The Latest News in ELT

July 2003

Early Voices: The Leap to Language
A recent New York Times article looks at how theoretical linguists have found a renewed interest in the origins of language. Largely due to the perceived disdain of such studies by Noam Chomsky, the father of modern linguistics, they have been largely left to geneticists for more than two decades. But recently, even Chomsky is getting involved, finding in one study "speculations (which) can be turned into a substantive research program." With the recent rapid advances in genetics and the mapping of the human genome, there is a growing feeling that scientists may finally be able to see through the mists of time and discover how humans developed the one faculty that separates us from the animals. Read the full article. (July 30, 2003 )

Mandarin Takes More Brain Power Than English
Mandarin speakers use more areas of their brains than people who speak English, scientists said on Monday, in a finding that provides new insight into how the brain processes language. Unlike English speakers, who use one side of their brain to understand the language, scientists at the Wellcome Trust research charity in Britain discovered that both sides of the brain are used to interpret variations in sounds in Mandarin.

"We were very surprised to discover that people who speak different sorts of languages use their brains to decode speech in different ways; it overturned some long-held theories," said Dr. Sophie Scott, a psychologist at the charity. Using brain scans on volunteers, Scott discovered that different areas of the brain are used to interpret words and intonation.

The left temporal lobe of the brain is active when English speakers hear the language but Mandarin speakers use the left and right lobe, which is normally used to process melody in music and speech. Intonation is important in Mandarin because it gives different meanings to the same word. The word "ma" for example can mean mother, scold, horse or hemp, depending on the tone.

"We think Mandarin speakers interpret intonation and melody in the right temporal lobe to give the correct meaning to the spoken word," Scott said in a statement. She believes the research could provide insights into what happens when people are forced to re-learn speech comprehension following a stroke. "It seems that the structure of the language you learn as a child affects how the structure of your brain develops to decode speech. Native English speakers, for example, find it extraordinarily difficult to learn Mandarin," Scott said. (Reuters) (July 29, 2003 )

Educational Quotas
60% of Tokyo's public high schools now set numerical targets, following regulations introduced this year by the metropolitan board of education. For example, of the 207 schools in the area, 120 set a target for the number of graduates who go to third-level education. Hibiya High School in Chiyoda ward has a target of 20 graduates entering the most prestigious schools, such as Tokyo, Hitotsubashi and Kyoto Universities, with a further 100 making it into such institutions as Waseda, Keio or Sophia Universities. The school also dictates the number of home-study hours, 3 a day for first-years, 4 for second-years and 5 for seniors.

Other schools have set such goals as full employment for those looking to work after graduation or a 30% annual reduction in the number of students who transfer or drop out of school. While many parents support the approach, others question whether public education should follow the same path as "yobiko" or "juku" cram schools. It also seems to be somewhat at odds with the less academic focus recently introduced in elementary schools. (July 28, 2003 )

Footing the Bill for U.N. Uni.
Tokyo Gov. Shintaro Ishihara has demanded that the central government shoulder about 860 million yen needed annually to host the United Nations University in Tokyo, Foreign Ministry sources said Thursday. Ishihara made the request to the Foreign Ministry in January by letter, saying it is irrational that the Tokyo metropolitan government has rented the facility free of charge and paid other costs of the university's research facility in Tokyo's Shibuya Ward, the sources said.

Negotiations on the issue are likely to be tough, as the two sides both have financial troubles, the sources said. "The metropolitan government was active in attracting the university by promising to lend the facility free of charge," a Foreign Ministry official said. "It is inappropriate to break the promise now. Such a demand will also influence other local governments that host U.N. facilities."

The facility is for the Institute of Advanced Studies of the university. The five-floor facility, which opened in 1996 near the main building of the university, houses about 40 researchers and officials. Of the 860 million yen, the annual rent is about 730 million yen and the rest involves running costs including electricity, the sources said.

U Thant, the third secretary general of the United Nations, proposed the idea of building the university in 1969. Japan's prime minister at the time, Eisaku Sato, attracted the university to Tokyo. When the university, headquartered in Tokyo in 1975, was moved to Jingumae in Shibuya Ward in 1992, the Japanese government constructed the main building and the metropolitan government provided the land, about 7,000 square meters, free of charge. (Kyodo News) (July 25, 2003 )

Blair Cornered by Articulate Students
UK Prime Minister Tony Blair, in a time of grave political crisis, can hardly have expected the toughest of questions to come from Chinese students this week. During a Question & Answer session at Tsingua University in Beijing, Blair was confronted by students who were equally articulate in English and knowledgable about current world events. One particularly direct question was "Can you tell us frankly what you felt when you heard the news [about the death of Iraq weapons expert Dr David Kelly] on the plane to Tokyo? How can you get through this political crisis and regain your people's trust?" Would Japanese students have put him on the spot like that? (July 24, 2003 )

School is Fun?!
The TCPalm.com web site has an article by Erika Pagano (15), studying at the prestigious Akita High School in northern Japan. Pagano came on an exchange program after earning a scholarship from Youth for Understanding USA. Entitled "Surprisingly, high school in Japan is fun," the short article paints a picture of Japanese school life that is quite different to the perception abroad. Read the full article. (July 23, 2003 )

No Rest For the Wicked
No more long summer vacations for teachers in Osaka. The prefectural board of education has ensured that there are plenty of seminars to attend during the summer break, with the aim of improving their general knowledge and professional skills. The program continues up to August 29, and includes a course at Ritsumeikan University to help teachers achieve a TOEFL score of 550. Following the switch to a five-day week, teachers - in theory at least - no longer have to work on Saturdays and thus attitudes to their long summer holidays have become more strict. Last summer the Education, Science and Technology Ministry issued a warning to teachers not to pretend to be working or studying at home. ()

Challenging Time for JET Program
Some interesting articles relating to the JET Program in the Daily Yomiuri recently. "JET Program entering new era of challenges" (Saturday July 19) details how attitudes towards the program are beginning to change. Boards of education are expecting Assistant Language Teachers (ALTs) to be more than just speaking tape recorders or entertainers with nice personalities. For example, with a view to hiring more professional teachers, Saitama Prefecture "has decided to reduce the number of JET ALTs teaching in high schools from 314 in fiscal 2002 to 236 in this fiscal year. The shortfall will be filled by non-JET assistant teachers, who will be provided by a private ALT dispatch firm." Remarkably, Tokyo only hired 4 JETs in 2002, compared to over 250 non-JET teachers. Other factors affecting the change include: the fact that the program is more geared toward the Western academic year than that of Japan, with new recruits arriving each summer; having to look after new arrivals to Japan is a burden for many schools; and many schools want to keep their ALTs for longer than the current three-year maximum contract period. Read the full article.

Recent letters published in the newspaper about the decline in the standard of ALTs have drawn a lot of responses. Several can be read online.

An article on a brighter note appears in today's edition. It tells the story of how Canadian ALT Valerie Hogue earned the nickname "Genki Sensei" during her three-year term on the program. Her dedication and enthusiasm have left an indelible mark on her young students in the city of Kashiwazaki in Niigata Prefecture. Read the full article. (July 22, 2003 )

Eikaiwa Encroaching on Hallowed Ground
A lack of faculty members with English communicative skills is forcing an increasing number of universities to take on teachers from eikaiwa schools as assistant lecturers. Also, credits for English classes are becoming more widespread. Tokyo Institute of Technology started a course in Technical English for 3rd year students last October. But they discovered that there were not enough teachers with both the technical expertise and English skills to handle the course. So last month they contracted with Berlitz to take on 24 "temp teachers." Also, following a survey of graduates asking them the degree to which they had achieved their academic goals, in which English ranked last of 11 subjects, they have set a target TOEIC score of 650 for all graduates. According to lecturer Osamu Kusakabe, "Teachers who have only taught Shakespeare and literature may resist the changes. But we have to condsider the students' needs and educate engineers who can use English at work."

Tokyo University of Agriculture took on 10 teachers from eikaiwa school ECC in 2000 in order to teach classes in English conversation, composition and TOEIC preparation. An administrator said, "We had to swallow our pride in order to start these English classes. But they are well received by the students." But there are those who disagree, seeing it as "passing the educational buck."

In April, lecturers at Keio University had their hands full with English classes of higher-level students. So the Environmental & Information Sciences and Policy Studies departments took on 2 Berlitz teachers to teach 4 classes of students who had chosen English as their compulsory foreign language class, but had TOEIC scores below 400.

Berlitz currently has contracts with about 60 universities, while ECC has about 50. Of these institutions, about 20% give credits for the English classes, following approval given by the education ministry in April. Both eikaiwa schools see this as a growing market, particularly with the deregulation of state-run universities set to take place next April. (translated from Asahi Shimbun) (July 18, 2003 )

What's Up, Pussycat?
Takara have come up with a product to rival their surprise hit, Bowlingual. The Japanese toymaker has big hopes for Meowlingual, a handheld device that translates cats' meows into human speech. "Translations" of cat language can be read on its liquid crystal display when held close to the animals. News of its November release sent the company's shares up by more than 5% on the Tokyo Stock Exchange yesterday. At ¥8,800, the device is cheap compared to the ¥14,800 canine version, and the company hopes to match the 300,000 Bowlingual units sold between September last year and March. That device is set to make its US debut in August. (July 17, 2003 )

Kagawa Supporting English Teachers
Under a new system introduced this year, Kagawa Prefecture is helping Japanese English teachers boost their communicative skills. Teachers can receive subsidies from the prefectural board of education that cover up to 70% of the tuition fees at English conversation schools, provided they achieve tangible results. The system is based on teachers taking a 3-month course of 4 hours a week, with an estimated cost of ¥200,000. 14 of 20 teachers who applied this year are currently taking such a course. In order to receive the subsidy, they need to achieve the Pre-First Grade (jun-ikkyu) of the STEP Test, a TOEFL score of 550 or a TOEIC score of 730. (July 16, 2003 )

The Student News
Today's language Connection in the Daily Yomiuri is an article on Reitaku High School in Kashiwa, where third-year students recently presented live "newscasts" in English as a major group project. Students worked in small groups to prepare the 15-minute presentations, similar to a TV news broadcast, which they gave in front of fellow students and parents. They used computers to organize the video, photos, graphs and other visual and music content. Students took the project very seriously as it was video-taped and graded as an exam, based on "content, pronunciation, grammar, vidual aids, body language, eye contact with the camera, clarity and creativity." Read the full article. (July 15, 2003 )

The Aggressor Language
There was an interesting article in Saturday's Guardian newspaper on Esperanto and the violent reactions it has encountered during its 116-year history. Created as a language of peace and cooperation, it has been viewed as a threat in countries as varied as Japan and Saddam Hussein's Iraq. It was once dubbed the "Aggressor Language" and it's teachers have been persecuted and even, in 1930s Japan, killed. There is a dubious claim that "it's very big in China and Japan, because they find English too difficult." Esperanto is a very long way from replacing English as the international language, but the grammatical simplicity described in the article - new learners can be speaking the language in a matter of hours - certainly has its appeal. Read the full article. (July 14, 2003 )

University Reforms On Track
Yesterday's Daily Yomiuri carried an article on upcoming reforms in the state university sector, what the education ministry calls "the greatest reform in a century." Entitled "State-run colleges enter competitive era," the article focused on how universities will have to form stronger ties to local communities or businesses in order to adapt to the changes, approved by the House of Councillors earlier this month. Particularly affected will be colleges in local areas. The current standard annual tuition fee of ¥520,800 will also be subject to competitive forces. Read the full article. ()

All-English School a Hit
A school in Ota, Gunma Prefecture, that will offer most classes in English has been swamped with inquiries from across the nation from parents eager to enroll their children there. The 12-year public-private school, tentatively called "Ota International Academy" is set to open in April 2005. It will accept applications this fall. Successful applicants are required to attend a preparatory school from April 2004 to become familiar with English education.

The town has already received 150 inquiries over the last month, 90 of which came from other areas. The school will give priority to children in Ota and if there is still room it will admit those from other areas, said Takashi Uehara, chief of the policy section at the municipal government. "There will be no entrance exams, and we will select entrants through interviews with children and their parents." It was Mayor Masayoshi Shimizu who hit upon the idea of establishing the school when the chairman of a famous manufacturer had told him that "Even if a company is top in production capacity, you cannot be a leader at international conferences unless you speak English. It's a handicap to be unable to speak English."

In recent years, foreign assistant language teachers (ALTs) have been teaching at schools across Japan. But Shimizu said there are many flaws with the ALT system. "ALTs are part-timers under short-term contracts, performance cannot be verified. The problem is the system does not want them to take responsibility." The mayor thought it was better to remove barriers in the system and hit upon the idea of creating a school where full-time foreign teachers teach in English. The town has also received inquiries from teachers in Japan and overseas who are interested in working at the school. Uehara quoted a teacher as saying, "I've long had questions about English education in Japan. I want to be employed because I feel I can teach as I like."

There is criticism that the annual tuition fee of ¥600,000 is a bit steep, but he mayor disagrees. "Why do they feel that ¥600,000 is high for a school, although they are paying ¥50,000 per month for daycare? I was told by a grandfather in the neighborhood that he wants his grandchild to be educated at the school with his pension." He added, "If there are children who cannot enter the school because there are too many applicants, one more school can be established."

Eugene Cooper, a space engineer at the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration, who used to teach at the Ashikaga Institute of Technology, is expected to become the school principal. (Kyodo News) (July 11, 2003 )

Kyodai To Admit Int'l School Grads
Kyoto University decided on Tuesday that it will allow graduates of non-Japanese, or international, schools to sit its entrance exams without taking the so-called "daiken" pre-entrance exam first. The prestigious university still needs to receive permission from the education ministry for the move, the first by a state-run university but likely to be copied by many more institutions by the end of the academic year. A panel of Kyodai faculty members recommended the change based on historical and human rights viewpoints. Pressure has been brought to bear on the issue by the bar association as well as Chinese and Korean groups since initial government plans to exempt only western-accredited international schools from the daiken requirement were scrapped following claims of racism. (July 10, 2003 )

New-Style English Primary School for Fukuoka
Tsuzuki Ikuei Gakuen, a private school operator based in Dazaifu, Fukuoka Prefecture, plans to open a primary school in Dazaifu next April that would have an all-English curriculum designed to give Japanese schoolchildren complete bilingual skills. Tsuzuki has submitted the plan to Fukuoka Prefecture for approval and says it expects the prefectural government to give its official nod this fall. Tsuzuki Ikuei is building a campus for the school -- tentatively known as Linden Hall Elementary School -- on a 17,000-square-meter site.

According to school officials, Linden Hall would be the first non-international primary school in Japan with a complete English-language curriculum. Apart from Japanese language classes, all other courses would be taught mainly in English. Officials say a majority of the teachers would be native English speakers. Tsuzuki Ikuei has translated government-approved textbooks into English and plans to use both versions as teaching materials. Instructions would be a mixture of English and Japanese until the students get used to all-English teaching.

Tsuzuki says it plans to introduce some novel courses, such as the teaching of verbal presentation skills and computer classes. Officials say class hours for first-year pupils would be about 30% longer than the government-approved standard. Plans are to admit 40 boys and girls in the first year. The annual school fee would be around 1 million yen.

Kimiko Tsuzuki, deputy director of Tsuzuki Ikuei Gakuen and the designated principal of Linden Hall, says the school plans to build a dormitory and turn Linden Hall into a boarding school. "Our aim is to recruit pupils around the nation and bring up people who are at ease with the world at large," Tsuzuki said. (Kyodo) (July 09, 2003 )

English That Stirs the Body
Yesterday's Daily Yomiuri included a feature on Meiji University professor and writer Takashi Saito. Best known among Japanese for his bestselling book on reading Japanese aloud, he has written a similar book for English. Karada o Yusaburu Eigo Nyumon (Introduction to English that Stirs the Body): The Learning Method & the Greatest Reading Texts for Moving English is published by Kadokawa Shoten. It includes a compact disc featuring the voice of British narrator Frank O'Connor reading passages ranging from Mother Goose to Shakespeare. Saito has recently been including the English passages in his popular workshops. Read the full article. ()

58% of Public Schools Have Web Site
Almost all public schools in Japan are connected to the Internet and 58% of the schools have their own Web site, according to an education ministry survey conducted at the end of March and released Friday. About 53% of the teachers use educational software and Internet materials in class. The figure is 5 percentage points up from the previous year, and is the first time the figure has exceeded the 50% target set by the ministry for the end of fiscal 2001. Its new goal is to have almost all public school teachers using computers by fiscal 2005, and plans to beef up its training program for teachers accordingly. At public elementary schools, 66% of teachers uses computers in class while 46% teachers at junior high schools do so. Only 38% of high school teachers use computers, according to the survey. (from a Kyodo story) (July 08, 2003 )

Most Universities Want Int'l. School Grads
A recent survey by the Asahi Shimbun newspaper shows that the majority of universities want to accept graduates directly from Japan's international schools. 74% of heads of national schools, which do not do so at present, said they would like to be able to. About a quarter of the 451 private universities surveyed already accept such students. Under current rules, graduates must take an pre-entrance exam (commonly known as "daiken") before being allowed to sit university entrance exams. Recent moves to exempt schools accredited by US and European education groups, but not the majority -- mostly for ethnic Korean or Chinese students -- were fiercely opposed as being racist. (July 07, 2003 )

Windthird Pres., Employees Arrested
Five people have been arrested for using strong-arm methods to enroll students at Windthird Consolidated Institute. They include Daiji Saito (51), president of Right Stuff, the Tokyo firm behind the school. He and the employees are accused of luring prospective students to their Osaka school with the offer of a free trial English conversation lesson. They then used verbal and physical intimidation to get the students to sign up. If they refused, the accused demanded exhorbitant cancellation fees, making references to ganster connections. The arrests were for seven such cases between February and April of this year. Like many eikaiwa schools, Windthird employees have quotas and are paid based on how many students they get to sign up. Training manuals include such instructions as to never take no for an answer when recruiting students. Windthird schools opened in Tokyo in 1989, in Osaka and Fukuoka in 1990, and in Nagoya in 2000. ()

Selling Out
The Chronicle of Higher Education site recently ran an illuminating article on how universities in the US decide the books students are required to buy. It seems to be an increasingly common practice for publishers to offer to "buy off" professors or offer lump sum payments to departments to guarantee the adoption of a book. It seems that the relatively low salaries - compared to Japan - paid to many faculty members is the major factor pushing them to accept such, some would say, Faustian arrangements. Even the major publishers use similar tactics, paying professors to review books in the hope that this will increase the likelihood of their adoption. Read the article. (July 04, 2003 )

NZ Not Attracting Students
English language schools say enrolment numbers were already in decline before SARS emerged. Private Providers of English Language chairman Patrick Ibbertson claims New Zealand is not making itself attractive enough to foreign students. He says China, Korea, Japan and Taiwan, whose students are the highest spenders on overseas education, are being wooed by other English-speaking countries. Mr Ibbertson says marketing efforts in other places such as Thailand and Vietnam are welcome, but will not provide the bulk of students for New Zealand language schools. He says more students would come to New Zealand if they could work while they study, as they can in other places. (Story: NZCity, IRN) ()

JALT Reports Gain of ¥6.9M
JALT held its second executive board meeting at Sophia University last weekend (June 28-29). Forty-two JALT officers attended the meeting to discuss a wide range of management issues facing the organization. In attendance were the national directors and officers, representatives of JALT chapters and special interest groups, the auditor, the publications board chair, and business manager. Among the highlights were:

- A ¥6.9 million gain for the year for FY2002, from ¥65.3 million in revenue.
- An approved FY2003 budget of ¥65.4 million in revenues, ¥64.0 million in expenses.
- Online credit card payment system to make it more convenient for members to renew.
- New "Large-scale institutional membership" category is added.

See a more detailed report. (July 03, 2003 )

Dabble in Scrabble
Patrick Blanche, a teacher at Kumamoto Gakuen University, wrote an article in yesterday's Daily Yomiuri about the role that Scrabble can play in the EFL classroom. This from the article: "Scrabble is out there, everywhere, and one of EFL teachers' greatest challenges has always been to bring more of the real world into their classroom. The word game students are most likely to play with host families and/or foreign friends abroad is Scrabble. Its social, cultural and intellectual value remains unsurpassed, its international significance is tremendous, and its name recognition is second to none. Tossing aside such capital would be irresponsible." Read the full article. (July 02, 2003 )

The Little-Known Linguist
A recent edition of the UK's Guardian newspaper included a feature on Larry Trask - a little-known name but a very interesting article, that begins, "Asked to name a linguist, most people come up with Chomsky or Pinker. But Larry Trask - an expert on Basque - deserves to be famous too." Here is an excerpt:

His short book Language: the Basics, which has been in print since 1995, is the best primer around: it's not just instructive, but written with clarity, verve, and a sense of fun. He hasn't got any sensational theories, but his field, like any other, is extraordinarily interesting when the orthodoxy is well explained: after all, the mainstream of any science is the result of tens of thousands of smart and dedicated scholars refining their knowledge over decades or centuries. This fact is particularly important in linguistics, since it's like teaching, in that everyone feels that a little common sense would solve all its problems. "Everybody has his own ideas about what is sensible," he says, "and a linguistics based wholly on common sense would be chaotic."

Read the full article. (July 01, 2003 )

Top