JALT photo album 65
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AKITA JALT meetings in 2013
picture album page 2 - the 4th meeting of 2013

July





Guest speakers: Philip L. McCasland
Date: Saturday, July 27, 2013
Topic: Designing supplemental materials to study American culture through literature
Time: 2:00 PM - 4:00 PM
Place: Yugakusha
Room: Kenshushitsu 1

6 people attended

Chapter Report
(to be printed in The Language Teacher)
Guest speaker:
Philip L. McCasland
AKITA – July 2013 - Designing supplemental materials to study American culture through literature – Philip L. McCasland, Fukushima University. Creating engaging, authentic, quality classroom materials completely from scratch proves challenging for today's busy teachers. However, adapting and supplementing materials from an already established textbook or classic piece of literature may be a more reasonable proposition. In this workshop the presenter began by providing several principles of materials design and asked the participants to describe what they consider appropriate materials for their teaching contexts. He then demonstrated the steps taken to develop these materials. Finally, the presenter asked the participants to brainstorm several possible designs that could be appropriate for their own classroom use. Some of the examples used include Akimoto & Hamada's American Justice in Focus with John Grisham's, The Rain Maker; John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men; and F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby. The presentation finished with a Q&A session.
Reported by Stephen Shucart

AKITA JALT meetings in 2013
picture album page 2 - the 5th meeting of 2013

September




Guest speakers: Sarah Louisa Bircheley
Date: Saturday, September 28, 2013
Topic: Hard Pressed to Succeed without Soft Skills
Time: 2:00 PM - 4:00 PM
Place: Join-us
Room: Kenshushitsu #6

9 people attended

Chapter Report
(to be printed in The Language Teacher)
Guest speaker:
Sarah Louisa Bircheley
AKITA – September 2013 -Hard Pressed to Succeed without Soft Skills? – Sarah Louisa Birchley, Toyo Gakuen University. Ideally, university students should learn the skills indispensable for business success before they graduate. This leads to the crucial questions of how can they learn the necessary skills, and is it possible to teach them? The presenter started the session with these very questions. In the first part of the workshop, the presenter explained how “soft skills” are necessary for success in international business. The presenter defined the term “soft skills”, and showed how they can be taught in the classroom. Soft Skills are those behavioral competencies that are also known as Interpersonal Skills, or people skills. She also showed how “soft skills” are connected with the Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) approach. She then defined awareness-raising assessment and showed how it relates to the topic. In the second half of the session, the presenter demonstrated various entertaining activities that she actually uses in her classroom. Each of the diverse components was seamlessly connected to the next and the session was very informative.
Reported by Mamoru “Bobby” Takahashi

AKITA JALT meetings in 2013
picture album page 2 - the 6th meeting of 2013

November





Guest speakers: Terri Lee Nagahashi
Date: Saturday, November 16, 2013
Topic: Making the Most of Study Abroad
Time: 2:00 PM - 4:00 PM
Place: Yugakusha

8 people attended

Chapter Report
(to be printed in The Language Teacher)
Guest speaker:
Terri Lee Nagahashi
AKITA – November 2013 -Making the Most of Study Abroad - Terri Lee Nagahashi, Akita Prefectural University. The presenter reported on an innovative faculty-led study abroad program. The program was designed to support the curricula of the Faculty of Bioresource Sciences at Akita Prefectural University and took place in Oregon, USA during the summer of 2012. Professor Nagahashi showed several interesting examples of student-made presentations. The results of the post-trip questionnaire suggested that this program produced multiple benefits including enhanced intercultural awareness, increased motivation for learning English, and improved research, writing and presentation skills. This presentation was not only an excellent tutorial for those who are interested in developing short-term study abroad programs, but also an excellent project example for those who are interested in Experience-based Learning in general. A lively question and answer session took place at the end of the presentation.
Reported by Stephen Shucart


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Akita JALT

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