Interview

Rob Waring

Rob Waring has been teaching in Japan for 12 years and before that in Australia, China, France and the UK. He has travelled extensively both for work and pleasure and hopes to be able to do that again soon. His research interests inlude Extensive Reading and vocabulary acquisition. He lives in Okayama, 17m above sea level in a lovely house with an English garden (and a pond) with his wife Tomoko, daughter Mariko, and dog Dingo. He is currently an Associate Professor at Notre Dame Seishin Women's University In Okayama.

He spoke with ELT News editor Mark McBennett in September 2002.

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About your career in general

MM: How and why did you get started in teaching EFL?
RW: It all started when I got involved in helping Vietnamese refugees. The village where I was living in the UK accepted 2 Vietnamese refugees to help them settle in the UK. I met them and realized just how difficult it would have been for them to integrate both linguistically and culturally. So I started to teach them. I had no idea how to reach at the time.

Looking back now I can laugh but I was pointing at things in the room - curtain, table, book and so on giving them dozens of words they immediately forgot. My language learning theory was 'look and say'. Despite this, their enthusiasm was immense and their desire to learn English was almost scary. I decided I wasn't doing well because they weren't remembering the words and I knew something was wrong (lesson structure and recycling) but I enjoyed doing it and wanted to continue doing it as I travelled around the world.

Therefore I did my first training course in London and loved it. I went back to these two boys and was able to teach them better. I noticed my role changed and their perception of me changed too over the following weeks. I became a teacher rather than a friend because I was intent on honing my teaching skills, not seeing them so much as people. I didn't realize this till much later.

Anyway they left the village and I embarked on another long overland trip spending months in Eastern Europe, Russia, China and elsewhere getting teaching as I could. I found myself back in Western Australia and started teaching at a college there for 3 years before I took my RSA Diploma in Sydney. Then I came to Japan. After coming to Japan I became interested in the research and academic side of teaching, so now I have a foot in both camps, but my heart is still in the classroom.

You've been involved in English teaching for almost twenty years. What changes have you seen in the field during that time?
Not a lot. I still see a lot of new people coming in, but people tend to stay in EFL a bit longer now. There are fewer people who are just in it as a stop gap, or to pay off college debt. There are more older faces now with more experience. Teaching methods haven't changed much, although awareness of different teaching styles has increased. These things can take decades to change. Some people are just catching on to the Communicative Approach while others think it is all passe now.

There is a greater awareness now of the unnecessary separation of grammar and vocabulary and the need to teach more lexically. Text books are still basically the same but more of them are in colour now. Probably I have changed more than the field has, maybe because the questions we have to answer are so difficult.

What are your specific areas of interest within EFL and what projects are you currently involved in?
I have been interested in Extensive Reading for a number of years now. In 1997 I edited a special edition on Extensive Reading which served to stimulate interest in ER within the foreign community in Japan. Since that time, numerous people have become involved and there is a very active community of ER teachers. I'm also involved with a few publishers and their projects, which is fun but time consuming.

What prompted you to come and teach in Japan?
Money! Initially. When I was in travelling China and elsewhere my aim was to come to Japan to get some money to keep traveling and teaching. Then I met my wife...

About EFL In Japan

MM: How did you find working in the Japanese university system when you first arrived?
RW: It took some time to learn that just because you have a good idea that solves an immediate and long-term need does not necessarily mean everyone can see it. Or that everyone has an interest in making it happen. Now I have get used to not trying to overpower people with a billion reasons why XYZ is a good/bad idea, and am working more organically and with much better results. My colleagues tell me (I hope light-heartedly) that when I go grey I will get more respect.

You taught in Australia for several years in a multi-lingual environment, where developing English skills was presumably a significant part of the students' integration into society. How does that compare to teaching in Japan, where the need for English is far less defined?
In Australia, as the college fees were paid by the students themselves rather than their parents, there was a greater desire to learn and get value for money. Also because the students were in the community all the time, their exposure in class was a good balance between things they could understand in class and the, well, 'noise' of native talk outside. The multi-cultural classes and society makes a great environment for learning, and not only English.

In Japan, many college students believe that just sitting in the class is enough and that not doing homework is somehow 'getting one up' on the teacher who they know has to pass them anyway. The idea of learning English rather than studying it has yet to take off here. Luckily, in my college most of the students care about their English and want to try.

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