Asahikawa American English Conversation School
for September 2009
NOTE: The OBJECTIVE of this BLOG is to help my students with their study of English.
AND
For all of you, out there, around the world to;
SEE HOKKAIDO
2009 September 24 Thursday thru September 30 Wednesday.
Tis
the season of the colored leaves. Such a beautiful sight, but for only a
short time. Enjoy it while you can.
Heading into October, we will be getting more rainy days than sunny days. After all of the colored leaves have fallen to the ground and turned brown, it will be a season between seasons, before the snowfall starts. Not a very pretty time of year.
Well, that's OK with me. I've got a lot of work to do indoors. Besides, I can't control the weather anyway.
Speaking of working indoors, I have been spending a lot of time on my new eLearning website. On average, it takes me about 20 - 24 hours of work over a period of 5 or 6 days, just to make one new lesson for the website.
It is most certainly worth the effort, however. The first year students at Asahikawa University whom I have in my two classes this year, enjoy using it. In fact, none of them goes off surfing on other websites, during the lesson time. They all finish the lesson and then they look at other websites, if they have any time remaining in class.
I remember in previous years, when we were using the other eLearning software made by a big company, that the students got bored with the lessons in less than 5 minutes, and would be off onto other websites, not learning any English at all. With my new website, all of that has changed.
The students take the lesson and the multiple choice quizzes that are embedded between the lesson slides, until they get a test score of 90% or better. Then I give them a piece or two of paper, that has the same text as that which appeared on the lesson slides, only the paper test has some of the words missing. So, the students have to go back through the lesson again, and fill in all of the blanks on the paper test.
A really good student will only have to take the lesson two times, but most of the students have to take the lesson between 3 and 5 times to get 90% or better, and to fill in all the blanks on the paper test.
Before you know it, the 90 minute class time is all used up.
Why is it that just one guy, like me, working alone, can make a better eLearning website than a big fat over staffed corporation can? Maybe the big corporation has too many meetings that waste time, and compromise everybody's ideas, until they find the lowest common denominator that everyone can agree on. YUCK! Small is Beautiful. Try out my new Lesson 4, by clicking here, and see for yourself.
2009 September 23 Wednesday.
Today
is the Autumn Equinox, and another National Holiday here in Japan.
Unlike yesterday, I did not go for a bicycle ride in the warm afternoon sun. Instead, I got up before dawn, and took a walk along the quiet streets, while looking up at the beautiful star filled sky.
The planet Venus in the eastern sky was so bright, I thought for a moment that it was Jupiter.
From now on until the Winter Solstice, the days will get shorter, the nights will get longer, and both will get colder. Much colder.
That's just the way it IS.
By the way, I finished Lesson 3 for my new eLearning website. It is about the deserts of the world. You can try it for yourself by clicking here.
This lesson file is a bit large and the download time is a bit slower than Lesson 1 or Lesson 2.
I need to make some adjustments as to how I put these lessons together. Learn by doing.
2009 September 21 Monday and September 22 Tuesday.
Yesterday,
today and tomorrow are consecutive holidays, known as Silver Week.
That is because Monday is an annual National Holiday called 敬老の日, Respect for
the Aged Day. People over 65 years of age, can get a "Silver
Discount" on various shopping items.
Today is a holiday, just because tomorrow is the Spring Equinox, which is also an annual National Holiday. Might as well make it 3 in a row, including the weekend, that makes 5 holidays in a row. A great chance to take a trip, even overseas.
I have been spending a lot of time in front of my PC, making new lessons for my eLearning website, which is very interesting for me, because I learn new things too, as I put the lessons together.
However, I need to get outdoors and stretch my legs big time, so I took advantage of the excellent weather today, and went for a ride on my mountain bike, for the first time in about, 16 months! YIKES! No wonder I am so damn obese.
I took an easy route today, along the cycling roads of the Biei River and Chubetsu River.
A lot of other people were out and about also, walking, running, cycling, standing around. The sun was hot and the air was cool. Perfect for outdoor exercise. When the sun goes down, it will get very cold, especially if you are up in the higher elevations. Bring warm clothes with you if you go out for an excursion these days. The first frost of the season, is not all that far away.
2009 September 15 Tuesday thru September 20 Sunday.
A
very busy week of teaching classes, including 3 private lessons on Saturday.
Saturdays have become a regular work day, until about 14:00, then I have some
free time.
On Sunday, I walked across the street to Taisetsu Crystal Hall, to see the last part of the 第２３回 旭川市公民館合唱サークル.
In total, there were 16 different groups that sang about 2 or 3 songs each, plus a rousing finale combining the last two groups, and everyone in the audience, for a big sing along.
One of the students who comes to my classroom every week, is a member of the last group to sing before the big finale.
She is a member of the chorus group それいゆ or Soleir, which means Sunflowers. The first song they sang is one of my all time favorites that I have known since I was just a little kid. It is a Negro Spiritual entitled; "Sometimes I feel like a motherless child." They did a beautiful job of singing it.
The other song they sang was another all time favorite; "Amazing Grace".
I also brought along my video camera and tripod, so that I could make a Memorial DVD of the performance, and give it to my student as a gift. Today, was their last concert of this year. I look forward to seeing them again next year.
2009 September 13 Sunday and September 14 Monday.
On
Sunday, I was invited to go out and see a music festival at Kitoushi Park, where
the Canmore Ski Village is located, but I couldn't go because I had not
yet completed Lesson 2, for my new eLearning webite. I finally finished it
at about 22:00 on Sunday night.
You can try Lesson 2 for yourself, by clicking here.
I was out on Saturday night until about 02:00, because I was playing and enjoying music at Live House Good Luck since about 19:00 that evening. While I was there, I met a young lady whose father is Japanese and mother is American. She speaks both perfect English and perfect Japanese. A pleasure to talk with. Just before closing time, as she left with her Japanese boyfriend, I suddenly realized that I know her mother! It's a small world.
The photograph in today's blog, is of the front cover of the evening edition of the Hokkaido Newspaper.
Even if you can't read Japanese, you can probably guess what it says.
ICHIRO gets 200 safe hits for the 9th straight year in a row, breaking a baseball record that has stood for 108 years.
Mr. Baseball. Ichiro Suzuki. He is only 35 years old.
He gets to the ball park 3 hours before the start of each and every game just to stretch out and practice the basics.
Then, he plays a full game. Dedication. Hard Work. Commitment to the Game. Professionalism all the way.
I can't wait to see what he does next.
ROCK ON ICHIRO!!!
2009 September 7 Monday thru September 12 Saturday.
A
very busy week, with 6 new students signing up to start taking lessons at my
classroom. Six new students in one week may be a new record for me.
On Tuesday, I went out to Asahikawa University to teach my two freshman classes. This semester, I am using the computer lab and my new eLearning website with the students. Today, we did Lesson 1, about mountains of the world. Some of the students finished the computer course and the paper test in 40 minutes. Some of them needed the full 90 minutes.
I asked the students how they liked using my new website, and they said it was interesting and enjoyable. Glad to hear that. Next Tuesday we will do a new lesson, about rivers of the world.
As you can see from the photo in today's blog, I have an Acoustic Guitar Live gig tonight.
YIKES! I haven't had any time to practice for it this week.
So, I'm going to finish up this blog really quickly and get into some guitar playing right now.
Click here to see my SET LIST for tonight.
If you have time, come on by and enjoy the music.
2009 September 1 Tuesday thru September 6 Sunday.
No
longer any doubt about it, autumn is here to stay. Warm sunny days with
cool breezes, then suddenly, heavy rains, sometimes with thunder and lightning.
It might be a good idea to carry an umbrella with you, everywhere you go these
days.
Most of my morning classes at other schools have already started except for one.
My classes at Asahikawa University for the fall semester will start on Tuesday, September 8.
Since about 5 years ago, the school introduced a very expensive (for the school) eLearning software package, produced by a big name Japanese company, so that the students could learn English via the internet.
I too have used this system along with the students, and found it lacking in many ways. While the system does have some fancy features like being able to slow down or speed up the speaking voice for the listener, it lacks some very basic features such as, having spoken audio for ALL of the printed material that appears on the screen.
In a word, it sucks. I know it and the students know it too. In fact, the software fails to hold their attention for longer than about 5 minutes. Then they are off, surfing around on other websites and not learning any English.
So, during this entire week, I have set up my very own eLearning website, to use with the first year students at Asahikawa University in the computer lab, at the school.
Right now, the website has only one lesson on it. A lesson about the tallest mountains in the world. I will add a new lesson every week for the entire fall semester, and see how the students interact with my new website.
In order to be sure that the students really are learning the material, I have not allowed the user to back up to a previous page in the program. They must complete the entire lesson, see their final score, and then retake the lesson if they didn't get a passing score.
Also, the students will have to fill out a paper quiz with the same information on it, that they just learned from my new website. That should keep most of them busy for the full 90 minutes of class.
We will see how it works on Tuesday.
You too can try out my new website by clicking here.
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