Hotel reservation - Mena House Oberoi Hotel, Giza, Egypt

 Kanako & Takeshi's writing project for June was to email a hotel to confirm a reservation. 

Dear Madam,

I'd like to make a reservation for  a family room for a week, between the 22nd and the 27th of August. I'd like a room with a view of pyramid, and confirm what menus there are with price for dinner.

Please confirm the reservation.

Yours sincerely

Your sincerely

Takeshi

Hotel reservation - Hotel Venice

Kanako & Takeshi's writing project for June was to email a hotel to confirm a reservation. 

From Kanako 

To danieli.hotelinvenice.com

Subject Reservation for March

Dear Sir Madam,

I would like to make a reservation for a double room for two nights, 25 and 26 March.

I would like a room with a view of the lagoon. Could you tell me about using terrace? What foods we can buy? Is there a freezer in the room?

Please confirm the reservation

Yours sincerely

Kanako

Remembering my father - Sayuri's fond memories

When I found the old photo of my father, some warm feeling was recalled immediately and made me smile.

My father was fond of literature and he was rather a romantic person. When he was a high school student, he belonged to a literature club and he organized a small funeral for the famous cat at his school festival. The cat was in the masterpiece: I am a cat, Wagahai wa neko dearu, by the great Japanese author, Soseki Natsume. He told me about it a long time ago but I didn't know a photo existed. In the old black and white photo, there was a small altar of the cat in the story and three rather serious looking boys sitting straight. One of them was my father in his high school uniform. I felt strange to see my father's youth and the figure that I hadn't known.

He liked books, newspapers, movies, and a little bit of beer. I am wondering what he would do in this self-isolated situation. Probably he would enjoy himself in his creative way of living. I miss him a lot.

Posted for Sayuri

Postcard: Wish you were here

We're having a great time! We had a good journey and the weather is mostly good. 

It's sometimes a little wet. The hotel is right in the city center. It's good to visit Big Ben. We shopped all of yesterday and got some really nice books. The food is excellent (tired lots of different cafes!) I'm looking forward to our dinner cruise tonight!

By Misawa Hinata

A travel recommendation - Ishikawa prefecture, Japan

Kenrokuen in winter

If you are going to Ishikawa, you ought to visit Kanazawa, which is the capital, located in the center of the prefecture. It has a lot of places to visit and a lot of foods and sweets to eat.

You can get there by a car, bus, airplane, and bullet train. In the city, you should take a walk with wearing sneakers, because there are many historical buildings like temples. If you’re going there in winter, you need to take an umbrella in case of rain.

First of all, you should go to Kenrokuen, which is one of the most beautiful garden in Japan, and then there is also famous museum called the 21th Century Museum nearby. After that you had better go to the Oumi market, which is a fresh seafood market. You can buy fresh seafoods from Japan Sea, and if you need, you can send them to your house. Finally, I strongly recommend you to go to a sushi restaurant. It must be delicious.

Kenrokuen after a blizzard

Unfortunately, in holidays, many tourists visit there and it gets so crowded. However, I think it’s worth it, because you can have great experiences in Kanazawa.

Posted for Ai

A travel recommendation - Route des Grands Crus

One of France’s most incredible places to visit is Burgundy, which is eastern part of France. If you’re going to Burgundy, you ought to visit “Route des Grands Crus“, which is a 60-kilometre running nort to south between Dijon and Beaune and lead to Santenay. It’s really beautiful country side and it passes through the many of great vineyards of Burgundy wines.

Cycling the route is an ideal way,which you’ll enjoy a tasty trip and picturesque villages at your own pace. You need to rent a bicycle, wear comfortable shoes , a sunhat, carry some water , a raincoat and a camera .You don’t need to carry your lunch, because there are some restaurants, which serves the local foods and cafe on the way.

Frist of all, you rent your bicycle at Beaune and then you start to the heart of Burgundy wines region. After you leave Beaune ride through the vineyards for a while. About half way, you get on Nuit-Saint-George and have a tasting lunch. After lunch you keep on cycling and stop at Romane Conti’s vineyard,which is the most famous wine in the world. After that you pass “Chateau Clos de Vougeot“,which is a highly symbolic building, is really picturesque. Then you arrive at Gevrey-Chambertin village and visit the winery, which is possible tasting wine. Finally you go back to Beaune by bicycle or by train with your bicycle.

Unfortunately, it depends on the weather, if you’ll be able to enjoy and you need to take care of traffic. However I think it’s worth it, because it’s so spectacular.

Posted for Miyuki

Nanaha's Haiku - "Swallows"

 Swallows flying fast

Catching insects as they swoop

They make summer days

I chose "swallows" because I like them. Swallows are so cool They fly a long long way to build nests under roofs in my town. I miss them when they go away.

Posted for Nanaha

Try to have fun!

Currently entering my 2 months of teaching at Luna International School set in the beautiful mountains of Nagano. Coming from a background teaching teenagers and only teenagers. When I got an offer to start teaching younger students, it definitely scared me. I always thought I could do it, it won't be that different from teaching high school (so I said!). Boy, was I wrong!

Barely a week in and I cracked. It was hard! I learned that kids especially younger ones had the attention span of a fly. I felt like a clown put to show and begged the kids for attention. My balloon tricks weren't doing the work here. Had to talk to Jim (my boss) on how to make the kids pay attention and what is too hard and too easy for them. Basically, his advice was to go back to the basics, alphabets, song, singing, and dancing. Acting silly with them. Try to have fun! 2 months in and he still reminds me of that, have fun with the kids and I do agree with that. Once I start enjoying my time with the kids, I start to relax and understand their needs better. 

I learned a lot, to be honest, I noticed how students pick up languages differently. Most kids require a hands-on approach while others are okay with learning by textbook. I felt a mix of emotions, more patience definitely. I learned different methods in approaching kids with help from Jim. I do want to be better for my students because I know they are silently struggling to understand a foreign language too. My heart cares for these kids a lot and I do agree that they deserve the best education possible and hopefully, with more guidance and learning on my side. I'm able to help them. l I still have a long road ahead and I am excited to see what else I learn! 

Megacities: Istanbul

 Istanbul is the largest city in Turkey and the country’s economic, cultural and historic center. It is in the northwest of Turkey and spreads over the Bosporus Strait. It spreads in both Europe and Asia with a population of 14.1 million. It is a period of about 1600 years, the city was the capital city until Ankara is the new capital of the Republic of Turkey in 1923.

Istanbul has a borderline Mediterranean climate, humid subtropical climate, and oceanic climate under both classifications. Istanbul’s weather has a special feature as high humidity 80% usually in the morning. In summer, the average maximum temperature is 29 degrees Celsius and it has low rainfall.

by Reiko

Megacities: New York

 

Racism is still rampant in New York. Recently, crime targeting Asians have been increasing due to COVID-19. It’s dangerous when you walk alone in the early morning and night. Lurking danger in a quiet place, ally, and subway. There are a lot of people who come from other countries.

Four seasons in New York but spring and autumn is very short. Very hot in summer and very cold in winter. You can get anywhere by walking because New York city’s streets are designed in a grid. Subway runs 24 hours a day.

The cost of living is high in New York. New York is the highest in fashion. New Year events at Time Squares is the most famous New Year count down in the world. Many famous artists perform
here every year.

by Rinka.

Junior ornithology - swallows

Original artwork by Nanaha

I like swallows. They have thin black wings, small black claws and beaks. They have red throats and faces, and white bodies. 

They are small; 10 - 24cm, and weigh 10 - 60g. Swallows live all over the world, and they make small mud nests under rooves. They have four or five chicks.

Swallows eat insects, but not stinging ones. They find food when they are flying. They can fly fast and well.

I like swallows because they are little, but they fly nicely. I like to see them in the summer.

Posted for Nanaha

Birdwatching in Matsumoto - crows

Crows are my favourite birds. Crows have black wings, talons, and beaks. Crows are 45cm tall, and 337 to 1,625 grams. They live all over the world, and in Matsumoto around the castle and Agata no mori (park).

Crows make big nests high up in trees, 15-60 metres off the ground. Crows have four or five chicks.

Crows eat small animals - mammals, worms, other birds as well as carrion (dead things) and garbage. They find food anywhere.

Original artwork by Izhe

Crows can fly acrobatics, and make big groups. I like crows because they are so smart.

Posted for Izhe

Young Learners & graded readers: win win!

Supplements to class books

I think graded readers have a place in every language learning environment; they certainly play an important part in our learning goals at Luna, and have proven their worth many times over as our students have blossomed from learning first words to biting off big chunks in Cambridge exams - be it entry level Young Learners (pre-A1Starters) to B2:First with us here at JP004.

Young Learners are rarely independent learners, so we use our readers in class to form good habits; get used to the format & style, find the audio or read along with the teacher narrating - we love correcting the teacher if he/she 'makes a mistake'! We exploit the artwork to predict or reflect, recycle & repeat. We get used to the kinds of tasks that are included in the puzzle pages, and understand that we absolutely can turn the pages back to find what we are looking for together (is it a team race? are we working in pairs? are the books on the table even? which pages do we need to look at?) Follow the directions (which are also in English). Stuck? Ask peers or the teacher for help, of course it's OK!

Exploit the glossary

Good choice of reader will mean you can easily suppliment/compliment your regular course books, be it in terms of vocabulary or target structure. Working on animals or numbers...prepositions or suggestions...culture, values, social studies or science? 

Use your readers for much more than 'just reading' and instead a launch pad for inquisitive minds & project work in all shapes and forms - a talking picture of a favourite character being interviewed maybe...a poster or illustration personalising vocabulary & self...scaffolded writing eg focussing on personification, localisation or prediction...use the 'hard' or new words imaginatively not as 'test' items.

Make a meal out of the level of language, and the repetitive nature of graded reader titles? Notice, for

pronunciation mining

example, when you can take advantage of regular past tense verbs. Make it a listening task & colour code your -ed endings and then organise them - organise them into sets in side the front cover (invariably blank real estate there!). Can your learners match up the (probably limited number of) irregular past tense verbs with their dictionary form - another reason to re-read (but this time scanning) & quickly.

Collaborating on a project

Reading out loud? I really think this is a bad idea for so many reasons (stage fright, fear of mistakes, "I'm too slow", not confident with big words, wasn't in class last week, didn't hear the audio etc)! Instead, narrate the story yourself (model good pronunciation/intonation, speed) and only have your students speak particular roles each. This encourages them to read ahead & identify direct speech and to figure out who is speaking...this can take time but let them do that together & agree! What words in the text help us do that? How does the speaker speak (cry? shout? whisper?)...it has meaning! But don't flog it - save more for next week and only give 'homework' if they can do it/know how to do it. Can they actually access the audio components, for example.

Lastly for now, with digital versions of readers available (OUP did a fantastic job in 2020 offering their reading bookshelf titles available for free) it is not hard to cater for online learners as well as our F2F cohort to stay on the same page. Takes a bit of thinking about, but the room for even more exploitation of the materials is there - US or British narration as well as fast/normal/slow choices. Most importantly, enjoy. Reading will yield the best results over time, at a regular, steady pace, at 'not-too-hard' levels and with meaningful engagement/activities. Keep track of progress - not just word count or number of books read, or obsess over reading speed...but build portfolios for your students, give them the confidence to skip tough words & come back later with an informed guess over meaning if they have to; don't translate everything, and don't stuff it all up by making it a test.

Enjoy reading :)

Young Learners - making things "harder"

colours & shapes

We love teaching children at Luna, and we particularly enjoy students who come to every class with big "Can Do' attitudes, like gannets hungry to learn & use English.

You'll notice in the photos our textbooks are not front & centre; we really like to encourage our learners to become independent of the printed word (massively useful to set out structures etc, for sure, and provide direction + continuity)...but to get language properly into heads we need to use it variously, flexibly & realistically.

Problem I have as a teacher with this class is to slow down ravenous appetites for progress! Instead, add on a lot of extras & let our students really go to town with their awesome willingness to jump into challenges bravely and intelligently, teaching/helping each other and being very positive.

"Outer Space" (Learning Resources)...was on the table five seconds when these two started playing (first time!) asking each and answering questions "What is it? .. "It's a blue circle." then game play asking each other Yes/No questions. Winner irrelevant as loads of great language work, prompting/correcting each other nicely. And the teacher lost!

Everybody Up on the board

Song "It's a book, it isn't a notebook" from Everybody Up 1 (Unit 1) > listening task & digging out the flashcards to pop on the board & then point along as we listened again...'narrate' it at their own speed, then join in & switch places half way through. "Re-write" the song by choosing other vocabulary items...and then try with the reverse sides (words) only...still too easy!

Can't wait to get into our new graded readers, but somehow I doubt they'll help as sheet anchors either...full speed ahead!
 

Can't do my homework: Part 3 of 3 - flipped class

Activity from Primary Grammar Box (CUP)

Books closed, use it to hide a pair work activity and to lean on (one in-class learner paired with the Zoomer whose screen share also 'hidden' on another monitor). Pencils at the ready - no need to spell anything (although all the target vocabulary is familiar...didn't want to defeat the object of this exercise by getting bogged down again!) but the possible issue of artistic limitations/reluctance instead?

To be honest, I didn't monitor that output. Rather, I tried to see what the students were doing to get the language out...

• glancing at the rods to 'get started' & 'load' the full utterance in their mind before starting
• glancing at the rods to double check they'd 'used' each block/word ie completed their utterance (I wanted to make sure the time phrase was included to give meaning to the past simple target structure)
• moving a rod to make sure they'd used the right word needed to add a couple of extra rods for the plural (doubled the ones in play) forms - nicely previews or flips next week's lesson
• listening to each other better (for nitty gritty bits!)

...and of course listening to their spoken out & giving as much non-verbal encouragement as possible - which was not really necessary as they got on with the task really fluently, collaboratively and effectively. And, despite the masks, pretty chuffed smiles all round. And the dark clouds have lifted.

With that, I don't think any of us are dreading the next lesson! 

What are your solutions/suggestion/reactions? Let me know @oyajimbo on't twitter :)

Appendendum: a few days later I asked my son to get his homework book out (imagine the face!). I asked him to underline the words in the structure we'd been practicing with the same colours as we'd used midweek. Penny dropped - the colours had done the trick & he could correct his own work...

Where can you buy Cuisenaire Rods? 

Can't do my homework: Part 2 of 3 - a different tack

Cuisenair Rods = colour + length 'coding'

I wanted to take the words out of the equation, but leave them in somehow. Replace them?

The Game Plan...and no, I couldn't remember exactly all the words either.

Solution...post-it notes. As a group, I asked them to write one word at a time on to a post-it (books open if needed); my online student did so into the Zoom chat. So no, not a 'spelling test' per se. Fortunately, my post-it notes were not very sticky so they needed weighing down (fan was on for a reason!).

Online? I'd opened a Google Jamboard & drawn colour lines where I wanted my student to enter text. Hard for newbies, but he's been learning on the job for a year now, and could cope with the challenge (enjoys messing about with the mouse/keyboard when I give him control, defacing things!). Problem = few colours available for the pen/type tools on Jamboard than I needed...

Unsticky post-it notes...just the excuse!

So we had the question form on the table, in a straight line, and then the answer below, so's that words 'lined up'. Putting the Cuisenaire Rods on the post-its = words were there but obsured, and could be peeped at if we needed a prompt (ie "I want to read the word")  without referring to the book. We negotiated block lengths to suit the actual words...subliminally giving each part of speech a different colour code into the bargain.

I didn't want to hide the words for my Zoomer, as he's already operating from the far end of the telescope and he has a lot fewer clues to work with - cannot pick up non-verbals etc. But, as his workspace was on another screen, my in-class gang did not realise he had an "advantage", so he became quasi-sensei & his ego was suitably enhanced.

Did it work? 

(Part 3 will be posted tomorrow)

Can't do my homework - it doesn't make sense. Part 1 of 3 - the problem

Ever had one of those classes when you assumed you had a relatively straightforward lesson coming up, and 2 minutes in you realised it was going to go horribly wrong and you had no escape route? Happens to us all - especially if you make stupid assumptions and you have a blended F2F/online classroom. As I tell my teachers all the time, have a plan B and 'go to resources' just in case...and don't make assumptions!

Everything fell apart when I could not see whether my online student had done his homework or not (still struggling with that 'problem' as he cannot fax his homework book, nor scan it on his own - he's 11). Holding it up to his webcam about the best we can manage at the moment (cannot spot mistakes/spelling/handwriting obviously). Goody two shoes had done her work in pristine condition + extra doodle decorations; older lad was absent (happens); and the left-hander presented a dog's dinner. I blame the parents (that would be me...).

The rest of the lesson was painful for all; no dynamic as everyone had different starting places...could not do 'next' as the last thing we'd done was clearly a train wreck. Orally, this class usually steams through content. Listening? Too easy. Reading - we get by, and the graded readers are core to this, especially as we now have audio + online presentation tools. Comprehending question/answer word order...decoding the grammar if you like...at home, alone showed for the most part I had not done my job at all well. I'd assumed it had 'gone in' when I had not paid careful enough attention.

My son avoided me for a day or two - ask any school owner & you'll realise that is not difficult, and I had a whole week scratching my head trying to figure out a nifty app or online game that would deliver a "Tadaa" solution. Lazy.

So I asked myself what would Alex Burke think of. 

Colour. Ah yes, colour. And inaccessibility - my lefty does not like reading for detail. It overwhelms him (Japanese maths problems - he can do the numbers but he does not 'understand' the questions). 

More sleepless nights for me, and lefty's homework bag an abandoned nightmare on the floor in the genkan (entrance hall). Dark clouds as the next lesson loomed.

(Part 2 will be posted tomorrow)

Sir Bobby Charlton - Biography

Sir Bobby Charlton is the former football player who had played for Manchester United Football Club and England's National team. He is called the greatest football player in England.

He was born in Ashington, Northumberland on 11th, October, 1937. He joined Manchester United Football Club when he was seventeen years old. But, he faced "Munich air disaster" on 6th,February, 1958, and he lost many teammates in this accident.

He recovered from his shock after two months, and he was chosen to be a member of England's National team. He brought not just many titles to Manchester United Football Club but also the championship of the World Cup in 1966 to England's National team. 

Although he is eighty three years old, he is still well. For celebrating the sixty years anniversary of his debut, the south stand of the Old Trafford, the home stadium of the Manchester United Football Club, was named "Sir Bobby Charlton Stand".

Poul Henningsen (1894-1967) - Biography

 

Poul Henningsen was famous for modern lighting designer.

He was born Ordrup, in Denmark, on 9 September 1894. His mother, who was noted author.

From 1911 to 1917, he was trained at Copenhagen Technical College and the Technical University of Denmark, where he studied to be an architect, but had not graduated, he chose a career as an inventor and painter.

In 1919, he was hired by Kay Fisker. From 1920, he freelanced as an architect and designer. Henningsen presented the Paris Lamp at the International Exhibition of Modern Decorative and Industrial Arts at Paris which was a World’s fair, was designed by the French government. He won gold medal for the Paris lamp, was consisted of 6 shades and made of silver.

A few years later, in 1925, he worked with Louis Poulsen which was company, had corporate with him until he was died.

Henningsen designed PH lamp series, which has three-shade system. The lamps were successful and gave him for royalty. 

He was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in 1963, struggled with difficulty speaking, when he finally died on January 31, 1967. 

Musical postcards

 As it is very difficult for many of us to travel abroad, we used our imagination. I asked Takeshi and Kanako to listen to this song and draw a scene of what came into their heads. I then asked them to pretend that they were on holiday there and to write a postcard as their homework task. In a time where we can't send/receive postcards, this is probably the next best thing!