10/20-10/27 N.Korea and making a plan before writing.

Nukes in North Korea: What stance should Japan take


Today we tried to use a few planning methods.'Bubbles' and 'Listing'
Ss reactions were mixed.

On the positive side that
it made it easier to write,
they were able to write more,
they didn't forget what they'd thought,
they didn't lose track of the order of the ideas they wanted,
a bank of ideas was a good thing to have available,
people who used a pen and paper found it more flexible to graphically represent thier thoughts, (drawing lines, etc) than if it were done with a PC,
those using Japanese found it easier to lay down their thoughts first and then transform into English (Before they had given up from the start when they couldn't do the first E sentence.)


However, on the negative side, the planning took too much time: they couldn't do both with he time allotted, they ended up writing something different from the plan anyway. They couldn't tell if it had a good effect or not.

9/1-10/13 Middle East

There were 2 joined classes with Yamada where we did a gap-fill one side and space for writing a summary on the other. Both topics were about recent middle east events and summarized from wikipedia.
* Interesting feedback technique was to pass the sheets back in a random order and tell Ss to read it and give the paper along with a comment on content (or unclear areas) back to the writer at lunch. It worked nicely!
These texts were used for the test.

Next, back in CAV, the topic asked Ss to offer a solution to the Palestinian problem. Average was 111 words, and answers were very creative and deep.

6/30 Child labor group A

average 160* (group A and B)
*(minus one or two for student numbers or character errors in samples)

Monitor students for samples:
402, 412, 218, 201, 312, 317, 439, 336, 129, 122


Noticed some finishing early because they had nothing more to write, or tired?
(possible poll?)

*group B had just seen an NHK special on Cacao (cash crops) and developing countries.

6/23 Child Labor

Explanation of text. Give broad definition of what can be written. Review strategies (paste, eijiro, word)

6/9 Takeshima

I noticed an interesting technique. Ss were pasting my text onto the editing box of the BBS so they could refer to it as they wrote, borrowing phrases, and answering elements one by one.
Today I made the text very short (in contrast with 'Darfur') so that more time could be spend writing. Most classes had 40 mins for thinking and writing (a success indeed).
The topic was one selected from student suggestions made last time.
I asked for 150 words but got 105(139 when taken from a sample of 10) on average. This with 40 minutes of writing on a farmiliar but technical subject.

Best solutions: Split EEZ in half, Blow Islands up, first connect through culture like pop music, or soccer.

5/19 reading into writing about Darfur.

40 min classes made it hard to get all done. Teaching those absent on the first day about all the software settings was tough to do while also setting up class number 2. Even the ones that understood had a hard time figureing out that there were two different user names: the 'classword' of quizlab, and the username of the BBS.

5/12 (B)

Was able to do all 3 things: read 'Darfur', do quizlab, and write on BBS. A success, but I gave to think about tests. 30 points from my end.

from Group A: 4/28

Different passwords for qzlb or absent
1-3 arai (dif)
1-4 inoue (dif)
1-10 kiyataka (dif, ab)
1-20 taniguchi (dif, ab)

2-1 aoki (dif)
2-5 inui (dif, ab)
2-6 inoue (dif)
2-13 kawamoto (dif)
2-14 kida (dif, ab)
2-16 kusakabe (dif)

3-4 itami (dif, ab)
3-6 imanaka (dif, ab)
3-8 baseball (dif)
3-13 kadota (dif)
3-16 kiyoto (dif)
3-17 gota (dif)
3-18 sakai (dif)

4-3 inoue (dif)
4-4 iwata (dif)
4-12 kiyohara (dif, ab)
4-16 shigemoto (dif, ab)

I have to pre-register all student that werte absent on the bbs.