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TokyoLiz
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Posts: 1548
Location: Tokyo, Japan
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 Posted: Thu Jul 12, 2007 2:38 am Post subject: |
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Fox1 said
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Example: You have a Japanese language class in Seattle/Montreal/Manchester/Adelaide and the kids are talking their heads off (in English, obviously).... keeping talking... keep talking... standing up... talking....> You as the teacher say...: "Dame"?
Really???
You don't say, (confidently, not drill-sergeant-style): "Hey, nooo talking. OK? no talking!"?? |
I studied first year Japanese at uni many years ago. It's a sad thing to say, but the teacher instructed the class in English, and the language lab assistant, who led the one hour weekly "conversation class" spoke mostly English to us. The poor lab assistant had received little or no training in language teaching skills before she started.
A lot of our student talk in English was about trying to decipher what the lesson goal was, what the assistant had said, and how to adequately respond to her. She spoke broken English.
You'll get a lot of L1, poor motivation, and lack of learning when the teacher has no clear methodology that is first communicated to the students and then used to teach the language. I was so frustrated by the lack of Japanese learning that I stopped attending.
This is the fate of many a language program taught by people with no training in either the students' L1 or pedagogy - no method, no master, and a lot of frustration on both sides. When the teacher cannot understand the incidental talk happening in the classroom, s/he loses control of the classroom.
I suggest that you avoid speaking Japanese to your students at all costs until you have taken at least a year of language training yourself, or achieved the nikyu - second level of the Japanese proficiency test. Attend some seminars in EFL/ELT. As foreingers in Japan working in schools, we have so much opportunity to learn about Japan, ELT, middle/high school pedagogy and Japanese language. You can ask people on this forum how to pursue any of these juicy topics.
I'm with gaijinalways about saying a discreet point in Japanese when you know it. Students may not know the term past participle, but they know 過去分詞. When you need to communicate a grammatical point in a hurry, it makes sense. After all, ESL students need the English terms, while EFL students need the grammar terms as used in their native language.
I found this list of grammatical terms - http://www.alse-net.com/column/english%20grammar%20terms.pdf |
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Glenski
Joined: 15 Jan 2003
Posts: 12844
Location: Hokkaido, JAPAN
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| Posted: Thu Jul 12, 2007 3:12 am Post subject: |
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| Glenski and others. I think the 'be quiet' is not that effective (in Japanese or English), but I have used it sometimes. Of course you can also tell studnts that they are too loud, please be quiet/quiet please, which I hear some Japanese teachers using. |
gaijinalways,
We are going to have to agree to disagree, because I have gotten positive results in>95% of the times I have used this one simple word, and I have seen it work effectively in 100% of the situations where Japanese teacher use it. You wrote that you think it is not that effective. I have seen and done it. Works like a charm, even with freshman college students in classes as large as 120. |
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Gypsy Rose Kim
Joined: 08 Dec 2006
Posts: 151
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| Posted: Thu Jul 12, 2007 3:36 am Post subject: |
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| TokyoLiz wrote: |
I'm with gaijinalways about saying a discreet point in Japanese when you know it. Students may not know the term past participle, but they know ????. When you need to communicate a grammatical point in a hurry, it makes sense. After all, ESL students need the English terms, while EFL students need the grammar terms as used in their native language.
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Yours was an excellent post that should be required reading for all new teachers, regardless of their level of training.
As for this part, what I was saying was that most of the time, teachers are saying stuff like, "yamette!" or using numbers or other completely basic vocabulary which the students already know. I whole-heartedly agree that there are occassions when the students' L1 is called for, but they tend not to be the same occassions as the ones I've witnessed. If that makes sense... |
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TokyoLiz
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Posts: 1548
Location: Tokyo, Japan
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| Posted: Thu Jul 12, 2007 4:37 am Post subject: |
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Gypsy Rose Kim,
Thanks for your kind comment 
I'll admit, sometimes I use Japanese in the classroom to clarify a point. For example, all directions for activities I give in English. However, when I consolidate a lesson, in the last five minutes or so, I occasionally explain the significance of the lesson point. For example, in today's junior high class, the students reviewed about 20 verbs through a combination of activities.
First, I drilled the vocabulary - "Look at the picture. What is the monkey doing?" The students call out, "The monkey is reading a newspaper". Next, we played a karuta or slap game to make let them hear and say the sentences again. Finally, we played charades, with the students doing the actions. At the end of the lesson, I asked them if they had taken the recent Eiken (STEP) interview test, and learned that many had just passed the fourth level. I explained that, at the third level, they are asked to decribe the actions of various people in pictures, demonstrating that their lessons are relevant to the test they want to pass. Only at consolidation did I speak Japanese. They appreciated what I told them, and there were some big smiles. They were chuffed because they knew they could do it. |
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gaijinalways
Joined: 29 Nov 2005
Posts: 2279
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| Posted: Thu Jul 12, 2007 5:42 am Post subject: |
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GG posted
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| I think the 'be quiet' is not that effective (in Japanese or English), but I have used it sometimes |
Glenski, read the bolded part please.
Gypsy Rose Kim posted
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| I whole-heartedly agree that there are occassions when the students' L1 is called for, but they tend not to be the same occassions as the ones I've witnessed. |
It's true, you have to pick and choose your opportunities to use the local language (or students' first language) carefully, but using some translation is sometimes a huge time saver. Often too, I let one of the better students do it if I trust their understanding of what should be translated, sometimes just a word or two.
This 'peer' teaching is helpful, as long as it is not overused. I sometimes remind students who do it too much, "Are you going to take his or her test too?" or "When will the two of you marry?" (in other words, if you're not always going to be there to translate, your partner maybe needs to learn some of the language for him/herself). |
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fox1
Joined: 22 Feb 2005
Posts: 268
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| Posted: Thu Jul 12, 2007 5:53 am Post subject: |
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| Vince wrote: |
I worked for four years in a senmongakko (2-year business college) that had students like yours, and I kept some pretty rough classes under control. Here are some suggestions:
First, understand that addressing long-term attitude adjustments is better left to Japanese authority figures. Your students have very different priorities and frames of reference than those to which you'd appeal, and there are very few foreigners who can sincerely and effectively address that. You should focus on immediate classroom management issues, and keep it as basic as possible. It sounds like that is all you're trying to do, but I just wanted to cover that base.
I had one class that was particularly bad. A Japanese teacher asked me about them, I told him they were pretty bad, and he apparently set them straight while he had them in his lesson. For the rest of the year, they were much better. The improvement went beyond behavior and seemed to be a booster shot of character. I couldn't have achieved that in the two years I had them, let alone in a single butt chewing.
If you don't know what urusai means, you clearly don't have enough Japanese to use it in class. This could be made abundantly clear by a student answering your speaking-Korean question with "I don't know what language you're speaking, but it sure isn't Japanese." I'm not saying this to slam you, but to illustrate where the situation leads. As other posters have said, you shouldn't use Japanese regardless of your ability, because the students probably understand or are capable of quickly learning this basic English.
Speaking of capability, know that many of your students probably have a little more English than they show. Basic disciplinary commands aren't beyond them. They've been fed the cop out that they can't handle it because they're Japanese and therefore can't understand English, but you know not to accept that.
If you simply need to regain order and don't have time for language, a look is really all you need. The students know when they're doing something wrong. Just look at them as if to say "what are you thinking" (without hamming it up, which is an ineffective habit of too many EFL teachers). The students ultimately want reasonable guidance and will respect you for taking the upper hand. Not a heavy hand, but the upper hand. |
yep. no, really, I know what you're saying. Great advice. I do sometimes try too hard to mould kids, change attitudes, appeal to their better selves. Hard stuff. It's definitely a tough balance with kids who (in class at least) just don't do what the teacher says, again and again and again. |
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Miyazaki
Joined: 12 Jul 2005
Posts: 635
Location: My Father's Yacht
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| Posted: Thu Jul 12, 2007 7:44 am Post subject: |
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| I find beating them helps. |
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flyingkiwi
Joined: 29 Jan 2007
Posts: 211
Location: In the Golden Gai in Shinjuku, arguing with Mama-san over my tab
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| Posted: Thu Jul 12, 2007 8:09 am Post subject: |
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| Then get the hell outta the teaching profession, mate, because you won't last long anyway. |
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nomadder
Joined: 15 Feb 2003
Posts: 709
Location: Somewherebetweenhereandthere
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| Posted: Thu Jul 12, 2007 9:50 pm Post subject: |
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Shorter is better for all kinds of reasons.
Urusai, yamette and dame-referring to behaviour in question should work. Translations of the above are fine too. Everyone seems to understand shhhh especially plus finger to mouth. |
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Lynn
Joined: 28 Jan 2003
Posts: 696
Location: in between
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| Posted: Sat Jul 14, 2007 12:45 am Post subject: |
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I deleted my original post because I realized your situation is a little more serious than I thought it was.
I understand your frustration. I once taught at public school that was hell. I really wanted to record the situation because I knew no one would believe me. |
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gaijinalways
Joined: 29 Nov 2005
Posts: 2279
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| Posted: Sun Jul 15, 2007 5:57 am Post subject: |
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Really depends on the school, some of the students are pretty rude, but than again, I remember some of my American classmates being pretty bad too (though now I can read about some of them in the past local crime reports  ).
But then again, they were graded, so some of them had more incentive than kids that may or may not be graded, and who are given multiple make up exams (in the no one will be left behind scheme of things  ). |
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