| Great site building site |
| My blog, EFL in
Japan これは私のweblog.見て下さい！ Yokkaichi University  |
| UPDATES: - Take a look at some of my students' writing. I published it here, hoping that we can use it in class. Octobler 1, 2004 -I put up some new study sheets and quizzes for my students. August 25, 2004 -just added a Google site search bar at the bottom! August 25, 2004 -added a Weather Page connection for Yokkaichi weather. Ain't weather cool! August 25, 2004 - front page updated, 15:45, 4/12/2004 -Yokkaichi University link, 15:00, 4/12/2004 - Conversation class information, 15:30, 4/12/2004 |
About MeHaving been born in Indiana, and carried off to the wilds of West Virginia, where I eventually graduated with an MA from West Virginia University. At 40 I find myself in Yokkaichi, Japan, a pedagogue, like my brother and my father before me.Take a look at my CV. EnglishJapanese About My JobI'm currently employed at Yokkaichi University in the Faculty of Policy Management, and teach English as a Foreign Language. Here is a list of my classes with information on each one of them.Let's make an English web page! Go to the English template here. Here's information about the Yokkaichi Teacher Development Initiative. Here's
information on the Faculty of
Policy Management English Program. About My ResearchIn order to continually improve the learning environment in my classes, I conduct research in areas that are of interest to me and that I think will benefit my students.My Periodic Journaling
Teacher Testing: English in Japan
The
November 3, 2002 article, "Teachers furious over rank grading
system." at the Mainichi Shinbun
site set off resonant chords of disquiet with another article
that I had read in the same newspaper, the July 12, 2002, "Japan's
awful English prompts national investigation." The more recent
article says that teachers will be subject to an evaluation at
various times in their teaching careers, and that the teachers' union
is unhappy with the way it is to be conducted. The July article
says that new English teachers being hired into public schools must
have scored at or above prescribed levels. Janurary 24, 2003 Over the break I spoke to one high school teacher and two elementary school teachers about the topic of smaller class sizes. The stories that I heard from these teachers are very similar. There is much discussion of smaller classes, encouragement from various bureaucracies, and excitement among parents, but in reality, there is little movement toward smaller classes. The pressures that prevent this from happening seem to be mostly financial. Even as schools in some areas close because of falling enrollment, other schools spring up in new neighborhoods. Teacher numbers are reduced through attrition, but real numbers of children attending schools in the Yokkaichi area does not. The prefecture and school boards claim that there isn't the money. |