Bed Time Story

Bed Time Story
Originally uploaded by mr_caffeine74.

There is nothing like being read to by your parents before bedtime. Noelle loves to have us read to her. Most of the time she just wants to look at the books and the pictures. But as we read the same books to her again and again, she begins to remember the contents of the books. She remembers what comes next and she starts saying the words with us. She does this in English and Japanese. It wasn't until just recently that she has started listening quietly through the whole book.
This book you see here is the first book that she has listened to without wanting to turn the pages herself or stop halfway through to get another book. We always let her choose which book she wants to read. We also make suggestions but never force a book on her.
Reading books to her has contributed a lot to her vocabulary and knowledge of things. I'm glad we do it. It also gives me ideas for my Story Time project.

For Peaches

One of my students who I call "Peaches" was complaining that I haven't been updating my blogs so this one is for you Peaches.
Recently I have been thinking a lot about how Noelle is going to learn English. She is learning English from being with me. However, since I leave for work in the morning and come home at night, she doesn't get to be with me very much. She gets some other limited English input from TV, music and books but not much. I doubt that a child can really learn how to speak English from TV, songs and what not. The child really needs to interact, to communicate with another person. She was learning well I thought but now the balance is tipped to far over to the Japanese side. She interacts with her mother, her grandmother, her grandfather and everyone else here in the community using Japanese. So where before, she would accept both English and Japanese for things, now she insists on Japanese. She has learned from countless intractions with many people that Japanese works. So when she comes to me, she tries to correct me and won't accept me speaking English. But of course this is not a all or nothing phenomenon. She doesn't totally understand the difference between English and Japanese. So she still uses some English. Mostly for the names of things. She also says "Okay" and "Hello". She used to say "morning" but I haven't been able to get her to say it recently. I need some help. I'm so scared she's not going to be able to learn English well.
By the way, the picture in this post is of Noelle trying to pick up her grandmother's cat Saemon. She loves playing with the cat and chases it all over, pets it, throws things at it, gives it things, picks it up and carries it, runs away from it and even feeds it. The cat often reaches out a paw and scratches or hits her . She always has little scratches on her hands arms and face from Saemon but she still loves it.

Special English Podcasts on VOA

Recently I begain a search for podcasts or other similiar options that would be useful for learners of English or other foreign languages. Personally I am interested in continuting my study of German and Chinese. I have always been drawn to the use of techonology in the study of foreing languages. First of all I suppose I should explain what a podcast is, or at least my understanding of what podcasts are. The word "podcast" itself is a term coined from Apple's iPod. It combines the "pod" in "iPod" with the "cast" from "broadcast". "Cast" is a word that all by itself means "to throw". "Broad" means "wide". No, a podcast is not "throwing pods" but it is broadcasting non-music audio in an MP3 format that you can listen to on your iPod or other digital music player. Heck, if you wanted to, you could burn it to an audio CD and listen to it on a cd-player as well.

These days there are very few families in Japan who don't have a computer and an Internet connection. Students who don't have these things at home often have similiar resources available to them at school or someplace else. Many people also have MD players or MP3 players. There are many ways to listen to a podcast. You can copy the file to your iPod or other MP3 player, burn them to an audio CD or copy them to an MD and listen to them in a car or while walking or exercising.

By the way, if you do copy them to your MD player, I suggest you not do it with a SONY Net-MD. It is best not to use the Net-MD software and to copy them to the MD using a stereo line. The reason why is that SONY Net-MD software will mark each track you copy to the MD as non-editable. You can't delete it, divide it or combine it. Being able to divide tracks on an MD or add track marks is a valuable function for learners of language. For example you can add a track mark (divide a track) right at the beginning of a phrase or word that you want to be able to practice. Then you can use the back function on your MD to listen to that word or phrase over and over again without having to search for it. You could even have the MD player repeat that phrase over and over again.

Sorry for the long digression. What I really wanted to do with this article is to introduce a great resource for English listening practice. What I found yesterday was the Voice of Americas Special English podcasts. These podcasts are for learners of English and are in slow and clear American English. Go to http://www.voanews.com/ and look for the Learning English or Special English link. There you can listen to the Special English Internet radio broadcasts or download the podcasts to listen to later. I'm really excited about this and I hope many of you can take advantage of this valuable resource. VOA says on their site that they are offering the podcasts as a trial. Let's hope that they make it a permanent feature!

I am thinking about

I am thinking about what to do for my night class coming up next month.  I have a very limited amount of time to prepare my students for their trip abroad.  They need more vocabulary so I think teaching lots of vocabulary and making that vocabulary stick is very important.  They need lots of practice speaking.  They especially need a lot of practice with conversation but how to go about doing it?  If they have a set dialogue then they don’t have to improvise and improvisation is a vital part of conversational skill.  A circumlocution game or a game like Scategories may be the key.  With an increased vocabulary they should at least be able to one-word-shotgun their way through a conversation.

Russian Tea Cakes

Russian Tea Cakes
Originally uploaded by mr_caffeine74.

Russian Tea Cakes
I made these myself. Just had to have some Christmas Cookies. Luckily, I was able to have a snowman cookie and a Christmas tree cookie with red sparkles on it at a friend's house. So Christmas has come and gone and I have only a few Christmas Cookies left. "Russian Tea Cakes", or as my recipe book calls them, "Sandies". These cookies were really simple to make. I mean, even I was able to make them turn out right! I wanted to make several different types of cookies for Christmas but I just didn't have the time. Actually, if truth be told, I really just wanted to EAT several different types of cookies. Ah well, next year, with better planning, I should be able to make many more cookies. Since you can refrigerate the dough, I should be able to prepare several different types in the month before Christmas and just keep them in cold storage until I am ready to bake them. That should work out all right.

Living here in Japan has made me begin to take more care and have more interest in my own culture and traditions. I miss things from back home. I realize that if I want to enjoy the traditions of my homeland, I will have to actively engage myself in them.

Kaki wo kajiru - Noelle eats a persimon

Autumn is the season for many fruits of the land, and of the the favorites of the Japanese, and Noelle, is the persimon or "kaki" in Japanese. They are hard to hold on to for her, being kind of slippery when peeled, but she loves to bite into them. Right now she really likes to feed herself as much as she can. She is not very good at it yet, getting food all over her face, in her hair, all over us, her high-chair and the floor. We always set her high chair over a bunch of old newspapers to catch the shower of food, bowls and other utensils that come down.

Snow in Ashibetsu

This just came in this morning from a former student. It's snowing in Ashibetsu! I think it is time for me to change the tires on our car to studless tires. In contrast to the weather in Ashibetsu, it is a gorgeous sunny day with blue skies here in Makubetsu. The weather brings me to another topic: tires. I had only just heard of "studless tires" right before coming to Tokachi. My father in law was using them on his car. Then when I came here, I learned that EVERYBODY uses special winter "studless" tires and special tires for summer. It was a new thing for me. The summer tires that most people put on their cars were like sports tires or racing slicks. Now way you could use those for winter. In Wyoming I had always used all-season tires and never changed tires during the year. If I weren't married with a child, I think I would try to use only all-season tires again rather than buy another set of expensive studless tires.