Freshman Reading 1B: Fall semester mid-term presentations・後学期中間プレゼンテーション

Hello!

How are you? Here is the guidelines and deadline for our fall semester mid-term presentations. 

While I have given all of you the handout about this assignment, I am posting about it here also as another way to help all of you know what you can do. 

You will present about the book you chose, and have been reading. Please have these points in your presentation:

• A summary (要約) about the story - what is it about?
• The main character(s) of the book
• The qualities (質) or characteristics (性状) of the main character(s)
• The most interesting or exciting situation or event in the story
• The character you liked the most - and what qualities he or she had

Guidelines

For this presentation, you can design a small poster or make a Power Point show. 

If you design a poster, I would like you to follow these guidelines:

• It has to be on A3 size paper
• You have to have 4-5 pictures on it (hand-drawn or photos, or a mix)
• It has to be colorful and interesting to look at 

If you make a Power Point show, I would like you to follow these guidelines: 

• You have to have a title slide - then 5-7 slides with pictures and text on it - then a closing slide
• It has to be colorful and interesting to look at

Deadline (締め切り)

Let's try to do these presentations on November 21st (11/21). Come in with your work and rough outlines (あらすじ ), as I showed you about in class, and let's see where we are then.  We'll do a practice speaking with these outlines, then do the real presentations then. 

If we are not completely ready, we will have to do these on December 5th. (Please remember that there will be no classes on November 28th.) 

Next week (11/7), please show me what you are presenting about and we will make some time to do some work in class on the presentations. I would like to see your work and give you some advice on what you can do to make the best presentations you can. Please be ready to present on 11/14! 

Good luck! I look forward to our presentation day! 

See you next week!

Image: By Strebe - File in w:en, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=10554354

Freshman Reading 1B: Cuisine from different countries・海外の食文化

Hello!

How are you? Here are some pictures of food from different countries. 

Look at the picture above. It's a common Vietnamese breakfast - with Vietnamese coffee, a baguette, and fried eggs. 

Activity 1/homework
Let's look at these dishes! Which countries do they come from? Here is a list of countries these dishes could come from:

Thailand     Italy     Indonesia     Germany

Brazil     Ethiopia     Ukraine

1. 

2.

 

3. 

4.

5. 

6. 

7. 

Talk about these and make some guesses!

Activity 2/homework

Now - what is in these dishes? What kinds of different things do you see - for example, chicken, fish, beef, and so on? 

Have fun! See you next time!

Images: Top - personal photograph/1. "Pasta" (courtesy of savitkeawtavee)/2. By liz west from Boxborough, MA - borscht served, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=18741185/3. "Thai Chicken Curry" (courtesy of John Kasawa/4. By ​English Wikipedia user Gunkarta, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=4240598/5. "Sausages" (courtesy of savitkeawtavee)/)/6. By Chris.urs-o - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=31512556/7. By Rama - Own work, CC BY-SA 2.0 fr, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=63036

Photos 1, 3, & 5 from FreeDigitalPhotos.net/All rights reserved on personal photograph.

Writing English 2B: Comparing & contrasting music・音楽が比較対照

Hello!

How are you? Here is a new post for today - writing comparison and contrast (比較対照) with pieces of music. 

Activity/homework
Check out these four (4) video files. Listen to them as many times as you want or need. Select two (2) to write about. Compare and contrast (比較対照して) them with each other. They are instrumental pieces of music only - there are no words or vocals. 

Important notes: 
Take notes about these pieces of music you select. Which do you like better? What qualities (質、優劣) do they have? 

Also - what do you believe the artists are expressing (発送して) through their music? What might the sounds give you feelings about? 

What kind of scenarios might each piece of music give you feelings about? What do you imagine as you see and think about them? You can imagine people, characters, animals - anything that comes to your mind as you listen is okay!

When writing your comparison and contrast, write about the instruments (楽器) that are playing - for example, piano, brass, guitar, violins, and so forth. 

Now listen to all four (4) of these files - then choose two (2) for your comparison and contrast: 

File #1

File #2

File #3

File #4

I hope these pieces of music give you ideas and feelings to try out a different kind of writing. 

Take care! See you next week!

Image - By Henri Matisse - Barnes Foundation, PD-US, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=40686428

Video files uploaded from YouTube. I do not own the rights to the files or the musical compositions within them. All rights reserved to the copyright holders of the files and compositions respectively. 

Culture through English 2B: Foreign educational systems・国際教育制度

Hello!

How are you? We'll keep going with our theme of education. 

I have three short videos for you about educational systems in three different countries - Finland, India, and South Korea. 

Let's watch one of the videos in class - as a class, you choose which one. Let's answer these questions after you watch:

1. Do you see anything like your own educational experiences in the country's system you watched?
2. Is it anything like your experience? If so - how is it the same? If not - how is it different? 

Here are the videos. The first one is about education in Finland: 

This next one below is about India.

This last one is about South Korea.

Homework
Watch the other two videos we did not see in class and make some notes about your impressions. Now answer these two questions:

3. Which educational system is the most different from your experience?
4. If you could bring some things together from all three (3) of these countries into a single educational system, which parts would you take from each country? Which do you think are the best parts? 

Post your impressions as comments to this blogpost. I'll be interested to read what you have to say and will value it greatly.

See you next week!

Image: By Laboratorio de Escritura - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=18242352

All videos uploaded from YouTube. I do not own the rights to these videos. All rights reserved to the copyright holder(s). Uploaded for classroom purposes only.

Culture through English 2B: Math education in India・インドの数学教育

Hello!

How are you? The picture at the top is a multiplication table (九九の表) . It is one of many ways that multiplication is taught in schools in a number of countries. 

Activity/homework
Look at the video below. It's an elementary school math teacher (小学校数学の講師) showing patterns that children can follow to learn multiplication tables. It's in Hindi (ヒンデュ語), but you can follow the patterns if you look carefully. 

How did you learn multiplication tables in school? Was it anything like this? 

(If you have any trouble seeing this video clip, go to this link here, or look on YouTube for "How math is taught in India," or paste in this URL: https://youtu.be/EIYPGfcCab0)  

What do you think of this method? 

Have fun talking about this! 

See you next class!

Image: By Yomomo - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=67776389 

Video uploaded from YouTube. I do not own the rights to the content. All rights reserved to the copyright holder(s). Uploaded for classroom use only. 

Freshman Reading 1B: About Denmark・デンマークについて

Hello!

How are you? Today, to go with our reading, I have a video about Denmark for all of you. 

What do you know about Denmark? The map above shows where Denmark is in the world, and in Europe. 

Activity/homework

Watch the video below. Watch it as many times as you want or need. It's by a Japanese person who has studied the Danish language and culture. 

(If you have trouble seeing this video, go to the link here.)

I hope you find this interesting. 

See you next time!

Image: By User:Rei-artur - Original by User:Vardion, Image:A large blank world map with oceans marked in blue.svg, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1441311

Video uploaded from YouTube. I do not own the rights to the content. All rights reserved to the copyright holder(s). Uploaded for classroom use only.