54th Benkyoukai (Study Forum) Karen Christiansen "Starting a Japanese Language Program from Scratch" (fwd)
- From: lacurej@xxxxxxx (Nihongo)
- Date: Sat, 9 Apr 2005 16:48:03 -0400
---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Wed, 06 Apr 2005 15:53:05 -0600
From: Keiko Schneider <kschnei@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Cc: me me <kschnei@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: 54th Benkyoukai (Study Forum) Karen Christiansen "Starting a
Japanese Language Program from Scratch"
Dear teachers of Japanese,
Info Page:
http://www.sabotenweb.com/bookmarks/about/54thbenkyoukai.html
SenseiOnline presents 54th Benkyoukai (Study Forum)
Karen Christiansen "Starting a Japanese Language Program from Scratch"
April 14th (Thursday), 2005 at 4pm PDT/MST
April 14th (Thursday) 1pm Hawaii, 6pm CDT, 7pm EDT, 11pm GMT, April
15th (Friday) midnight London, 8am Japan, 9am Sydney, 11am New Zealand,
if this calculation is correct. To be sure, please go to Time
Converter (<http://www.timezoneconverter.com/>)
How long?
For about 50 minutes
Whos is the invited speaker?
Karen Christiansen
Karen Christiansen graduated from the University of Alberta in
Edmonton, Alberta with a degree in French and very few specific plans
of what to do with it. Her husband's teaching career soon took them
both to a remote First Nations community in northern Alberta, where she
suddenly became a teacher aide. A few transfers later, and after jobs
such as teaching basic literacy to adults and teaching ESL to Lebanese
immigrants, Japan came "calling". The sister town in Hokkaido was
interested in an AET. Was there an English teacher interested in the
opportunity? Karen, her husband and two pre-school children answered
the call. They stayed they for four years, with Karen working as an
AET, librarian, cooking teacher, crafts teacher, ...
Four years later, arriving in the small town of Creston, British
Columbia ... how to find a job? There were already French teachers in
place in the town's one high school. There was no ESL program, and
apparently no need for one. The town had a sister town in Japan, but no
Japanese class operating in the high school. Could that be a job
opportunity? Could it benefit the students and the town as well?
In a school with no intention of offering of Japanese program, with a
principal who had little knowledge of Japan or Japanese, Karen managed
to ?sell? the idea of offering a Japanese language instruction. It's
not that anybody had anything against it; somebody just needed to
propose the idea, show some ideas of how it could be done, convince the
principal that it could be viable, recruit enough students for the
first class (about 30), make sure the district administration created
the position, APPLY for the position, HOPE to get hired, run the class
in such a way that it required no special budget (because there isn't
one) and then make sure the students are successful. No problem!
Short description of the presentation
The presenter will share her experiences of convincing a secondary
school administration in a small, western Canada town to include 3
levels of Japanese language in their course offerings. Pluses were a
long-standing sister-city relationship with a Japanese town, an
already- established Japanese friendship society, a "Japan-friendly"
town administration. Minuses were zero funding, lack of support from
other members of the languages department at the school, declining
enrollment, school district with a large deficit, no Japanese language
courses anywhere else in the school district.
What is going to happen?
Karen sensei's paper can be downloaded at
http://christiansens.ca/karen/benkyoukai/start_from_scratch.doc
or
http://christiansens.ca/karen/benkyoukai/start_from_scratch.sxw
So read the paper above and go to TAPPED IN. There, you will be able to
discuss this topic with Karen sensei and others from around the
world. TAPPED IN is open to everybody and the presentation will be done
in English.
Where?
TAPPED IN is letting us use their space. Please go to
http://www.sabotenweb.com/bookmarks/about/54thbenkyoukai.html
for detailed Guest log in info. No sign up necessary. Please log in a
few minutes early to get used to the environment or do practice before
the actual session.
Can I use Japanese?
With some combination of operating system and browser, TAPPED IN is
known to be Japanese capable. However this event will be conducted in
English. Future events will be conducted in Japanese.
If I can't attend? If I am too sleepy?
The log of the event will be available in PDF format after several days
after the event. Please visit:
<http://www.tappedin.org/transcripts/artshumanities/>
Please send any question to the Manager of senseiOnline at
senseionline-owner@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx I look forward to seeing you all!
Sincerely yours,
Keiko Schneider
--
Keiko Schneider (kschnei@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx)
Bookmarks: http://www.sabotenweb.com/bookmarks
Manager, SenseiOnline:
http://www.sabotenweb.com/bookmarks/about/senseiOnline.html
Executive Board ATJ 2003-2006:
http://www.colorado.edu/ealld/atj/
HelpDesk volunteer at TAPPED IN: http://www.tappedin.org/new
.
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