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LongShiKong
Joined: 28 May 2007
Posts: 1082
Location: China
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 Posted: Mon Jan 16, 2012 9:00 am Post subject: Is Japan still 'old-school' in TEFL methods? |
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Correct me if I'm wrong but I get the sense teacher-centred drilling is still the norm in Japan.
I recently started working for Shane* in China (est'd in Japan). Training covered literally dozens of drill techniques. Despite the 100s of flashcards we do have, there's none for the random vocabulary beginners are expected to know to complete their phonetic homework. There's very little narrative or meaningful context within students' books.
It wasn't surprising to hear the senior teacher of another private school I worked with in '07 (who taught in Japan) complain of behavioural issues. His method of teaching was to ask the same mundane question to all 20 students in the class one by one. Such teaching struck me as highly unusual having taught in Canada and American-owned private schools in China that emphasized pair and group work, and more task-based methods.
As I had in the past, I used my obligatory office time to develop pairwork activities, games, role plays and other means to centextualize the language taught into meaningful communication tasks. Unfortunately my Chinese TA, was too busy marking workbooks during class time to be of much help to me in organizing such activities.
When they dismissed me, they told me what I expected was too difficult for gr. 4 students and I'd be better off teaching high school. But had the students actually mastered the limited language of the previous levels through meaningful practice, I'm sure what I was doing would've been far too easy for them--I'd be having to add a lot more language.
Even the coursebook author, a TEFL trainer, lecturer and teacher in Japan recognized the inherent problem of over-drilling in her own teaching on her Yahoo Superkids UsersGroup at the time. She claims to have read my advice but for whatever reason, is reluctant to respond.
If autonomy, mastery, and purpose are the secret according to Drive: The Surprising Truth of What Motivates Us, then such methods only instill dependency; allow only for the mastery of responding to cue (operand conditioning) and strip language learning from any communicative function or purpose, inevitably leading to behavioural issues.
I remember from my own gr. 6 French class--within a month, our first teacher left the room in tears, never to return. Where we such naughty kids or was the teaching so dehumanizing that we just naturally rebelled?
* I'd be interested to hear how Shane's changed now that it's been bought out from an academic standpoint. I assume they've replaced their curriculum with Longman, Oxford or some other courseware and possibly gone digital with interactive whiteboards as what Shanghai Shane's doing currently.
Last edited by LongShiKong on Mon Jan 16, 2012 9:27 am; edited 3 times in total |
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rxk22
Joined: 19 May 2010
Posts: 1629
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| Posted: Mon Jan 16, 2012 9:12 am Post subject: |
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I think anybody that says Japan is on top of things TEFL wise, they are full of it. It is all that you said and more. I still haven't seen good company made flash cards. Most books just wonder around topics, and they never go back and reenforce grammar/vocab learned in the past. Which encourages cramming and then forgetting it forever.
''How are you?'' is still a deal breaker for most students. I am pretty surprised when half the kids even know what that question is. If they do get that, then ''how old are you?'' is game over 
I've worked as an ALT and at a conversation school. Seems the one thing that the companies have in common, is that they have absolutely no clue on what is going on. From what their employes want from them, to what their customers demand. |
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It's Scary!
Joined: 17 Apr 2011
Posts: 823
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| Posted: Mon Jan 16, 2012 4:33 pm Post subject: |
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I'm fine, thank you, an-do you?
It's about all they know!
(Here's something that I used to have fun with...right after they responded to my question about their name, I'd immediately ask, "Why?" 99.8% would suffered an immediate and permanent melt-down, the other .02% would shine and haltingly reply, in a questioning tone, "Because my parents named me that?"
COMPLETELY OFF-SCRIPT!!!
Of course, NOVA had little use for me as I was making their clientele nervous and unhappy when the vast, vast majority was faced with the face-losing reality of not being able to speak a syllable of unscripted/unread Engrish!
Bad, Bad, Bad Teacher!!!  |
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Mr_Monkey
Joined: 11 Mar 2009
Posts: 661
Location: Kyuuuuuushuuuuuuu
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| Posted: Mon Jan 16, 2012 7:11 pm Post subject: |
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I think it's probably more accurate to state that teaching methodologies without any empirical evidence in their support are widespread in Japan.
At the level of individual teachers, it varies. Wildly. |
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rxk22
Joined: 19 May 2010
Posts: 1629
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| Posted: Mon Jan 16, 2012 9:44 pm Post subject: |
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| It's Scary! wrote: |
I'm fine, thank you, an-do you?
It's about all they know!
(Here's something that I used to have fun with...right after they responded to my question about their name, I'd immediately ask, "Why?" 99.8% would suffered an immediate and permanent melt-down, the other .02% would shine and haltingly reply, in a questioning tone, "Because my parents named me that?"
COMPLETELY OFF-SCRIPT!!!
Of course, NOVA had little use for me as I was making their clientele nervous and unhappy when the vast, vast majority was faced with the face-losing reality of not being able to speak a syllable of unscripted/unread Engrish!
Bad, Bad, Bad Teacher!!! |
Yeah, at my eikaiwa it was all scripted. Anything that deviated outside of that narrow conversation, turned into the meltdown stare.
Which I get all the time as an ALT. I think a major problem, is that the kids don't know how to think for themselves. For instance if I do Bingo, with a 9 squared board, and I give them 10 items to be filled in. They get confused about that. Instead of knowing that 1 item should be left out. |
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G Cthulhu
Joined: 07 Feb 2003
Posts: 1373
Location: Way, way off course.
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| Posted: Tue Jan 17, 2012 2:15 am Post subject: |
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| rxk22 wrote: |
| It's Scary! wrote: |
I'm fine, thank you, an-do you?
It's about all they know!
(Here's something that I used to have fun with...right after they responded to my question about their name, I'd immediately ask, "Why?" 99.8% would suffered an immediate and permanent melt-down, the other .02% would shine and haltingly reply, in a questioning tone, "Because my parents named me that?"
COMPLETELY OFF-SCRIPT!!!
Of course, NOVA had little use for me as I was making their clientele nervous and unhappy when the vast, vast majority was faced with the face-losing reality of not being able to speak a syllable of unscripted/unread Engrish!
Bad, Bad, Bad Teacher!!! :lol: :lol: :lol: |
Yeah, at my eikaiwa it was all scripted. Anything that deviated outside of that narrow conversation, turned into the meltdown stare.
Which I get all the time as an ALT. I think a major problem, is that the kids don't know how to think for themselves. For instance if I do Bingo, with a 9 squared board, and I give them 10 items to be filled in. They get confused about that. Instead of knowing that 1 item should be left out. |
Maybe it's just you? From scripted or limited range it's entirely possible to get to fluency. There are entire methods based around that idea. But you keep talking about your students as if they're incapable of learning, which doesn't say much about you as far as respecting the learner goes, TBH.
You keep talking about how bad your students are and how unsuccessful they are at learning. Has it never occurred to you that across all those students the only constant was you? From a pedagogy point of view, you're more likely to be the problem given what you've described. |
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It's Scary!
Joined: 17 Apr 2011
Posts: 823
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| Posted: Tue Jan 17, 2012 2:45 am Post subject: |
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Moi?!? Since you quoted another poster quoting me, I think not... 
It's a bit confusing...'then again, I tend to edit out the non-essential bits! |
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LongShiKong
Joined: 28 May 2007
Posts: 1082
Location: China
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| Posted: Tue Jan 17, 2012 3:50 am Post subject: |
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[quote="It's Scary!"]
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I'm fine, thank you, an-do you? It's about all they know!
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It's the same here for the vast majority of the population. I often pass 20-somethings on the street and one will shout 'How ah you?' or 'Nice to meet you!' while their friends snicker in amusement that from all those yrs of English, they can still (only) remember their first lesson.
However, I, and I'm sure many other schools/teachers here only ever teach such scripted dialogues in the first lesson--it's how I started learning Chinese. But I get the impression from that Japan's far more 'scripted' or what I'd call drill-oriented than China.
Please tell me how representative Richard Graham's Genki English is of the way English is taught in Japan because the following videos illustrate my point:
1.Teacher-centric: Everyone's facing the screen/teacher, not each other. Notice the use of kid-vids for what may even be corporate classes--teach the lesson, not the students. 
2. Drill-oriented / Scripted: Students are expected to repeat exactly what the teacher says/does;
3. Decontextualized language: To be honest, it's hard to say since we're only seeing a part of the lesson but if the objective was to get students using the language introduced in meaningful ways (provide a context) then why would they choose not to include this desired outcome?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q0jxUkQZmvA&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F4NZo7vMfKQ&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AxynuKLLFJc |
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rxk22
Joined: 19 May 2010
Posts: 1629
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| Posted: Tue Jan 17, 2012 3:52 am Post subject: |
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| G Cthulhu wrote: |
| rxk22 wrote: |
| It's Scary! wrote: |
I'm fine, thank you, an-do you?
It's about all they know!
(Here's something that I used to have fun with...right after they responded to my question about their name, I'd immediately ask, "Why?" 99.8% would suffered an immediate and permanent melt-down, the other .02% would shine and haltingly reply, in a questioning tone, "Because my parents named me that?"
COMPLETELY OFF-SCRIPT!!!
Of course, NOVA had little use for me as I was making their clientele nervous and unhappy when the vast, vast majority was faced with the face-losing reality of not being able to speak a syllable of unscripted/unread Engrish!
Bad, Bad, Bad Teacher!!! |
Yeah, at my eikaiwa it was all scripted. Anything that deviated outside of that narrow conversation, turned into the meltdown stare.
Which I get all the time as an ALT. I think a major problem, is that the kids don't know how to think for themselves. For instance if I do Bingo, with a 9 squared board, and I give them 10 items to be filled in. They get confused about that. Instead of knowing that 1 item should be left out. |
Maybe it's just you? From scripted or limited range it's entirely possible to get to fluency. There are entire methods based around that idea. But you keep talking about your students as if they're incapable of learning, which doesn't say much about you as far as respecting the learner goes, TBH.
You keep talking about how bad your students are and how unsuccessful they are at learning. Has it never occurred to you that across all those students the only constant was you? From a pedagogy point of view, you're more likely to be the problem given what you've described. |
Well that is much like saying that 'you touched it last, you have to put it away'. You can't lay blame at my feet for all of it. As an ALT, I only get the kids for 6 months, and that's it. After that, I never see them again. My 12th graders, was that my fault that they couldn't speak any Enlgish, or the fact that the didn't try for 6 years straight?
I don't believe in scripted learning. You need to drill, and to go outside clearly defined scenarios. Freedom of action and thought is required. otherwise it is like learning to wrestle, and never once placing your foot on the mat. Until it can be applied, you don't know it. |
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LongShiKong
Joined: 28 May 2007
Posts: 1082
Location: China
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| Posted: Tue Jan 17, 2012 7:53 am Post subject: |
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| Quote: |
| I don't believe in scripted learning. You need to drill... |
rxk22: I know I shouldn't have conflated 'scripted learning' with 'pattern drilling' but just how do you 'go outside clearly defined scenarios' in your teaching? And when you say you 'need to drill', is it out of the real need to help students retain the language you're teaching or because your employer expects you to? If so, are you not also expected to provide more meaningful contextualized practice: pair work, group work, discussions, etc.--the standard fluency-developing practice common in most countries?
I'm trying to get a sense for how English is commonly taught in Japan, if in fact, there is a common method. I understand there are 'conversation schools' in Japan but do they follow a less-scripted, more fluency-focused approach or not? |
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rxk22
Joined: 19 May 2010
Posts: 1629
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| Posted: Tue Jan 17, 2012 10:05 am Post subject: |
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| LongShiKong wrote: |
| Quote: |
| I don't believe in scripted learning. You need to drill... |
rxk22: I know I shouldn't have conflated 'scripted learning' with 'pattern drilling' but just how do you 'go outside clearly defined scenarios' in your teaching? And when you say you 'need to drill', is it out of the real need to help students retain the language you're teaching or because your employer expects you to? If so, are you not also expected to provide more meaningful contextualized practice: pair work, group work, discussions, etc.--the standard fluency-developing practice common in most countries?
I'm trying to get a sense for how English is commonly taught in Japan, if in fact, there is a common method. I understand there are 'conversation schools' in Japan but do they follow a less-scripted, more fluency-focused approach or not? |
Those videos were pretty great. A lot going on, fun, informative and so on. That's exactly what is discouraged here. Reading from a book, and reading scripts(often both parts by one's self), and mindlessly repeating after the teacher are heavily encouraged here.
Even though we 'team teach' now, most JTs seem to want their ALTs to 'repeat after me'.
I like to drop in classes from time to time(like history or social studies), and they tend to be pretty boring classes in general. Seems to me that the Japanese education system is heavily lecture based, and involves as little interaction as possible.
At the conversation school. It was all scripted. Anything outside of the basic Qs , the kids didn't know. But it was for kids, whom most were there on account of their mom's would drop them off while they shopped. Which does affect quality, as it was mostly entertainment, and not actual learning. Otherwise we wouldn't have dumped a newbie in with kids learning for 6 years. |
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LongShiKong
Joined: 28 May 2007
Posts: 1082
Location: China
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| Posted: Tue Jan 17, 2012 12:24 pm Post subject: |
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| rxk22 wrote: |
Those videos were pretty great. |
I'm surprised you think so given my criticism.
It appears you contradict yourself. On the one hand you describe the videos as: 'a lot going on, fun, informative and so on' stating "that's exactly what is discouraged here" while on the other hand "mindlessly repeating after the teacher are heavily encouraged here." Isn't that what the videos depict? I don't see any meaningful exchanges, do you? And if 'fun' is discouraged, why do you say 'At the conversation school....it was mostly entertainment'.
And you haven't answered my questions:
Just how do you 'go outside clearly defined scenarios' in your teaching? And when you say you 'need to drill', is it out of the real need to help students retain the language you're teaching or because your employer expects you to? If so, are you not also expected to provide more meaningful contextualized practice: pair work, group work, discussions, etc.--the standard fluency-developing practice common in most countries? |
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rxk22
Joined: 19 May 2010
Posts: 1629
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| Posted: Tue Jan 17, 2012 1:10 pm Post subject: |
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| LongShiKong wrote: |
| rxk22 wrote: |
Those videos were pretty great. |
I'm surprised you think so given my criticism.
It appears you contradict yourself. On the one hand you describe the videos as: 'a lot going on, fun, informative and so on' stating "that's exactly what is discouraged here" while on the other hand "mindlessly repeating after the teacher are heavily encouraged here." Isn't that what the videos depict? I don't see any meaningful exchanges, do you? And if 'fun' is discouraged, why do you say 'At the conversation school....it was mostly entertainment'.
And you haven't answered my questions:
Just how do you 'go outside clearly defined scenarios' in your teaching? And when you say you 'need to drill', is it out of the real need to help students retain the language you're teaching or because your employer expects you to? If so, are you not also expected to provide more meaningful contextualized practice: pair work, group work, discussions, etc.--the standard fluency-developing practice common in most countries? |
Well, I liked the first video. As for me that was more interactive than I am really allowed to do in my classes. That was almost real TPR.
When I say mindlessly repeating. I mean like a galley slave level level of repetition. For reals, have had HUGE amounts of classes devoted to having the kids repeat after me, and the JT.
Well, let me explain a bit more. The fun part is playing games with the kids. The learning part was sterile, and super repetitive. Asking the same basic Qs like how are you, what's your name, what school do you go to...etc. Then the games were almost entirely divorced from using any target language. I feel that they were just time wasters, and to make the kids want to come back ie $$$.
For drilling, I mean using target vocab, and grammar in a setting that is not already spelled out. Most of it is fill in the blank, or scripted. I would like the students to use the grammar, and try to make a conversation with it, in some manner, as opposed to reading a script.
By drill, I mean taking the target language and playing with it. Have the kids talk to each other using it. Have them use it! As in my schools. The kids rarely if ever are encouraged to to partnering up activities. I can't stress how much they read from the book. Breaks my heart. As I can feel how boring it is for them.
My employer really doesn't have anything in the way of guidelines, as an ALT. The JTs basically tell me what I am to do. If I propose something that they don't like, they veto it, and it doesn't happen. I can sometimes sneak things in, but it isn't often. |
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LongShiKong
Joined: 28 May 2007
Posts: 1082
Location: China
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| Posted: Tue Jan 17, 2012 2:16 pm Post subject: |
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Glad I chose not to teach in Japan! 
Today, I took a look at the Shane curriculum guidelines. My American colleague wouldn't believe me even when I showed him that Shane expects students to be able to ask and answer specific questions from each course such as: 'Have you been abroad?'. So, after 10 yrs of teaching, I now have an idea what you mean by scripting. Fortunately, Chinese are starting to recognize the value of fluency as more and more go overseas for studies or business. Parents wisely recognize the time to begin learning L2 is in their pre-school years, as I'm sure, our low beginner adults do as we help prepare them to go overseas in 6 months.
At Longman Schools in Beijing, I surveyed 9 parents of the 4 yr olds I taught. Here's how each rated rated the importance of the following. Sorry the #s don't line up but the last bolded # is the average.
a) 9 10 9 10 10 10 6 3 8.4 Your child enjoys coming here:
b) 9 9 9 9 10 6 10 8 8.8 Your child can recite the words and phrases from the course:
c) 10 10 10 9 10 4 10 10 9.1 Your child can understand, ask and answer simple questions in full form:
Now, the aim of the course was simply (b) the result of drilling/scripting. But notice how only one parent considered this more important than (c) the developing stages of fluency. It's clear that most see fluency as, if not more important than rote memorization. Personally, I see the 3 as inseparable goals.
----------------------
Fluffyhamster: You've taught in both Japan and China? What's your take on ELT in Japan? |
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rich45
Joined: 26 Jan 2006
Posts: 127
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| Posted: Wed Jan 18, 2012 12:32 am Post subject: |
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| LongShiKong wrote: |
Glad I chose not to teach in Japan!
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There are some benefits...
I am an ALT and a lot depends on the JTE you work with.
In my junior high school, I have two JTEs who are like chalk and cheese.
The guy JTE hardly uses me at all and his classes are akin to what rxk22 describes. His lessons start with a word test, then I ask "how are you?" followed by reading of the text. The rest of the lesson involves the JTE translating for the kids, and if there's time, then they will finish with a few comprehension questions. Dull. Sometimes, the entire lesson is devoted to memorising. Here, the students simply try to memorise the text from the New Horizon book, and when they are confident, they come to either the JTE or myself and recite the passage. Success=sign.
The female JTE passes all the responsibility to me which sometimes annoys me, but sometimes is a pleasure...depending on my mood at the time. I usually start with a fun warmer for 5 minutes, read the text, try to explain the grammar point (with the aid of the JTE if she is feeling willing), then the last 20-25 minutes are spent doing an activity that gets the kids practising the grammar point, whether it be in the form of a card game, board game, group survey, etc. Just anything to get them interacting and to keep them from falling asleep, something that frequently occurs in the male JTE's classes. |
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