Almalang_Newsletter2022_EN_WEB

Praise for Ibunka

“A very adaptable textbook. I can use it both for general English courses in which this textbook performs well for structured speak ing activities and provides stimulating con tent that keeps student interest, and also for a seminar where the focus is more on ana lyzing data for research purposes. The sec tion that works best across the board for me is the warm-up survey. For 18 to 20-year olds, it seems to work well to relate every thing to themselves. They do not get tired of talking about themselves, and it makes them want to understand the English so they can answer on the form. They also energetically participate in interviewing each other.”

want, which is important because I mean, if you’re going to use a book, you don’t want to work your head off. You want a book that’s going to have a lot of busy work for your students and that enables you to sit back.

pretty high. So they’re used to seeing rela tively high level material, even though they can’t understand it. University students, they’ve been studying for years and years and years. When they come into my class, I actually look at them and I think, wow, these guys do not want to study English, but I can understand why. One of the problems with Japanese people learning English is they spend years and years and years doing it and not getting very far. And that’s just demoralizing. They should not be studying “Jack and Jill go up the hill”. They should be doing something, you know, interesting. And a good way to do that is to give them some interesting content and guide them towards a serious discussion. If they can actually sit down and create something which is relatively high level, which they can be proud of, then they feel like they’ve done something right. So you can take really low level students and give them time, and give them the tools, and they can put it all together and practice it and show you something that’s really quite good. The book lends itself to that. It’s got the structure that they need to move towards that final discussion. At first glance you found the textbook too structured, but actually you discovered that the structure helped you. That’s in teresting. Can you elaborate a bit about the connection between structure and creativity? NR: Yeah. I mean it’s a structure that is not too controlling, I suppose. For exam ple, “write down your answers to the inter view”. You know, it’s like there is just space for it, and then because there is space in the book you take time in the class. And then that gives the students time to think a little bit quietly and write their ideas down before going to the speaking stage. It’s also easy for the teacher because there’s so much prep going on that you can sit around drinking your coffee if you

Absolutely! Amen to that!

NR: I look at some other books, and there’s so much stuff that you need to go through. They’re so complicated, and every page is different, and there’s all these things go ing on, and you could spend hours trying to work out how to use it.

Maria Lupas, Sophia University Junior College Division

“I love this book. It is different from every book I’ve used in the past. Every section pro vides a host of opportunities for discussion about the topics, but also gives specific pat terns of speech that are helpful for interme diate level students and good practice for more advanced students.”

Too much work for the teacher, and not enough work for the students?

NR: Yeah, the teacher is like running around like a headless chicken. And the students are just yapping away in Japa nese, thinking, What the hell’s going on? With this book, once you’ve done one unit, they know exactly what to do. I mean, I think a lot of people, when they write textbooks, they think, “Oh, well it’s got to have some variety.” But actually, it isn’t the structure of the book that should be varied. It’s the content. The content is the point, isn’t it? I mean, it’s a bit like looking at a normal book which has got words on every page and saying, “Well, surely that’s boring.” Having words on every page with a number at the bottom, you know. But it isn’t, because no one cares about that. It’s the content that counts.

Linda Gould, Hadano English Speaking Society

“I like the format of having a survey at the beginning of each unit to guide student thinking and discussion. My intermediate level students definitely benefit from the bilingual Japanese support. The cultural commentary in the Teacher’s Book was also very helpful.”

Jerry Miller, Yamagata University

“I love the fact that the course is based around genuine responses. This gives stu dents access to real English, but in a man ageable way. It also generates natural sounding English, which the course then integrates into its vocab lists. I like the way the first week culminates in a paragraph essay that allows students to reflect on what they have discussed. It is well scaffolded and gives them room for choice.”

Do you have a background in intercultural communication?

NR: No, I mean not more than anyone who has lived in this country for 30 years, re flected on personal experience, and read a few things here and there. But before each new lesson I read the “Cultural Commen tary” section of the teacher’s book. That is very helpful, both solid and down-to earth.

Tim Greer, Kobe Gaidai University

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