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Saturday
Jun152013

June 28 Workshop: Engaging All – Instructional Strategies That Foster Student Success

 

Engaging All – Instructional Strategies That Foster Student Success

 

Friday, 28 June 2013 - 6:00pm - 8:30pm

Speakers: Laura Markslag, Scott Badiuk, and Robert Sheridan

Doors open at 6:00 pm, workshop starts at 6:30.
Drinks afterwards for those interested at a nearby pub. 

 
To download the handout, click here.

Location: Osaka Municipal Lifelong Learning Center - Umeda (Dai-ni Ekimae Building, 6F, Rm 2 総合生涯学習センター 梅田) Guide to Location: Link to meeting location

 

Educators of the 21st Century are realizing that teaching with the aim of student success involves more than disseminating information to students. Rather, students need to be fully engaged in order to maximize their learning potential.

In this workshop, participants will experience various practical and effective instructional strategies that facilitate students’ engagement in learning activities.

The workshop will begin with energizing community-building activities that assist teachers in focusing student attention. It will then transition into practical instructional strategies that promote student-based learning.

All of the strategies discussed can be implemented immediately in the classroom, and will help foster sustained and substantive student success.

Laura Markslag is currently a lecturer at Osaka Gakuin University. She received her M.S.Ed. (TESOL) from Temple University Japan and has taught students of all ages and abilities in North America, Europe, and Asia over the past 15 years. These experiences have lead to her interests in developing and implementing authentic teaching materials, technology-assisted learning, and cross-cultural communication. A reflective practitioner, Laura empowers her students through autonomy and creativity. Strongly believing in the value of community involvement, Laura has served as an officer of Osaka JALT from 2009 to February 2012, and again from April of this year after returning to Osaka after a year of maternity leave back in her native Canada.

Scott Badiuk is certified by the Ontario College of Teachers in Canada at the Intermediate/Senior Level. He received his B.Ed. from York University, an Honours B.A. and B.A. from Wilfrid Laurier University in Waterloo, Ontario. He completed a diploma with honours in Business Management at Fanshawe College in London, Ontario, working for an international transportation company in operations management for five years before transitioning his skills into the education sector. Scott is passionate about the field of psychoanalysis and its application to learning engagement and classroom management.

Robert Sheridan is an EFL and business instructor at Otemae University and Kinki University. He received his M.S.Ed. (TESOL) from Temple University Japan, his B.Ed. (Secondary Business Education) from the University of British Columbia and his Honours Bachelor of Commerce from McMaster University. With 13 years experience teaching English in Japan at the university, high school and junior high school levels, he is skilled in the design and implementation of classes that address the needs of EFL learners. Robert has served as the program chair of Osaka JALT since September 2012. His research interests include vocabulary acquisition, extensive reading, motivation, and assessment.

Tuesday
Apr232013

Call for Presentations for KUIS Summer Seminar on July 20

KUIS Summer Seminar 2013: The 12th Conference on Language Teaching and Learning

Hosted by Research Institute for Communication & Department of English Education of Kansai University of International Studies

Co-Sponsored by Osaka JALT, Kobe JALT, Cengage Learning, & Oxford University Press

Details: Saturday, July 20, 2013, 10:00-17:30, FREE
Venue: Kansai University of International Studies, Amagasaki campus (5F), Hyogo
Contact: Jonathan Aliponga alipongaj0103@gmail.com

Presentation proposals are now closed, with deadline on June 16, 23:59 pm. To submit a presentation proposal, please click this link: http://tinyurl.com/chzwqoe

Plenary Speakers:
Atsuko Takase (Kinki University, Osaka):  Improving students' English skills through extensive reading and listening activities
Hajime Narita (Osaka University): English Education Appropriate for Japanese: Communication Based on Language Differences and Brain Processing

Please join us to finish off the first semester on a fine note!


Tuesday
Apr232013

Slideshow of Back to School presentations

Thanks to everyone who helped to make Back to School 2013 a success. We had around 80 people in attendance. And thanks to everyone who came out we were able to raise 60,000 yen at the door for Minna no Te (http://www.minnanote.com/) plus another 20,000 from the sale of Fresh Currents, books that were donated by Kyoto Journal.

 In case you missed it, our Back to School website has a slide-show of what happened. http://bts.osakajalt.org/

Thanks to our webmaster (and future paparazzi) Bill for getting pics of EVERY single presentation! Great job, Bill!
Here's the report for the July 2013 issue of The Language Teacher, for the record:


OSAKA: April -- Back to School 2013 was our fourth annual spring mini-conference aimed at helping everyone start the new school year on a positive note. Held on Sunday, April 14, at Osaka Gakuin University, it was by all accounts a big success, with 38 presentations to over 80 attendees, and ¥80,000 raised that was donated to the Minna no Te NGO to support Fukushima disaster victims.

The day started with a plenary session by Minna no Te founder and Fukushima native Yuko Nishiyama and OGU Associate Professor Stephen Dalton, entitled Two years since 3/11: Where are we now in the healing process? Subsequent concurrent sessions ranged in topics from hands-on EFL classroom activities to the more research-oriented and esoteric, with computer skills presentations, social issues awareness raising sessions, and even an energizing line-dancing session following our lunch break.

Presenters included recent university graduates, teachers of kindergarten through university level, and several graduate students as well. OGU’s International Chat Lounge <http://tinyurl.com/cdbooc6> was open for much of the day for participants to freely sample a variety of language learning games and activities that have been popular and effective with many OGU students. Poster presentations by the volunteer organizations Free the Children Japan, and Hato, as well as by the General Union and teachers and researchers alike added another lively dimension to the day’s variety of activities.

In addition to the many Kansai based participants, attendees came from as far as Kyushu, Shikoku, and even Gunma. Special thanks are due to officer Stella Maxwell for coordinating and to webmaster Bill Hogue for photography.

For a complete listing of presenters and presentations and a slide show of the day as well as archived info about our past years’ Back to School events, please see http://bts.osakajalt.org/. And for more about Yuko Nishiyama and the Minna no Te organization, please see http://www.deepkyoto.com/?p=7886.  

Reported by Ray Franklin and Bob Sanderson



Thursday
Apr112013

Back to School 2013 Schedule

Friday
Apr052013

Back to School 2013 poster

Here's the poster for Back-to-School 2013... please download, print out, and post up at your schools!