Notes on the ‘Note’ The Eigo Note

1. Notes on the ‘Note’The Eigo Note Harry F. Carley III Imabari City, Board of Education, Ehime Prefecture

2. The Eigo note has a translated copy. This is downloadable for free from the publishers web site. http://www.kairyudo.co.jp (this site is in Japanese) Free sites with Eigo Note lessons, plans and ideas are http://www.eigonoteblog.com http://www.ruralsprawl.com Along with many others. My e-mail is: pm333@ric.hi-ho.ne.jp For any questions, comments, or concerns Harry Carley

3. + Overall the students have been enthusiastic toward the Eigo Note. • Most students are trying very hard • and seem to WANT to learn English. Their enthusiasm is very high. This • is a good first step. • With almost all initial editions of any text, • there are many bugs to work out • and areas for improvement.

4. Briefly: most lessons are • ‘use it and lose it’ • Topic matter is covered during the lessons (usually 2 or 3) and • then we move on. We never review previous material. • - Lesson topics do not relate to previous or future lessons except on • 1 or 2 occasions. • Songs do not go over well. (Too childish, lyrics are too fast). Time could • be spent more productively familiarizing students with useful phrases • and actual conversational situations. • - Listening exercises using the CD are too fast. I almost always have had to • reread the tape script from the teacher’s manual. Students listening once or • twice, • normal speed then I would read it more slowly, once or twice. • - New vocabulary that has not been taught yet is constantly thrown in, • **quite annoying. • Each lesson needs to be analyzed ahead of time to what vocabulary and dialogue • the main topic contains and what and how smaller areas will be broken down and pre-taught. Ex. Lesson 3‘How many’ introduces numbers but additionally adds • country names which students may/may not already know.

5. A simple but important item for all schools – • I / We (JTE and I) have found it is best to keep • the Eigo Note books in the classroom • (international study room, wherever). • One school had the students bringing their texts every • week from home and many children would forget. Got to • be the same kids every week. One week there were 8 kids • with no book; out of class of 38. - That’s when I lost it. • In such cases, I would quickly run to the teacher’s room to make copies (many tasks are listening based and require • the students to do something) since sharing a text is • not an option.

6. Lesson 1:Hello. Okay lesson, could be much better; really had to depend on expanding the lesson. The entire (grade 5&6) Eigo Note is comprised mainly of listening based exercises. Kids weren’t so into getting up and greeting each other with different gestures. We made passports (with their own photo) instead of name cards. Used the passports once, never have used them since. Expanded by: introducing more world greetings and country flags. We played a number of games using the phrase “Are you from?” Flag cards and question sheet. Tried to also teach them their names, addresses, and phone #’s using the passports we had made. Needed more than one lesson but moved on to lesson 2 instead. Overall, only marginally successful. Grade C+

7. Lesson 2: I’m happy. Lesson went okay. Almost everyone knew the main lesson topic already. I felt this was due to the fact that all of these 5th graders have had English classes since they were 3 years old. The topic has been covered and reviewed many times over the years. It has also been expanded to cover many other feelings. The song (Hello song, pg. 11) did not go well at all. This is a perfect example of a right idea but the wrong class activity (okay song/ better suited for second or third graders). Again, many of the Eigo Note activities are listening based requiring very little input (circle the correct face, put an X…).Gesture game was typical, lively students’ participated, shy quiet students did nothing. Expanded by reviewing all the expressions that they had learned in previous years. Getting the students to get up and ask each other “how are you?” (a task based exercise) In the future this might not be an option; depending on how many lessons the lower grades have. How much this topic is covered, etc. GradeC Lesson 3: How many? This is another lesson that needs improvement. Activities and songs in the text were once again of little help. It all depended on what extra parts of the lesson plan we could add in. Cheapest and easiest way to teach numbers was to roll dice. Each pair or students (depending on the size of the class) had three or four dice. They would roll the dice; add the numbers, highest score won. Surprised to find that the ‘addition part’ was a little difficult for some. Also made a number board game using numbers. Odds one side, evens the other. Again using dice. Also dot to dot number puzzles but again this wasn’t the most difficult task that 5th graders have done. As mentioned, lesson with right material, wrong level; written all the way through it. Grade C-

8. Lesson 4: I like apples. Another good lesson that could be better; it was a good idea/ bad execution. The topic phrase is “I like…” or later changed to “Do you like…?’ I would be doing a lesson similar to something like this if I was doing my own curriculum Except… -Too many sub-topics were thrown out. Nouns such as fruit/food/sports/ animals were all askew together. Those that knew the words already knew them. Those that didn’t know beforehand still didn’t. The interview game was good. Got the students to use the language and ask each other. Drawing/coloring pictures was a waste of class time. Overall satisfactory but there are areas that could be use improvement. GradeC Lesson 5: I don’t like blue. I felt that this was one of the better lessons, the main topic with the addition of clothes, supplemental material of money and counting helped boost their enthusiasm. The final lesson we were able to put the desks in groups (the desks arranged as they would be during lunch time) to make little stores. One group shirts (all colors, sizes small, medium, large,), another group socks, and so on. They are blank clothes cards in the back that one of the classes took almost all period to color, ignoring the JTE, JAT, and my pleas to “hurry up”. Never again! I have gone ahead to make 20 sets of clothing cards which we can use for games and the shops. One set of cards in multi-activities. These same cards can also be used in the lower grades as introduction to the Eigo Note. This was a good lesson; but a lot of supplemental material was needed. Japanese play money was used and 100, 1000, and 10,000 yen was introduced. Anything with money adds a level of motivation to the topic phrase. GradeB+

9. Lesson 6: What do you want? Another lesson that was not bad. Again the addition of extra material helped pump up the reinforcement of the target phrase. Although in the beginning it was another lesson that had too much vocabulary thrown out. Unit #3 and 4 centered more on food and a restaurant. Language acquired in Lesson 5 (What do you want, I don’t like…, How much…, counting money, and others) had material that could easily be used again in a different situation (clothing stores/restaurant). This part of lesson 6 was very beneficial and flowed very smoothly. One of the final activities of this lesson ‘making a fruit parfait’ didn’t generate any English. Added to this was the activity that took up waaay too much time (students cutting out fruit cards and gluing). GradeB- AGAIN— right activity/wrong class (suitable for 2nd/3rd grade. Pg. 42 &43 Let’s enjoy 2 – Made no sense for 5th graders. It is a page of hidden animals in a larger picture. Something, 1st or 2nd graders would be doing. Lesson 7: What’s this? We are currently on this lesson at some area of the text in all the schools.I understand what the writers are trying to do but they initially start off with the introduction of some fish names (starfish, octopus) and then switch to classroom things (ruler, pencil, scissors). This causes confusion amongst the students. The two groups of vocabulary (fish/classroom things do not exactly match) Activities list in the text (pg.47) are not that difficult for 5th graders and actually seem rather degrading in their intelligence. More age relevant material is needed. Additionally a task requiring one student while the others sit and watch seems to be an utter waste of class time. Grade so far C

10. Lesson 8: I study Japanese. There is one school that is not using the Eigo Note text for either of the 5th or 6th grade classes. We have been loosely following the text curriculum but are notusing the text book in class. We are also using an even/odd method. One week I teach the even number grades (2, 4, 6) next week odd (1, 3, 5). The week that I do not teach that grade (5 or 6th), the JTE teaches them English, seems to work as well or better than the every week team-teaching approach. So since we jump around, this is the only school where we have already taught this lesson topic – School Subjects. Most junior or senior high students do not know, can not remember, or say the names for all the Japanese subjects covered in school. This was a very difficult lesson for the students. Since we do not use the text here I can not speak for the activities in the book. I did copy the subject cards from the back of the book (scanned them) and made cards in Japanese and cards in English. This way we were able to utilize them in different ways and introduce different phrases “I like …” “Do you like…?”“What’s your favorite subject?”---“I like …” Phrases were not difficult, they had learned them in previous lessons over the years (fruit, veg.s,etc.), it was just trying to remember the subject names in English. This was a perfect example of a ‘use it and lose it’ lesson. We had this lesson in the first semester (June/July) and I don’t think a single kid could tell me have the subjects in English. The introduction of the weekdays fit into this lesson but it was about the only thing that went right. GradeD Lesson 9: What would you like? We have not gotten this far at any of the schools that I teach at. It is very similar to lesson 6 (clothes, colors, food and menus) “What do you want?” This lesson is supposed to involve more international foods and meals. Pg. 57 covers four different breakfasts of the world. The final part has students in groups designing and presenting to the class a meal that they designed. Don’t see that taking a whole lot of time but I do see a whole lot of Japanese language being used. Final activity; a board game involving review of all nine chapters; Available -- Japanese language only. Yet to be taught, thusly No Grade but … seems to have a lot of potential. The internet could be integrated into this lesson relatively easy, foreign food, breakfasts of foreign lands, (calorie counting) more nutritious, etc. Grade ???

11. Eigo Note – NotesGrade 6 Lesson 1That’s right. Lesson 2AaBbCc Lesson 3When is your birthday? Lesson 4I can swim. Lesson 5Turn right. Lesson 6I want to go to Italy. Lesson 7What time do you get up? Lesson 8Please help me. Lesson 9I want to be a teacher?

12. In conclusion and in preparation for next year; One item that would be most beneficial for students is an English-Japanese dictionary of vocabulary words in the back of the book. Lists of worlds that are covered in the Lessons; greetings, fruit, vegetables, sports, countries, common foods, colors, Colored activity cards are good for tasks and activities. The students do not need to take the time to color them. (Utilizing crayons should have been taught in preschool or 1st grade) It is extremely important for all students to have the text with them for every lesson. (as if anyone didn’t know that) Many lessons are listening based. The CD goes at a native language speed level. They offer a variety of voices, some of which both the students and I find ridiculously silly. It is best to play the CD once or twice, read the dialogue from the teacher’s manual, two or three times, gradually slowing down until everyone reaches a level of understanding. Also important to instruct students to listen to the ‘key words’ needed tocomplete the task. L.3-1-2 p.17. Gives individual’s names but what is needed is to recognize the name of the country they are from. Many games, activities and tasks are required to supplement the text. In its current form it is very easy to complete the Eigo Note in less than a year.

13. Extra material Or how to buy nothing new.