PIGATE gathering, 2019.06.08

PIGATE's June 2019 session

This month's highlights: Guest Speaker Series (GSS)

Active Learning from Theory to Practice

Dr. Fumi Takegami

Faculty of Letters

The Prefectural University of Kumamoto

Prof. Terry Laskowski

Faculty of Letters, Kumamoto University

Date & time

Saturday, June 8, 2019; 13:30–16:30

• Doors open at 13:00!

Venue

Seminar room 10, 5th floor, Faculty of Administrative Studies office wing; 
Prefectural University of Kumamoto (PUK)

• Please see PIGATE Meeting Locations (https://goo.gl/h5DgbP) for site details.

About the presenters and the program

Fumi Takegami has extensive teaching experience in schools ranging from elementary to secondary levels, mostly at high school. She is now teaching in the Faculty of Letters at the PUK. Terry Laskowski also has extensive teaching experience, in his case at university. He now teaches in the Faculty of Letters at Kumamoto University.

Together Terry and Fumi will talk about the relationship between theory and practice in teaching.  Linking theory to practice helps teachers to better understand why they do what they do in their classrooms. Having this knowledge will better inform teachers regarding their instructional practices. 

During their workshop session, Fumi and Terry will talk about learning theories going from behaviorism to social constructivism and complementary teaching methods. They will focus in particular on social constructivism and related teaching methods and techniques. 

Participants will take part in classroom activities. Through active involvement, i.e., active learning, participants will understand the purpose of the activities by experiencing them themselves. They can expect to take part in a jigsaw activity and a task-based problem solving activity.

Let us know you're coming!

If you would like to take part in this month's session, or to join PIGATE, please fill out one of our short online info. collection forms (https://goo.gl/Hpe9pd). 

• Thank you!

Classroom practice: Using instruction checking questions (ICQs)

This post showcases a presentation that Taishi Kaneko (KU, Fac. of Educ., M2) used for a demonstration and discussion of instruction checking questions (ICQs) at the PIGATE gathering earlier this month (2017.05.13). Taishi began to develop his interest in ICQs while studying overseas last year.

If you have comments or questions regarding ICQs and their use or potential, please feel free to spell them out in comments on this post. Suggestions of and pointers to related resources also are welcome.

[80 words]

Shadowing for Improving Listening and Reading Skills (Fukushima & Lavin, 2013): A brief review

On June 13th, Mr. Taishi Kaneko (right) made his début as an emcee for guest speakers Mr. Hiroshi Fukushima (left) and Prof. Richard Lavin (center) at the PIGATE gathering in the KGU English Lounge. I hope we'll see and hear from them all again soon!

Mr. Kaneko introduced the guest speakers.

Along with a bit of historical and theoretical background, Mr. Fukushima and Prof. Lavin introduced two types of shadowing. The first focused learners' attention on the sounds of the target language, and the second focused on content–namely vocabulary, syntax (grammar) and meaning. 

PIGATE members had opportunities to try a little of both types. Then Mr. Fukushima reported on an on-going study to assess the effectiveness of shadowing relative to standardized test results. 

Prof. Takaki summed up the session.

Below are a couple of books on shadowing (Kadota, 2007, and Tamai, 2005) highlighted either in the presentation itself or in Prof. Takaki's summary. The other (Kadota, 2012), which I discovered today at Amazon, JP, appears to be a follow-up on the first.

• Kadota, Shuuhei. (2007). シャドーイングと音読の科学 [shadouingu to ondoku no kagaku: the science of shadowing and reading aloud]. Tokyo, JP: Cosmopia.
• Kadota, Shuuhei. (2012). シャドーイング・音読と英語習得の科学 [shadouingu, ondoku to eigo shutoku no kagaku: the science of shadowing, reading aloud and English acquisition]. Tokyo, JP: Cosmopia.
• Tamai, Ken. (2005). リスニング指導法としてのシャドーイングの効果に関する研究 [risuningu shidouhou toshite no shadouingu no kouka ni kan suru kenkyuu: a study of the effects of shadowing as a method for teaching listening]. Tokyo, JP: Kazama Shobou.

Though there seemed to be a general consensus among audience members about the potential of shadowing for dedicated individual language learners, a question remained about how teachers might adopt and adapt such practices for general classroom instructional purposes.

If you have other key readings to suggest, other questions about shadowing, or suggestions regarding shadowing and classroom teaching practices in particular, please feel free to spell them out in comments on this post.