The phonics program started at an elementary school in Kumano, Mie in 2019 as a pilot project. When the first group of students matriculated to the secondary level in 2020, the Jolly Phonics approach, which was designed for younger learners, was modified to fit the junior high students’ language abilities and intellectual levels. Teaching phonics in English and phonics exercises are some of the modifications employed as part of the junior high school format.

As the use of digital technology continues to increase, the types of communicative competencies that are needed in this digital era are also evolving. Focusing on young people born after 2000 (whom I refer to as the “digital generation”), I address how they use digital technologies today and what kinds of communicative abilities are called for in this new era of advancing digital technology.

This study investigated English teacher motivation in Japanese secondary schools. Participants were two male Japanese teachers of English and their students. Data was collected through interviews, classroom observations, and focus-group interviews with students in one academic year. The findings showed that each teacher had unique motivation, and this was reflected in their teaching. Students also understood what teachers focused on. The study showed that teacher motivation can influence their teaching and their students.

Assistant language teachers (ALTs) entering the Japan Exchange and Teaching (JET) Programme serve in a role that ranges from language model to international communicator. As the native model of English education becomes less important globally, ALTs role in the classroom shifts. In this study, interviews with former JET ALTs were conducted to understand perceptions of teaching philosophy and teacher development before and after entering JET. Findings are interpreted in terms of recommendations for teacher training.

The use of dual-language authentic material in storytelling for English language learning is well understood. Though some studies have focused on the use of bilingual children’s books as authentic material, less is known about the effects of student-produced dual-language authentic material on early English language development. In this presentation, the presenter aims to explore how junior high school students make use of these materials in their language development.

In this session, I will briefly report on a school filmmaking project I organised. This showcase session will show attendees just how creative and video savvy our students can be if given the chance to freely express their talents using these skills and talents. At the end (time permitting) we will open the floor for further comments and discussion. Links to guides for how attendees can mirror this approach will also be provided.

In this hands-on workshop, participants will learn the techniques and digital tools for designing and implementing lessons on visual storytelling in the ESL classroom. The workshop looks at the stages of storytelling from brainstorming, storyboarding, scriptwriting, recording, and editing to producing student-centered short films. Participants will leave the session with techniques for implementing visual storytelling in their lessons as well as their own handcrafted visual story to share with their students.

In pair- and group-work, teachers often do not recognize how their students communicate or complete given tasks because the teacher cannot be present in all the groups. This conversation analysis (CA) aims to explore how high school students perform given tasks without their teacher's intervention. The results suggested that students attempt to achieve tasks if they clearly comprehended the purpose of the task, while avoiding tasks for which the purpose is unclear.

This corpus-based research investigates vocabulary taught in Japanese EFL senior high school textbooks. Results show that most vocabulary words appearing in textbooks are what native speakers often use, indicating that Japanese EFL learners can be exposed to high-frequency words in the real world by using textbooks. However, textbooks cannot suffice in order for learners to read English texts intended for native speakers.

In this session, one student from each of the grade levels I teach (junior high school 2nd- and 3rd-years, and, and high school 1st-, 2nd-, and 3rd-year) will take part as panelists in a symposium. They will talk about their experiences as learners with a specific focus on teacher feedback as well as some other issues.

This presentation will describe an exploratory study conducted in Japan and Nepal of lower secondary school students and their teachers who engage in PBL projects they create collaboratively through a learning server that also includes channels for learner autonomy and professional development. Specifically, we will share strategies for empowering teachers through cross-cultural professional development and collaboration. We believe such strategies will strongly enhance students’ language learning for their empowerment.

There is increasing pressure to equip students with global skills and to be able to use English. This presentation details a project-based communication task for junior high school students in one school. Also, the elements that facilitated how the project was adapted from an out-of-class oral research project to an in-class collaborative written communication project in response to the limitations imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic will be highlighted.

A controversial English-only policy for teaching English was recently introduced to junior high schools. This presentation shows the analysis of the policy-making process, with a focus on policy makers’ differing positions toward English education and the English-only policy. The analysis revealed a complex process in which those positions were conflated in the English-only policy, while the position prioritizing oral communication in English education became prominent, portraying political struggles in developing Japan’s English education policy.

Although there is an apparent need for scrutiny of the lived experiences of foreign assistant language teachers (ALTs) in their situated contexts, research addressing them has been insufficient. This study explored, via narrative interviews, the identities and their constructions of 25 ALTs in the JET Programme. The findings revealed that the gestalt of ALT identity comprises two primary categories: foreigner identity and dabbler identity, and their six incumbent sub-identities (e.g., sojourner and greenhorn).

To the best of the presenter’s knowledge, no studies (in English) have been found on ALTs specific impacts at the prefectural level concerning English language outcomes in Shizuoka. The study’s findings showed that teaching methods continue to be influenced by traditional teaching methods; however, there is some effort to integrate more communicative approaches. For more positive impacts, there is a need for clarity across schools about ALTs’ job roles and functions.

An online international exchange program was implemented to enhance students’ willingness to communicate (WTC) as an extracurricular activity in a public junior high school. Discussion and reflection after each one of three sessions revealed how the nine students viewed academic English and what they want to learn in school. In order to support the qualitative data, the WTC questionnaire was distributed and analyzed to capture the changes in three sessions.

Textbooks play a key role for input and practice of knowledge about language use, especially in an EFL context. This study explores beginner level ELT textbooks to determine how the commonly recurring speech acts of giving advice, suggesting proposals, giving offers, and requesting in ELT textbooks are treated in the tasks. In the end, some practical suggestions are made as to how teachers can adapt these tasks for pragmatic instruction.

This presentation outlines what was learned as my preparations for a year of research into establishing a small professional learning community (PLC) to retain tech knowledge were altered over a 24-hour period when the COVID lockdown was announced. Suddenly I was standing up with administration as the entire school was forced to join my tiny PLC and we rode the wave into Google Classroom as an LMS, developing online conferences and interactions for our students.

Extensive reading and creative writing are two activities that can be both enjoyable and motivating for students. With the objective of combining the two, a semester-long project was piloted in which students were tasked with writing their own graded readers. Despite multiple challenges, the result was successful. The presenters will discuss the process that was used, share some samples, and explain how the project will be expanded in the future.

For students who use English as a second language, the “speaking” skill is usually placed after reading, writing, and listening. This is not due to the priorities in actual life communication needs, but largely due to the exam-driven educational systems in Asia. In this forum, we will introduce an 8-week long Youth Leadership Program which prepares children and teenagers to speak English in public through various leadership role designs.

This study reports the professional experiences of three immigrant Chinese language teachers (ICLTs) regarding their professional acculturation into the Singapore education system. This study investigates how the ICLTs constructed their teaching identities through the negotiation of their positionality in their daily working life at school. The research findings indicate that healthy acculturation of the ICLTs required efforts to be made by both sides - ICLTs and members of the host school community.

What teaching techniques are being used by Japanese teachers of English in high schools? To what extent are these techniques achieving the goals set by MEXT? What can be done to improve the quality of English language teaching in Japan? All these questions and more will be answered in this presentation of an exciting and innovative research project conducted in high schools across Japan in 2020.