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What do you think of when you think of your Target Language country/countries? While you may have spent some time there - and traveled to various spots - your students may have not. As a Japanese teacher it seems that Tokyo is the number 1 'want to go to' place for my students. However, as I spent my first 2 years in Japan in smaller more out of the way places, I want my students to learn that there's more to Japan than the big urban areas. And so the Year4 travel fair - a summative activity at the end of a 2-week unit - was born. It allows students to utilize key words they will need if/when they visit Japan - and also allows them to research and introduce key areas to their classmates during an interactive oral. For me the fair takes a week - with time spent planning/preparing for the 'fair', running the fair and then using the information for a written 'summative' evaluation. (My handout - for my Yr4 Japanese class including is here) The premise: Design an optional tour for a visitor to Japan - one that is outside major urban areas (I list the 'no go' places). This can be a 2 or 3 day tour.

At any given moment, the disciplines represent the most well-honed efforts of human beings to approach questions and concerns of importance in a systematic and reliable way. (Howard Gardner, The Disciplined Mind, p. 144)

What they never tell you is that when you're eleven, you're also ten, and nine, and eight, and seven, and six, and five, and four and three, and two, and one. (Sandra Cisneros, "Eleven," from The House on Mango Street)

Literacy expert Tim Rasinski gave me an idea for a bellringer that I think will improve students' vocabulary, fluency, listening, reading, and speaking skills and get them hooked. Rasinski proposes an acronym for those wishing to improve students' literacy skills, and although Rasinski's research and strategies revolve around L1 literacy, I think his theories align perfectly with L2 acquisition. AMAPPS stands for Accuracy as in being able to sound out words correctly Modeling fluent reading Assisted reading e.g. choral or partnered Practice with a variety of texts as well as repeated exposure to the same texts Phrasing or chunking words in common combinations Synergy of all of these elements

"EdLeader21 is a national network of school and district leaders focused on integrating the 4Cs (critical thinking, communication, collaboration and creativity) into education."

"Building reading competence seems to be a bit more challenging these days. Maybe it's just me, but students seem quite reluctant or incapable of guessing while reading. We have to provide a comfortable environment to encourage guessing. Moreover, teachers need to find ways of attracting students to reading of any kind-for information [see http://flava2011.wikispaces.com%5D and for pleasure. I feel it's somehow related to our testing culture that demands 'the right answer.' So how can we build reading? -By following what good parents do with children as they grow. Read children's books to your students-in class or in a reading circle on the floor in the library. Let students read for fun without an assignment attached. Or, read with a fun assignment. Read song lyrics and use them for a variety of reading steps: pick out words you can guess, pick out verbs that look similar to ones you've seen recently, which activities refer to a future event?, which phrases use an object pronoun? Which words go along with our area of study [Earth Day for example] Look at a related website and repeat the steps above. When does the song change from lyrics in one language to another? Link reading to a visual and show the visual first-a personal video, a tourism clip, a feature film. I used to think this was the reward after the reading, but so many topics can be enhanced if you teach about them saying: remember when you saw… [A previous student's video about daily routines, the advertisement for the Col Vert campground, Petit Nicolas, The Phantom of the Opera are such examples worth a preview."

Welcome to our site to share students' work from the first to the fourth year Japanese language! The purpose of this site is to give you some ideas of what our students do in class and to create opportunities to share work by our students. Our program offers Elementary Japanese I and II (first year), Intermediate Japanese I, II (second year), Advanced Language and Composition (third year), and Advanced Language and Cultural Studies I to IV (fourth and fifth year). We have about 150 students enrolled in total for 2013-2014. Please click the classes which you are interested in and tell us what you think.

'There's so much constantly to react to in the world in which we live, and in a country like South Africa, that can become a full-time occupation'

AAPPL Measures and IPAS I think tests are stupid. A test can't tell you how well I do my job or live my life--or anything you really need to know about me. Now, I'm really good at taking tests, and if you were to look at various test scores I've accumulated in my life, I daresay you'd be impressed with me. But do you know how much bearing the ACT, SAT, or GRE has had on any of my roles since college or grad school application time? Do you know how much impact that Issues in Teaching Foreign Languages or  Masterpieces of Hispanic Art and Literature exam has had on me as a teacher, mother, wife, or friend--or even as a speaker of Spanish?

Great resource article!

Great ideas for questioning strategies.

As most of you know, the uber gods of PBL are BIE. I was first introduced to the BIE PBL 'model' from mate Dean Groom who handed me over what I still refer to as my 'PBL Bible' - a ring-binder full of the BIE Freebies that help teachers plan effective projects and keep students on track as they move through the different phases of each project. The cool thing is that you can use as much or as little as you want … PBL is a very personal process that (like all good teaching) should be tailored to the expertise and needs of the teacher and students. However, there are 8 Elements of Project Based Learning that can be called the 'essential elements' of PBL … keeping an eye on these and 'testing' your project design based on them can help you determine if what you're creating isn't just a 'project'. I really like this statement from BIE contrasting PBL and traditional 'projects':

A typical unit with a "project" add-on begins by presenting students with knowledge and concepts and then, once gained, giving students the opportunity to apply them. Project Based Learning begins with the vision of an end product or presentation. This creates a context and reason to learn and understand the information and concepts.