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Oxford University Press News

Dear colleagues,

Oxford University Press is pleased to announce that we will be holding a free series of practical presentations in Osaka, Nagoya and Tokyo on the following dates.

The presentations will be conducted by renowned authors and presenters including the author of the brand new Passport second edition, Angela Buckingham, and evaluation consultant, author and popular presenter Grant Trew.

Please visit http://www.oupjapan.co.jp/events/index.shtml for pre-registration and more details.



教育者の皆様

オックスフォード大学出版局では、大阪・名古屋・東京にてOxford Teaching Seminarを以下の日程で開催いたします。

弊社新刊 Passport Second Editionの著者Angela Buckingham氏 や、数々の教材制作を手がけトレーナーとしても定評のある Grant Trew氏など、英語教育の分野で活躍する講師陣によるプレゼンテーションを予定しています。授業に役立つ指導のヒントが詰まったこのセミナーに、ぜひご参加ください。

詳細およびご予約方法については、弊社ウェブサイト http://www.oupjapan.co.jp/events/index_jp.shtml を覧ください。


------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
◆Oxford Teaching Seminar Osaka

Date: Tuesday, November 17th
Time: 18:30 - 20:40
Venue: TKP Osaka Umeda Business Center, Conference 9B
http://www.tkpumeda.net/access/index.html

◆Oxford Teaching Seminar Nagoya

Date: Wednesday, November 18th
Time: 18:30 - 20:40
Venue: Sakae Gas Building, 5F Dai-Kaigishitsu
http://www.gasbldg.net/gashall/sakae.pdf

◆Oxford Teaching Seminar Tokyo - in association with Aston University, Toyo Gakuen University, and JALT West Tokyo

Date: Thursday, November 19th
Time: 18:00 - 21:10
Venue: Toyo Gakuen Daigaku, Room 1302
http://www.tyg.jp/e/other_information/access_information.html
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If you have any questions, please feel free to contact us at elt.japan@oup.com
ご不明な点は、elt.japan@oup.com までお問合わせ下さい。


Oxford University Press
オックスフォード大学出版局

ETJ Events

The ETJ English Language Teaching Expos
______________________________________________

Sun Nov 8:
Tohoku Fukushi University, Sendai

Sun Nov 29:
Seifu High School, Osaka

Sun Dec 6:
Seinan Gakuin University, Fukuoka

http://www.eltnews.com/ETJ/events/expos.shtml

______________________________________________
The JALT Conference
______________________________________________

Nov 21-23
Granship Center, Shizuoka
http://jalt.org/conference

______________________________________________
FULL CALENDAR OF EVENTS
______________________________________________
Nov 7

KITAKYUSHU, Fukuoka -- November 7 (Sat) 18:00-20:30
The Differing Theories of SLA
Speaker(s): Matthew J. Jenkins
Kitakyushu ETJ
http://www.eltcalendar.com/events/details/4566

______________________________________________
Nov 8

SENDAI, Miyagi -- November 8 (Sun) 9:00-18:00
Tohoku ELT Expo
Speaker(s): Various
Sendai ETJ
http://www.eltcalendar.com/events/details/4511

OMIYA, Saitama -- November 8 (Sun) 14:15-16:00
JALT Omiya Member Presentations
Speaker(s): Kyoko Suzuki and Jun Harada
Omiya JALT
http://www.eltcalendar.com/events/details/4580

______________________________________________
Nov 14

TOKYO -- November 14 (Sat) 10:20-17:00
The World of Children's Book Publishing
Speaker(s): Alvina Ling
SCBWI
http://www.eltcalendar.com/events/details/4577

______________________________________________
Nov 15

OKAYAMA -- November 15 (Sun) 14:00-16:00
The functional literacy theory and the contextual learning theory as applied to English language learning
Speaker(s): April Mella-Alcazar
Okayama JALT
http://www.eltcalendar.com/events/details/4554

______________________________________________
Nov 18

NAGASAKI -- November 18 (Wed) 18:30-20:30
Functional literacy and contextual learning theories applied to English language learning
Speaker(s): April Alcazar, the Balsamo Asian Scholar/Four Corners national tour guest presenter
Nagasaki JALT
http://www.eltcalendar.com/events/details/4571

______________________________________________
Nov 19

TOKYO -- November 19 (Thu) 18:00-21:10
Oxford Teaching Seminar 2009
Speaker(s): Angela Buckingham, Grant Trew, Sue Garton, Andy Boon
West Tokyo JALT
http://www.eltcalendar.com/events/details/4576

______________________________________________
Nov 21-23

SHIZUOKA -- November 21 (Sat)
JALT2009: 35th Annual International Conference
National JALT
http://www.eltcalendar.com/events/details/4379

______________________________________________
Nov 26

KOBE, Hyogo -- November 26 (Thu) 10:40-13:20
Towards Global Excellence in Foreign Language Education: Technology and Classroom interaction
Speaker(s): Neomy Storch, Bruno Vannieu, Bill Perry, Greg Sholdt
Kobe University
http://www.eltcalendar.com/events/details/4567

______________________________________________
Nov 29

OSAKA -- November 29 (Sun) 9:30-17:30
Kansai ETJ Expo
Speaker(s): Variety of speakers (call for participation due October 1st, 2009)
Kyoto ETJ
http://www.eltcalendar.com/events/details/4518

OITA -- November 29 (Sun) 18:30-20:30
ETJ-Oita / Oita JALT Year End Workshop
Speaker(s): Simon Weedon, Etsuko Minami, Lindsay Mack, Sean Chidlow
Oita ETJ
http://www.eltcalendar.com/events/details/4578

______________________________________________
Dec 6

FUKUOKA -- December 6 (Sun) 9:30-17:30
Kyushu ELT Expo 2009
Speaker(s): Various Speakers (call for presentations due Oct 31)
Fukuoka ETJ
http://www.eltcalendar.com/events/details/4528

Make your own blog for students and teachers

Make your own blog

Edublogs is very good and makes an attractive blog. I used it to make a TEFL blog
a few years ago.

GEOS in Trouble

GEOS`s website for Japan has been showing gibberish for some time now. Now this from

Wikipedia:

"Recent economic woes have lead Geos to be late paying the Japanese staff in August and September 2009. It is further reported that foreign teachers working at the adult schools were not paid on time in October 2009. Geos is currently asking clients to pay as much as 5 months in advance for the following year's lessons in a bid to raise the necessary funds to meet payroll obligations. This financial distress has led many Japanese staff members to resign.^[7]"
^{--from Wikipedia}

Labor issues

"An article in The Japan Times noted the deplorable working conditions of GEOS staff. In 1999, the company was taken to court by fourteen of its managers over unpaid overtime. At the time of the case, the main plaintiff said that she was working a 72-hour week under constant unmanageable pressure to increase sales at her school. Even though the managers won their suit, costing GEOS 300 million yen in unpaid overtime, the media mostly overlooked the case. In the same article, managers noted high staff-turnover and long working hours. However, a spokeswoman for the company insisted that GEOS, and the language learning industry as a whole, provided women with rare opportunities to begin business careers.^[6]"--from Wikipedia

My wife works overtime unpaid at least three hours a day and
this is at a public junior high school in Japan.

No the lousy working conditions in Japan are not only at GEOS, they are across the spectrum,
in all industries and professions.

This country is crazy when it comes to work, and we have a high suicide rate to show for all
of this stress.

Start your own School in Japan

Open your own School in Japan!



I did, and God knows if I did you certainly can eh!

So if you stay in Japan long term, you may wish to join the growing ranks of entrepreneurs that open their own schools here.
There`s an ETJ Group at Yahoo Groups devoted entirely to this topic.



I opened Kevin`s in 1991, two years after arriving in Japan. I had kept my eyes open, I had worked for a few different schools at that point. I had gotten a feel for what worked and what didn`t. I felt fairly confident I could open my own school.

You can too!



I encourage you to consider opening your own school or other business in Japan. Japan badly needs new people and new ideas.
Foreigners bring both into Japan when they come and stay. We
make Japan a better and more interesting place. White rice is good but rice mixed with meat and vegetables is healthier and will make you stronger.


Frankly I don`t recommend it as a business and it isn`t a good way to get rich.
It is a pretty good life though.


Just don`t open near me!

ESL/EFL News

Read the latest ESL/EFL News

Read More

*A Call for articles

*Latest Events

*Associations

The best time to learn a foreign language?

"The best time to learn a foreign language: Between birth and age 7. Missed that window? New research is showing just how children’s brains can become bilingual so easily, findings that scientists hope eventually could help the rest of us learn a new language a bit easier.

“We think the magic that kids apply to this learning situation, some of the principles, can be imported into learning programs for adults,” says Dr Patricia Kuhl of the University of Washington, who is part of an international team now trying to turn those lessons into more teachable technology."

--Associated Press

ILC Sugamo, Distributor of EFL Press Books in Japan

To whom it may concern,

This is Katsumi Ota from ILC Ltd., which is a sales agency of EFL Press, a publisher of English textbooks specially designed for the Japanese market.



EFL’s textbooks are developed exclusively for English teachers in Japan and Japanese students. Therefore, the textbooks are filled with content both necessary and effective for Japanese English learners. There is a wide range of publications which covers a wide range of English levels and student needs. Actually, EFL Press textbooks are divided into three categories; Conversation, Speaking & Listening/Conversation, and Writing. We are confident you will find that EFL Press texts produce much better results compared to other commercially produced courses since they are very user-friendly and specifically designed for Japanese students. Also, we are very proud of the fact that a number of famous and prestigious universities and colleges in Japan have already adopted EFL Press textbooks. Please reference “Examples of 2009 Spring Adoption”http://www.ilcsugamo.com/japanese/09adplist.pdf If you would like to know more about the content of EFL Press textbooks or EFL Press itself, please visit the company website; (http://www.eflpress.com). If you have any inquiries, please feel free to reach out to our points of contact using the information provided below. We thank you for your consideration and look forward to meeting your specific requirements.

Points of Contact

Mr. Kazuo Yoshimura: yoshimura@ilcsugamo.comMr. Katsumi Ota: ota-k@ilcsugamo.comILC Limitedhttp://www.ilcsugamo.com3-25-2, Sugamo, Toshima-ku, Tokyo 170-0002TEL: 03-3940-2821 FAX: 03-3940-2831

ILC

ケビンズ英会話スク-ル英語教材御担当様 突然メールを差し上げ、失礼いたします。株式会社アイエルシーの太田と申します。弊社は、日本人向け英語学習教材を出版しているEFL Pressの販売代理店でございます。 EFL Pressのテキストは、日本人に英語を教える先生および日本人の学習者のみにターゲットを絞って開発されているため、英語を学ぶ日本人が必要とする要素をふんだんに取り入れた内容となっています。英会話テキスト、スピーキング＆リスニング・会話テキスト、ライティングテキストの3種類のカテゴリ別に、様々な学習レベル・ニーズに対応したテキストをご用意しています。 御覧いただければ、EFLのテキストがいかに日本人学習者にとって取り組みやすく、効果的に作成されているかがお解りいただけるかと存じます。すでに多くの有名大学・専門学校の先生方にご採用いただいている実績もございます。 2009年春期採用例http://www.ilcsugamo.com/japanese/09adplist.pdfを御覧ください。 テキストの内容およびEFL Pressについて更に詳しくお知りになりたい場合は、下記ウェブサイトを御覧ください。 http://www.ilcsugamo.com/japanese/efl.htm ご質問等ございましたら、下記の弊社担当者までどうぞお気軽にお問い合わせください。御検討いただければ幸いです。ご連絡をお待ちいたしております。 株式会社アイエルシーhttp://www.ilcsugamo.com〒170-0002 東京都豊島区巣鴨3-25-2 岡ビル3FTEL: 03-3940-2821 FAX: 03-3940-2831担当者名吉村：yoshimura@ilcsugamo.com太田：ota-k@ilcsugamo.com

Stories from the Past

Atsugi & ECC: Craig Hits the Canadian Teachers


Atsugi,Kanagawa


In late January, I had confided to Craig that I would be leaving for Kanagawa Prefecture and Ikumi. I wanted to give them a couple of months to find my replacement. On March 30th, I handed in my official letter of resignation. In it I told them they should warn all new teachers and students about Craig; and raise the starting salary, a salary that hadn't been raised in many years, and was one of the lowest in Nagoya at the time.



Craig had punched me in the back and reputedly spanked another
teacher. I know unbelievable. I often think real life is much stranger than a novel. Why did Chris punch me in the back
and spank the other teacher? We had forgotten that he didn`t
like to be touched. For that we were assaulted.



Some people are really "touchy" (sorry couldn`t resist) about things.



In my heart, I knew they would never warn students about Craig, and hoped he wouldn't do the same to a student as he had done to Brenda and I.



It would be great to be with Ikumi more, and live in a different part of the country. The thought of being able to go into Tokyo sometimes was also intriguing.



I moved on March 30th and my new home was Hon Atsugi, a city of about 400,000 souls, 50 minutes south of Tokyo. My 4 year old apartment was a rokujo or six tatami mat flat. There was one room about 3 and a half metres square. There was a hallway that doubled as a kitchen leading to the room and off the hallway was a tiny unit bath with a toilet. I was about 15-20 minutes walk from the main ECC school I would work at. There was no air conditioner and I didn't feel like paying the huge amount of money I would have had to pay to buy one.



In the summer I had the experience of having a sauna right in my apartment. My boss at ECC was very impressed that I came to work one hour early everyday. I never told him it was because ECC was air conditioned. He didn't need to know!



Hon Atsugi seemed like a cheap imitation of an American city, without the parks and large trees. It was near to many beautiful places though. You could go hiking in the Tanzawa mountains only thirty minutes away by bus.



Chigasaki, a small beach community was nearby. It was home to many famous singers, and artisans, not to mention surf loving Aussies. Enoshima another nice beach town and interesting island was just up the coast from Chigasaki. Hon Atsugi boasted a brand new library with free English movies. I was to love that! Oiso too was a nice little beach town and I was within one hour of Tokyo or Yokohama and close to Ikumi as well.



So I managed to land a job with what was then the largest English school chain in Japan. I was paid 276,000 Yen per month which was pretty good for 20 hours of work per week and being 27 years old! I picked up some private lessons on my own and in four months, I proudly sent home over 10,000 dollars to Canada! In my second year with ECC, my salary went up to 296,000 Yen and with my private lessons I made around 350,000 Yen per month. My rent was only 45,000/month and I could live very cheaply if I wanted to. I was able to save a lot.



I worked a twelve hour teaching day on Tuesdays. I got up at 4 AM, staggered to the train station, and took the earliest train to Tokyo so I could get a seat and sleep. I taught in the fashionable area, Shibuya from 7-9AM, then took the train back to Hon Atsugi, was picked up by my private student and she drove me to my apartment where I taught her for the next hour, I ate lunch, then a Korean couple came by for their lesson from 1-3PM. From 5:20-9:20 I taught at the ECC in Hon Atsugi and after that I taught a doctor and his wife. It was a 30,000 Yen day. It was a killer day but I enjoyed counting the money.



One reason I chose to work for ECC was the fact that I would have my days free. I have always been into more and more freedom. ECC offered a good salary and reputation. The fact that I only had to show up for four hours per night, was also a major attraction. The longer you are in Japan, the more opportunities come your way. If you hustle, you can pick up private lessons on your own as I mentioned. When teachers leave for home, they often have students they need taught. When Mary Ellen left for the States, she mentioned that the Machida YMCA would need to replace her. She put in a good word for me and I ended up with another two mornings of work per week at good pay. The manager was a great guy. Mr. Minamida had lived in Vancouver, and knew Westerners well. He was a great boss and I learned a lot about how to manage from his laid back style. The YMCA had no time clock. You didn't need to punch a time card as you did at ECC. They seemed to trust their teachers more and treated them with more respect.



ECC was an interesting place to work. There were so many different characters there. My constantly sick boss Mr. Suzuki was there 6 days a week at lower pay than the foreign teachers. He was a nice enough man, but I never got to know him very well, although I enjoyed working for him. I really wanted to land a good job near Ikumi, and after striking out in Odawara, the nearest major city to her, I interviewed at other schools. I figured that it was probably pretty rare for a Westerner to walk in the door all dressed up, and asking about employment, as we were relatively far from Tokyo. By doing so, I hoped to make a bit of a splash.



Mr. Suzuki was suitably impressed when I waltzed in, in my tailored suit with my "Japanese fiance." The fiancé part really was a lie. We had no firm plans to marry, but we were both thinking of heading in that direction, but needed more time to get to know each other. I figured the Japanese fiancé part, would further my chances for the job, and I really didn't mind calling Ikumi my fiancé, and she didn't either.



Mr. Suzuki and I had a long talk and he seemed interested in me. He told me to talk with ECC's head office, and I had the impression that he would too.



A few weeks later I went to Shinjuku in Tokyo for an intense interview at ECC's head office. I was interviewed by a couple of staff from the Personnel Section, and then given thirty minutes to prepare a lesson. I felt good about the lesson I taught to my fellow interviewee and I was hired shortly after. I was so happy to get the chance to work for this famous school, and to be near Ikumi!

Overseas Teaching Jobs

Are you interested in teaching in Japan? If so, check out the jobs we have listed.