Jane Spiro 4 Corners Tour

Jane Spiro 4 Corners Tour

Sponsored by the Kansai Chapters of JALT (Kobe, Kyoto, Nara, & Osaka)

JALT 2015  4-Corners Tour Speaker
November 15th, 3pm to 5pm
Kobe International House room 902

Dr. Jane Spiro has been an active member of the ELT community for 35 years, directing language, literature and teacher development programs in England, Switzerland, Poland, and Hungary. She has taught English to asylum-seekers newly arrived in the UK; retrained Russian teachers in Hungary supporting the replacement of Russian with English in the Hungarian school curriculum; and run programs on teacher development, literature and language, creative writing, academic literacies, and materials writing worldwide, including in the Netherlands, Mexico, Japan, Kenya, China, and India. Her publications include two books on creative writing pedagogy with Oxford University Press Creative Poetry Writing (2004) and Storybuilding (2007) adopted by language teachers in Malaysia, Ireland, Finland, Sweden, Croatia, and Japan. Creative Poetry Writing is considered an essential text for teachers using the medium of poetry and poetry writing in a second language classroom.

PRESENTATION ABSTRACT:

Genre as a recipe for writing 

This workshop will show how the features of text types such as recipes, instructions, memos, can be recognised, mixed and subverted in order to generate inventive new texts.  Participants will be able to experiment with these activities for themselves, to experience the ways in which the activities can develop both language awareness and creative writing skills. The workshop will also include examples of student writing, and explore how the activities can be adapted to meet a variety of student needs and levels. 

There will be a dinner with the author following the presentation. Details and registration for the dinner will be provided before the start of the presentation.

Fee for JALT members: Free

Fee for one-day members: 1,000 yen

A Special Double Session on Translation and Interpretation

A Special Double Session on Translation and Interpretation

co-sponsored by SIETAR Kansai and Osaka JALT

Date and Time: 

Saturday, 24 October 2015 - 2:00pm - 5:15pm

Speaker: 

Shoko Toyokura, Osaka Jogakuin University

Masako Mouri, Kansai University

(1) "Focusing on Increasing the Metaphorical Competence of Japanese EFL Learners through Subtitle Translation" by Shoko Toyokura, Osaka Jogakuin University (in English)

Metaphors pervade every aspect of our daily life. Thus, metaphorical competence (MC) is crucial for EFL learners in order to communicate effectively in English. Many EFL researchers claim that a lack of metaphorical competence is typical for classroom learners, and this is caused by their limited accessibility to English in their daily life. In fact, students are rarely given an opportunity to learn metaphors in the classroom situation. The presenter firmly believes that translation and subtitle translation, in particular, can be an effective pedagogical tool to compensate for this disadvantage. This presentation will include an introduction of the presenter’s methodology to enhance the MC of Japanese EFL learners. She will demonstrate how her students developed MC in her subtitle translation class.

Shoko Toyokura started her career with subtitle translation, and is now a translator of many young adult novels. She has also been teaching translation classes including “Subtitle Translation” at two universities. Her main research interest is TILT (Translation In Language Teaching).

(2) "The Current Circumstances and Challenges in Courtroom Interpretation in Japan – The Interpreters' Roles as Cultural Brokers" (in Japanese)
(日本における法廷通訳の現状と課題ー文化の仲介者としての通訳人）by Masako Mouri, Kansai University

The number of criminals who are foreign nationals has increased during the past decades in Japan in step with globalization. Accordingly, many legal interpreters have been hired in various sectors, however, these legal interpreters have not taken any official examinations for certification, nor have they received official training or education to work in legal settings. In fact, every word in translation and interpretation can possibly provide important evidence for the courtroom. Those involved in police and legal work have not understood the role of interpreters as mediators who can help avoid misunderstanding related to language or culture. For many people, interpreters are merely expected to act as word-by-word translation machines. The presenter will discuss the current situation faced by legal interpreters in Japan, and she will propose possible measures to allow interpreters to work as cultural mediators.

Masako Mouri is an assistant professor at Kansai Gaidai University. Her research fields are courtroom interpretation, cultural gaps and language barriers in courtroom examination, and cultural translation. She holds a doctoral degree in Social and Cultural Studies from the graduate school of Nihon University.

Q&A will be in both languages

Location: 

Takatsuki Shiritsu Sogo Shimin Koryu Center (1 minute walk from JR Takatsuki Station) Tel.0726-85-3721

Guide to Location: 

Link to meeting location

Fee for JALT members: 

Free

Fee for one-day members: 

500 yen (free for students)

Contact or Queries: 

Email contact form

FAB8: NeuroELT Brain Days International Conference

FAB, originally an acronym for First Annual Brain day, explores the new interdisciplinary field of NeuroELT, where applied linguistics and educational neuroscience meet. The upcoming conference will be held on September 26-27 at Kyoto Sangyo's Musubiwaza-kan.

For more details visit their site at http://www.fab-efl.com/index.html

Or, to submit a proposal by August 15th visit http://www.fab-efl.com/page1/index.html for more information.

A Mid-Summer's Day Micro-Conference

On July 4th Osaka JALT, in association with JALT's GALE SIG held a mini-conference in Namba Shimin Gakushu Center. The presenters discussed a range of topics and opened several interesting dialogues.

Samuel Sorenson - Cultivating Creativity through Video Sharing Projects

Creating videos on topics of students' choice to share with an audience promotes collaboration and autonomous learning. It provides the opportunity for students to express their personal voices through the creative process, while resulting in a finished product that is relevant, meaningful, and something students can be proud of. This presentation will discuss the presenters' experience implementing such projects at two elementary schools in Shiga.

Samuel Sorenson came to Japan in 2010 on the JET Program and taught four years at two small elementary schools in Nagahama City, Shiga. In 2014 he moved to Osaka and is now teaching at two high schools through the Osaka City Board of Education. He is in the MA-TESOL program at Temple University Japan and is interested in motivation as well as task-based and project-based learning.

Michael Iwane-Salovaara - Using Quizlet in the Classroom

Quizlet offers another tool for language teachers by providing a low cost for testing and learner self-study. This presentation will focus on set up and implementation as well as various issues that have arisen.

Michael Iwane-Salovaara teaches at Momoyama Gakuin University. His interests include how technology interfaces with learners, spoken discourse, pragmatics, and poetry.

Cameron Romney - I hate my textbook! What can I do?

Many teachers are required to use a textbook that they had no say in choosing and many choose to make supplemental materials that better address their students’ needs. But how do teachers go about creating supplements? How can they determine where their textbook is deficient and what their students need extra practice with? This presentation will introduce a systematic approach developed by the presenter called ACoPE (Analyze, Consult, Produce and Evaluate) to help teachers create supplementary materials.

Cameron Romney has taught EFL in Japan and the United States for more than seventeen years. An avid presenter, he has twice won the Best of JALT award for his presentations and will be a featured speaker at the JALT International Conference in Shizuoka this fall. Currently he is a Lecturer at Kyoto Sangyo University in Kyoto.

Gerry Yokota - Beyond the Binary: Anime, Gender and the Multicultural Subject

Japanese anime and manga are fertile sources for prompting classroom discussion and critical thinking. But educators are justly concerned about their frequently problematic representations of gender, sexuality and violence. Professor Yokota will introduce recent examples from three prominent subgenres (mechas, cyborgs, and beautiful fighting girls), propose a few ideas about how to address such concerns, and invite participants to share ideas about possible approaches, pitfalls, outcomes and alternatives.

Gerry Yokota is Professor of English and Contemporary Interdisciplinary Cultural Studies at Osaka University, where she teaches undergraduate and graduate courses in English and Gender Studies as well as courses on Contemporary Japan for the G30 program. She was a plenary speaker at JALT2014 in Tsukuba, but the large audience made discussion and interaction difficult, and many Kansai colleagues were not able to attend, so we are pleased to have this opportunity to share her talk again as a workshop.

We look forward to continuing these discussions and many more in future events. Thank you to the presenters and attendees for making this event a success.

Osaka JALT Journal 2, June 2015

The Osaka chapter of the Japan Association for Language Teaching (JALT), is excited to announce the second annual Osaka JALT Journal.

The Osaka JALT Journal is devoted to outstanding research across the spectrum of language teaching and learning, including: empirical studies, theoretical papers, classroom action research, book reviews, conference reviews, and practical teaching suggestions.