When I was in high school in Japan, I was fortunate enough to have teacher that I really respected. I ended up working with her as an English teacher at the high school I graduated. Her teaching style was very inspirational to me and showed me how to be an effective teacher to my students.
In 2016, participated in the ALLEX Foundation program, which provides training in Japanese language teaching at Washington University in St. Louis. To understand the learner’s feelings, the program required me to take a class in a foreign language which I had never taken before, so I participated in a Chinese class. In that class, the instructor insisted on immersion and aimed for 100% target language use. It was very similar to the Direct Method (Larsen & Freeman, 2011, p. 25). The students were not allowed to use English or our native language, Japanese, because in the Direct Method, translation is not allowed. In addition, we were also not allowed to open the text book. The pronunciation of Chinese was not easy to imitate. Even with substantial practice, I felt it was meaningless, as I could not hear the differences among the four tones. In the class, it was also hard to understand whether you had answered the instructor’s questions correctly or not, as the feedback was given in Chinese only. I felt it was fruitless. With this experience in mind, I always prioritize the student’s feelings in my class when I teach Japanese to English speakers. For example, I try to give clear feedback to the student in Japanese with according commentary so that the students do not get confused about whether they have answered correctly or not. It is important to know where you stand to give you proper motivation to keep going. As the supportive material, I provide the list of classroom instructions and expressions to guide the students’ understanding of my feedback in Japanese.
In addition to my experience of being an instructor, I have served as Director of Virginia Governor’s Japanese Academy for last five Summers. I experienced both in-person program (2017-2019) and the online version (2020-2021). This duty allowed me to observe multiple classes of beginner, intermediate and advanced Japanese, in addition to supervising the teachers who were in charge of the classes. Having great staff members is one of the main key to be successful in order to run the program smoothly as if the staff member cannot perform well, it will influence the student’s successful learning. Holding the Japanese food cooking classes, Keshigomu Hanko (Stamp) making, Calligraphy with 3D printer, Japanese Sports day, Star festival, Uchiwa fan making and Sushi banquet were something I was very passionate about because it delivers authentic school curriculum of Japan. Students showed stronger interest towards language learning after having these culture classes. However, the best feedback I always got from the students was from a Skype/Zoom exchange program that I established with a high school in Japan. The students really enjoyed the conversation and real time interactions with native speakers of Japanese. Like I mentioned earlier, language is a tool to communicate and understand each other’s perspectives better, as well as building relationships across cultures. The students’ feedback explains how language satisfies leaners and keeps them motivated to move forward. One of the principles of Communicative Language Teaching includes that whenever possible, authentic language – language as it is used in a real context -- should be introduced (Larsen and Freeman, 2011 pg.119). All the culture classes I taught were authentic classes that has being taught in the school system in Japan that I experienced when I was a child. Therefore, these classes enabled the students to have culturally coherent experiences.
As Japanese is considered one of the toughest foreign languages for native English speakers to master, the learning process can be difficult as the students think it will be difficult and it is inherently difficult, but it is also challenging for the teacher to teach. However, I would like to challenge myself to create new ideas based on the students’ level and needs. I strongly believe that language is a tool to communicate and understand each other’s perspectives better, as well as building relationships across cultures. Learning language should not be just learn about the language, practice grammar and vocabulary; being able to use it as a tool is the real epitome. If the leaner could not feel the meaning why they should learn the foreign language, I can strongly tell this is the key to fuel the motivation to the learner.
Before I participated in the ALLEX program, for two years I taught English, and in the second year, I taught Japanese in a private high school in Japan. The experience of teaching Japanese to international exchange students at that high school motivated me to apply for the program which enabled me to teach Japanese in the United States. This is my sixth academic year of teaching Japanese at the college level, and I will be teaching a brand new course, “Writing in Japanese” for the advanced level for the first time that the college is going to offer from September in Fall 2021, in addition to the elementary Japanese courses that I have taught last three years. I always try to create an environment that is student-centric; I am just the navigator on the student’s path of learning. Based on my experience of learning foreign languages, I use both Japanese and English in the class, depending on the context, developing proficiency in the target language. I switch my mode from director mode (in English) to performer’s mode (in Japanese) effectively to ensure that the student can understand what is going on in the class and try to make easier for the students. Once a student loses their concentration, it is hard to bring back their attention back and make them focus on the content. The other reason why I use English in class is that I would like to make sure that the student is getting the grammatical information correctly. With this method, I use native Japanese for their comprehension, with a follow up in English to complete their understanding. On the textbook review, I mentioned that it is important to reduce the learner’s anxiety to be a successful learner and the teacher must be aware of the pressure of speaking (Tomlinson, 2012 p. 232). By using the student’s native language, I would like to also ensure to reduce student’s anxiety towards speaking in the Target language. I do wish that my students to not to worry to come to the class like I had experienced. To give the feedback is also a great way to reduce the student’s anxiety. To ensure where the students stands, I try to give the feedback as much as possible. Feedback can be formal or informal, delayed or immediate, overt or implicit (Christensen & Warnick, 2014). It is sometimes outside of the classroom in person, when I meet with the student at the Japanese chatting club or the cooking class, I give feedback and the students seems to be liking that having the feedback from the instructor in regular conversation how they are doing in the class.
I have had the two most memorable experiences as foreign language learner. The first is when I was a high school student, and I studied the social situation of East Timor in English class. The teacher gave us a topic and we discussed how we felt about the topic and how could we make a difference in the world. Though we were native speakers of Japanese, we communicated all in English with native speaker of English teacher in the class. I learned this is a reason why we study foreign language, this is how we communicate across cultural and national borders in foreign languages, and it was a great experience as a learner, and I felt having opportunities for authentic communication is the meaning of studying foreign language.
The best educators know that the they never stop learning, and that is the reason why I am pursuing a master’s degree at MSU. I would like to keep learning to be a better educator of Japanese language, not just as a native speaker of Japanese but also to improve myself as a professional language teacher.
Christensen, M.B. & Warnick, J.P. (2006). Performed culture. An approach to East Asian language pedagogy. Columbus, Ohio: National East Asian Languages Resources Center.
Larsen-Freeman, D., & Anderson, M. (2011). Techniques & principles in language teaching (3rd ed.). New York: Oxford University Press.
Tomlinson, B. (2012). Applied linguistics and materials development. Retrieved from https://ebookcentral-proquest-com.proxy2.cl.msu.edu
ACTFL World-Readiness Standards
Interagency Language Roundtable Scale
Center for Applied Linguistics (CAL) - Resource Center
ETC.