This is a short post to quickly provide the PDF version of the presentation that I and my JTL and wife Yoshie Holland and I presented at this year’s Sapporo ALT Skills Conference. The topic was “Cooperating and Communicating Effectively” at the Junior High Level. Check out the slideshow below, or click here to load [...]

This year, the Sunshine English textbooks were updated.  One of the new stories is called “Faithful Elephants” and is about the sad end of three elephants at  Tokyo’s Ueno Zoo during WWII: Many years ago, there were three wonderful elephants at the Ueno Zoo.  The elephants were John, Tonky, and Wanly.  They could do tricks.  [...]

This is a lesson I designed and did several years ago and have done a few times since.  I introduce Calvin and Hobbes, explain who the main characters are, and then give the students a handout with a few comics on the front.  We read the comics together and I try to make sure they [...]

Yesterday I took the highest level test of the JLPT, level N1, in Sapporo at Hokkaido University. The test consists of three main sections: A language knowledge section and a reading comprehension section administered in one 110 minute session, and a 60 minute listening section. I took and passed the old level 2 (barely) JLPT [...]

Now that the days have become cooler, the heaters are regularly turned on in the classrooms at my junior high school. Since the thermostat controls are all centrally located in the teachers room, we have to call down there and ask someone to flick the switch to off for our particular classroom. Often, when this [...]

Why do we teach Japanese 1st and 2nd graders about fruit, colors, animals, and numbers? Are these truly the first words that they need to learn in their progression of English education? Should the simplest structures always be presented first? Should we expect students to remember words, or should they be encouraged to use them? [...]