General Reflection Part1: How I would apply what I have learnt for my future teaching in Japan

General Reflection Part1

As TE714 module: English Language Teaching Materials has ended, I would like to reflect generally what I have learnt from this module. In my blog, I have shared what we have discussed in the seminars and my thoughts about ELT materials including principles, evaluation, frameworks, adaptation, designing and creating my own materials. I have also shared the situation of ELT in my context, Japan.

In this post, I would like to mention my context in more details and share how I would apply what I have learnt in this module for my future teaching in Okinawa prefecture, Japan.

My context in details

I have mentioned Japanese English education in general. However, here I would like to stress especially my context: junior secondary schools in Miyako Island (my hometown), Okinawa prefecture, which is about 300km away form Okinawa main island, 2040km away from Tokyo and 380km away from Taiwan. The population of the island is about 55,000 people and we speak Japanese and our regional dialect. Due to the geographical situation, there are few opportunities for people living in the island to expose themselves to the English language. For a number of students, the opportunities may be only in English class at school. Even though the government has hired Assistant Language Teachers (ALT) who are native English speakers in order to expose students to communicative-oriented English speaking environments, it seems that it does not engage with the reality.

In some case, an ALT in the island is allocated five or eight different schools, and s/he needs to move around from a school to another school per month. In particular, at a large school, some classes would not have an English class with the ALT for two months when the schools’ timetable and ALT’s schedule do not match. Hence, those students miss the opportunity speaking with the English speaker. In addition, it is felt that both Japanese English teachers’ and ALT’s views are not corresponding over the way of teaching.

Through my teaching experience, Japanese English teachers need to teach English for the senior secondary school and university entrance examinations, whereas ALTs feel that they need to communicate with students through English conversation. Moreover, when I taught the language in such circumstances, I felt that students not only wanted to learn English through communicative-oriented teaching, but also needed to learn it to pass the exams. Some students really liked speaking with English speakers because they were interested in communication with people from different countries, other cultures and what foreign countries look like. However, other students just needed knowledge. Like students, their parents wanted their children to be fluent in speaking and also pass the exams. As a result, we, as English teachers, are struggling with what we should provide to students and how we could deal with the dilemma.

Based on my context, I have been thinking of what kind of teaching materials I could bring to English classroom to meet my students’ needs and wants after reading various articles, chapters and taking this module.

Theoretical implication: how I would apply what I have learnt for my future teaching in my homeisland: Miyako Island, Okinawa, Japan

Before I talk about the theoretical implication, I would like to make a list of classroom equipment and the provided materials by the government I can use in a classroom of secondary school in Miyako Island.

• Blackboard
• TV
• A cable to connect TV and my iPad
• Internet (It has been said that the Internet would be available in every class in secondary school in Miyako Island in the near future)
• A DVD/CD player
• Textbooks, workbooks, an accompanied CD&DVD, accompanied picture cards

Since I am supposed to follow the syllabus and use the textbook, I could create a teacher-made worksheet to supplement the textbook if it is necessary for my students. When I design my own worksheet, I will adopt the 5 principles that I value the most on materials design and use the template that I have already created as a portfolio (please see the post here and here). The contents on my worksheet will be related to target grammar so that students could follow the grammar explanation and practise the use. Furthermore, I would provide my own worksheet to adapt tasks on the textbook depending on the needs of and the number of students if it is necessary.

In terms of digital materials, I would like to use in a class, YouTube, infographics, digital comics, and Skype (if the authority allows me to use it in a class). Here is my rationale of using those digital materials.

YouTube

I personally believe that YouTube is a great source for students in Miyako Island to expose to authentic use of English, and simply students like watching YouTube videos and have been familiar with it. More importantly, YouTube fits 5 materials evaluation criteria by me (here is the materials evaluation criteria post) which are Contextualised, Teachability, Adaptability, Flexibility and Students’ interests. I can choose a video that should be culturally relevance, yet interculturally effective. Regarding YouTube’s Teachability and Adaptability, I could exploit Jamie Keddie’s Videotelling (please see the post here about Videotelling) to foster students’ listening skills, elicit target vocabulary and increase an interaction between teacher and students in English.

Infographics (please see the post here about infographics)

I found it useful in explaining grammar and the process of tasks in class because it provides multimodality: visual and texts. It also includes Teachability, Adaptability, Flexibility and Students’ interests. Furthermore, what I like infographics is that students could make their infographics as their portfolios. During the process of creating, they could foster their creativity, digital and visual literacy and increase interactions between their peers in English.

Digital comics (please see the post here about digital comics)

Digital comics could meet secondary students’ interests but an issue is that they may not read the digital comics and create their own comics with their own mobile device in-class due to a school restriction. If I exploit the digital comics in a class, I would need to leverage from digital to paper-based comics for individual students or they would need to share one TV screen to read the comics.

Skype

Skype could be vital for students living in the island because it facilitates communication with English speakers through face-to-face conversation no matter how far away from they are. This would also expose the students to intercultural differences and varieties of English in the world. On the other hand, I would need to go through an official procedure with the Municipal Board of Education to get permission to conduct Skype conversation in class, which may take a certain amount of time until Skype can be used. However, as I mentioned ‘a future school’ in the last post, the government seems to gradually acknowledge the effectiveness of Skype in a classroom. Therefore, I could exploit Skype as a part of speaking task so that students could practise spoken English in my future teaching.

In addition to digital materials in-class, I would exploit Aurasma or any apps of Augmented Reality (AR) for out-of-class materials (please check the post here about the use of Aurasma in my context). I assume that most students in Miyako Island have their own mobile device. Thus, giving students homework using Aurasma could be achievable out-of-class and more enjoyable compared to worksheet homework which students are given most of the time.

By providing those materials in-class and out-of-class, I would like deal with the dilemma. It can never be a perfect solution but I may be able to provide various opportunities exploiting the materials to students living in the island where they cannot get enough exposure to authentic English use. Hence, the biggest reason I would provide materials is to supplement the textbook in order to expose students to communicative-oriented learning and balance between input (knowledge) and output (particularly speaking skill).

When I go back to Okinawa prefecture, I would like to analyse students’ needs and wants again so that I could determine which materials should be used and how can be adapted and supplemented depending on the number of students and the provided textbook. When I exploit the materials that I have mentioned above, I should always ask myself “Why I use this?” “What is an aim and outcome?” “What will students have learnt at the end of a class?” “Is the material appropriate for students’ level?” However, more importantly, I should not depend on materials too much at the same time. I believe that materials are helpful for a teacher to measure how much vocabulary, what kind of grammar students have learnt and to facilitate learning of English, although as a teacher, I should always think about what and how I can teach students without materials. This can be challenging but it is important for my continuing professional development.

Manami