Toyohashi University of Technology,
Institute for Global Network Innovation inTechnology Education

News from QC（Vol.6 2014/11/10）

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Reports

New York Life

Shin-ichi Akazawa, National Institute of Technology, Nagaoka CollegeNY life
Do you want to know the “Real New

priority entrance tickets easily using theYork Life”? This article will present New

website. Don’t forget to buy a Metro Card

York to you from a personal perspective.

when you go to Manhattan!

The card

allows one to ride the subway and theAround the QC Collegebus.

There are three different types ofsupermarkets around QC. The mostLet’s enjoy conversation!

recommended supermarkert as indicatedIn order to improve our conversational

by No.1 on the map is “Seasons” because

English, the group meets at a restaurant

it has a good atmosphere and is close toto converse. One of the scary and best

QC (20 minutes on foot). The second one

methods

is a convenient place which has an homespeaking skills is to call a restaurant andimprovement center, a grocery center,reserve a table for dinner.

and a PC store. The third place is an
Asian supermarket where we can buy
Asian food. Chinatown is a little far fromQC (40 minutes by bus) but it feels likeone is in Asia instead of New York.
Furthermore, there is a famous dumpling
restaurant whose "SHORONPO" is thebest food I ate in my life.
Speaking of New York?
Manhattan is one of the most famous
tourist destinations and is close to QC
College. There are a lot of activities to do
in Manhattan, such as sightseeing theStatue of Liberty, night view of theskyscrapers, observing the sculptures at
the Metropolitan Museum of Art, andwatching Broadway shows in Manhattan.
In Queens, you can enjoy watching major
league baseball at Citi Field, and watch
theGrandSlamUSOpentennis

tournaments nearby Citi Field. You mayask, how does one get a ticket? A website
is one of the places we can use ourEnglish skills! You can get a discount or5topractice

yourEnglish

We especially have the chance toexperience because of this project. These

improve our conversational English whenexperiences are helpful for us faculty

we leave our dormitory. One of the best

members, especially when we take ourfeelings I

students abroad.

experienced was whenIcheered for my favorite baseball teamwith local people. These are some of thefascinatingaspects

thatwegotto

Natural English
Toru Okawara, National Institute of Technology, Kitakyushu CollegeIn

this letter, I

relationships

introduce someandyellow stuff” like these. It sounds wild,

personality. In Japan, we do have “how-to”

doesn’t it? And he is like a meister whobooks

Englishmight be loved by Japanese people.

phrases in classroom. We might be able toAnother Ph.D. student uses a phrase,

make English only classes. Eventually,“let’s say…” very often and he never say

all teachers and students will speak“stuff”. Anyway, this phrase means “let’s

totally identical, colorless English. First

assume this as …”, or “for example, …”.

of all, what I’d like you to understand is

Whenever he and I discuss something, hethat there are none of the same types ofuse the phrase once in three minutes.

Japanese

totally

Even though it means “for example”, I’ve

identical tone, expression, formality, andnever heard other phrases that have theeven grammar. English as well. If wesimilar meaning when I talk to him. A

want to learn natural English, we should

master course student says “you know, …”goourselves.

in conversation. “You know” is frequently

Fortunately, we are in this situation. One

spoken everywhere in conversation. Thisof our missions is bringing back theserves as a filler and similar to “Well… “,invaluable experience and teaching toand “Uh… ”. But he uses the phrase as another teachers as many as we can.

abbreviation of “Do you know?” At first, I

thatabroad

betweendescribe

teachersandwording

deficient carbonyl carbon”, “I’ve gotusefulwholearn

usesbyI usually talk to around 10 native

couldn’t catch what he meant. I justspeakers in both lectures and laboratory

nodded unconsciously but he were asking

works. I sometimes just listen to theirsomething.

conversation. All of them use different

Let’s say, we are in a class. During thetypes of English in terms of wording andclass, if a student answers a quiz and it isgrammar. I can’t go over everythingcorrect, what could you say? According tobecause of the limitation of this paper soan English textbook in Japan, “That’s

I’m going to explain some of them. Oneright” is a good feedback. I learned theresearcher, who works with me in thephrase when I was a Jr. High student.

laboratory, often uses “guy” or “stuff”. For

However, let’s say, if I use the phrase

example, “this guy attacks to the electron

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hundreds of times, then I become a boringteacher.

Intheactualclassroom,students. I often hear “Am I done?”. InAmerican teachers do use “Good”, “Great”,

this context, “done” is an adjective, not a“Perfect”, “Wonderful”, “Awesome”, “I love

past participle. For instance, “3 ÷ 2 = 1 …

that”, “Terrific”, “Cool”, “Yes, right”,

Am I done?” like this. It’s not enough,“Correct”, “Good job” and so on. I’ve heard

right? 3 ÷ 2 = 1 reminder 1, I guess. The

ten or more variety of feedback phrases

wording is totally dependent on teachers

from teachers. Next, if the student’s

and these simple but natural English

answer is correct and we want to ask amake teachers special.

reason or a logic, what would you say? I

I regard these natural English as

feel like to say “why?” or “how come?” butuseful phrases. If we can’t use the natural

these aren’t good choices because theseEnglish in classroom as we do inquestion words are used when someone

Japanese, we lose personality and finally,says something and it doesn’t make sense.

become a boring teacher. The last two

In this situation, American teachers

more months, we will correct further

might say “how did you know that”. Thisnatural English and make a superior

never hurt the student’s mind. Even

database for other teachers who want toteachers

conduct English only lectures.

arewriting

somethingonwhiteboard, they intend to ask their

Toyohashi University of Technology
Institute for Global Network Innovation in Technology Education
Center for International Education
1-1, Hibarigaoka, Tempaku-cho, Toyohashi, Aichi, Japan
Tel:+81-532-81-5161
Mail:unireform@office.tut.ac.jp

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