Telephone calls, Questions about English

This is from: http://japanese.about.com/library/weekly/aa040801a.htm

Even though you start understanding a language better, it is always difficult to talk on the phone in that language. You can't use gestures, which help a lot most of the time. Also, you can't see the other person's facial expressions or reactions. You have to listen very carefully to what the other person says. Talking on the phone in Japanese might be especially harder, since there are some formal phrases customarily used in phone conversations. (The Japanese normally talk very politely on the phone unless talking with a friend.) Let's learn common expressions used on the phone. Don't be intimidated by phone calls. Practice makes perfect!

English ability (some questions)

I know that the students are getting frustrated about their English. It's difficult to know if you are improving in English because unlike the TOEIC test, which gives you a grade, conversational English is difficult to assess for the students. I think that videoing and showing the students what they are like goes some way towards giving them their first assessment. Talking about English, such as the questions below also gives the students to chance to air their frustrations and talk about them IN ENGLISH. Feedback about how well they are doing also helps a great deal. Since the students are soon going to be going on a break I would like them to go away feeling as though they are improving and can improve further by taking responsibility themselves.

Today, I also want to ask you some questions about your English.

1. Do you think that you are getting better at English.

2. What do you think you are getting better at in English, for example, pronunciation, grammar, vocabularly, etc?

3. What are you going to try to improve in for the next week?

4. What frustrates you with learning English?

5. What do you think is the hardest thing about learning English? For example, not understanding fast talk, not having topics to talk about, etc.

Now you think of some questions............let's write them on the board.

Involving families in plans - conversations

Tomorrow in class, we are going to do a task on student's communicating their plans to their homestay parents. These are simple plans that the students probably decide to do on the spur of the moment, but I think that the students need to understand that it is considerate to communicate their plans, so that they don't interfere with family arrangements. I would like to teach the process of how plans need to be thought through, so that everybody understands what is going to happen, when, where, and who with.

Stage 1
I plan to introduce the topic of "planning" by writing it on the board and then write up one example, such as, "you want to go to town." I will then pass the markers to the students and get them to elicit some of their own personal topics. If there are not many topics forthcoming then I'll add a few from the list below. I will then choose one of the topics and get the students to sub-topic what they should do in order to make their plan succeed. For example, if the topic was "you want to go to town," then the sub-topics would be: arrange the time - there and back, check the bus timetable for there and back, make sure that you tell your host family.

Stage 2
Complications arise if the time that the students arrange falls over dinner time, or some other time which disturbs some set family routine or plan for that day. Therefore, more sub-topics need to be organised for the plan to succeed. Obviously, if the student's arrangements are over dinner time, then the students need to have a further sub-topic (or routine) to explain to their host families what they plan to do. For example, a sub-topic might be added to the above list, like, "explain to host family that I plan to have dinner in town," "decide what restaurant to eat at," "check that I have enough money," etc.

Stage 3
Students now need to be taught the language associated with stages one through three.I will do this by getting students to elicit what they think they should say. One student will write this up on the board with the class's assistance.

Stage 4
Role plays can now be written individually by the students using the above topics, sub-topics and language expressions.

Stage 5
Role plays will be checked by me and then practised by the students.

Stage 6
I plan to video record the students doing the role plays for listening practise and use it as a class discussion/evaluation/class check later.

Topics to plan
You want to go to town.

You want to go to the movies.

You want to buy a pack of cards.

You want to go to your friend's house.

You have been invited to stay the night at your friend's house.

You have been invited for dinner at your friend's house.

Telephone conversations - Listening and pronunciation practise

Today, I rang the students from my colleagues phone. Each student had to go into my office and answer the phone. I gave each student a message to perform. They had to use strategies (if they needed to) to correctly understand my message. They returned to class and carried out the messsage, eg. could you please tell Soma that I will meet him at four o'clock at the Bill Robertson Library, etc.

The students then checked with me that their message was correct. I then got the students to write down the conversation in their books. I checked the conversations and then the students recorded them on a cassette tape. Once all the students had done this, I got different pairs to listen to one conversation and write the conversation down in their books. The students had to listen very carefully to all of the details. I then got the students to write the conversations on the blog. I intend to now go through the written conversations and put them up on the whiteboard (through the data projector) and put on the tonal shifts and highlight some pronunciation on one of the conversations. I will then get the students to look at the conversations that they wrote in their books and write in the tonal shifts using arrows and marks to show emphasis, etc.

The Task:

1. Telephone conversation with me.
2. Wrote down the message.
3. Told the message to the other students.
4. Wrote down the whole conversation.
5. Recorded the conversation.
6. Wrote the conversation out neatly.
7. Listen to a different conversation and write it out neatly.
8. Checked the conversation for correctness.
9. Pronunciation practise.

The aim of the task is to practise listening to phone messages, give information (transactional), and practise pronunciation.

The next task is to get students to make up their own phone conversations and practise them using the same process as above.

One of the students had to cancel their hair appointment using the phone. Here is the conversation that we used, below.

HD: Welcome to [hairdresser's name], you're speaking with Susie,

S: Oh, hi, this is [student's name],

HD: Oh, hi, what can I do for you?

S: um, I was wanting to cancel my appointment.

HD: Sure, when was your appointment?

S: um, this Wednesday at four forty five.

HD: Ok, what was your name?

S: Um, [student's name]

HD: Sorry could you spell that please.

S: Sure, it's [........]

HD: Sure, ok, that's fine, no problem.

S: Ok, sorry about that, thank you, bye.

HD: Ok, see you later.

Greetings - role plays

Thank you for responding to the feedback callout. It's been really helpful.

Today in class we did greetings:

S: Hi, _______ I'm home

HP: Oh, hi ________ did you have a good day?

S: Yeah, it was ok, just the usual, but yeah, nothing really special. How was your day?

HP: Oh, yeah, not bad, just the usual.

S: ok, hey, um, I'm just going to change my clothes, so I'll talk to you later.

HP: Ok, see you soon.

S: yeah, see you soon.

We went through these conversations in role plays. I video taped all of the role plays and then we had a discussion about what was good and needed to be improved. A lot of the time, the students were too slow to respond, so we then had to look again at the safety strategies, for example, "Oh, um, sorry I'm a bit nervous, but um, anyway I'' be back soon, just a minute," or words to that effect.

I also got the students to write a conversation like the one above. I will go through these conversations with all of the students in class.

I will also teach the students about how to write and format texts, explaining when they will be home, where they are, etc. I did this with the students a long time ago, so hopefully, this will only be review, but still good for extensions.

Thanks again for the feedback - already it has changed and given me fresh ideas for what to teach.

Homework + Japanese Topics

I am trying to get the students responsible for their own learning, so decided to firstly get them, for homework, to write down a diary of what they do during the day. Hopefully, the students will be able to reflect on whether or not what they are doing is valuable to their study on the programme. I'm not going to judge what is good or bad, but rather, try to elicit some discussion around time management and how students could perhaps orient themselves towards achieving goals before they return to Japan next year. It would be awful if the students regret that they didn't do something near the end of the programme (as I have often heard before).

In class today, we talked about some Japanese topics - for example, teruterubouzu, seijin no hi, etc. These are common names that label particular cultural aspects in Japan and so are known to the students. The trick for the students is to maneuver the conversation around to explain this topic - no mean feat, I can tell you now.

We also looked at more expressions that I use in the class to "manage." For example, "ok, let's move to the back of the class," etc.

Start, Stop - Expressions

Today, the students got into two lines facing each other.
One line are the homestay parents and one line are the students. The parents have to ask their students, "how was your weekend," or, "how was church," "how was the winter carnival?" etc. One student was the time keeper and had to use the following expressions.

Students are starting to take responsibility for all of the English used in the classroom.

Ok, one minute starting from now.

Ok, stop - well done! um, everybody move around, please.

Ok, please change, um, this line is the homestay parents and this line is the students. Ok, please begin.

Snow

Toshi enjoyed the snow last week but playing with a 5 year old is very tiring. On the way home form Polytech each day Toshi tells us which classes were easy or hard.

Rugby

My student did not go to the Rugby but was keen when I told him how we could see it from the top of the hill with binoculars (new word). A strange experience listening to the crowd and being told "ball in posts" but he was not able to tell me which colour team had scored. I returned home quickly to get a couple of camp chairs and popped a bag of corn"to do things properly" and we sat for the whole match like that. Funny thing was I still didn't know the score until I looked on the computer. he said it was a good experience.

The Winning Sushi

Thanks to Bronwyn for organising the sushi contest. All of the students enjoyed it. Here are some photos of the occasion. It certainly will be a memory for the students to take home with them!

Sushi Contest

Contact Details

Polytechnic is now closed. I will try to keep this blog updated and if you want to get in touch with me then text or ring on 021732089.

Email me on mpryde@tekotago.ac.nz

Call the polytech on:

Phone: 03 477 3014 and then ask for extension 8639 or ask to speak to Michael Pryde
Fax: 03 471 6870
Freephone: 0800 762 786

So far, Soma and Daiki are the only students here, but I will give them the choice of staying warm in the classroom and using the computer or heading off home.

L11 TESOL PRACTICUM

View L11 TESOL PRACTICUM (SATELLITE) in a larger map

Map for the TESOL Practicum

View L11 TESOL PRACTICUM in a larger map

Conversations

The Game on Saturday Night

What did you think on Saturday?

What did you think of the game on Saturday?

un...It`s

I like Toshiaki`s haka more than the real Haka because Toshiaki`s haka is funny and yucky!!

I love the Allblacks because they had a haka and when I watched the game I was cheering um so it was very very exciting!! But the All blacks lost the game, so I felt a little sad. My throat was sore because I did a lot of cheering.

was cheering go blacks waving but when I go to the bath room it was very troublesome and sad so I couldn't see the Allblacks try. Then the Allblacks lost. I could spend a good time.That is about it.

It was a lot fun . Of course I saw the game the Allblacks and France.The children were very cute.The All blacks and France players were very dangerous.

I felt a little sad.

The body guards tackled one of the supporters, so I thought that it was really funny. Everybody laughed and took photos. Some people were also fighting because they were Allblacks supporters and they were angry, but I don't know why they were fighting.

New Zealand supporters throw beer cans, or bottles, so it's very dangerous, but in Japan that doesn't happen at all. Japanese supporters are more gentle than Newzy supporters. Japanese supporters also don't run onto the ground. In Japan the supporters have drums to support and sing chants.

When I was watching a fight in the stand, France made a try, so I didn't see it, but I heard the crowd cheer.

I couldn't choose.

I was in another place smoking, so I didn't see that happening.


I think that it was a great experience for me.


The mayor Peter Chin sang the NZ national anthem.

The entertainment was the boys ballet and the marching band and the kids rugby.

Was there any other entertainment? No there wasn't.

Yes, but they missed some tackles and missed the ball, but it was a great experience for me.

No, I didn't, but I heard that it was a good game, but disappointing for the All blacks.

Anyway, I've got to go to class, see you.

Maths - expressions to show that you understand

ar, yeah, I gottit.

oh, yes, I've got it.

Oh, ok, yeah, I understand.

oh, yeah, I knew that before.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, ok.

oh, I see

Smiling nodding body language eye contact over reaction\


Today in maths class we learnt about quadratic equations, oh yeah, it was quite difficult, but I like drawing so I quite liked this class. Um, yeah, we drew co-efficient graphs and then we drew a pra, parob, oh it's difficult to pronounce. Anyway, I like Richard, and it was a good class, yeah, ha ha.

Excellent Sushi

That is the best sushi I have tasted. We will try it at home as Toshi likes sushi. Thank you to Keiko and Yoko for the recipe.
The class did a great job of cleaning up afterwards. We will have to get Toshi to clean up every night:-)

Measuring Car Speeds

Today the students went outside to measure the speed of the cars. Students were placed in groups of three. One student would be the marker, one the writer and one the time keeper. One of the students would stand at one end of 25 metres and signal start. The other two students, which would be standing at the other end of the 25 metres would stop the watch when the car or truck went past the 25 metre mark. The time would be marked down. The students then went back into class and made a graph of the times.

From my email

Hey, this is an email directly posting into my blog. Cool, aye!! And you can do this as well. I'll try to show you this at the sushi contest.Good luck for making the sushi tomorrow.

See you soon,

Cheers,

Michael

This email has been scrubbed for your protection by SMX. For more information visit smx.co.nz

Class Photos

Conversational Topics - check the link on the right hand side of this blog "Conversation Analysis"

Today in class we looked at what students talked about when they went home. It was a great exercise in making students think about who spoke first, what was said and what could have been said. In all of the situations that occur here, the host parent speaks first. I think that it would be good for the students to actually speak first. Why? We discussed why and the students came up with some interesting things. We also looked at how the slightest conversational initiation can lead into a conversational topic, sometimes without any of the participants being aware of what is happening.

In the later stages of the conversation I showed the students the actual function of the utterances that were spoken; for example, why do you think this was said, what was the meaning of saying this etc. This means that the students are coming away from the sentential level (clause, verb, noun, phrase, etc) and focusing their attention on the meaning above this.

For example, "did you have a good day?" actually means something like, tell me what you did today using general, details, feelings, and a conclusion. The function that this utterance produces is a sociable function inclusive and meaning "lets narrate." The student's response will send out branches of ideas that will no doubt be subsequently picked up by the parent and then sidelined into another conversational topic. Once again, by making the students aware of the frames and references that are involved within conversations (meta-language) makes them understand, to some extent, of why conversations succeed and/or fail. I then also ask if this happens in Japanese language - again, the idea being to get students thinking about cultural appropriacy and context.

HP: Hi [student's name] Who spoke first in this situation? Why? What does it do?

S: hi, [homestay name]

HP: when did you get home?

S: half past five

HP: oh, I'm very tired and I'm hungry, today I didn't eat breakfast or lunch.

S: eh? really are you ok?

HP: oh it was a crazy day ha ha ha ha

S: ha ha ha ha do you want something to drink?

HP: oh, no thanks

S: ok, talk to you later.

This conversation is characterised by short, quick statements that seems to be successful. There is no extension into any topic, but I don't think that that is necessary. In fact, to me the student responded very well. I would recommend that the student concentrate on practising short, quick comments - perhaps a joke would be appropriate.


HP: Hi, what did you do today in class?

S: so, oh, um, today I had English and computing class. Computing class was so difficult because so teacher spoke so fast and his writing is difficult to read, but anyway, yeah, how was your day?

This short conversation illustrates quite a simple response. The student does show a general topic, one short detail, their feelings and then passes (just like a rugby ball) the conversational turn over to the parent.


HP: Did you have a good day?

S: oh, yeah, I think so, it was a good day oh, um, how are you feeling?

HP: oh, I'm feeling quite bad.

S: Oh, that's too bad, would you like me to do something for you? How about I make you a cup of tea, hot milk.

S: oh, you look very tired, would you like me to help you with anything?

S: oh, you look very tired, look, don't worry about me, I can look after myself. Please just look after yourself. I'm going to let you rest a bit, see you soon.

HP: oh, thanks, but I'm fine. well, actually there is something, could you please take my medicine into my room?

S: sure, no problem.

This conversation shows a successful transference of kindness by the student. If the parent is sick then the student needs to think of strategies in language to excuse themselves from tiring the person who is sick. The expression below achieves this. I think that it would be inappropriate for the student to try to engage their parent in a lengthy conversation here.

S: oh, um, excuse me, I just need to do something. I'll be back soon.




How was your day?

Ar, it's kind of good , so same old same old.

HP: Did you wake up at 2 or 3? Question

S: yeah, of course because it was very noisy because the cactus was knocking on my window, so I was scared. Response

HP: That's too bad. Did you think that it was a ghost? Question

S: yes, because I don't like scary things. um I thought that somebody might be looking in the window ha ha ha. Response - the beginning of a story

HP: ghosts aren't in New Zealand. Comment

S: really? In Japan ghosts come from old stories, for example have you seen Ring? It was very scary. I saw it a long time ago and it was very very scary because when I was watching it I couldn't move. If I watched it I can't sleep. I can't go to the bathroom to do pee. ar, so I don't want to watch any horror movies (ha ha). Your story from Japan

This conversation really goes to the heart of what I am trying to teach. Again, I asked the students why this conversation worked. It really is a lead into a conversational topic about ghosts and was generated by the student and the parent adding to each other's story.

Article about blogs

http://www.articlealley.com/article_922245_13.html

What to talk about - Topics

Often, most of the students say that they have trouble thinking about what to talk about with their host families. I tried to show how the students can lead themselves into a conversation, where they can take control of the conversation by telling something about Japan. Hopefully, this will engage you, as the host parent, into further conversation. Here are a few conversations that we did in class. Once the students understood the structure of the conversation I asked them to write their own conversation. We will now go through these in class.


1. HP: did you have a good day?

S : oh, yeah, I learnt about tongue twisters today.

HP: oh, right, yeah are they difficult to learn?

S: well, today I learnt about............



2. S: oh, today I learnt about tongue twisters.

HP: oh, right, what did you learn?S: well, I learnt about.........


3. HP: What did you do today?

S: oh, well, today I learnt about elec, electi, oh, wow, that's really difficult to pronounce.

HP: oh, do you mean "electrical?"

S: ha ha, yeah, it's like a tongue twister

HP: oh, yes it is.

S: Many languages have their own tongue twisters. I played with them when I was young. It will be good to practice Japanese pronunciation. Here are some common Japanese tongue twisters. Please don't think about the meanings deeply since most tongue twisters don't make sense. Let's have fun! "Namamugi namagome namatamago (Raw wheat, raw rice, raw egg)," "Tonari no kyaku wa yoku kaki kuu kyaku da (The customer next to me eat a lot of persimmons)," and "Bouzu ga byoubu ni jouzu ni bouzu no e o kaita (The monk draw the picture of a monk well on the screen.)"



HP: Wow, it's really windy today.

S: Yeah, but at least it's not raining.

HP: Oh, yeah, I don't like the rain.

S: Yeah, because in Japan, it's almost the rainy season.

HP: Oh, do you have a rainy season in Japan?

S: Yeah, well, June is a rainy season in Japan. I don't mind rainy days as long as I wear proper clothing and shoes so that I don't get soaking wet. Also, I like watching rain from inside of the house. There are many songs rain themed, but one of the most well known Japanese songs is the child's song, "Amefuri." I like the song, "Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head" by B.J. Thomas and "The Raindrop Prelude" by Chopin. I also like the last scene in "Breakfast at the Tiffanys," when Audrey Hepburn rushes through the rain to rescue her cat. Do you have any favorite songs about rain? (From http://japanese.about.com/b/2009/06/03/rainy-seasons.htm)

Parry Street, Median Strip, Computer Door

These three pictures were taken to teach: what the median strip is used for, the emergency
assembly point, and a story about the computer door being hinged open after Polytech hours.

Conversation with two people

Today we looked at conversation. (General)


We divided into groups of three. One person marked the other person's conversation. For example, general, details, feelings, conclusion, safety, smiling, nodding, body language, eye contact, comments. (Details)

It was interesting, but difficult. I think that I became a more natural speaker than before. (Feelings)

Anway, that's about it. (Conclusion)

The students are now realising that conversation is made up of complex components that all act in many various ways. By teaching the students about these components I hope that they will distinguish between why some conversations work and others don't. By talking about these components (termed "meta-language") students consciously look at how their own "Japanese" communicative style operates - this brings student ideas and opinions more out in the open because the students are now in the position of explaining to me about what they think - very motivational stuff! I intend to reformulate the students' particular language, so that they will be able to explain these features, in a light-hearted, but analytical way, if the opportunity arises in any conversation.

The other added bonus is that any discussion around conversation may also focus on specific communication breakdowns and how these might be avoided in the future.

Slideshow Fun

One small game that I did today, that the students enjoyed, was what I called "slideshow fun."

We went around the class one at a time making small, but relevant comments related to the slides that were shown on the blog. The students had to respond in the time that the slide was on show - about three seconds in total. There seems to be about ten slides constantly repeating themselves, so each student got to comment on something different as well as listen to others. Some of the language that arose was:

wow, that's great scenery, they make me feel........, that makes me feel........, oh they look......... etc.

A good exercise for quickly getting students to respond in a hurry and teaching some quite common expressions. It was fun!

Video Taping Interviews

I used the video camera to record the students responding to the question, what did you do in Electrical class today?

The students used the conversational framework that I gave them and I marked them according to this. The students individually came into my office, sat down and talked for about two minutes. I will go through the video with them on an individual basis, so that they don't get embarrassed if others see it, and point out how they could improve their response. Already, students have commented that this is the first time that they have seen themselves speaking in English and have said how beneficial it is.

The students have learnt how to say "safety strategies" if they don't know how to respond, for example, "oh, it's difficult to express myself in English, um, anyway, moving on...." and so forth. They also learnt how to move away from the topic and then move back into their narrative. Finally, the students illustrated that they could conclude their narrative by saying something like, "well, ar, that's about it, yeah." They also learnt to make eye contact, provide body language, and smile. I explained that if they provide body language, smile and make eye contact then the listener is more likely going to appear interested. (Using a video to show this to the students is really beneficial.)

All of the students did very well, with some actually moving away from their topic to branch into another topic and then skillfully manoevre their way back into their main monologue. Others need to concentrate on providing quick "safety strategies" when they fall into difficulty.

We will do this activity again and hopefully I will ask the students if I can put some of the recordings onto the blog for homestay feedback. (I'll keep you posted about this.)

Once all of the students have become proficient at framing their narrative I will add in the listener's comments and then teach about turn-taking. I plan to map the listener's comments onto the basic conversational framework using an overhead projector - any other ideas would be most welcome! This is where the fun is going to begin because this is where the conversations start to define themselves. After conversations using two people I will move into three people.

Small steps first!!