January 2020 Newsletter
Dear chapter members,
A happy New Year to you all! Out with the old and in with the new. We
just had our Annual General Meeting (AGM) and if you couldn’t make it,
we have included our chapter president’s AGM report in this issue. We
hope that this year one of your resolutions will be to come to more
Kyoto JALT Events. Come participate, discuss ELT related issues, and
learn something new! In 2020 the Kyoto JALT team has already planned a
program of events that we hope you will be excited about too. Coming up
soon we will be hosting Issues with TBLT in Japanese EFL January 12th,
2020. Come listen to Natsuko Shintani and Rintaro Sato discuss the
efficacy of TBLT in the Japanese context. We’re also holding a Call for
Participants for our Grant Writing Symposium to be held in March.
Also, in this issue there are calls for proposals/papers and some
interesting events around Kansai. Also, there is a call for research
participants at the end of the message.
Richard Sparrow
Publicity Chair
On behalf of the Kyoto JALT Team
Kyoto JALT’s 2020 Event Schedule (Tentative)
TBLT in Japanese EFL: January 12
– Come listen to two experts in our field discuss the application of TBLT in the Japanese context.
Getting your Research funded: A Symposium presented by Kyoto JALT: March 15th
– One of the little-known steps to getting research done is getting it paid for. Come listen to Other researchers’ experiences in applying for grant money in Japan.
Lilt SIG Collaboration: April 19th
– This is a collaboration with Lilt SIG on creative writing in ELT
TESOL x Brain SIG: June 20-21
– This event, planned by the Mind, Brain, and Education SIG of the Japan
Association for Language Teaching, in collaboration with
TESOL, introduces the brain-based learning methods that have been
developed so far.
Academic Publishing Workshop: September 26
– Everyone knows you need to publish, but not everyone knows the ins, outs, and rigors of the publishing process.
4 Corners Talk: November (TBA)
– In collaboration with the other Kansai Chapters we hope to bring a
JALT 2020 speaker to the Kansai region for a pre-conference talk.
GALE Collaboration: December 5
– Sexual harassment in the workplace is one of the serious issues of our time and can be hard to navigate by yourself.
Kyoto JALT’s President’s AGM Report
I am happy to report that the state of our chapter is strong, in no
small part thanks to the hard work and dedication of our officer team.
Our program chair, Gretchen Clark, has done an excellent job of
organizing a broad an engaging event program even in the midst of
unexpected personnel changes in her team. We are happy to have a new
programming co-chair, Chelanna White, join us in 2020 and look forward
to working with her more. Our Facilities Chair, Yoshimi Ochiai, has been
superb in working with the Campus Plaza office and Ritsumeikan
University, who controls the room we usually hold our events in. Our
treasury team, headed by treasurer Martin Hawkes, has done great in
keeping our finances and paperwork with JCO in order. To that end,
co-treasurer Alex Kirkham, who joined us last year, attended the
treasurer’s workshop at the June 2019 EBM. Our publicity team of Donny
Sparrow and webmaster John Syquia, with assistance from former publicity
chair and current member-at-large Bjorn Fuisting, have regularly sent
out newsletters and Facebook updates, and have kept our event listings
up to date on the JALT.org Event’s Calendar and on eltcalendar.com.
John has done a great job of updating our website to a new WordPress
account. John has also continued the practice started by former
publicity co-chair and current member-at-large Oana Cusen of making
posters for each event that we can distribute and post at our
workplaces; if you aren’t already, please help spread the word about
Kyoto chapter events by sharing these posters. We are sad to report that
our Membership Chair, Eric Martin, will be stepping down to focus on
his studies, but thank him for his hard work and service, and welcome
him as a new member-at-large. Eric has been working closely with our
incoming Membership Chair, Ben Thanyawatpokin, to make their transition
seamless, and we welcome Ben to the team. Finally, in addition to our
new officers Chelanna and Ben, we are also happy to welcome Betsy
Lavolette as a new member-at-large who will be assisting us as needed,
and who has been helping in the web development for the upcoming
TESOL-JALT symposium to be held at Kyoto Sangyo University in June 2020.
We are also happy to welcome Anne Flanagan as a new member-at-large
videographer for recording speakers who consent to have their
presentations shared online on a Kyoto chapter YouTube channel.
As president of the chapter, my work is made immensely easier by having
such a dedicated and professional team to work with. I am also happy to
say that this officer team is by far the most diverse and representative
of JALT’s current and potential membership that we have ever had. In
2020, we are looking forward to holding more professional development
events, based largely on feedback we have received in 2018 and 2019. We
will also continue the efforts started in 2019 to maintain and extend
transparency to our members of what goes on both at the chapter and the
national level so that current members can be assured that their dues
are being spent making the best professional development organization
possible, and so that we can continue attracting more teachers who share
our mission of improving language teaching in Japan.
—
Please let me know if you have any questions or suggestions, and best wishes for the coming year.
Kyoto JALT’s January Event
TBLT in Japanese EFL
Speakers: Rintaro Sato (Nara University of Education) Natsuko Shintani (Kansai University)
Fee for attendees: Free
Date & time: Sunday, January 12, 2020, 1 – 5 pm
Venue: Campus Plaza Kyoto, 6F Ritsumeikan Satellite Room
Link to Map
Thinking about the incompatibility of TBLT and reconsideration of PPP-based approach in the Japanese EFL environment
Rintaro Sato (Nara University of Education)
One of the most important objectives of English Education in Japan is to
develop students’ communicative abilities. Thus, students have to be
engaged in activities that will lead them to exchange their thoughts and
feelings by actually using the English language. By “actually using
English” (not learning to use English), students ideally learn English.
Being compatible with this trend, the utilization of task-based language
teaching (TBLT), which is a logical development of communicative
language teaching (CLT), is attractive and gaining attention. However,
as educators, we have to reflect on the effects of TBLT on Japanese EFL
students’ English learning, considering that the goal of English
education is to improve the four language skills. With that in mind,
this presentation will report on the incompatibility of TBLT in the
Japanese secondary context, where learners do not have natural exposure
to English or a real need to regularly communicate in that language. I
argue that a drastic revision of TBLT is definitely needed for its
application in Japanese junior and senior high school, and then suggest
more effective ways to teach English to our students.
日本の外国語学習環境におけるTBLTの不整合性とPPPの再考
佐藤 臨太郎 (奈良教育大学)
日本の英語教育の重要な目的の一つは英語でのコミュニケーション能力の育成にある。英語を用いての発信能力の育成が求められており、そのため、英語を「学んで使用する」のではなく、実施に「使用しながら学ぶ」ことがより重要視されるようになっている。この流れに伴って、コミュニカティブな言語指導の論理的な発展であるタスク中心の指導法が注目を浴びている。しかしながら、日常生活において英語との接触があまりなく、使用する必要もないという外国語として英語を学ぶ環境においてはこのアプローチの不整合性も考えなくてはいけない。発表においては、この問題について切れ込み、より日本での効果的な指導法を提案する。
Rintaro Sato is professor at Nara University
of Education. He received a Master’s degree from Tsukuba University and
earned his Ph.D. in Education at the Joint Graduate School in the
Science of School Education, Hyogo University of Teacher Education. One
of his research interests is in incorporating theories of second
language acquisition into the Japanese EFL classroom. He can be
contacted at <sato.rintaro@nara-edu.ac.jp>.
Implementing tasks in English classrooms in Japan
Natsuko Shintani (Kansai University)
In this talk, I will explore a number of issues and possibilities
relating to the implementation of task-based language teaching (TBLT) in
Japan. Drawing on second language acquisition theories, I will seek for
answers to questions such as What are the benefits of using tasks in
English classroom?; Is it possible to incorporate tasks into the
existing syllabus?; How can we assess the outcome of the TBLT?; and What
are the roles of teachers in TBLT?
I will first examine the goal of TBLT by contrasting it with the goal
of present-practice-produce (PPP) where grammar explanation is given
followed by production practice activities. I will draw on research that
has investigated the relationship between implicit/ explicit learning
and implicit/ explicit knowledge to argue that it is better able to
develop students’ communicative skills. I will conclude with some
suggestions for implementing TBLT in the English classroom in Japan.
日本の英語教育におけるタスクの活用
新谷 奈津子 (関西大学)
この講演ではタスクを中心とした指導法(TBLT)を日本で導入するにあたっての課題について議論する。第二言語習得研究の知見にもとづき「英語の授業でタスクを用いることのメリットは何か」，「TBLTを現行のシラバスの中で導入することは可能か」，「TBLT型の授業においてどのように学習評価をすべきか」，「TBLTにおける教師の役割はなにか」などの疑問に答えることを目的とする。
まず、従来の文法説明の後に産出活動を行う提示-練習-産出(PPP)の指導法と比較しながらTBLTの目的について述べる。続いて、明示的・暗示的学習と明示的・暗示的知識の関係について調査した研究に触れ、どのようにTBLTが学習者のコミュニケーション能力を伸ばすのに効果的かを議論する。最後にTBLTを日本の英語教育に活かす方法について提案をして講演のまとめとしたい。
Natsuko Shintani is professor in the Faculty
of Foreign Language Studies at Kansai University. She has taught English
to young learners in her own private language school in Japan and
applied linguistics courses at the postgraduate level at Nanyang
Technological University in Singapore and the University of Auckland in
New Zealand. Her research interests encompass the roles of interaction
in second language acquisition, second language writing, and task-based
language teaching. She has also co-authored a book entitled Task-based language teaching: Theory and practice, published by Cambridge University Press. She can be contacted at <natsukoshintani@gmail.com>.
Kyoto JALT’s March Event
Getting your Research Funded: A Symposium Presented by Kyoto JALT
Speakers: Tanja McCandie (Chair, JALT Research Grant Committee, Code of Conduct Committee) Greg Scholdt (Consulting Editor, JALT Journal)
Fee for JALT members: Free
Fee for one day members: 1000 yen
Date & time: Sunday, March 15, 2020, 10 – 2:30 pm
Venue: Campus Plaza Kyoto, 6F Ritsumeikan Satellite Room
Link to Map
Morning session: Writing your JALT Research Grant Proposal
This presentation will discuss the goals, requirements, and schedule of
the 2020 JALT Research Grants. Presenters will talk about application
procedures, what makes a strong proposal, tips about what should and
shouldn’t be included in your proposal regarding budgeting, what
committee members are looking for, and types of proposals that have won
in the past. Information regarding JALT SIGs and Chapter grants will
also be provided. Participant involvement is highly encouraged and we
hope that attendees will ask questions, discuss requirements, share
individual research ideas, and any grant experiences they may have.
CALL FOR PARTICIPANTS
Afternoon session: JSPS Kaken Grants Symposium- Questions, Strategies, and Experiences
Kyoto chapter is looking for 4-5 symposium discussants who are current JALT
members of any chapter and have experience applying, successfully or
unsuccessfully, for JSPS Kaken Grants (aka. kakenhi) and can speak on one or more
of the following topics:
-What are the different kinds of kaken grants?
-How do I get an application, fill it out, and submit it?
-What research topics are more or less likely to be funded?
-What are strategies for effectively organizing a kaken proposal?
-What is my university’s role in kaken grant applications and administration?
-Can non-tenured (part-time or limited-term contract) faculty apply for kaken
grants, and how can they participate in kaken projects?
-Applying solo or with co-researchers: Is one better than the other?
-How do I set a budget for my proposal?
-What are the typical stages and requirements over a grant period?
-What happens if I change universities during my grant period?
Interested JALT members should send us an email at jaltkyoto@gmail.com by
February 14, 2020, indicating their chapter of membership and affiliation, and a
proposal of no more than 250 words describing the topic(s) they can discuss. Each
talk will be limited to 15 minutes to allow for Q&A with a panel comprising all
symposium speakers at the end. A projector and screen is available should
researchers choose to use a slideshow during their talk. If you have another topic
not included in the above list that you would like to speak about, please feel free to
inquire with us first. We look forward to receiving your proposals.
Call for proposals: JALT2020
Community plays an important role in language education, both inside and
outside classrooms, and will take centre stage at JALT2020. The theme
of this year’s conference encourages participants to reflect on the
importance of community, explore ways we can strengthen our professional
communities and help students enhance their learning communities. We
welcome sessions on any area of language education and professional
development, particularly those which address the theme: Communities of
Teachers and Learners. We are opening our call to teachers, students,
administrators, publishers, and others who have an interest in learning
about and shaping language education in Japan and beyond.
Proposals will be accepted until February 24, 2020 for Regular Vetted
Proposals, Featured Speaker Workshops, and Technology in Teaching (TnT)
and Professional Development (PD) Workshops.
https://jalt.org/conference/call-proposals
JALT2020 will be held at Tsukuba International Congress Center (Epochal
Tsukuba), Tsukuba, Ibaraki Prefecture, Japan, 20-23 November 2020.
Call for Proposals: JALTCALL 2020
JALTCALL 2020 will be held at Hirosaki Gakuin University in Aomori
Prefecture from June 5-June 7, 2020. The theme will be Teaching with
Tech. The deadline for conference presentation proposals is January
31st.
https://conference2020.jaltcall.org
Call for Proposals: PanSIG 2020
PanSIG 2020 will be held at University of Niigata Prefecture in Niigata
City on May 30-31, 2020. The call for papers is due January 15th, 2020.
http://pansig.org
PanSIG is an annual conference sponsored and organized by many of the
Special Interest Groups (SIGs) of JALT. PanSIG brings together leading
scholars and practitioners in language education from Japan, Asia, and
throughout the world. It is meant to be a smaller, more intimate
conference than the annual international JALT conference, and is a place
where SIG members can network with each other.
Advance Notice and Call for Papers
LINGUAPAX ASIA 2020 INTERNATIONAL SYMPOSIUM
WORLD LANGUAGES IN MULTILINGUAL SOCIETY
Common Values and Challenges for Teaching and Learning
International Christian University (ICU), Tokyo, Japan, https://www.icu.ac.jp/en/
Date: Saturday, June 13th, 2020 Time: 8:30AM – 6:30 PM
Description: Tokyo hosts the 2020 Olympics – an event with a message of
world peace and friendship through sport. Multilingual people from
around the world, sharing various languages, will come to Japan. What
common values do we share? What challenges do we face as teachers and
learners of Spanish or Korean in Japan, Chinese in Australia, Korean in
Malaysia? Why do we teach and learn other languages? How can we raise
the awareness, among all stakeholders, about the multilingual society we
all share.
Goal: Linguapax Asia ’20 brings together the shared concern of teachers
and learners of different languages of the world. Linguapax Asia 20
focuses on what teachers and learners of many different languages share
about their experience. Linguapax Asia invites proposals for (a)
individual papers and (b) poster sessions in all areas of research in
Teaching and Learning languages, Bilingualism, Multilingualism, Language
policy, Deaf Sign language, Heritage language, Endangered language,
Migration, Family language maintenance. There will be a panel on
Multilingualism and a round table on Community Languages in Japan:
Japanese Sign Language, Japanese, English and other languages
interpretation provided.
Attendance Fee: No Charge
Venue: International Christian University (ICU), Tokyo, Japan
About Linguapax: Linguapax Asia works in partnership with Linguapax
International, a nongovernmental organization located in Barcelona,
Spain. The Asian associate of Linguapax International, Linguapax Asia
carries out the objectives of both Linguapax International and UNESCO’s
Linguapax Project with a special focus on Asia and the Pacific Rim. For
further information visit our website at https://www.linguapax-asia.org.
The organizers: The event is organized by Linguapax Asia.
Abstract submission: Please send your proposal for a paper or poster
session to Dr. Daniel Quintero Garcia, Program Director at
quintero@icu.ac.jp by the deadline, January 17th (Friday), 2020. We
welcome original and previously unpublished papers. The language of the
conference is English. Papers are assigned 30 minutes plus Q&A. (15
minutes for ‘young scholars’). Abstracts should be sent in English by
email attachment (300-350 words, excluding title and references, in
Times New Roman, 12 pt.) and include the following: name and affiliation
of the author, e-mail address of the first author/convener, title of
the paper, abstract. Notifications of acceptance will be sent before
March 6 2020. Since the number of presentation slots is limited,
selection is competitive.
Events around Kansai
TUJ Distinguished Lecturer Series
Date & time: Saturday, February 1st, 2020 Time: 2:00 PM – 5:00 PM
Venue: TUJ Osaka Center: Osaka Ekimae Bldg. 3, 21st Floor, 1-1-3-2100 Umeda, Kita-ku, Osaka 530-0001 (map)
The next TUJ Distinguished Lecturer Series in Osaka will feature Dr. Anna Siyanova (Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand)
Description:
The last decade has seen an unprecedented interest in the acquisition,
processing and use of multi-word expressions (MWEs). The last few years,
in particular, have been instrumental in our gaining better
understanding of the role played by elements above word level in first
(L1) and second language (L2) learning and use. MWEs are frequent and/or
highly familiar phrases that exhibit a degree of fixedness and are
recognized as conventional by mature language users. Examples of MWEs
include, among others, collocations (strong tea), binomials (bride and
groom), phrasal and prepositional verbs (tell off), idioms and proverbs
(better late than never), grammatical constructions (this is X), and
other phrasal configurations. MWEs constitute a large proportion of
authentic spoken and written discourse, which renders them an essential
component of proficient language use.
This series of seminars will follow a recently published volume on the
various aspects of MWEs. In particular, we will focus on MWEs in the
usage-based tradition, corpus linguistics and learner corpus research,
L2 pedagogy and academic discourse, and language processing. We will
look at some of the L1 and L2 differences, as well as a central place of
phrase frequency effects in MWE enquiry. The pertinent evidence will be
discussed and analyzed in view of methodological rigor and
replicability. The interdisciplinary seminars will be of interest to
research students working in the area of vocabulary and second language
acquisition, corpus and cognitive linguistics, and psycholinguistics. As
always, the first 3 hours of this lecture is free to attend, and you
can find out more about it here.
National Geographic Learning:
Bring Your Classroom To Life – Winter Tour 2020
Date: Sunday, Jan 12th; Monday, Jan 13th; Sunday Jan 19th
Time: 10:00am-3:45pm Monday
Venue: TKP Nagoya-ekimae Conference Center, Conference
Room 6A; TKP Shin-Osaka Ekimae Conference Center, Hall 4A; TKP Okayama
Kaigishitsu, Hall 2A
Speakers: Mayumi Tabuchi, Julie Hwang, David White
Description:
Come and join National Geographic Learning for a fascinating day of
practical workshops that showcase a range of skills and techniques for
teaching young learners. Led by skilled experienced practitioners, these
sessions will share ideas on how to provide the right learning
environment for your students to succeed and will improve your ability
to teach confidently to bring your classroom to life! Click here for registration and more information
ETJ Aichi:
Session A: Most effective and successful teaching activities;
Session B: Help students build confidence and improve their test scores
Date: Sunday, January 19th, 2020 Time: 10:00 AM – 12:00 PM
Speaker: Wayne Jackson, Yuichi Hasegawa
Description:
Session A: Wayne Jackson will share his most effective and successful
activities from his 20+ years of teaching. The activities he will
present will cover a wide range of topics and be applicable to a wide
range of students.
Session B: Yuichi Hasegawa will present his three-year program for high
school speaking students. This program is designed to help participants
build confidence and improve their test scores.
Cost: ETJ Members: 500 yen
Non-members: 1000 yen
Venue: Nagoya International Center, Lecture Room 3
Research help needed: Request for interview participants
Dear all,
We are two teacher/researchers based in Kansai who are investigating how
foreign (i.e. non-Japanese) instructors feel about teaching the zemi in
Japanese universities. We feel that the zemi offers unique challenges
and opportunities for instructors assigned to teach these courses, and
we want to understand them more deeply.
We hope to interview foreign teachers who are currently teaching zemi
classes in Japan. Each interview will take around 60 minutes to
complete. We are happy to meet any willing interviewees at their place
of choice.
If this sounds like an interesting topic for you to discuss, please
contact us at the following email:
<zemi_interviews2019@hotmail.com>.
Many thanks,
Martin Hawkes, The University of Shiga Prefecture
Calum Adamson, Doshisha Women’s College of Liberal Arts
Finally
Kyoto JALT on Social Media
Visit our website https://kyotojalt.org/
To keep up to date with all the things from Kyoto JALT via Facebook, please join our Kyoto JALT Facebook Group
Follow us on Twitter: @JaltKyoto
******
Hope to see you at some of the events.
Donny Sparrow,
Publicity Chair
On behalf of the Kyoto JALT Team
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