Event Report, Nara Chapter October 2017

Kashimoto talked about his four-year ongoing project, Templish, the combined term between “temple” and “English.” He voluntarily teaches local children at a temple about Japanese culture and customs in English. Various monthly activities such as pounding rice cake, flowing noodles, abd making a charm enable children to learn English practically. Interaction with foreign volunteers supporting this project also gives children the opportunities to speak English for communication. Yonezaki introduced a student-generated Q & A activity, where students generate their own questions based on a reading passage and ask those questions to their partners. Questions can be identified as being easy and straightforward (factual questions) or challenging and interesting (inferential or personal questions). Sharing such questions in class enhanced students’ engagement in text reading and helped to improve their reading comprehension. Nishiyama rebutted conventional English teaching practice including grammar translation by saying, “Accuracy comes first, but fluency never comes.” Picture-descriptive activities he shared with the audience would encourage not only students’ spontaneous spoken output but also their imagination and involvement in expressing their ideas or opinions. He also emphasized that adequate exposure to authentic materials such as English monolingual dictionaries and children’s picture books would be more beneficial to students than too much Japanese explanation by teachers.