Course Description

This course is for the students who plan to be teachers in junior or senior high schools in Japan, and who need to improve their communicative competence for everyday conversation and future classroom skills.

The students will learn essential items for practical communication such as formulaic expressions, appropriate wording for typical situations, and linguistic and cultural differences between English and Japanese by doing exercises of writing emails. The students also read e-books on an extensive reading website in order to steadily enhance reading comprehension in and outside of class. Selecting the e-books you are interested in, you will practice reading at your own speed. After reading each book, you will answer the comprehension quizzes. These activities will enlarge your vocabulary and improve your reading rates. Each of you will write a composition about the book you recommend. This class is designed to achieve Learning Goals 1, 2, and 3 of the General Basic Subjects, incorporating active learning.

Course Objectives

By the end of this course, students will be able to
1. understand and utilize appropriate expressions including honorifics and the expressions
　reflecting cultural differences from Japanese in typical situations.
2. select e-book graded readers that match their interests and proficiency and read them for 30 minutes in class and 30 minutes outside class per week.
3. answer three comprehension quizzes after reading each book.
4. write a book review about the book they recommend with no fewer than 90 words.

Grading Policy

Final examination (40%), the number of words read & comprehension quizzes (29%), book review (8%), VELC Test (10%), improvement of the VELC Test score (5%), and book reports & participation (8%)

・The final examination is composed of the review questions of textbook exercises (70%) and the comprehension questions on new passages (30%).
・The book reports and compositions will be returned through the LMS with grades and corrections.
・The participation of students is graded according to the responses when being called on and the degree of participation in extensive reading activities.

Textbook and Reference

Requirements(Assignments)

[Preparation with the Textbook, etc.]
1. For the preparatory study of each unit, do the exercise on vocabulary first. Next, read through the model email and answer the comprehension questions. Third, examine example sentences in Key Expressions 1 and translate the Japanese phrases in the questions into English. Fourth, fill in the blanks of "English mind, Japanese mind," understanding the explanations written above the questions. Fifth, translate the Japanese sentences in Key Expressions 2, referring to the explanations above them and the previous example sentences in the same unit.
　Questions in the textbook should be answered before class. Unfamiliar expressions in the model email and questions will be looked up with dictionaries beforehand. (40 minutes)
2. For review, students will practice giving correct answers to the questions studied in class, especially the mistaken ones. The meanings of new expressions should also be memorized for making correct answers. (30 minutes)

[Preparation for Extensive Reading]
1. Select the e-books that match your interests and proficiency: There should be only a few unknown words on one page.
2. Read e-books for no fewer than 30 minutes outside class in total. (30 minutes or more)
3. Jot down the title of the book you like for writing your book review. (After reading a book)
3. Read the comments and corrections on your book report and composition feedback on the LMS. (5 minutes)

Note

・Students are supposed to bring in English-Japanese and Japanese-English dictionaries for each class. (Either paper or electronic dictionaries are accepted. If you are an international student, the dictionaries that translate English into your mother tongue and vice versa are preferable.）
・Bring your earphones so that you can listen to the audio of the e-books.
・You can borrow a computer tablet to read e-books at school. (However, you can also bring in your favorite device, if you like.)
・If your eyes are sensitive to computer work, preparing the glasses that block blue light will reduce your eye strain.
・The feedback on the LMS should regularly be checked.

Through various activities in this course, I hope that you will be able to improve your communicative ability in English.

Schedule