focused and organized points - Really?
    Student Comments (in their own English):
    "In PK, the number of words are strictly limited, so my skill to sift the content and focus on what is the most important and to summarize the contents was improved."
    "I liked that I need to create or present as simple as I can. By that way, I need to focus on only the most important thing, so it helped me to understand what I want to say most too."
    "Because each slide only takes 20 seconds, I could say only the main key point so that it was good to organize the presentation."
    
    
12. Benefit 2 Better use of visuals = more interesting to create / watch ?
    Survey Results:
    
    "PK helped me make a more visually attractive presentation"
    50% Strongly Agree, 28% Agree, 13% Disagree, 6% Strongly Disagree
    
    "PK helped me make a better presentation than a free style presentation"
    38% Strongly Agree, 41% Agree, 16% Disagree, 6% Strongly Disagree
    
    "PK presentations (of classmates) are more interesting to listen to than regular presentations."
    50% Strongly Agree, 34% Agree, 9% Disagree, 6% Strongly Disagree
    
    Of course, we have to consider that not all of the students have extensive presentation experience, and so their ability to compare to other types of presentations may be limited.
    
    Student Comments (in their own English):
    "Creating slides was enjoyable, because PK made us to use images to communicate with the listeners."
    "First of all, doing/listening to this kind of presentation was not boring! I think it is very efficient to keep audience's attention during presentation because of many images."
    "As for the listener, I was never bored because the tempo was good and easy to understand."
    
    
13. Benefit 3 Forces more preparation and rehearsal?
    Survey:
    
    "I had to practice harder than regular presentations to prepare for PK"
    Strongly Agree 41%, Agree 34%, Disagree 16%, Strongly Disagree 9%
    
    "PK helped me speak with more rhythm"
    Strongly Agree 41%, Agree 38%, Disagree 13%, Strongly Disagree 6%
    
    Student Comments (in their own English):
    "It made me practice more, but it was effective because I could find easily what I had to practice on"
    "The first few practices were hard because I couldn't keep up with the time limit, but it was easy to practice once you got the hang of it. I felt i could speak more smoothly when I did the PK than when I did a regular presentation."
    "The PK is demanding, so I like this. To make good presentations in the PK Style, students have to think, think, and think, and practice, practice, and practice."
    
    
14. What are the drawbacks or issues that came up? What did students want to change about their PK assignment?
    Students mainly mentioned problems with
    1) the demand of preparation and practice being heavy within the tight schedule we had,
    2) the format being too inflexible for what they wanted to communicate, and
    3) discomfort and a feeling of being rushed with having a timer to worry about during their presentation.
    Let's look at these one by one below.
    
    
15. Drawback 1: High demand for preparation and practice
    "To create the content and slides suitable for and effective for 20x20 slides, we need a little bit long time."
    "There should be more class time to rehearse the PK. Also, I wanted to start preparing much earlier in the term" (We had one month, but it was not enough because I chose a new topic different from my essay.)
    "There were some technical defects creating PK; for example, the counter doesn't work or the visual effects animations cannot be used."
    
    
16. Drawback 2: A lack of flexibility in making and delivering
    "Not every slides have the same importance, so 20 second for 20 slides are not so effective sometimes. "
    "In the PK presentation, speakers can hardly tell deep contents."
    "It was uncomfortable for me to make 20 slides. I want to make slides more few. This method didn't fit my want to improve my presentation."
    "Once I failed to mention some key information, but I do not have chance to retry because of time restriction."
    "I thought presenters should be in control of the timing to switch the screens because changing screens at the right time is also an important skill for presenters to make their presentation look smooth."
    
    
17. Drawback 3: A sense of discomfort with the timer
    "I very worried about whether I could finish speaking in 20 seconds, so I was hasty during the presentation. It was hard for me to relax!"
    "
    
    
18. Is it better than other types of presentation requirements? Does it help students MORE? Is it worth trying?
    This is the ultimate question, but I think it depends on what level the students are at and what their needs are. I imagine that trying to get empirical comparison results to other types of presentations (with no timer, no slide number constraint) would be a complex study to design and am not setting up anything at this point. What I can say at this point is: Give it a try yourself (for a conference presentation or class lecture to explain something) and consider it as one way to push your students to develop good habits to make better presentations (focused, visual, rehearsed). For motivated students who have some experience with trying to make an English presentation, PK 20x20 will probably work well. For students who do not have much to say or do not care enough to prepare well, or have never made a presentation in English before, PK 20x20 may not be ideal or modifications of the format may be needed. Also, for fairly advanced or experienced presenters (like myself), some of the constraints can be a bit frustrating, too, but it is still enjoyable to try to design a message within 20x20 specs.
    
    
19. Will you continue to use it in classes or research it in the future?
    Use in classes? Yes. Research? Still seeking future directions. My main research interest is identifying the stages that Japanese college and professional ELLs go through toward developing a sense of confidence in their ability to communicate orally in an effective way, and I believe that using PK 20x20 is beneficial training for emphasizing good habits in making a presentation using slides and avoiding death by PowerPoint. At the same time, I think I will use it in a flexible manner with an aim to squeeze out only the real essence that makes 20x20 work. For example, 20 seconds may not need be an exact time. The essence is to help students speak shortly on a focused point, so it probably makes more sense to require the use of a timer, but say "No more than 20 seconds per slide" just in case students want to speak more shortly on one image. The timer can be easily shortened (or lengthed a bit, perhaps) in the PowerPoint template by deleting some of the dots. As a result, 20 slides becomes a minimum number to encourage students to not overload slides and keep key words and images focused on one point. I want to try with those new flexible guidelines.
    
    It may also be interesting to act like the requirements are strict until just one day before the presentation and then relax them suddenly to allow some degree of flexibility in the style of delivery such as: 1) It will be OK to stop the timer or even go back to a slide to clarify a point, 2) It is OK to change the timer a little by adding or taking off dots, and 3) It is OK to not have exactly 20 slides. Plus or minus a few is no problem. Too flexible for Pecha-Kucha purists? I want to try it and see how it goes.
    
    
20. Can we see samples? Can we ask you questions about it?
    Samples of my materials and student work such as slides, photos, handouts, and video clips will be presented at JACET 50 in Fukuoka next week. Also, feel free to send me questions or comments through this blog. -Mark
    

So we recorded videos of student discussions...now what?

I am trying to re-assess a teaching practice I have conducted two or three times.

In my speaking classes, I have students do discussions and record their discussions on videos.

Goal of the Activity:
1. Give students a chance to see how they are communicating in discussions and set goals for improvement.
2. Nothing else? Perhaps to accumulate data for research on student speaking needs and improvement goals.

Steps:

1. Students take turns leading a discussion on a topic of their choice and one member of the group acts as the camera person using a small video device.

2. I take the video files and make them available to students. This can be done in a variety of ways such as burning a DVD so students can check it out and watch/download their videos, posting them on a webserver and giving students links, posting them on YouTube and sharing the link with them, or posting them on a Moodle page. Each way has pros and cons. The fastest way is still the DVD burning, but that is not convenient for students. In addition to convenience, privacy is a consideration. The safest way to control access to videos is to email each student a private, possibly secure link to their video so they can download it or share it with their classmates as they like. The ideal way would be for each student to get their own video on their own device like a cell phone...but many don't have enough memory.

So...this week...I am going to upload videos to YouTube and either email restricted links to students or give them access via a class account.

3. Students will come to a lab, watch their videos, take notes, fill out some kind of analysis form with self-ratings on skills, transcriptions of key phrases they used, and goals and plans for improvement. The form can be paper, which is easiest for students and myself, or it can be an electronic survey form, like a Google Spreadsheet form or a Moodle Feedback module.

4. Finally, students will discuss their improvement goals and plans. The assumption here is that some explicit awareness of their needs, improvement goals and plans for speaking practice based on watching their own videos will help students move toward proficiency in those skills in a more efficient, focused way. Of course, it is possible that spending time for "more practice" instead of "stop and reflect" will lead to better proficiency...but my working theory is that in the long term, students who have a clear idea of what they want to work on will make more progress.

That would be interesting to examine somehow with a comparison of two groups: those whose teachers gave them time to reflect and those who did not. What will the difference be?

Mark

SoundCloud - the best online voice recorder!

I was just in the process of looking for an easy way to record and share audio online when I noticed that my blues harp teacher Satoru Hiramatsu (link) was using a tool called SoundCloud to share tunes and lessons with his students.

Very nice tool. http://soundcloud.com/

See this embedded audio for an online handout (link) for my Academic Speaking students, for example.

Sound Cloud can create a short link to the recording like this: http://snd.sc/dJksSB

Or, you can embed it like this below:

Check out SoundCloud by Markc0908

It is very, very easy to record and post online. The only problem I have encountered so far is that the process of "transcoding" a recording seems to take a long time sometimes and that delays the availability of the online audio sometimes. I hope the short recording embedded above will finish transcoding soon...it has been going for 5 minutes or so even though it is a very short file...I didn't have any problem with this yesterday when I recorded for several minutes, so maybe it just depends on the traffic load of the server?

I'm hoping my students can use this for English speaking homework such as "record a rehearsal of your upcoming presentation" and share it with your teacher to get advice, or just record a skit or dialogue with a classmate to show that you have mastered the language we studied this week.

Brainstorming for my ASP Class: Skills for Good Discussions/Meetings

I'll be teaching ICU's Academic Speaking (ASP) class for first year students again this term from next week, and here goes some messy brainstorming to squeeze out some new ideas and make some vague images for new activities a little more concrete...

The goal of the course is to help students become more comfortable with using English in "on campus" situations, with an emphasis on group discussions. Other situations we cover are meeting people, carrying on a conversation, visiting a teacher's office, and giving peer feedback. I think that is a good list of situations, and we just need to teach functional language and concepts and do practices that will help students feel comfortable in those situations.

Lesson 1
Meeting people - We do this just for the first day. How to self-introduce, shake hands, ask a few polite questions, start, continue and leave a conversation...all in 70 minutes. We could do more...I guess...but one period usually does it for introducing the basics.

I'd like to assign a "meet a non-Japanese person on campus" activity like I did five years ago...Samples here. Possibly as a pair work, or in threes? Video would be cool, or at least a photo plus a short report students submit on a Moodle site or class blog.

I should make an example. Take the VADO out on campus or just within the ELP. 3 minutes should do it.

Lesson 2
Controlling a Conversation, Active Listening: Students should master 10 or 15 phrases that can really help students clarify things or avoid miscommunication. Phrases include "I'm sorry. Could you please speak a little slower?" and "Sorry, could I confirm? Do you mean...?"

What's the best way to assess this? The ultimate way would be to have students actually use the phrases when they interview or do discussions with a non-Japanese person.

Another good way is to ask students to create a skit that uses those phrases in a simulated way. They would write a short, 1 minute skit that uses one or more of the phrases, and act it out in front of the whole class. Or it could be homework--record the skit together and post it on the class site.

Last year I did a "oral quiz" with a partner saying "How do you ask for slower speaking?" and the other replying "I'm sorry, could you please speak a little slower?" and the first student trying to evaluate whether the response was good/OK/or not correct. It was a good activity, but messy from an evaluation point of view. I let the point thing go ambiguously.

One final idea is to ask students to record answers to quiz questions in a computer lab.
Q: What can you say if someone is speaking too fast?
A: I'm sorry, could you speak a little slower please?
But who is going to grade this? I don't want to have to listen to file after file of phrases...If it is just an assignment with no grading, then checking whether it is done or not is easy.

Overall, I think I like the skit approach best. Just do it in class. Not homework...unless I want them to write a skit draft before class to have some ideas to run with. Perhaps make a worksheet that asks for a skit (preview) and a recording (review) as homework.

How would that work in class? Just get into pairs (10 pairs for 10 phrases) and write a 5 line skit that uses one? two? phrases.

Teacher: Your group is in charge of *I'm sorry. Could you speak a little louder please?"*

Students: (After working together on a notebook) OK, we're ready! (Come up front)

A: (whispering) I am Professor White.
B: I am his student, Taro.
A: The place is Professor Suzuki's office and Taro has come to ask some questions. They have already exchanged greetings. (Both sit down on chairs)
A: (Normal voice) So, Taro, how can I help you today?
B: Yes, I have a question. Could you tell me why I got a C for my grade last term?
A: Uh.....(inaudible mumbling)...
B: I'm sorry, sir, could you speak a little louder please?
A: Yes, uhh...(inaudible mumbling)
B: I'm sorry, sir. I still can't hear you. Could you speak much LOUDER please?!

The End

They would act this out, and I would get it on video (final) or audio (practice), and then upload it to our class website along with the script. Classmates could add comments (if a blog or Moodle forum is used). The teacher could add some advice.

XtraNormal might be interesting for this too.

Embedding YouTube video in Blogger/Sites is easy, but students might not be comfortable with public video...so I just need to make it private by changing settings on Blogger.
-------------------

Lesson 3:
Visiting a teachers' office

Lesson 4:
Leading a discussion

Lesson 5:
Participating in a discussion

Lesson 6
First recording of P&D "short opinion + leading a discussion"
Do it in one period with four VADO cameras. 4 groups of 5, 7~10 min per student including a 2~3 min. opinion and 5~7 min. discussion.
Send YouTube links to all students.

Lesson 7
After GW, do a discussion based on their video self-analysis of speaking style points.

Lessons 8-9
P&D skills - learning SGW.

Lesson 10
Reporting on a discussion

Lesson 11
Strategies for fluency

Lesson 12
Giving peer feedback

Lesson 13:
Survival game

Lesson 14:
Kelly Mystery

Lesson 15:
Practice for 2nd recording

Lesson 16:
2nd recording -- very similar format and difficulty compared to the first one. Make comparison of analysis somewhat possible.

Lesson 17:
Discuss analysis of recordings, set goals

Lesson 18
Summary/class party

Something like that? How can this be more fun...
Include intro to iTalki, speech video imitation, music cloze, air band, interaction with other sections, interaction with international students on campus, integration with ARW, making funnier videos...PK20x20s? Just go to class and chat and relax...improv...ideas, ideas, ideas.

How about an oral journal to accompany their written journal?

Speech Exercises from Link

Do NOT spend time thinking about the topic before you speak.

1. Your favourite hobby and why it’s your favourite.
2. What you would do if you won five million dollars on the lottery?
3. If you had unlimited resources, what would you do to improve your business?
4. What do you like best about what you do? Why?
5. Which of the five senses is most important? Why?
6. What skill or talent would you most like to have? Why?
7. Why is the current federal government doing such a bad job?
8. What should your town do to create a better climate for business?
9. What are the best places to eat in your town or city? Why?
10. What are the best things to do to relax? Why?
11. What’s the worst fault a person can have? Why?
12. If you could be young again, would you? Why?
13. What are the four things you least like to do? Why?
14. Who do you most admire? Why?
15. If you could visit any place in the world, where would you go? Why?
16. What are your three best personality traits? Why?
17. What do you like most about living where you live? Why?
18. What was the worst job you ever had? Why?
19. What was the best workshop or conference you’ve ever attended? Why?

Improv ideas: I like the Question game. Good for question grammar practice.

http://plays.about.com/od/improvgames/a/competeImprov.htm

Alphabet looks challenging but interesting too.

Alphabet:

This game is ideal for performers with a knack for alphabetization. The actors create a scene in which each line of dialogue begins with a certain letter of the alphabet. Traditionally, the game starts off with an “A” line.

Example:

Actor #1: All right, our first annual comic book club meeting is called to order.

Actor #2: But I’m the only one wearing a costume.

Actor #1: Cool.

Actor #2: Does it make me look fat?

Actor #1: Excuse me, but what’s the name of your character?

Actor #2: Fat man.

Actor #1: Good, then it suits you.

Anything that helps students gain confidence with speaking expressively is going to valuable in Japanese college classes. Need to get students away from flat, mechanical speaking. Drama/acting in skits may be the best way!

Hatoyama's English Speech - A Target for Our Students?

I was introduced to this video, which I may have seen before on news, as part of participating in a survey about the intelligibility of English spoken by Japanese professionals.

Hatoyama does a good job of articulating the key words of his speech enough to make his message clear. He is reading a script for his speech (as most high level speakers do in important occasions), but he has practiced well and it meets the aim of the communication situation.

To be effective, your English doesn't have to be perfect! Also, pronunciation mistakes of a few sounds or words here and there don't affect your general ability to be understood, so mainly focus on saying your key words and phrases correctly and with emphasis.

Of course, at the same time, as an instructor of higher level public speaking skills, it is easy to notice many areas that Mr. Hatoyama needs to improve in.

He obviously did not write the speech by himself, and he is not able to pause effectively to wait for an applause after he states his most important point about Japan's commitment to reduce emissions 25%.

He needs to prepare to deliver his most important point like that with eye contact and more emphasis and pausing, stopping after every word and building up to the main point and possibly even repeating the most important phrases for emphasis.

What do you think?

Nice debate video on TED: Do we need nuclear energy?

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...

Vocaroo Online Voice Recording Widget

Powered by Vocaroo

Does this work? Please give it a try!

Also, what happens if I embed two of these in the same blog post...

Powered by Vocaroo

So...it seems like the recording gets deleted as soon as the web page refreshes.
So, what use is this?? It seems only good for listening to your own voice momentarily.

We need an easy free service for online voice recording! Of course, I know we can always download something like Audacity or use Voice Thread, but it would be nice to have something simple like a Blogger Widget that could easily embed voice bites into blogs.

ARW Notes 2/8 Monday - Death by PowerPoint, Tips on Visuals for Presentations

After confirming schedule items such as the upcoming exam on Wagar and the JLP exchange class, and making sure everyone understood their essay drafts need to be shared with me some time this week, we examined the concept of effective visuals for presentations.

I showed the following video Death by PowerPoint, which make four nicely illustrated points about how presentations need Significance, Structure, Simplicity, and Rehearsal. I will probably need to clarify my expectations one more time on Monday next week, but I hope these concepts will help the groups as they begin to collaborate on their presentation materials.

Notice: It is best to use a small number of key words per slide, and use large, full-screen images that illustrate the points. Also, make sure fonts are easily visible with clear color contrasts!

Our Rule= 7 Words or Less / Slide




Also, I recommend checking out the Presentation Zen website tips on visuals. The nice three slide comparison is taking from the Presentation Zen site.


Bad slide--Too much text and main point is NOT clear. The audience will be busy reading, the presenter will be busy reading, and little communication will occur. Also, the clip art image is not very professional and has little impact. Visuals are NOT your notes. Your notes should be separate. Your visuals should make a point with impact.


Good slide --point is clear. 7 words or less. Big font. Good image.


Best for impact. The presenter has selected what should be emphasized and has visualized the information.

5 Independent Practice Methods for Speaking

What is "shadowing" for speaking practice? Does it work?

I often used "shadowing" my own Chinese study - repeating as I listened to tapes or movies - even before I knew the name shadowing. Basically, it just makes sense because the more you practice a language, the easier it gets. We probably don't need fancy theories to agree that it is an effective way to practice.

Below is one 2007 paper paper on the subject. I attended a workshop in 2006 by John Wiltshier of Miyaki U. once and this paper is basically the content that was presented.
http://www.efcafe.com/fluency_through_shadowing.pdf

Here are some of the main points:

-Research (which I have not examined personally yet) seems to show that "shadowing" or repeating (mentally or orally) input immediately after hearing it improves listening comprehension, oral reading fluency, and speaking in terms of prosodic elements (rhythm/pausing/intonation). It is probably more effective than "just listening" because "attending" to the input by saying it puts in the processing mechanism of your brain and that probably helps it stay in your memory longer and deeper. I am not an expert on this, but anyway, if you practice language more, you probably tend to remember it more.

-What should you shadow? My instinct would be to shadow "advanced speaking" such as a native speaker or high non-native speaker, but Wiltshier seems to prefer (at least for in-class activities) "peer shadowing," which asks one student to talk about a topic, and the other student shadow it. It is a good "active listening" activity for sure and requires to the speaker to speak clearly with the audience in mind. However, in my mind, active listening is active listening, and shadowing should be shadowing. Why would you intentionally "shadow" or imitate inaccurate, disfluent output of a peer? Hmm...I would still call that "active listening" and tell my students it is a good conversation strategy to show a speaker that you are following the person--it is definitely better than listening in a conversation with too much silence.

Wiltshier lists seven types of shadowing:

1. Full shadowing, where the speaker keeps speaking and the shadower keeps repeating everything with voice.
2. Slash shadowing, where / the speaker / deliberately / helps / the shadower / by pausing between phrases.
3. Silent shadowing, shadowing mentally only with no voice
   
4. Part shadowing, saying only key words
5. Part shadowing + comment. ....your dog, uh huh, hospital? I see. I'm sorry to hear that.
   
6. Part shadowing + question ....your dog, uh huh, hospital? When?
7. About You shadowing "I went shopping and..." "Oh, you went shopping and..."
   

For my ICU students (in my lessons this week), I plan to recommend full or silent or partial shadowing of native speaker recordings, but tell them it is also good to do some repeating of key words during a live conversation too.

Academic Speaking 2009にて良い学びをどう提供するか？

春学期開講まで後４日。

ICU ELPのAcademic Speakingを教えるのは３回目、Coordinatorを務めるのは２回目。毎年学生には人気の高いクラスで、過去にやったことをそのまま再度やっても問題はないが、まだまだ向上させたい部分はたくさんある。

この記事はASPの概略と今年の計画である。シラバス・授業進行など、全て英語でやる授業だが、敢えて日本語で書き出すことによって違う視点が出てくることを期待する。学生に渡す英語の実際のシラバスは左記リンクのような感じである。もっとFriendlyなフォーマットを考慮中。

授業名：Academic Speaking　（通称ASP)

対象：ICUの一年生、A,Bの学生（Cは免除）
　　　　プログラムAは旧TOEFL平均４５０点、Bは平均５００点、Cは５５０点
　　　　A,Bの中でも英語で話す力は人それぞれ様々

授業数：一回７０分、週二回、春学期で全１８回
人数：　１クラス約２０人、自分はBを２クラス担当の予定

環境：
ICUの一年生は春学期はASP以外にWriting 3, Reading 2, Listening 1, Learning Strategies 1, Content Lecture 1（授業名は全て簡略）と合わせて週に10回の英語の授業がある。WritingとReadingのクラスが一番宿題などで重い。どのクラスでも英語の話し合いはあるが、英語で話すためのスキルを取り扱うのはASPだけ。ASPは一回の授業の準備時間が平均して６０分ぐらいが目処とされている。

目標：
ELPで定めたASPの目標は簡単にいうと「ICUのような大学英語環境で機能していくために必用な英語のスピーキング力を身に付ける」となる。最も強調する「機能」はDiscussion Skills。つまり、Discussionにおいて意見の説明（簡単なプレゼン）・質問・議論できること、そして会議の進行、まとめ、内容の発表ができること。それから書いた文章、発表した内容について他の学生とフィードバックが交換できること。そして講師とアポをとり、オフィスに行って相談が英語でできること。
そしてもっと根本的に
１）上手な人の交流や異文化交流の基本って何？
２）英語で交流する力ってどう身に付ける？弱みを克服する上手な持続可能な練習方法は？
おおまかな目標はこれで良いかなと思ってます。特に最後の二つは去年から私とCoordinatorを共に務める二人と話し合って追加して重要だと思っている。

規定のテキスト：Communicating on Campus　大きく、重く、学生用のCDやDVDが付いていなくてちょっと不便。でも内容はしっかりしている。著者はICU講師。来年あたりから使わない予定？
（吉田さんの「会議の技法」など、日本語でも知識をつけて欲しい）

学生：ASPに取り組む学生のやる気は強い。受験英語を主にやってきて話す能力がバランス良く鍛えられていない学生が多い。英語はたくさん勉強してきているのに、話すとなると思うように言いたいことが出てこない。でも話す力をしっかり付けて将来につなげたい。という学生が多いと思う。中には軽い日常会話、そしてスピーチ・話し合い・討論は高校で多少したことあるが、大学で扱うような課題を英語で議論した経験はない、もしくはまだその能力は自分で足りないと思っている。多くの学生は留学生と英語で話したい、ICUの英語の講義に参加したい、留学したいなどの希望をもっている。

今学期の授業計画（１８回）

1. 雰囲気作りと目標設定：アイス・ブレーキングや自己紹介で英語で話す不安を減少させる。お互いにどんなスピーキングの練習を今までしてきたか、そして将来英語を何のために使いたいか、グループ内でアンケートし、それぞれの目標設定を話し合う。
   
   
2. Interactive Strategies/Controlling a conversation:限られた英語力でどう英語の交流を上手にするか、様々な「会話コントロール」の策・技法に迫る。繰り返しを求めたり、相手に止まってもらったり、待ってもらったり、他の人に振ったり、質問したり、助けを求めたり、知らない単語を言い換えたり、例を挙げたり、話題を変えたり、策は様々。その有用フレーズをロールプレーで鍛える。「交流の技法のチェック・リスト」みたいなものも作って欲しい。様々な個人製リストや振り返りが入るReflectionノートかBlogがあると良いのかも（要検討）。
   
   
3. Leading a Discussion：良いDiscussion・会議とは？という質問に答えられるようにする。できれば講師と学生が共にチェック・リストを作成する。進行役(Facilitator)と参加者の機能を考える。短いロールプレー的な会議で進行役を一人づつ務めて練習し、グループのメンバーからフィードバックを貰う。
   
   
4. Participating in a Discussion: 参加者としての責任を考え（チェック・リスト、機能的な表現を学ぶ。意見を表現したり、問題提起したり、同意したり、補足したり、反対したり、掘り下げたり、つっこんだり、発展させたり、話題を戻したり、など。
   
   
5. Introduction to ASP Assessment No.1: この授業では翌週に行われるVideo Recordingとその自己分析・振り返りの方法を説明し、Recordingに向けたDiscussionの練習もする。この紹介のクラスも含む、Recordingには以下の通り２時間もかけているので自分が英語で人と交流する姿を記録に残して、自分で分析して、目標を定めて、向上したいところを意識して、これから一年間続くELPの授業の中で上達していくその意義を良く理解して欲しい。もう一つ重要なのは、Recordingはテストではないということ。あくまで具体的な振り返りと目標設定のプロセスを促すため。去年のAudio RecordingによるSelf-Assessmentについての実践報告はこちらから。
   
   
6. Recording Day　学生が３人一組で講師のオフィスに入り、その場で与えられたトピックに対して一人づつ１～２分Opinionを話し、更に２分程そのTopicのDiscussionをFacilitateし、それをWebCameraで録画して学生のUSBメモリーに保存する。退室後、学生はそのVideoファイルをComputer Labなどで三人で見て、Peer Reviewを行い、Discussion leader、participantとしてverbal/non-verbalな面で良くできたこと、できなかったことを話し合う。
   更に、各自個人の宿題としてopinionの１～２分の部分をTranscribeし、自分の論理的展開、表現の正確性などを分析する。最後に総合的に見て自分のVerbal improvement goals, non-verbal improvement goalsそしてそれぞれのPractice planを考え、書き出して８回目のクラスに持参する。
   
   
7. Recording Day　同上、一回に１２人までしかできないため、２日かける。その日に録画がない学生は教室で独創的な学園ドラマ的スキットを書いて演出するClassroom Taskが与えられる。
   
   
   
8. Improvement Goals / Practice Methods: この授業にVideoに基づいた自己分析の内容を持参し、クラスメートと話し合う。意識したい上達目標は何？そのための練習方法は？という感じで話し合い、アイデアをまとめて報告する。講師はそれを聞いて更に具体的な練習方法や参考資料を提案する。ここでSelf-Assessment Formの提出があり、講師が個人的なアドバイスを書いて次週に返却する。
   
   
9. Getting Help/Asking for advice/Making an appointment/Visiting a Professor: スキルとして教授・講師・クラスメートにどうやって助けを求めるか・相談をお願いするか、そのスキルの重要性を考え、表現を練習し、ロールプレイで練習。
   
   
10. Summarizing/Reporting on a Discussion:会議の最後に話し合った内容をどうまとめ、報告するかを練習。例を勉強して表現を練習した後、mini-meetingsを行って話し合った結果の報告の練習をする。
    
    
11. Presentation and Discussion Practice（通称P&D）：ELPの伝統的授業方でより本格的なDiscussionの練習。４人のグループをつくり、一人１５分の持ち時間で６０分話し合いを続ける。各自、３分自分が選んだ「教育問題」の分野のトピックに関して問題提起し、自分の意見を理論的に説明し、その後１０分ほどそのトピックに関して他のメンバー間の議論を進行役として進め、話合ったことを最後にまとめて、講師へ一分以内に報告。最後の２分はFeedbackで、メンバーから評価のコメントが出る。もらったコメント、振り返りを書いて提出。
    
    
12. P&D, no.2 上記と同じ。前回と同じトピックでOK。変えてもOK。目標を意識して再チャレンジ。
13. Strategies for improving fluency - No.2の授業に似ていますが、fluencyを「交流している相手に自然で気持ちいい会話と思わせる力」と定義し、相手のペース・文化的・個人的スタイルになるべく合わせることを考える。例えば、長い沈黙を避けるなど飽きないようにつなげる方法をなどを考え、関連するフレーズを練習。"Just a moment, let me see, I can't think of the word, what was it? Well, let me put it another way, what I wanted to say is, for example, what do you call the thing you use when you......well, I can't seem to express it well, so let me get back to it later. Let's move on...or better yet, why don't you go ahead and tell us your idea first" などのsurvival filler phrasesを練習してから、spontaneous speech topicsを与え、３－２－１のメソッドでスピーチをします。最初は言葉を捜しながらFillerをたくさん使い、時間制限３分、次２分、最後に一分の制限でなるべくfillerをカットして中身のあるスピーチ。練習方法はshadowing, 音読などを紹介する。
    
    
14. Giving Peer Feedback ー上手なFeedbackの仕方の練習。Positive comments, asking the person for self-reflection, giving suggestions with appropriate indirectnessなど。
    
    
15. Practice for Assessment No.2 - ２回目のVideo録画に向けた練習。練習した様々な要素を組み込めているかグループでお互いにチェック。
    
    
16. Recording Day、一回目と同じフォーマットの予定だが、３人で３つのトピックを５分づつ短い時間で浅く話すよりも、今度は掘り下げて議論する力を見るために一つのトピックで１５分間ぐらいのDiscussionにするかも知れない。
    
    
17. Recording Day、同上。
    
    
18. Final Discussion on Speaking Goals, Reflections, and Future Practice Methods。夏の間の練習方法も重要。練習方法やリソースのアイデアをASPのMoodleサイトにたくさん紹介したい。

コースの評価基準は今のところ：
Class participation: 30%
Phrase quizzes, skits, and other tasks：20%
Self/Peer Analysis of recorded assessments: 40% (Record, watch video, get comments from peers, self-evaluate based on criteria, set goals and practice methods, 20% for each cycle)
Teacher evaluation of recorded assessment No.2: 10%　（まだ表ができてませんが、ファシリテーターとしてやるべき機能をできたかどうかについて加点方式。本人の自己評価を確認する形で１０点満点から講師がつける予定。）

とELPで規定されているが、その具体的な内容は私が柔軟に決めることができる。例えばPhrase quizzes/skitsの代わりにReflection JournalかSpeaking e-portfolioをやりたいなと思っている。Reflection Journalは授業の終わりに何分間か書いてもらえばいいかな、と思っているが、Speakingのクラスなので、できればReflectionは「話す」方法でやって欲しい。しかし、学内には学生が宿題として自由に録音ができる部屋がまだできていない。。。（４月中にできるらしい）。それから携帯を使ってもらう手も考えたい。授業外で話し、録音か録画ができれば表現の練習や応用が主題として出せ、YouTubeのstreamingをあわせてブログにUpさせれば一種のe-portfolioとなる。果たしてできるか？ただ、パソコンが苦手な学生には苦痛の可能性がある。

以上、手探りな部分が多いですが、とりえあえずここまで書きます。アイデア・質問・コメント、何かあれば是非教えてください！


Sample: This is one student's 2nd recording from a pilot I did in 2008 ASP. Last year we did solo recordings, but in 2009, we want students to record in groups to show their interactive skills more, and also to give the teacher time to observe rather than react to the discussion.

Communication Strategies that can be used when you get stuck in speaking

Have you ever gotten stuck in a foreign language conversation, not being able to understand what the other person is saying, or not being able to express what you want to express? Did you stay stuck for an uncomfortable amount of time, or were you able to solve the problem and move on in a comfortable way? How many "strategies" for getting unstuck can you think of?

Canale and Swain (1980) include "strategic competence" as one of the four main components of communicative competence along with linguistic (accurate expressions for what you want to say), socialinguistic (appropriately polite choice of verbal and non-verbal language), and discourse competence (making a smooth transition from idea to idea so that you don't lose your partner). Strategic competence is defined by Canale and Swain (1980) as "strategies that speakers employ to handle breakdowns in communication. (p.25)" In other word, it is the ability to "keep going" with your communication in spite of difficulties with understanding or expressing ideas in the foreign language." Judging from my experience with professionals and college students in Tokyo, I feel that strategic competence is one of the areas in which Japanese speakers of English need more explicit practice.

I had read about strategic competence before and had seen taxonomies of strategies such as the one below adapted from Yoshida-Morise's article in Young and He's Talking and Testing (2001), but had never worked through them with a view to introducing them systematically to language learners. I'm considering some kind of introduction in my speaking class next term, but will knowing these be useful somehow? Also, how do I make this list into a usable resource for learners to draw on when they get stuck. What learners are interested in, unlike researchers, is what strategies they SHOULD use, not what they DO use.

Reduction Strategies (abandoning or reducing the meaning)
-Topic avoidance (staying silent or changing the topic)
-Message abandonment (giving up trying to say that idea)
-Semantic avoidance (changing the message to a simpler one)

Achievement Stragies (filling in the gaps of IL to achieve communication of the meaning)
1.Approximation (using a similar meaning when you don't know the right phrase)
--Lexical substitution (similar word)
--Generalization (more general word)
--Exemplification (listing examples to let the listener guess)
2. Paraphrase (saying the meaning in different words)
--Circumlocution (like playing Taboo)
--Word Coinage (two sleep days)
--Morphological creativity (internationalizated)
3. Restructuring - Changing to a different sentence structure
4. Borrowing from their L1, which is usually not effective
5. Cooperative Strategies - Asking the interlocutor for help
-Indicate they cannot explain "It is very hard for me to express."
-Ask how to say something "What do you call the..."
6. Non-linguistic gestures, mimes, pictures, sound imitations
7. Repair - saying it, then fixing it and saying it better
8. Telegraphic strategies--communicating without saying anything, just a pause
9. Fillers (in L1 or L2) nanteyuuka How do I say it?
10. Change of role (Asking a question instead of answering it)

So...all of these are good, of course, in the sense that learners have to do what they have to do to survice with limited language resources. There is nothing wrong with abandoning something that is not working as a message in communication.

Next, the most useful of these, as "good" strategies to teach seem to be:
1) Giving examples
2) Circumlocution
3) Non-linguistic circumlocution (?) - mimes, drawing etc.
4) Asking for help
5) In any case, not giving up on the conversation or going quiet. Continuing to find a way to go forward with the communication (assuming that is the best thing to do, of course)

Question:
What would a conversation between native speakers of English show? What kind of strategies for communication are used among advanced speakers to make the conversation go smoothly? Less proficient speakers definitely should learn from those.
Can a database of academic spoken language shed light on that?
http://lw.lsa.umich.edu/eli/micase/ESL/FormulaicExpression/Definition.htm
http://lw.lsa.umich.edu/eli/micase/ESL/Clarifying/Intro.htm
http://lw.lsa.umich.edu/eli/micase/index.htm

What would a corpus of academic spoken discourse look like at ICU? What kind of speak acts will students actually need to perform? Also, in business or other professional arenas beyond ICU, what will be required of many of our students? (Is it even realistic to try to guess that?) How do we lay a foundation that will maximally applicable to the maximum number of students?

Speaking Improvement FAQs

These are just some notes I'm making to prepare an FAQ list for a speaking class website. I'm hoping to have a number of FAQ articles about speaking skill development for ICU students to peruse.

It is actually very challenging to keep responses short. I guess what may work best is a short response with a link to more imformation about sub-points that can be easily navigated.

I want the FAQ list to be visually appealing and accessible. I want students to enjoy wading through it and getting ideas. Hopefully they will discover many concepts and practice methods that will encourage them to become self-propelling learners of speaking.

Q. How can I improve my speaking skill? (The most general question)
A. Improving your speaking has three main steps:
1. Input through listening, understanding when to use what type of language
For example, you hear somebody say "I'm sorry, could you say that again?" when they can't catch something somebody said. You notice the function of the words, intonation, timing, and (if possible) even the gestures or facial expressions that make up that act of communication successful.
2. Practicing a similar expression in a similar context. This can be in a classroom, or in a real situation, or even in an "imagined situation" that you simulate by yourself.
3. Getting feedback on your effectiveness. In other words, getting a reaction to check whether your communication is successful or not. In the example of "I'm sorry, could you say that again?" if the listener stops and repeats his words for you, your communication has been successful. By experiencing positive feedback/reactions, your confidence increases.
Basically, people who speak a foreign language well have repeated the 3 step cycle again and again, building their confidence with more input, more practice, and more feedback.

Q. I speak English very slowly--the words don't come out. How can I develop my fluency?
A. This often happens to learners who have not had a chance to practice speaking very much even though they have learned English for many years. Don't worry! As you repeat the 3 step cycle of input, practice, feedback and try expressing your ideas in various situations in class and outside of class, your fluency will develop. In addition, here are some key practice methods to keep in mind for improving fluency:
1. Repeat useful phrases until you can say them smoothly (Use dialogue materials to learn what kinds of phrases are useful for the situations you will be in, such as class discussions. Keep trying to use new phrases for a variety of functions.)
2. Prepare what you want to say before class and do a rehearsal. If you have a chance to discuss something in a class, imagine what you will say when you do your homework.
3. Practice talking about what you like to talk about. For example, you can do a Oral Journal by recording yourself talking about what you did that day or other topics that you choose. Even if you do not ask someone else to listen, just speaking and recording can be an excellent way practice connecting your ideas more smoothly.
4. Use time limits and systems such as 3-2-1. With a topic, first give yourself three minutes to talk about it. Then, try to say the same content more smoothly in two minutes. Finally, summarize the ideas in one minute--not just speaking more quickly, but also speaking more efficiently to get your main points out. If you record yourself, you can reflect on your own improvement too. If you have a partner to exchange recordings with or give presentations to, your study can be even more enjoyable or effective.

Q. I feel like some of the topics we discuss in our academic English program are too difficult. I want to practice more casual conversation English. What should I do?
Topics in ICU English classes can be difficult sometimes, and may not always help you develop fluency in terms of being easy to speak main ideas without thinking. Unlike "free conversation" lessons, academic English practice asks you to develop skills to think critically and discuss at the same time, in a good balance. You should see those difficult topics as an excellent chance to practice phrases that analyze the difficult issue and keep the communication going even if you are not exactly sure what your opinion is. By getting ideas from others and asking questions about the question, you can "think together as you discuss." This ability to "think together as you discuss" is one of the most important skills that you can learn if you want to use English skills in professional situations in the future. Of course, preparation before class to read the text and have some ideas about the content helps immensely too. However, even if you have not prepared, you should still be able to use class time to engage in a meaningful discussion. There is no reason for silence or lack of participation, especially when your chances to speak English while living in Japan are so limited.

Q. I think my pronunciation is not good. What should I do?
Q. I have a poor vocabulary. What should I do?
Q. I get nervous when I speak English. What should I do?
Q. I want to find a native speaker conversation partner. How?
Q. My classmates often speak Japanese in discussions. What should I do?
Q. How can I use movies to improve my speaking? (What is shadowing?)

These ideas are all good...now to start developing the site...

Some research ideas on speaking skill improvement through video reflection

I'm kind of in groping mode for a new major research project, possibly leading to a dissertation, so here goes some brainstorming. So far I've produced scattered work in the fields of materials development, spoken fluency, self-assessment of speaking by learners, feedback on essay writing, self-confidence in language learning, and teacher training--and it is time to launch into a fairly involved study that will define my main specialty. So what will that be?

My main general interest is how to help people develop intercultural communication competency, with a focus on methods for developing skills in spoken fluency and confidence. At my university, I'm part of a team coordinating curriculum development for academic speaking of English for Japanese college students, and one of the most exciting developments is the video-recording based self-assessment system we will pilot from April.

What kind of research could we do there? Let me type as I think here...

From April to June, I'll be helping 40 some new college freshmen learn basics for "English academic speaking" ie the oral communication skills they will need to survive in English language medium college courses at ICU. The syllabus will start with skills/phrases for basic greetings, self-intros, small talk and then move on to skills for participating in or leading class discussions (lots of sub-skills there). It will touch on presenting, but not in a big way aside from presenting an organized opinion as part of a discussion.

One part of the curriculum will be a "self-assessment" that students will do based on video-recording, watching, and analyzing their own speaking to set goals and improvement strategies. What this basically means is that we'll have groups of students come into a recording room, take turns leading or participating in small group discussions, video-record them doing it, give them the video file to watch, and then ask them to notice what areas they especially have difficulty in...and they will probably come up with a bunch of typical things such as "I lack fluency" or "My voice is hard to understand" or "My opinion didn't really get across to the other person" "I have broken grammar--We'll have a fairly long checklist for this kind of thing and fairly difficult? task to "flush out their bugs". After they self-identify their areas of difficulty (and we are assuming these self-analyses will be basically valid--accurate enough?--...they won't be saying "My main problem is only grammar" when actually their main problem is pronunciation. In any case, the most important thing is that each student finds some clear goals for working on their speaking skills over the next year or so in the intensive English program. Also, based on the goals they set such as "I want to improve my pronunciation (my intonation, R-L difficulties etc.)," they need to find specific and realistic practice plans/methods they can try to implement independently. "I will listen to podcasts from xxx on every Thursday" and then actually do those plans, and actually make improvement.

Here's the critical issue: If the reflective process of Record->Watch->Self-analyze->Set goals/plans->Implement-> Review/Reflect on improvement (Measure progress in focus areas)-> Modify or Continue implementation does not really help learners improve their speaking, or if it is impossible to really measure any improvement based on the process, then arguably it is a waste of effort. Last year's pilot and survey results showed, at least, that learners feel they benefit from watching and analyzing their own speaking. This year's project, ideally, needs to go one more step and demonstrate that valuable progress is being made in the areas of focus. Of course, the inherent complexity of measuring language acquisition progress has to be considered. To be realistic, a simplified pre/post measurement of a isolated task/skill area, even with control groups etc. proves very little about whether the learner has become a better speaker.

So...what are some good research questions here:

1. In what way do foreign language learners benefit from self-analysis of their own speaking performance? Clearer goals? More self-awareness/monitoring when speaking? What do the learners say (based on questionnaires/follow-up interviews)
2. Is video-watching / reflection really needed? How much? One time? I've only seen myself speaking Chinese once and I hated it (it was ugly) Maybe I should eat my own dog food more. Is it a waste of time and effort? Are we going down the wrong alley here? Isn't it better to just practice, practice, practice?
3. Can learners identify their weaknesses? (like a teacher would) Do they need to?
   
4. Can learners set effective practice plans for themselves? (given resources)
5. Will learners at my institution actually do the self-study that they set out to do? (Or will they just be listing a bunch of bull to appear to engage in a reflective process)
6. Why do we do it two times in the term? Are they supposed to see improvement? Do they? (Sure, they get used to the tasks (organizing an opinion with appropriate signal phrases, leading a discussion etc., so their performance obviously improves, which is a good thing.) Does doing it two times lead to encouragement to continue the cycle of reflective learning/improvement?
7. Can engagement in the learning process be the main basis for the grade in the class? (I wish we didn't have to give grades in the course, but we have to, so...) How will that work? How do we use the video and self-assessment to determine whether a student has worked hard/made progress in the areas we want them to? Can we use a portfolio system? (record, self-evaluate, reflect, set goals, reflect on practice methods) Is that too much writing in a speaking class? Can the reflection etc. be in speaking, like a speaking journal with an online recorder function? Hmm...maybe in the future.
   

A little tangent here. What should we be calling this process of Record-Watch-Analyze-Set Goals/Plans-Do it-Reflect-Modify? Last year we misnamed it the Academic Speaking Assessment, and we had many students and teachers completely misunderstanding that we were giving them a test with a score about how good their speaking is. We should at least call it the Self-Assessment, but even that is just one part. It is more like a Academic Speaking Improvement Cycle/Process which is evaluated by a portfolio of measurement, analysis, goal-setting, practice and reflection. The assessment (for the grade of the class) is just whether they engage deeply and thoughtfully in the process of improving their speaking skills.

Maybe we shouldn't call it anything and just explain. "The best way to improve your speaking is not only to just practice, but have a cycle of... In this class, your grade will be determined largely by how well you complete two cycles of reflective learning about your own speaking..." Something like that?

Ideas for a website on Developing Professional English Speaking Skills

ICU needs a website to support students' development of spoken English proficiency. When a student wonders "What should do I do next to improve my speaking further?" "Where can I practice more?" or "How do I overcome my difficulty with pronunciation, fluency, stage fright or other skills?", they should be able to easily access useful information that guides them to tips, resources, and practice exercises.

This has been on my mind a while and it is about time that I do something about it. So here goes the brainstorming:

-Moodle, blog, ning, or other platform-need to explore
-The site should not be ICU specific, but available to people around the world, and hopefully more people will contribute ideas interactively
-Main content will be:

1) a basic overview of what it means to develop professional level English speaking skills as a non-native speaker in terms of comprehensibility (accent, intonation, phrases), cross-cultural sensitivity (humor, non-verbals), communication strategies (circumlocution/paraphrasing, giving examples, asking for help etc. etc.), communication style (direct/indirect, brief/elaborate...need to research and review these for myself)

Format = Q&A style linking from a graphic or box

2) audio/video examples of good speaking (including some related to ICU's speaking class - why not?)

3) sample practice methods by speaking difficulty (Could use a forum type tool to get ideas from all over the world- How can I improve my fluency? = shadowing, conversation partners, attend conversation cafes on campus etc., oral journal, random Skype-Me conversations, voice chat= describe/demonstrate these practice methods as comprehensibly as possible

4) Links to a variety of speaking/listening resources
http://www.italki.com/ has some good content, nice community to join for a language exchange or finding a language tutor. The future of language learning?
http://www.italki.com/resources/1/learn_english_in_english.htm
http://www.audioenglish.net/
http://mm.eigotown.com/c/aclOaabI49q57Vaj
http://www.yackpack.net/
is a nice list of resources, but as with many links lists, it is too much information for students to wade through. We need to give a select few with specific suggestions on how to start using it.

Where will the ASP course info go? We can't put it up in public, can we? Needs to be password protected if we want to upload textbook audio files.