PANSIG Conference abstracts

PANSIG abstracts, a set on Flickr.

Over the weekend May 21-2 my local bunch of professional colleagues, in the guise of Shinshu JALT, are hosting the PAN-SIG (Special Interest Group) Conference.

There will be no less than 140 presentations from specialists in all corners of EFL classrooms; foreign and Japanese situations and in English AND Japanese. Real time translating will be available for many presentations, and an effort has been made to concentrate Japanese presentations relevant to JHS/HS teachers.

I have had a few late nights playing with every single word of every presenters' abstract to produce something called a word cloud. Very coolly (but please don't ask how) a canny bit of software generates an image with the text you have chosen, and recognises which words are used the most frequently. The more commonly a word had been used, the larger it presents in the image.

Can you see a common theme running through the images? I hope so....but if you can't, ain't no thang: shed some cash and come the conference. Cheaper than twitter & so much more fulfilling. You do not have to be a teacher to enjoy this "teachers talking about teaching English" fest - I really wish a lot of our parents will be interested enough to come. Anyway, check out the art and make a bee-line for Shindai if you are remotely interested. I would really appreciate any sharing you'd care to do to make sure we get a great turn out as well.

Via Flickr:
What is coming to Matsumoto May 21-2? A whole lot of English teachers to talk about their niche interests, share ideas and make new professional connections. What are they going to talk about?

It's all about fluency - Rob Waring's abstract for PANSIG Conference

 

"Dr. Rob Waring teaches at Notre Dame Seishin University in Okayama, Japan. He is an acknowledged expert in Extensive Reading and second language vocabulary acquisition and lectures and publishes widely on these subjects. He is on the Executive Board the Extensive Reading Foundation and is also author and series editor of the Foundations Reading Library, the Footprint Reading Library, and the Page Turners Reading Library by Cengage Learning."

 Coming to PANSIG in Matsumoto, May 21-2

Sapporo - Super Sunday Co-ordination

Today was finally the chance to 'activate' all our remaining trainees/re-trainees for YLE & KET/PET. I am extremely confident of the competence of my examiners in Sapporo, and I am always delighted to see the enthusiasm/dedication they display. I don't know if it is fair to say or not (but I shall); some of this team are amongst the best examiners I have trained in the country.

Why? Well that's a fair question. I think it comes down to a host of things all adding up to 'natural examiner' - a bit like Tiger Woods is a natural golfer. Tons of hard work on top of talent, determination, training and 'x' factor. That 'x' factor you just can't bottle. All I know is, Hokkaido candidates are going to get an extremely positive experience out of their speaking tests.

Well done my team for, in most cases, giving up the best part of their weekends. Can't thank you enough nor congratulate more highly for a very good way for me to spend my time: OE's up north - valued and trusted.

I have to thank Peter for putting me up, and for hosting the weekend; OEs for their time & hard work; Kate for the lift that got me to the Station & thence the airport with a massive 8 minutes to spare. (Thanks ANA for seating me!)

Luna reaches out - Sapporo

I need to thank my Friday students for accepting the fact that I have to travel occasionally, with our school's commitment to promoting Cambridge ESOL Examinations/developing professional awareness across the country. Sometimes I simply cannot get to places and back again in the space of a weekend.

This weekend I am going to be training and co-ordinating Oral Examiners in Sapporo; I was here earlier in the year making a presentation sponsored by Oxford University Press to Hokkaido's mini JALT conference about the exams... Tonight it was time to follow up initial interest with a presentation to potential recruits with specific information about the exams, their levels, availability and especially the responsibilities of Oral Examiners.

It was good to catch up with some familiar faces from conferences and events I've attended in the past, and to touch base. English teachers are busy people (often unappreciated), so having a good turn out on a Friday night before a long holiday was particularly gratifying. Thank you JALT Hokkaido & OUP for initially inviting/sponsoring me; thank you Brick for sorting out the room at Hokkai Gakuen (very nice AV systems) and to Peter for getting folks together.

Following our communal chat about Common European Frameworks, rubrics, interlocutors, etc, we knuckled down to the serious business of actual training - my group this evening working very hard to get to grips with KET, until past 11pm. Managing to stay awake was not a problem; there was plenty of debate about materials and teacher vs examiner roles etc that kept us all going until we were obliged to leave.

Well done trainees, and thanks all for coming to my presentation.

Oral Examiner training - September

Teachers in Tohoku
http://www.eltcalendar.com/events/details/4534 (YLE) 13/9/09

Teachers in Hokkaido/northern Japan
http://www.eltcalendar.com/events/details/4531 (KET) 18/9/09
http://www.eltcalendar.com/events/details/4532 (PET) 19/9/09
http://www.eltcalendar.com/events/details/4533 (YLE) 19/9/09

Speaking in Sapporo

I was very happy to be asked to present at Hokkaido JALT's Teaching Children Mini-Conference over the weekend. Organiser Peter Schinkel, asked me if I would do it, the last time I was in Sapporo (last October) to train OEs. Of course I agreed, but the last week has been rather stressful actually putting the presentation together & figuring out how to get the most from Power Point without overdoing it.

Unfortunately, I presented in the graveyard slot - first thing on Sunday morning, so my audience wasn't huge. However, I think it went down well enough, despite the speakers I was given being as useful as bacon at a barmitvah...my audience couldn't hear a thing. Also unfortunately, I couldn't stick around to see many other presentations which looked really interesting - couldn't afford to miss my flight again or miss classes today.

I did get the chance to catch up with a couple of colleagues in Sapporo, which is always nice, and to make a few new connections; the Hokkaido EFL scene seems to be very healthy and enthusiatic, and I am really looking forward to going back again in July. With any luck, this will coincide with the Beer Festival (or is that such a good idea?) ! And I am really hoping I'll be able to give my presentation elsewhere too, after fine tuning it a bit and making sure I have louder speakers next time.

I should thank OUP for sponsoring my presentation, btw. Thank you Colin & Kayo for your help.

Jim