カテゴリー: 授業

Date: April 26th on Sunday, 2020 from 8:00 to 9:30 (9:00 – 10:30 in JST)

Course: Japanese Conversation 4

Used app: Streaming on DingTalk, Presentation by Powerpoint with 55 slides

Numbers of Students: 24 out of 28

Fully attendant for 90min : 17,    Completely Absent : 4,

Shorter signing-in: 87, 86, 69, 15, 12*2 minutes, and the shortest was 49 seconds.

Responses onto the BBS:

– Attendance check by a student his/herself: 25. One of these students was actually recorded as completely absent.

– 1st Quiz: 17 students responded. The quiz was just to measure whether or not the students understood the listening material.

– 2nd Quiz:19 students responded. The question was to find an erroneous use of conditional conjunctive particle “-nara” from four sentences. “-Nara” cannot be used in a conditional clause if the condition is 100% sure.

– 3rd Quiz: 19 students responded. The question was to select “If” type conditional conjunctive particle that is applicable in a sentence.

– Attendance check at the end: 21 students responded. It is to ask suitabilities of “-nai” or “-zu” for negations to speech or writing.

Teaching: 

– Listening to a conversation between two part time job workers.

– Review and exercise of conditional conjunctive particle “-ba,” and “-nara”. The emphasis was put on the latter, “-nara” with the following three features; (1) Suggestion can be made in the form of “Noun+nara, (clause)”. (2) In the construction of (Preceding conditional clause with “-nara”, conclusion clause), the conclusion clause has modality that expresses speaker’s feeling like intention, guess, request, and so on. (3) If the conditional clause is definitely certain, “-nara” cannot be used.

– Exercise of “-ba” and “-nara”

– Introduction of expression for negation using “-zu-ni” that is a little formal

Homework Assignment:

Any homework was assigned in this time, too. It was noticed to the students that homework during the holidays would be assigned the following day, 27th.

Issues and Problems:

This is a conversation class. So students’ utterances should be promoted. By far I have just tried teaching listening comprehension and making the students do a kind of  rote exercise. In order to prompt the students’ utterance, I decided to give the students a homework in which he/she need to fill his/her own words into many blanks put in the conversation script.

Date: April 24th on Friday, 2020 from 13:40 to 15:10 (14:40 – 16:10 in JST)

Course: Japanese Conversation 4

Used app: Streaming on DingTalk, Presentation by Powerpoint with 82 slides

Numbers of Students: 24 out of 28

Fully attendant for 90min : 15,    Completely Absent : 4,

Shorter signing-in: 86, 72, 52, 24*2, 18, 10, 5minutes, and the shortest was 5 seconds.

Responses onto the BBS:

– Attendance check by a student his/herself: 25. One of these students was actually recorded as completely absent.

– 1st Quiz: 19 students responded. The quiz was just to ask the right conjugation of 3rd group verb “Kuru/Kimsu” in Nai-form.

– 2nd Quiz:17 students responded. The question was to choose one sentence that was different from other three sentences. The four were all using “If” type conjunctive particles “-to”, “-ba”, “-tara”, and “-nara”. Of these, only the sentence with “-nara” had different construction that was simply “Noun+nara”.

3rd Only one student responded, no one got the right answer.  In fact the question was too difficult for the students. It was to choose one erroneous sentence among four that were using “If” type conjunctive particles.

– Attendance check at the end: 21 students responded. It is to find a sentence that was erroneously using “-nara” because its conditional clause was too definitely determined to be an assumption.

Teaching: 

– Listening to a conversation between two part time job workers.

– Review and exercise of conditional conjunctive particle “-ba,”

– Introduction of another conditional conjunctive particle “-nara,”,

– Exercise of “-ba” and “-nara”

Homework Assignment:

Any homework was assigned in this time. There was no time to check and evaluate a homework because many classes were scheduled in short period of time before the spring holidays from May 1 to 5th.

Issues and Problems:

The purpose of quiz during class is to check whether or not each student is really listening to the online class. It seems that I might have asked too much difficult questions for the purpose these days. Today’s quiz No.3 was so difficult that no student could get the answer. It is necessary to make those questions appropriate for level of students’ understanding.

Date: April 20th on Monday, 2020 from 8:00 to 9:30 (9:00 – 10:30 in JST)

Course: Japanese Conversation 4

Used app: Streaming on DingTalk, Presentation by Powerpoint with 81 slides

Numbers of Students: 28

Fully attendant for 90min : 20,    Completely Absent : 3,

Shorter signing-in: 71, 41, 31, 19, 7 minutes.

Responses onto the BBS:

– Attendance check by a student his/herself: 25. One out of 25 was recorded as completely absent. One student did not report the attendance by him?herself but was recorded with 41 minutes attendance. Probably the student came late and left early.

– 1st Questionnaire: 19 students responded. This was not a question but a questionnaire. The students were asked to answer which of the four summer festivals in Japan they want to come and see. The festivals were Nebuta in Aomori, Tanabara in Sendai, Bon-Odori in anywhere, and Fireworks in everywhere. Most of the students prefer fireworks.

– 2nd Quiz: 17 students responded. The quiz was to find a different type of conjunctive particle out of five sentences. Four sentences used “If” type conjunctive particles and only one sentence used “Even-if” type conjunctive particle. The students were asked to find “Even-if” type. All the 17 answers were correct.

– 3rd Quiz: 20 students responded. The quiz was to ask right connections between negative “-nai” and conditional conjunctive particle “-ba”. All the answers were correct.

Attendance check at the end: 20 students responded. This is a quiz to ask the right conjugation of verb ‘iku/ikimasu” for conditional form.

Teaching: 

– Listening to conversation between part time job workers.

– Review on hearsay expressions using “-souda”, “-rashii”. “He/she says”, and “It is said that”

– Feedback about a Test result; A small test was given to students on April 13. The result was explained to the students for further understanding about differences between hearsay and guessing

– Introduction of the conditional conjunctive particle “-ba” and verb conjugations for conditional form

Homework Assignment:  Students were asked to type verb conjugations to conditional forms.There were 30 verbs but 60 answers were required. 30 were conditional forms directly obtained from dictionary forms. 30 were also conditional forms but obtained from potential forms.

Issues and Problems:

I am not sure whether it is standardized teaching or not as to conditional forms that are obtained from potential forms. It might bring a severe confusion to students because it makes students think as if 5-dan conjugation verb were also conjugated to have -reba. Reba ending is only for 1-dan conjugation verbs, Kuru, and Suru (actually Ra-row 5-dan verbs, too). What I thought was simple. It is useful to know conditional forms coming from potential forms because Japanese use very often that kind of conditional forms in conversation.

Date: April 17th on Friday, 2020 from 13:40 to 15:10 (14:40 – 16:10 in JST)

Course: Japanese Conversation 4

Used app: Streaming on DingTalk, Presentation by Powerpoint with 63 slides

Numbers of Students: 28

Fully attendant for 90min : 16,    Completely Absent : 5,

Shorter signing-in: 82, 52, 42, 41, 31, 5minutes, and the shortest was 56 seconds.

Responses onto the BBS:

– Attendance check by a student his/herself: 22.

– 1st Quiz: 17 students responded. The quiz was to talk about several usages of particle “-to”. Selections are as follows: (A) “-to” for Noun1 and Noun2, (B) “-to” for someone whom you do something together with, (C) “-to” for comparison and/or classification, (D) “-to” follows what he/she thought and/or said, and conjunctive particle “-to” for conditioning. This quiz was to make the students choose D.

– 2nd Quiz: 16 students responded. The quiz was not a question but a kind of questionnaire. Students were asked to choose a hearsay from three choices. This was a kind of tips on business.

– 3rd Quiz: 17 students responded. The quiz was to distinguish hearsay or guessing. Probably it was a little grammatical to ask the students at this time. Only two students got correct answers.

– Attendance check at the end: 20 students responded. A correct verb conjugation to fit hearsay “-souda” was asked.

Teaching: 

– Review of conversation using the auxiliary verb “-souda” for hearsay.

– Introduction of the expression “-to itte iru” for “he/she says that -”

– Introduction of the expression “-to iwarete iru” for “it is said that -”

– Introduction of the expression “-ni mieru” for “it seems that – ”

Homework Assignment:

No document need to be submitted this time. The students were asked (1) to do self-check of the small test that was a homework of last class, and (2) to listen to a mp3 that was a conversation between two part time job workers with one being new to the job.

Issues and Problems:

Today’s new expressions were “he/she said that”, “it is said that”, and “it seems that” (in Japanese!). It seems that they can be alternatives for auxiliary verbs “-youda” and “-souda”. In a strict sense, I don’t think they are identical to “youda” and “souda” in the meaning and functions. But in order for the students to do conversation without stopping it, I would like to recommend using those a little bit lengthy but easy and clear  expressions. If you use “youda” and /or “souda”, a difference of just a one letter or two changes the meaning of whole sentence; guessing or hearsay.

Date: April 13th on Monday, 2020 from 8:00 to 9:30 (9:00 – 10:30 in JST)

Course: Japanese Conversation 4

Used app: Streaming on DingTalk, Presentation by Powerpoint with 63 slides

Numbers of Students: 28

Fully attendant for 90min : 16,    Completely Absent : 4,

Shorter signing-in: 85, 84, 84, 73, 37, 23, 11 minutes, and the shortest was 55 seconds.

Responses onto the BBS:

– Attendance check by a student his/herself: 26, but three students were recorded as completely absent

– 1st Quiz: 14 students responded. The quiz was to ask right connections between a Na-adjective and auxiliary verb “-rashii”.

– 2nd Quiz: 18 students responded. The quiz was to tell the difference of hearsay “souda” and guessing “souda”.

– 3rd Quiz: 16 students responded. The quiz was to ask right connections to auxiliary verb “rashii”. One is a negative verb predicate and the other is a  noun.

– Attendance check at the end: 14 students responded. This is a quiz to get to know similarities between hearsay and “It is said that” and between guessing and “I think that”. Of course they are in Japanese.

Teaching: 

– Review of conversation using the auxiliary verb “-rashii” for guess.

– Introduction of the auxiliary verb “-souda” for hearsay

Homework Assignment: Short test of one sheet of A4 paper to ask usage types of “youda”, connections of “rashii”, and miscellanious questions about sentences u4sing auxiliary verbs.

Issues and Problems:

Due to the time limitation, I couldn’t teach “he/she says that” which can be a substitute of hearsay. Five PPT slides were left unused.

Date: April 10th on Friday, 2020 from 13:40 to 15:10 (14:40 – 16:10 in JST)

Course: Japanese Conversation 4

Used app: Streaming on DingTalk, Presentation by Powerpoint with 66 slides

Numbers of Students: 28

Fully attendant for 90min : 16,    Completely Absent : 5,

Shorter signing-in: 81, 80, 64, 44, 6, 2 minutes, and the shortest was 11 seconds.

Responses onto the BBS:

– Attendance check by a student his/herself: 25, but two students were recorded as completely absent

– 1st Quiz: 19 students responded. The quiz was to ask right connections between words and auxiliary verbs “-youda” and “-rashii”.

– 2nd Quiz: 17 students responded. The quiz was to ask a little difference of nuance between auxiliary verbs “-youda” and “-rashii”.

– Attendance check at the end: 16 students responded. This is also a quiz to ask differences among hearsay, guess based on hearsay, and guess by him/hersalf.

Teaching: 

– Review of conversation using of the auxiliary verb “-youda” for guess.

– Introduction of the auxiliary verb “-rashii”

– Review of guessing using “-deshou”. There was not enough time for practicing for this. Some slides were skipped.

Homework Assignment: Completing conversation using guessing “-deshou”

Issues and Problems:

So many. But let me write them when I have time.

Date: April 3rd on Friday, 2020 from 13:40 to 15:10 (14:40 – 16:10 in JST)

Course: Japanese Conversation 4

Used app: Streaming on DingTalk, Presentation by Powerpoint with 73 slides

Numbers of Students: 28

Fully attendant for 90min : 16,    Completely Absent : 3,

Shorter signing-in: 78, 68, 65, 37, 32, 31, 12 minutes, and 1 minute. The shortest was 18 seconds.

Responses onto the BBS:

– Attendance check by a student his/herself: 25, but one student was recorded as completely absent

– 1st Quiz: Only 12 students responded. The quiz was to make a short sentences using guessing “-souda”. I wanted students to use adjectives for emotion, but some used verbs.

– 2nd Quiz: 17 students responded. The quiz was to ask how to pronounce body temperature. The unit for first decimal uses “bu” which is usually pronounced “fun”.

– Attendance check at the end: 18

Teaching: 

– Review of quiz in last class putting emphasis on similarity of the changes of auxiliary verb “-youda” and Na-adjectives. Limitation of guessing “-souda” in time sequence was also explained.

– Feedback for the Homework : The students sent me drafts of conversation between a doctor and a patients. I made comments about speech style between doctor and patients. Additional comments on mother tongue interference through Kanji.

– The main teaching was about guessing “Youda”

– Listening to conversation that contains guessing “-youda” and hearsay “souda”.

Homework Assignment: Completing five sentences conversation using guessing “youda”

Issues and Problems:

This is a conversation class. So my concern is how far I should or may dive into grammatical things about auxiliary verbs “youda”,”souda”, ‘rashii’, and so on..

Date: March 30th on Monday, 2020 from 8:00 to 9:30 (9:00 – 10:30 in JST). This is the first class on 5th week in second semester

Course: Japanese Conversation 4

Used app: Streaming on DingTalk, Presentation by Powerpoint with 64 slides

Numbers of Students: 28

Fully attendant for 90min : 20, Completely Absent : 2,

Late sign-in and/or early sign-out: 74, 71, 42, 32minutes, 35seconds, and the shortest 3 seconds.

Responses onto the BBS:

– Attendance check: 28, all the students wrote “Shusseki” on BBS, however, it is obvious that some students left the class immediately.

– 1st Quiz: 17 responses. Quiz is to tell the difference of speech levels between auxiliary verbs “youda”and “mitaida”.

– Attendance check at the end: 18 responses. This is to ask the meaning of “Kambyou-suru” whose Kanji(s)  have different meaning in Chinese.

Teaching: 

– Auxiliary verb “Mitaida”

– “Noun + rashii” for expressing a typical trait

Homework Assignment: Making a Japanese conversation script by listening to Chinese conversation to see a doctor in a hospital.

Issues and Problems: A lot, but I don’t have time to write them down now.

Date: March 27th on Friday, 2020 from 13:40 to 15:10 (14:40 – 16:10 in JST)

Course: Japanese Conversation 4

Used app: Streaming on DingTalk, Presentation by Powerpoint with 76 slides

Numbers of Students: 28

Fully attendant for 90min : 19,    Completely Absent : 4,

Shorter signing-in: 59, 37, 36, 22minutes, and the shortest was 18seconds.

Responses onto the BBS:

– Attendance check: 25

– 1st Quiz: 18   Quiz is to find the sentence that uses auxiliary verb “Souda” for hearsay among other sentences that use “Souda” for guess.

– 2nd Quiz: 19  Quiz is to tell the similarity of conjugation between “Youda” and “Na-adjectives”

– Attendance check at the end: 18     This was also done in the form of quiz that requires to select the right combination for connections between (1) Adjective”Ii” and “Souda” for guess, and (2) Adjective “Ii” and “Youda”.

Teaching: 

– Auxiliary verb “Youda”

Homework Assignment: No homework at this time

Issues and Problems:

The number of PPT slides were more than what I could use in a class of 90 minutes. That meant I wasted hours for preparation for those slides. I should have predict how many slides could be used in 90 minutes class. In order to make prediction accurate, I should have measured how many minutes and seconds each slide would take and calculated total number of slides.