
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May 2017

Volume 24

Newsletter of t h e Le a rn e r D e v e l o pme nt SI G
Introduction

1

Message from the Coordinators

3

Member Profiles

5

LD Connect

47

LD Sig News49

Why Do I Learn and Teach English?

8

Do You Remember the First Time …

Mina Hirano

Rob J. Y. Lee

10 Sensei, My Major Has Nothing to Do withEnglishMichiyo Masui

1127

29 Studying Makes Your Prospects Brilliant
Mitsui Hirano

29

Get Togethers

32

Daniel Hooper

Focus On16

The Realization of Goal setting and
the Necessity of Guidance

20

Reader Responses to The
Realization of Goal Setting and theNecessity of Guidance

34 K2W - Kansai to the World: Promoting
Learner Engagement About International
IssuesAnita Aden, Ann Flanagan,
Yoshio Nakai, Shuji Narita, Agnes Patko,
Jennifer Teeter , Katherine Thornton

Yusei AndoLD Grants Update

40

The Storytime Project

42

Reflections on and Takeaways fromRob Stevenson and Ben Thanyawatpotkin

23“Taking the Elephant by the Tusks”: A
Review of Assessment and Autonomy in
Language Learning
Alison Stewart

Tokyo Get-together Report: Making
Plans Together for 2017
Andy Barfield, Ian Hurrell,
Jenny Morgan, Ken Ikeda

It’s Good to be the JackMark Pileggi

Participating in CCLT3: A Sense ofAchievement
Debjani Ray

DIANE JACOB

14

Reflections about Co-creating
Criticality and Creativity
Jenny Morgan

Perceived Self-efficacy: Building theConfidence to Speak

12 A Storm in a Booth: Learner Autonomy inJapanese and eikaiwa

ld-sig.org

Reflections

Members‘ Voices

7

Issue One

Nathaniel Carney

JALT 2016

DANIEL HOUGHAM
ISSN 1882-1103

LEARNING LEARNING 

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

INTRODUCTION
As Golden Week approaches and thewarmer spring weather has started to movein, we hope that you all can relax and take abreak from what has been a busy start to a
new school year. In that spirit, we would
like to extend a very warm welcome to the2017 Spring Issue of Learning Learning! In
this issue, we have brought together anumber of articles that look back on someinteresting events in 2016.
In Members’ Voices, Mina Hirano, Rob Lee,
Michiyo Masui, Diane Jacob, Daniel Hooperand Mark Pileggi share from theirexperience and practice, in articles thatreflect their insight and their sense of
humour.
Reflections brings together the observationsof members who participated in theCreating Communities: Learning Together 3(CCLT3) held this past December as theylook back on what they took away from thissuccessful event.
Get Together reports on the successfulorganization of both the Tokyo GetTogethers and the Kansai to the World
student conference. Organizers examine thesuccesses and challenges associated withorganizing each event and discuss possible
directions these events will take in 2017.
In this issue’s Focus On, we provide asample of what to expect in our upcoming
Summer Issue. Yusei Ando shares his ideas
on goal setting and learner motivation,
which are commented on by readers, Rob
Stevenson and Ben Thanyawatpokin.

SPRING 2017

In addition, Alison Stewart reviews andanalyses Carol Everhard and Linda
Murphy’s (Eds.) Assessment and Autonomy
in Language Learning, which provides atheoretical underpinning and practical
approach to examining the relationshipbetween assessment and learner autonomy.
In our LD Grants Update section, 2016’s
Learner Development Grant recipients,
Nathaniel Carney and Daniel Hougham
share their experiences developing a English
Storytime program for local libraries(Nathaniel Carney) and the transformative
effect of attending JALT 2016 (Daniel
Hougham).
With so much to read, we hope that you will
also get a chance to look at the message
from LD SIG coordinators Matthew Porterand Mayumi Abe, who share with us someof the changes that have taken place within
the SIG committee, a quick update on the
progress of ILA 2018 from Steve Brown
and of course, get acquainted with our new
publicity coordinator, Nicole Gallagher and2017’s LD PANSig Grant recipient Farrah
Hasnain in the Member’s Profile section.
Don’t forget to look at LD Connect andstay up-to-date with LD SIG events
happening around you!
So, sit back, relax, and happy reading!
Arnold F. Arao
Editor, Learning Learning
May 1, 2017

INTRODUCTION

1LEARNING LEARNING 

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

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and Linda Murphy’s の 著、評価と学習者オートノミーの関係について理論的解釈と実践的なアプローチが述べられたAssessment andAutonomy in Language Learning について Alison Stewart の書評が載っています。LD GRANTS では、2016 年度学習者ディベロップメ
ント SIG 助成金受賞者のSPRING 2017

INTRODUCTION

2LEARNING LEARNING 

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

MESSAGEFROM
COORDINATORSTHE

W

ith the arrival of spring, educators
in Japan watch their soon-to-beformer students graduate and a
few weeks later, as the cherry blossoms
vibrantly color the tree-lined paths nearschool, welcome fresh-faced and eager
students. Anyone who has managed to stayin Japan as an educator longer than one year
also knows that this period between Marchand April is a time for people to migrate. At
work, this means that that supportive staff
member who had a talent for operating
every piece of equipment in the CALL lab
and also comprehended how these pieces fit
to support better learning opportunities,
gets moved to the Admissions Office. The
department head or principal retires. A
beloved colleague moves to a different
school or a different country. And the SIG
is no different as we shuffle to new jobs,
take on new roles in other facets of our lives,
or just decide we need to slow down.
With much gratitude, and a tinge of sadness,
we must bid farewell to some fine people
we’ve had the pleasure of working on thecommittee as they graduate and move on.
First, we’d like to acknowledge Lee Arnold
and Joël Laurier from the Program Team.
Lee served for two years as the head of theProgram Team. Joel Laurier has bravely
decided to take on a new role in JALT,
helping to coordinate collaborations
between and among SIGs and chapters.
Next, we’d like to express our deep gratitude
to the outgoing Publicity Team: Kie
Yamamoto, Tomoko Imamura, and teamleader Rob Moreau. Rob has kindly offered
to continue in the role of illustrator and weare thankful that we will still be able to callupon him to provide us with his creative
designs.
In local news, the get-together teams haveexperienced some major changes as wellsince the AGM in November. Perhaps thebiggest change is the temporary departure of
Ken Ikeda who has been an integral part of
SPRING 2017

the Tokyo Get-Togethers since 2012,
graciously hosting the meetings as well as
the Creating Community mini-conference at
his university. We cannot thank Ken enoughand we'd like to wish him a refreshing andproductive sabbatical. In Kyoto, Anita Aden
had to step away from the Kansai GetTogether Team, which she had led for the
past year, and we hope to see her back again
when her schedule permits. The SIG is
grateful for all her support with the Kansai
group.
Volunteers have come forward to fill thegaps left by their departures, some totallynew to the committee and others agreeing
to take on new or expanded roles, and weare extremely grateful. Blair Barr steppedback from his role on this team to take overthe Program Team, which welcomes newteam members Daniel Hooper and Rob
Morel. If you happen to attend a forum at
PanSIG (Akita) in May, JALTCALL in June
(Matsuyama), or JALT2017 in November(Tsukuba), please welcome them and lavish
them with praise. Nicole Gallagher has
volunteered to head the new Publicity Team.
Nicole is already working with thecommittee to develop a monthly news
update to help members keep abreast of allof the SIG-related deadlines, publication
releases, and upcoming events. Ian Hurrell
and Jenny Morgan have joined the Tokyo
Get-Together team as it begins meeting atdifferent locations in Tokyo, and Agnes
Patko, who joined the Kansai Get-Together
team from Tokyo in April 2016, and will
now be organizing the meetings. We areconfident that this year will be anotheractive and productive year for the Tokyoand Kansai groups.
We cannot say thank you enough to all of
the members who have supported andcontributed to the development of our SIG.
We hope that the LD SIG will always be acommunity where every member can growthrough collaborating with each other.
Mayumi Abe and Mathew Porter
LD SIG, Co-Coordinators

MESSAGE FROM THE COORDINATORS

3

LEARNING LEARNING 

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

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SPRING 2017

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MESSAGE FROM THE COORDINATORS

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LEARNING LEARNING 

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

MEMBER PROFILES
Nicole Gallagher: Learner Development Publicity Chairperson
My name is Nicole Gallagher and I have recently joined the Publicity Teamof the Learner Development SIG. I first got involved with the LD SIG in
Spring 2015 after receiving a conference grant to attend PanSIG 2015 inKobe. After meeting several members, I quickly became attracted to theethos and collaborative community of the SIG. As a relatively fresh
migrant from Kumamoto to Tokyo, LD SIG events, such as Tokyo GetTogethers and CCLT3, have provided spaces for me to share andconstruct new ideas of learning and teaching.
As a member of the Publicity Team, I will be responsible for sending out monthly
announcements of our SIG activities and events. If you are involved in something and want topublicize it, get in contact with me! nicolemariegallagher@gmail.com

Farrah Hasnain: Learner Development PANSIG 2017 Grant Recipient
Hello! My name is Farrah Hasnain and I am originally from Washington,
D.C. I am currently in my third year of the JET Program as an ALT at a
public senior high school.
I will be presenting at this year's PanSIG conference. My presentation will
be on the effectiveness of team-teaching in Japanese high schools. My
study, featured in the presentation, includes surveys and interviews with
ALTs and JTEs nationwide. The survey questions focused on theirperceived roles in the classroom and their opinions on their pre-service
and in-service training from their employers (boards of education, programs, dispatch
companies). I look forward to seeing you there and hearing your ideas!

LEARNING LEARNING PUBLICATION TEAM
Arnold F. Arao
EditorLayout & Design

LD Grants
Yoko Sakurai
LD Grants Coordinator

Members’ Voices
Andy Barfield,
Members’ Voices Coordinator
Ken Ikeda
CCLT3 Reflections Reviewer

Translation
Chika Hayashi
Translation Coordinator
Yoko Sakurai
Translator
Yoshio Nakai
Translator
Eriko Uno
Translator

Hugh Nicoll
Webmasterwith special thanks to Mayumi Abe, Anita Aden, Andrew Clarke, Johnny Govea, & Daniel Hougham!
SPRING 2017

MEMBERS’ PROFILES

5LEARNING LEARNING 

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

MEMBERS’ VOICESLD SIG Members' Voices offers spaces for
SIG members to introduce themselves toother members of the SIG in a variety ofaccessible and personalised text formats andlengths:• a short personal profile of yourself as alearner and teacher (100-200 words or so)• a short critical reflection on your history asa (language) learner at (a) particular stage(s)in your life (around 200-500 words)• a story of your ongoing interest in, andengagement with, particular learnerdevelopment (and/ or learner autonomy)
issues (around 500-800 words)• a short profile of your learnerdevelopment research interests and how you
hope to develop your research (around 500800 words)• a short profile of your working context
and the focus on learner development that a
particular institution where you work takes
and/or is trying to develop (about 800-1200
words)• some other piece of writing that you
would like to contribute and that is related
to learner development.
Many thanks to the following new membersof the Learner Development SIG in 2016
for sharing their voices with readers of
Learning Learning. We hope other SIG
members will also contribute their voices tothe next issue of Learning Learning. If you areinterested in doing so, please contact theMembers' Voices coordinator, Andy
Barfield, barfield.andy@gmail.com.

SPRING 2017“ＬＤＳＩＧメンバーの声”
ＳＩＧ会員の皆様に多様な形式・文体・長さで、ご自身の考えや活動をご紹介していただ
くためスペースです。以下のような様々な声を募集しております。
•
ご自身の学習者および教育者としてプロフィール。（約 100-200 語）• ご自身の（語学）学習者として経験で、特定の段階における逸話の省察。（約 200-500語）• ご自身の現在の取組みおよび関心を寄せていることで、特に学習者ディベロプメント（また学習者オートノミー）に関するもの。
（約 500-800 語）• 学習者ディベロプメントに関するご自身の研究内容の概要と方向性。（約 500-800 語）• 勤務先の教育環境の紹介や学習者ディベロプメントに関する取り組み。（約800-1200語）• その他、学習者ディベロプメントに関する内容。
２０１6 年学習者ディベロプメント研究部会に入会され、今号で『学習の学習』の読者に様々な声を共有していただいたSIG会員の皆様に感謝申し上げます。

MEMBERS’ VOICES

6LEARNING LEARNING 

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

Why Do I Learn andTeach English?
Mina Hirano
Adjunct Lecturer, Nanzan
UniversityM

y path as an English learnersomehow started in Mongolia
when I was thirteen. It was mydream to visit there ever since I
saw a picture of a Mongolian nomad boy,riding a horse in the ocean-like grassland
under the blue sky. Until I visited there for ashort homestay at a local traditional family’s
ger as my first trip abroad, I wasn’t so happy
about learning English at school. I wanted
to study something really new to me such as
Mongolian or Chinese, but I had to study
the same language as everybody else due tothe school system. However, when I
encountered people with a different
language and culture for the first time underthe beautiful Mongolian blue sky, I was
fascinated by communicating over andbetween different cultures and languages.
The local people didn’t speak English so I
talked with them in broken Mongolian and alittle Japanese, and, for some reason, I
developed my English a little bit. At thatpoint, my motivation towards learning
English suddenly grew as I wished so hard,“I want to make friends all over the world!
Therefore, I must learn English first!” Thatwish led me to study at a local high school
in California for a year when I was 15 years
old and at the University of Oregon for six
months four years later.
My second turning point was when I went
back to university after working for a while
as an English tutor and also a caregiver forchildren with autistic behavior, in order to
get a junior and senior high school English
teacher’s license. One professor asked,“Why do you want to teach English?”
I tried to explain how learning English
broadened my perspective and the world sothat I wanted my future students to be able
SPRING 2017

to have the same experience as me. He was
not content with my answer and said, “Youmust find a concrete reason why you teachEnglish that makes sense for every single
student in Japan.” Since then, I started tolook for my answer to that question.
When I entered graduate school in 2014 to
do a Master’s in Linguistics, my learner
identity broadened further and I started to
explore the world of research using English.
My first small qualitative research project
was about English learners’ identity. I neverforget how one of my participants described
her identity as an English learner. Although
she was Japanese (an English teacher andalso a graduate school student back then), I
interviewed her in English. She commented,“Learning
Englishbroadenedmypersonality and the way of thinking. It’s likeyou have more colorful clothes in yourdresser. Before you learn English, it was
only white and black. But now I havecolorful dresses in my dresser.”She told me that she used to be reserved
and sometimes timid to express her
opinions and feelings among Japanesepeople before she learned English. However,as she started to use English and madeforeign friends, she realized that it isessential to show her thoughts and feelings
when communicating with people in
English. As she did this, she began to enjoy
expressing herself in this way. At the sametime, she could keep more reserved way ofcommunication with her Japanese friends. It
was fascinating for me to gain confirmationfrom another that that learning English
could expand a learner’s identity.
For my Master’s dissertation, I investigated
how and what kinds of assistance were
provided between 16 low proficiency highschool learners and their teacher in a natural
EFL classroom setting, using a sociocultural
framework. It was a 2-year case study, andmy participants belonged to the bottom
class of three English classes according totheir proficiency levels. I wanted to explore
what was happening in that class becauseeven though the majority of the learners
were having difficulty in learning generally

MEMBERS’ VOICES

7LEARNING LEARNING 

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

and some had learning disorders, there was amarked sense of mutual assistance and afamily-like atmosphere between the people
in that class. As a result, I found out thatparticipant learners made up for theirpersonal limitation of English proficiency
and knowledge by collective scaffolding. For
example, if one of the members of the small
group didn’t know how to solve English
grammatical drills, one started to explain thegrammar first, then, when that person was ata loss for words due to lack of knowledge or
confidence, the other member naturally took
over. And if the second explainer made a
mistake while explaining, the third member
would assist the explainer’s self-correction.
This kind of collective scaffolding was often
triggered by the teacher’s mediation, but
how and when to assist each otherdepended on learners. Through this researchstudy, I learned when and how learners can
succeed in assisting to each other and how
significant the teacher’s role is to facilitatethat happened. It was also a good
opportunity for me to get to know myparticipants’ version of the answer to thequestion, “Why do you study English?”After I finished my master’s degree, I started
my career as an English lecturer at university
last April. As I teach, I feel I really need toknow the answer to that question, especiallywhen I found out that the majority of mystudents have a sense of inferiority as
English learners. And this question has also
led me to my current research interest in
learner’s identity. I’d like to finish my long
self-introduction (thank you so much foryour time and patience!) by quoting
Professor Noam Chomsky, who gave me agreat hint to the question, “Why do I teachEnglish?” I had the privilege to ask him thisquestion when he gave a lecture at Sophia
University in 2014. I asked Chomsky mainly
about the role of language. Then he calmly
and positively responded, “Language is likea hammer. You can use it to build a house,or hit somebody in the head. It depends on
our determination.”
So, why do I learn and teach English? For
now, my answer to that question is to teachSPRING 2017

learners that we learn and use language notsimply to pursue a successful career, but also
to construct a house where every person,with their different cultures, thoughts andcolors, can live together harmoniously. I’mlooking forward to hearing your answers as
to why you also learn or teach English!
Author correspondence:<Email> mina.1192000@gmail.com

Do You Remember
the First Time …

Robb J.Y. Lee

Hiroshima University

Aloha and Hauʻoli kēia hui ʻana o kāua
(It is pleasure to meet you). I wasborn and raised in Honolulu,
Hawaii. I am currently enrolled andworking on my Master’s degree incurriculum and education at Hiroshima
University. It is a great pleasure and honor
to be a new member of JALT and the
Learner Development SIG and to also
connect with all of you through Members’
Voices. The reason why I joined JALT and
the LD SIG is that it’s my mission to learn
about new teaching methodologies,
technologies and new ways of think to
education and English education inparticular. As the saying goes, “Seek tounderstand, then to be understood.”
If I may begin by asking you, do you
remember the first time you saw the ocean?
Do you remember the smell of the ocean or
the sound of waves crashing on the shore?
How about the feeling of fear andexcitement as you were about to kick yourslippers off and jump in? After a bit ofhesitation and self-deliberation, you take theplunge and your brain begins firing and

MEMBERS’ VOICES

8LEARNING LEARNING 

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

creating new synapses to record thisexperience. You realize that the water issalty to your tongue, and that this vast bodyof water really is not a lake or river. It
actually stretches way beyond the limits ofyour comprehension.
As a master’s student at Hiroshima
University’s
Graduate
SchoolofInternational Development and Economic
Cooperation (IDEC), you could say that I
have been blessed with the opportunity tomeet amazing people from all over the
globe. In a strange twist of fate, I crossed
paths with such a gentleman from Rwanda
as I was going to pick up my application for
the University. I introduced myself to him
and struck up a conversation about where
he was from and why he was studying in
Hiroshima. As we departed ways and said
our goodbyes, I thought that this was theend of the encounter and I would never see
him again. Not a week later, this fellow from
Rwanda was standing in front of my housewith my wife introducing him to mychildren and father-in-law. Oddly enough hewas sent on a 1-2 day homestay with aJapanese family, and it happened to be withmy family.
Life never ceases to amaze me and this was
no exception. Fate literally brought him to
my doorstep and two months later, we
decided to take him to see and go swimmingin the ocean for the very first time in his life.
It was a very deep and powerful moment forthe both of us because he had never seen
the ocean before and I had never met
someone his age who had never been in theocean. We were beside ourselves withabsolute joy and wonderment.

Kolb succinctly noted in his proposal of theExperiential Learning Theory (ELT) that:“Learning is the process whereby
knowledge is created through thetransformationofexperience.
Knowledge results from the combinationof grasping and transforming experience”(Kolb, 1984).
In many ways, I am quite similar to my
Rwandan friend in that I am immersing
myself in the ocean of graduate studies at
Hiroshima University. I hope to learn morein detail about international education in thecontext of Japan and the interculturalcompetency levels of domestic Japanese
university students. My main researchinterest is in the area of intercultural
exchanges that occur between domestic andinternational students and how theseexchanges are transformative with regards toEnglish ability and intercultural competency.
I hope to meet, talk, learn and connect withyou in the near future. Thank you verymuch and Mahalo Nui Loa.
Reference
Kolb, D. A. (1984). Experiential learning:Experience as the source of learning and development(Vol. 1). Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
Retrieved fromhttp://www.nwlink.com/~%E2%80%89do
nClark/hrd/styles/kolb.html

Author correspondence:<Email> mindfulness808@gmx.com

It reminded me of the little things we often
take for granted in our busy world, that eventhe most mundane of experiences can lead
us down the path of our greatest learning.
Also, as teachers and educators, we have theresponsibility to create the opportunities andconditions that facilitate learning for ourstudents. We are the bridge that connects
the educational needs of our students to theknowledge and experiences that lead tohigher levels of self-discovery and learning.
SPRING 2017

MEMBERS’ VOICES

9LEARNING LEARNING 

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

“Sensei, my major
has nothing to dowith English.”take any elective English classes. Theirdecisions must be respected, but is learning
English really a hindrance to becoming aproperly qualified health professional?

Michiyo Masui

Under these limited circumstances, studying
English has to be meaningful for each
student. I have been seeking for answers to
the following questions: “What is my role asa university teacher?”, “What can I sharewith my students as a learner?”, and “Howcan I link the isolated English subject withother studies so that the students cancontinue studying English?”Tohoku
Bunka
University

GakuenHello everyone. My name is Michiyo
Masui. I’ve been working as an
English teacher for nearly 20 years.
I started teaching young learners aged from
3 to 12 and switched my teaching settings touniversity a few years later. Now I work for
Tohoku Bunka Gakuen University in Sendai,
Miyagi, and mainly teach “compulsory”
English classes to non-English majors.
Many of my students study health services
and rehabilitation and are hoping to work as
nurses, physical therapists, occupational
therapists, speech therapists, and orthoptists
in the future. The rest of the students makea special study of social sciences such as
economics, politics, law and economics, etc.
English is one of the liberal arts subjects
that the students must take in their first year
at the university.
Over the past few years, I’ve been having
difficulty in dealing with students who haveno willingness and interest towards learning
English. They say things like:I have not found robust answers to thequestions, but I would like to tell mystudents that acquiring English will expand
their opportunities and help them choose
what they really want to do in the future. In
order to come to more criticalunderstanding of these issues, I joined the
Learner Development SIG. I hope to gain
new knowledge and ideas to develop mystudents’ learner autonomy and lookforward to meeting and talking with LD
SIG members at conferences and otherevents in the future.
Author correspondence:<Email> mmasui@pm.tbgu.ac.jp• “English isn’t important in my future
career.”• “It’s fine not to be able to speak
English in Japan.”• “English isn’t necessary to pass anursing national exam.”
It is not easy to change their negative
feelings and low self-confidence towards
learning English, which have beendeveloped over many years. In addition, themajority of my students stop taking English
classes by the end of their junior year inorder to start their job-related specializedstudies. Sadly, some students and teachers
claim that English should be an elective
subject, and those students probably will not
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10LEARNING LEARNING 

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

Perceived SelfEfficacy: Building
the Confidence to
Speak
Diane Jacob
Osaka English VillageAstrong influence on the principles
that guide my approach to teaching
English is my own experience inlearning and using languages. For many
years, I studied French. When I was in the
fourth grade, my mother enrolled me in an
early morning, extracurricular French class,and I continued studying French up until I
graduated university with a B.A. in French
Language and Literature. However, for the
majority of these years of study, I was
unable to use it functionally. That is, until
my third year of university when I enrolled
in a study abroad program in Paris and was
pushed to speak. From then on, I was able
to make more sense of the relationshipbetween form and meaning, andfurthermore, I became more confident andmotivated to learn. As a result of my own
experiences with French, I am especiallyinterested in encouraging students to put
effort into speaking in their second language(L2). Be that as it may, I find that it is notalways easy for students to produce speech.
Various factors can influence a student’s
motivation and willingness to communicate.
These factors include perceived self-efficacy,
a construct related to self-confidence that I
find has been influential in my own learning
behavior and therefore could be applicable
to my students as well.
Of course, I have not been the only person
to notice the importance of output. In 1985,
Merrill Swain observed that L2 students in
French immersion programs, while highly
fluent, were not developing a native-likespeaking proficiency, despite receiving
plenty of comprehensible input (Swain,1985). She argued that students were unable
to develop this proficiency because students
were not required to produce language at
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native-level complexity. According to
Swain’s (1995) output hypothesis, output
serves three functions that shift focus fromsemantic processing to syntactic processing:noticing, hypothesis-testing, and metalinguistic
processing. Output also serves to develop
fluency, which is a characteristic ofautomaticity that supports a functional useof the L2.
In support of this theory, I have found thatmy language proficiency has developed as aresult of producing meaningful output. For
example, in a conversation with a Japanesecolleague, I wanted to say, “I think ____ ismore ____ than ____,” but was unable toformulate the sentence. This prompted me
to seek out the appropriate linguisticknowledge, whereupon learning the relevant
forms, I proceeded to try my new
knowledge in other conversations. As aresult of this and other experiences, I havedeveloped a functional use of Japanese,
despite not having the time to devote toproper studying. The role that output plays
in language development is therefore
significant.
That being said, I still find that speaking
often seems to be the language skill that L2
students struggle with the most. Output
involves different, often less practiced
cognitive processes than does processing
input. Furthermore, speaking involves ahigher risk of losing face. In the face of
these difficulties, I have looked towards
motivation to encourage students tocontinue in their efforts to speak. In my
research into factors that can influence
motivation, perceived self-efficacy has proven to
be an interesting issue.
Bandura (1986) defined perceived selfefficacy (PSE) as a “set of self-referent
judgments arrived at through cognitive
processing of diverse sources of efficacy
information” (p. 362). In other words, PSE
is what an individual thinks he can or cannot
do, regardless of actual ability. Learners
form these beliefs based on social-comparative
information (“He can do it, so can I!”), social
persuasion (“You say I can do it? OK!”), direct
mastery experiences (“I did it before, I can do it

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Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

again!”), and physiological responses (“I feelextremely anxious, I cannot do it!”). In L2
acquisition, these perceptions can influence
whether or not students participate inpositive learning behavior, such as willinglyand earnestly participating in exercises
designed to elicit meaningful speaking
practice.
Although helping my students achieve acertain level of language proficiency isimportant, I have found that I should also
consider the development of students’
perceived self-efficacy. I became interested
in PSE through research into factors
influencing students’ willingness to produce
output; however, perceived self-efficacy is
an important concept in many areas of L2
acquisition. I have heard a student say manytimes, “I’m just not good at languages.”Though this statement paints the issue inbroad strokes, it stems from a low
perception of self-efficacy. A final point that
I would like to highlight about PSE is that it
is task and domain specific. A student canhave high speaking PSE when conversing
with friends but have low speaking PSE
when it comes to addressing the class as awhole. Also, a student can have highlistening PSE but low speaking PSE. Whena student claims not to be good at languages,
it can be worthwhile to pinpoint the reason
for this statement.
In sum, in order to encourage better
learning habits and build motivation, I am
interested in approaches that can positively
influence students’ perceived self-efficacy.
How a student perceives his or hercompetence can affect behavior andmotivation.
Furthermore,
motivation,
potentially more so than aptitude, can be astrong predictor for successful language
development and acquisition. Therefore, I
believe that PSE is a construct that warrants
further research in how it relates to learnerdevelopment in second language acquisition.
References
Bandura, A. (1986). The explanatory andpredictive scope of self-efficacy theory.
Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology, 4(3),359-373.
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Swain, M. (1985). Communicative competence:
Some roles of comprehensible input andcomprehensible output in its development.
In S. Gass & C. Madden (Eds.), Input in second
language acquisition (pp. 235-253). Rowley, MA:
Newbury House.
Swain, M. (1995). Three functions of output insecond language learning. In G. Cook & B.
Seidelhofer (Eds.), Principle and practice inapplied linguistics: Studies in honour of H.G.
Widdowson (pp. 125-144). Oxford: Oxford
University Press.

Author correspondence:<Email> diane.jacob@englishvillage.co.jp

A Storm in a
Booth - Learner
Autonomy inJapanese andeikaiwa
Daniel HooperHi everyone, my name is Daniel
Hooper and I recently started
working as a lecturer in the English
Language Institute (ELI) at Kanda
University of International Studies in April.
I have been teaching in Japan for ten years
with much of that time spent working ineikaiwa schools. I joined the Learner
Development SIG last year and have foundit to be a warm and welcoming group ofpeople who are earnestly trying to foster
student development. Hopefully this shortstory will serve as a cheery “hello” to otherLD SIG members from someone who was
greatly shaped by learner autonomy, andwho later fought to promote it in eikaiwa
schools.
I guess a decent metaphor for my initial
relationshipwithlanguagelearning
autonomy would be a driftwood raft inshark infested waters. It wasn’t pretty:
shoddily put together and lacking

MEMBERS’ VOICES

12LEARNING LEARNING 

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017engineering know-how but sturdy andbuoyant enough to stop me becoming
lunch. Left to fend for myself in rural
Saitama, my first foray into self-directed
learning stemmed from necessity rather than
any intellectual belief in concepts like“learner autonomy,” mainly because I wasn’t
aware that such ideas existed. The attractive
notion that I would simply “soak thelanguage up over time” quickly evaporated
as I met a number of other teachers who
had been deftly evaded by Japanesecompetence despite living here for around a
decade. Without any deliberate attempt tostudy the language many still needed to pullout the “look angry and speak loudly inEnglish”
approachwheneverthey
encountered a communicative hurdle. At adiminutive 165 centimeters tall, I thought I
had better prepare a backup plan to theintimidation card and so got out the
textbooks.
But they weren’t really working for me.
Neither were online classes that I started
taking in 2009, where essentially I was
guided through another textbook filled with“textbooky” sentences of tennis games in
the park, the exploits of “Taro” and “Ken,”and missed buses that failed to either
stimulate me or take root in my brain. In theend, I felt I wasn’t getting enough bang formy buck and instead opted for the more
economic option of a library card. I started
borrowing children’s books on a range of
topics (usually in the afternoon when kids
were in school, as I felt less creepy as a 30year-old man thumbing through books on
dinosaurs and bullet trains). Reading books
in Japanese was a valuable experience forme as it both increased my linguisticknowledge and allowed me to regain thechildlike curiosity I felt as a kid in the village
library where my mother worked,
surrounded by unfamiliar and exciting
words and pictures. These experiencesmotivated me to eventually strive to create
more opportunities related to personalized
and autonomous learning for my students ineikaiwa.

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Later, as an eikaiwa instructor I was put incharge of the same textbooky language that
had failed to invigorate my own language
studies and began to see myself in thestudents who sat in the clinical-looking
cubicles for the same 40-minute stretch eachweek. Just as with my experience, I failed inmany cases to register any real linguistic
development in students as they stumbled
through the “Complaining at a hotel” roleplay that they had done eight times before,
but would in all likelihood never have a usefor outside of our grey little booth.
Eventually, I began to offer graded readers
to my students for out-of-class study. Thiswas followed by spaced repetition flash card
applications and websites featuring gradednews articles. I was excited about my job for
the first time in years.
But then… a blip. That was all. The
students didn’t seem interested. But why? I
had read all of the studies, attended theseminars, shown enthusiasm, and offeredsupport. Why wouldn’t students want to use
free materials? Weren’t they paying forclasses? They should be motivated,shouldn’t they? I was desperate tounderstand. I read articles on everything I
could find about eikaiwa, on Charisma Men(Bailey, 2007), educational fad-dieting(Sapunaru-Tamas & Tamas, 2012), andleisure and consumption (Kubota, 2011). I
also was intrigued that other attempts todevelop learner autonomy, much like mine,
often fell disappointingly flat (Makino, 2016;
Shigeo-Brown, 2005).
Since then, I have continued to pushonwards in my mission of promoting outof-class study in a world I feel constantly
undulates between promise and futility. My
relationship with the eikaiwa industry has
been at times stormy, at times almost
oppressively calm, but always with the hopethat things can be better. The conversation
school industry is, in many ways, almost
untouched by academic inquiry. This isperhaps partly due to a lack of “researchers”
working in eikaiwa and partly because of thebad “McEnglish” (McNeill, 2004) reputationthat these schools have both deservedly and

MEMBERS’ VOICES

13LEARNING LEARNING 

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

undeservedly made for themselves. I see thisboth as an opportunity (selfishly as a
researcher) and a desperate problem (assomeone who watched students’ moneychange hands week after week). The daily
ups and downs of my eikaiwa classrooms aswell as the research on eikaiwa that I
discovered later in my career have often
given me more questions to consider rather
than settling old ones. Eikaiwa is a puzzle
that I sometimes feel stubbornly does notwant to be solved. However, over the years,
I have met students who have inspired me
and convinced me that they deserve better
than “one size fits all.” Maybe for that
simple reason alone, I have grown to believethat the world of eikaiwa and the promotionof learner autonomy within it is somethingthat deserves my time and effort in the years
to come.

Sapunaru-Tamas, C., & Tamas, A. (2012). The
eikaiwa phenomenon in Japan or the threeday magic formula: between marketing andlanguage acquisition.
[Osaka ElectroCommunication University Human Science
Research], 14, 95-106.

Author correspondence:<Email> tywardreathdan@gmail.com

It's Good to Be
the Jack

References

Mark Pileggi

Bailey, K. (2007). Akogare, ideology, and'Charisma Man' mythology: Reflections on
ethnographic research in English language
schools in Japan. Gender, Place and Culture,
14(5), 585-608.
Brown, P. S. (2005). Elements of learner training
and learning strategies in a Japanese eikaiwa(private language school). Unpublished MA
TEFL/TESL assignment. Birmingham, UK:
Centre for English Language Studies,
University of Birmingham. Retrieved fromhttp://www.birmingham.ac.uk/Documents/collegeartslaw/cels/essays/secondlanguage/Brown
1.pdf
Kubota, R. (2011). Learning a foreign language
as leisure and consumption: enjoyment,
desire, and the business of eikaiwa.
International Journal of Bilingual Education and
Bilingualism, 14(4), 473-488.
Makino, M. (2016, June 6). Success and failure,pt. 2 - Blended learning, mixed results [Blogpost].
Retrievedfromhttps://futurealisreal.wordpress.com/2016/06/06/success-and-failure-pt-2-blendedlearning-mixed-results/
McNeill, D. (2004, February 24). McEnglish forthe masses. The Japan Times. Retrieved fromhttp://www.japantimes.co.jp/community/2004/02/24/issues/mcenglish-for-themasses/#.VuNf5OYwDw8

Kobe City College ofTechnology

SPRING 2017W

hat do the words skateboarding,DJ, interpreting, Aikido, wedding
pastor, surfing, Bikkurimark, father,
associate professor, snowboarding, and
MegaBikk all have in common?
Well, I suppose the only answer could be,
me. I was a happy child raised in a Christianhome, the younger brother with a flair foradventure. A lack of focus on any one thing
led me to try a little of everything. While I
like team sports, I’m happiest riding
sideways on any type of board. My studies
were broad and Bikkurimark is my identity
as a computer graphic designer, which iswhat I graduated from the University ofCentral Florida with, back in 1997.
However, a love for interaction with people
led me to become a teacher instead. From
the Eastern seaboard of the United States toJapan as a JET working for MEXT I landed
in Matsuyama, Ehime, right after university.
Living in Ehime was a great chance to learn
Japanese, and, while studying the language, I
also took up DJing, which began mostly to
avoid keeping up with my best friend from

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Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

Ireland’s drinking pace. Life in Ehime gaveme time to learn written Japanese at workand long road trips with surfers notinterested in learning English helped my
spoken Japanese immensely. I got married
to a lovely Japanese girl from Matsuyama,
and we started out as newlyweds by moving
to Osaka. I began helping at church and wasinterpreting there, I trained to get aminister's license and I also began marrying
Japanese couples.
Why Japan? Well, I traced it back to being
mugged for my candy as a child one
Halloween in Massachusetts where I grew
up. That was the reason for me wanting tolearn martial arts to defend myself. It was
the defining moment that my interest in
Asia was born. That never went away, and I
now have a black belt in Tae Kwon Do anda 3rd degree black belt in Aikido thanks tothose misguided high school kids that
attacked my older brother and myself.
While working at Osaka Gakuin University's
I-Chat Lounge, I was able to take an online
Masterof
Sciencein
Education
specialization in Curriculum, Instruction andTechnology from Nova Southeastern
University (NSU) in Florida. I now work at
Kobe City College of Technology and teachEnglish communication and TOEIC classes
as a full-time associate professor full time. I
love it there, and, while I’m not an engineer
myself, all the brotherly bonding time spentplaying video games growing up became
valuable experiences that now allow me tohold friendly conversations on tech-related
subjects and join students on occasion for
online fun, usually under the alias of
MegaBikk.

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If there is a point to this chaotic story ofmine, it’s that no matter how trivial orseemingly negative an event or hobby may
be to others, if you keep a positive way of
thinking, all of those things can give you
individuality and strengths in a combinationthat nobody else could duplicate. So to all
the “Liberal Arts” majors out there, “There ishope!”Mark
Jack of all Trades
Author correspondence:<Email> bikkurimark2004@gmail.com

LEARNING LEARNING is a forum
for your voices and opinions. If you
would like to comment or respond toarticles or information presented in any
issue of LEARNING LEARNING,
please send an email to:learninglearning.editor@gmail.com

We are looking forward to hearing fromyou!

MEMBERS’ VOICES

15LEARNING LEARNING 

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

FOCUS ONThe Realization of Goal Setting and the Necessity of Guidance

Yusei Ando
Tokai University, School of Humanities and Culture
Department of International Studies

Abstract
In this short paper, I consider the issue of goal-setting theory in L2 teaching and show how it isapplied to a real teaching situation. Since it was introduced by Locke and Latham (1990), goalsetting theory has been applied in many academic contexts and numerous research studies havesupported its application to L2 teaching as well. However, as an English student for three years atuniversity, I strongly feel that this theory has still not yet been fully utilized by teachers in theclassroom. The first half of this paper therefore deals with development of goal-setting theory
and its relationship to language teaching. In the second half, its application to a teaching situationis considered from a student’s point of view. Finally, I conclude this paper with a strong
suggestion that teachers should pay more careful attention to goal-setting theory in their teaching.
要旨
本論では、第二言語教育における目標設定理論について取り上げ、またどのように実際の教 育現場で適用されるのかを第二言語学習者の視点から検討した。Locke、Latham に提唱されて以来目標設定
理論に関する数多くの研究が行われ、第二言語教育への応用研究も盛んに行 われてきた。しかしな
がら、現在まで三年間英語を大学で学んできている筆者の視点からす ると、この理論が実際の言語教育現場において教員に十分に活用されているとは言えない。 よって本論の前半では目標設定理論
に関し言語教育と結びつけて述べた。次に、その言語教 育現場への応用例を学生の視点から検討した。以上の考察より、言語教育において目標設定 理論に対するより注意深い関心が必要であるという提案に至った。
Keywords: goal setting, motivation, language learning/teaching, student perspective 目標設定、動機付け、言語学習・教育、生徒の視点M

otivation has been one of thecentral focuses of teachers andresearchers in the field of L2teaching. There have been many
motivational strategies suggested in order tohelp them motivate students to learn thetarget language so that facilitates students’learning in the classroom and even outside
the classroom. I am a junior undergraduate
student majoring in International Studies at
Tokai University, and got interested in
English education two years ago. Upon
researching on motivational theories, I
realized that much of my language learning
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had been immensely influenced by the
degree of motivation I had at certain time,and how teachers helped me to keep it. This
noticing has made me far more interested inthis field. While research on motivation has
been highly developed over the past several
decades, it is also true that some teachers
have failed to utilize or even ignored thesemotivational strategies in a language
classroom. Therefore, my prime purpose inthis article is to help teachers realize theimportance of motivational strategies in aclassroom, and a goal-setting theory is
focused on as one of them. My secondary
FOCUS ONLEARNING LEARNING 

purpose is to show how important teachers’
help is when the theory is applied.
BackgroundA goal-setting theory was introduced byLocke and Latham in 1990, suggesting thatpeople are more likely to deliver a great
performance when they are provided withspecific, difficult yet attainable goals andthat feedback relevant to performance has
also a crucial role in allowing them to becommitted to seeking the goals (Locke &Latham, 1990; Latham, 2003). Specific goals
refer to ones with specific dates, time orother components to be attained so that
performers work on it on a step-by-stepbasis with clear visions. In this regard, it isreasonable to assume that this theory isreadily and broadly applicable to a L2teaching situation since language learning or
acquisition requires a long-time anddemanding process for students.
However, looking around at my fellow
students at university reveals that most ofthem do not have so-called “specific,
difficult, yet attainable goals” for English
learning. For instance, Japanese university
students often aim to get a high score on the
Test of English for International
Communication (TOEIC) that many
companies require them to have. Similarly,
others might want to improve speaking
skills which enable them to be able tocommunicate with foreigners or English
speakers. These students are initiallymotivated to learn English, but from theperspective of a goal-setting theory, they areless likely to be successful because thesegoals are not specific. To make their goals
more specific, in the former case, students
should also care about “Specifically what scoreis necessary?” and “By what means it should beachieved?” In the latter case, “With whom do I
want to have a conversation?” and “What is my
purpose in having this conversation?” These arevital questions to be answered by students
themselves.
In my three years at university, I have spenta considerable amount of time talking withSPRING 2017

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

my fellow students about our English
teachers and reflecting on the extent
teachers help students set and reach specificattainable goals. My provisional conclusion
is as follows: “A good English teacher” isoften referred to as an “entertaining, easyto-talk to, and sometimes funny teacher” by
students, but “a great teacher” is seen as one
whom students gain great benefits from andare somehow motivated by to learn language
for certain purposes. Reaching thisconclusion has also allowed me to realizethat many teachers in a way have succeededin motivating students tentatively, but only a
few of them have actually been successful in
helping them keep long-term, lasting
positive learning attitudes. Despite the factthat teachers are too busy to deal with every
aspect of learning, to go beyond merely
teaching language, teachers should try to
expend more effort and time on helping andencouraging students to more clearlyvisualize their language learning. In order toachieve this, I would like to suggest a goalsetting theory as a useful focused activity forteachers and students in the classroom.
Goal-setting Theory in Language
Teaching
Numerous studies have identified theimportance of goal setting in language
learning (Zimmerman, Bandura, MartinezPons, 1992; Alison, 1993; Kelly, 2001;
Haynes, 2011). In more specific terms,
Dörnyei (2001) concluded that goal setting
in language learning leads to essentially
positive outcomes because it helps learners
achieve a high grade in school. He also
categorized four mechanisms of goals in
performance: First, a goal helps students tofocus efforts and concentration on primarytasks, instead of being distracted byirrelevant activities. Second, having a clear
goal enables students to envisage how much
effort or time should be expended on
studying so that they are likely to manage
their learning. Third, students tend to beengaged longer in learning when they have agoal, and it is likely to last until their goal isachieved. Last, appropriate strategies forlearning can be applied, based on their
FOCUS ONLEARNING LEARNING 

specific goals. Aside from facilitating
already-motivated students, Alison (1993)
points out that goal setting plays ameaningful and effective role in motivating
unwilling, reluctant students to learn. As
such, goal setting has been widely accepted
as a meaningful process for L2 learners.
After recognizing the importance of goal
setting, it is now valuable to examine how it
isactually
appliedinlanguageteaching/learning. A goal-setting theory
consists of five principles: clarity, challenge,commitment, feedback, and task complexity.
It is highly desirable that goals students haveinclude these five features. Therefore,teachers who plan to utilize goal-setting
theory in their teaching should help students
to take these five aspects into consideration
when they ask them to set goals.
Putting Theory into Action
First, goals should be clear for both students
and teachers. Especially, when specifics suchas a date or score are clear, students are
more likely to be motivated to learn. Thiscan be exemplified by my personal
experience. The reason why I started
studying for TOEIC in the beginning wasjust because I thought it would be
important, and hence, my motivation did
not last for a long time due to my lack of aclear purpose. However, when I started
planning to participate in the study abroad
program offered by my university andconsequently a specific score and date were
determined, the incentives that I had forgetting the score greatly increased and lasted
continuously until I achieved the goal that I
had set for myself.
Second, challenging and difficult goals
within students’ range of capacities arenecessary for helping them commit
themselves to learning and for enhancing
their motivation (Bloom, 2013). In thisrespect, teachers should be fully aware of
the importance of comprehending students’levels of English by monitoring andassessing them. Failure to do this often
allows for students to be distracted fromSPRING 2017

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

learning. In my own case I was always
struggling with this because I had a higher
proficiency than my classmates; so, most of
the tasks that we did in class were notchallenging or difficult for me. I clearly
remember one teacher at university who
thankfully always took great care of
students, and gave me an extra task or asked
me to foster a conversation in a class. His
kind consideration helped me keep
motivated and find value in the tasks that wewere assigned.
Third, it is important that students place acertain degree of value on goals so that they
are likely to start and keep on committing
themselves to achieving the goals. Moreoften than not, university students are
required to take English classes that do notinterest them and consequently lead them todevalue learning itself. The great teachersthat I have encountered, always attempted
to connect goals to students’ real-lifethrough highly imaginative situations. In
their classroom, for instance, vocabularybuilding activities for TOEIC, often
regarded as boring, were integrated with
job-interview activities or résumé writing
since TOEIC-specific vocabulary is directly
related to business situations. In this sense,
the goal was no longer merely to get a highscore on TOEIC, which we tended to finduseful only for job-hunting, but also to
improve authentic communication skills or
writing skills for a real-life purpose.
Fourth, feedback also plays a significant rolein keeping students motivated to strive for agoal
asPetchprasert(2012)
hascomprehensively reported. Students arehighly liable to be distracted from pursuinggoals, so providing them with feedback at
appropriate intervals and helping them not
to be distracted are essential for theirdevelopment. More importantly, feedback
also helps students realize where they are in
the goal-achieving process, and how muchthey have done and they should do to attaintheir goals. In retrospect, my learning has
always been related to, and supported by,
feedback from teachers and friends alike.
FOCUS ONLEARNING LEARNING 

Teachers’ feedback was helpful particularly
when pursuing certain goals such as getting
an “A” score in an assignment or English
proficiency test. Such feedback gave me aclear direction for achieving my goal. Peer
feedback was more related to psychologicalaspects such as being more confident or
feeling comfortable about using the target
language.
Last but not least, task complexity is one of
the important keys in goal setting. Despite
the similarity of task complexity to the first
aspect of task challenge (both involve acertain difficulty in achieving a goal), taskcomplexity needs to be dealt with in adifferent way. As mentioned above, students
are liable to be distracted fromconcentrating on the goal, or just fromlearning. In addition, students are more
likely to fail to reach a goal when the taskmerely requires them to make a slight effort
to achieve it. This is often seen amongstudious, diligent students. It is highly likely,
for example, that students will quit studying
if remembering all the vocabulary items
from a textbook is the only task required toget a good grade in an examination.
Conclusion
I would like to conclude this article bysharing my insights into the issues that I
have addressed above and discussing some
new ideas that I got from presenting at
CCLT3 and talking with other attendees.
First of all, applying a goal-setting theory ina language classroom has a crucial role inmotivating students, and more importantly,
teachers should be fully aware of this fact.
Following Oxford and Shearin (1994), I
have the strong feeling that goal-setting
theory has not been efficiently or regularly
utilized in language classrooms. By taking
the theory into consideration, students are
more likely to engage themselves in learning,and consequently, teachers’ expectations fortheir success are more likely to be met.
However, hearing real scholars’ voices andunderstanding their points of view andquestions gave me different and fresh
insights and reveals that some of them may
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Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

make more efforts than I thought they do. I
found out that one of the obstacles thathinders them from taking great care of thisissue is caused by time limitation andobligation to follow school rules or norms.
These findings led me to think that closer
and frequent collaboration between students
and teachers is necessary in the classroom inorder to promote a goal-setting process forlearner development.
References
Alison, J. (1993). Not bothered? Motivating reluctant
language learners in Key Stage 4. London: CiLT.
Bloom, M. (2013). Self-regulated learning: Goal
setting and self-monitoring. Language Teacher,27(4), 47-51.
Dörnyei, Z. (2001). Motivational strategies in thelanguage classroom. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press.
Haynes, L. (2011). Goal-Setting in EFL: Is it
really useful? Studies in Humanities, 15, 83-92.
Kelly, M. (2005). Motivation, the Japanese
freshman university student and foreign
language acquisition. JALT Hokkaido Journal,
9, 32-47.
Latham, G. P. (2003). Goal setting: A five-step
approach to behavior change. Organizational
Dynamics, 32(3), 309-318.
Locke, E. A., & Latham, G. P. (1990). A theory ofgoal setting & task performance. Englewood
Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
Oxford, R. L. & Shearin, J., (1994). Language
learning
motivation:
Expandingthetheoretical framework. Modern Language
Journal, 78, 12-28.
Petchprasert, A. (2012). Feedback in second
language teaching and learning. US-China
Foreign Language, 10(4), 1112-1120.
Zimmerman, B. J., Bandura, A., & MartinezPons, M. (1992). Self-motivation for
academic attainment: The role of selfefficacy beliefs and personal goal setting.
American Educational Research Journal, 29(3),663-676.

FOCUS ONLEARNING LEARNING 

Reader Response 1 to The Realization of
Goal-Setting and the Necessity of Guidance
Rob Stevenson
Kanda University of International StudiesA

s a learning advisor, I find myself
often discussing motivation withfellow advisors, teachers, andstudents. For advisors, motivation is a key
focus in our work and is dealt with directly.
In talking with teachers, it is often expectedof students to understand their own
motivation on their own, while students
themselves tend to be so accustomed tobeing led that they lack internal motivation.
Yusei Ando’s self-awareness to his own
studies and research into motivation is aremarkable achievement all teachers mightwish for their students to discover. A selfaware student can improve a class byfocusing on his own learning, as well as theclass as a whole. Yusei not only looked athimself and questioned what he and theteachers were doing and why, but also asked
his classmates about their own goals andmotivation. Yusei’s article brought up
questions that I often have when hearing
about students like him. I have to wonder
where and when that spark first appeared
for him to explore his own studies. Was thatcommitment to reflection always there or
did something, or multiple events andexperiences, lead to it?

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

Ultimately the student must be aware of hisor her goal and capabilities towards
achieving that goal, especially in competingin today’s marketplace. A passive student
becomes a passive worker, and those types
of jobs cannot compete with today’s
globalization and automation. Students
today must be able to anticipate change andreact to it, which requires a nearly endless
supply of internal motivation. The sooner
and more frequently this is taught in school,
the better their chances. Even if a student
does not fully grasp the concept of theirown motivation in their years of schooling,with repeated activities over time focusing
on questions of motivation, the student islikely to become more capable of selfawareness.
In Yusei’s further studies, I hope heexplores further where motivation comesfrom and how it grows or withers. And
hopefully that will lead to stronger evidence
that teaching and learning motivation canhave effects beyond the years in theclassroom and help empower students tocreate new opportunities as they face thechallenges of technological and globalchange.
Author correspondence:<Email> stevenson-r@kanda.kuis.ac.jp

Yusei lays out a path for teachers to help
encourage and guide students towards
motivation. For many students like Yusei,
this is often not done directly. When I havetaught motivation directly, I often question
the effectiveness of such teaching. Somestudents are willing from the start, whileothers simply go through the motions andclaim to have been motivated, but
motivation to please teachers is not the kindof motivation that is intended or needed.
Can there be a way to tell the difference
between true internal motivation and simply
following directions? When does one end
and the other begin?

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FOCUS ONLEARNING LEARNING 

Reader Response 2 to The Realization of
Goal-Setting and the Necessity of Guidance
Ben Thanyawatpokin
Himeji Dokkyo UniversityIn this article, Yusei Ando explores thepossibility of effectively using goalsetting theory in classroom. One of thefeatures that stands out for me the most isactually not the content discussed but rather
the point of view from which the article iswritten, that of an undergraduate learning
English in Japan. Upon reading the article, Ibegan to immediately notice the lack ofconsistent goals that my students have inmost communication classes that I teach.
Outside of a few test-based classes and asmall number of students who haveaspirations to go abroad, my students lacktangible goals that could apply to practicalusage of English.
Of course, the syllabi I make and thematerials I pass out all coalesce toemphasize “becoming able to converse in
English” or “writing academically and withgood structure.” However, to what extent
these official other-determined goals aremaking an impact on my students’development is not obvious. Many of theseofficial goals are more of a formality to set atone for a class rather than to help students
develop their own self-directed learning andcreate the impetus they need to become
motivated in the classroom.
If students themselves can set appropriate
goals for themselves, then they will start tounderstand how and why they should do toaccomplish a goal. However, even before
setting a goal there must be a purpose tolearning English. Simply by setting goals,
students do not immediately become

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

motivated to learn. Here, Ando explains thatthe study abroad program at his university
served as the main catalyst to propelling him
to create and meet his own English-learning
goals. What of other students in otheruniversities that may not have as muchopportunity as Ando? While some students
are fortunate enough to be put into asituation where they can have long-termgoals involving the use of English, what ofthose who do not have the socio-economic
status, available time, or resources atuniversity to do so? There are still many
Japanese students that can legitimately say
they have never spoken to a foreigner faceto-face before. Perhaps in the future there
will be a higher concentration ofinternational presence in all universities andplaces of learning in Japan, but at this timegoal-setting could well be hindered by theimmediate resources (both pedagogical andpersonal) students have at hand at theuniversities they attend.
Reading this article, I have no doubt that
Ando is a truly blessed student. In a perfectworld, all of our students would have themotivation, drive, and resources that hedoes. As Ando's article and experiences
show, goal setting is an important part oflanguage learning. However, I feel that wemust also look into how to spur students
into formulating goals for themselves andhelping them to take a more hands-on
approach to their own education. This could
be a suggestion for more research into
learner autonomy or motivation, but there isalso a pressing need to analyze and critiquethe current landscape of education in Japan.
Author correspondence:<Email> bpotkin@gmail.com

What is your opinion about goal-setting or motivation?
Share your practice, experience, and ideas with the Learner
Development community by writing a short reflection andsending it to learninglearning.editor@gmail.com .

SPRING 2017

FOCUS ONLEARNING LEARNING 

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

FOCUS ONa way of being or sense of selfachieved through cooperatively
making decisions about learning,
through access to both internaland external resources. The ability
to exercise autonomy depends onparticulardispositions
andpredispositions and fluctuatesaccording to circumstances. (p. 11)“Taking the Elephant by theTusks”: A Review of Assessment
and Autonomy in Language
Learning , Edited by Carol
Everhard and Linda Murphy,
Palgrave Macmillan, 2015
Alison Stewart
Gakushuin University“Assessment is very often the elephant in
the room that everyone can see but nobody
wants to mention,” writes Philip Benson in
the Foreword to Assessment and Autonomy in
Language Learning. This new anthology,
edited and introduced by Carol Everhard
and Linda Murphy (2015) “takes theelephant by the tusks” (p. viii). Six chaptersof innovative theory-elaboration andresearch, together with an introduction by
the editors and an epilogue by Sara Cotterall
and Diane Malcolm, turn the spotlight on
the difficult—and hence often ignored—
relationship between assessment andautonomy. It has become widely accepted(especially in our SIG) that autonomy is aprerequisite for language learning. But isautonomy something that can be, or shouldbe measured or assessed? Furthermore, if
learner autonomy means that learners havecontrol of all aspects of the learning process,how does that square with the requirement
in most schools and universities thatlearners be assessed by their teachers? These
are important questions for anyone whoworks in an educational institution—i.e., forall of us—to consider, and this book canserve as a very useful starting point forreflection, discussion, and, perhaps, newresearch and practice.
The chapters begin with Everhard’s wideranging review of the autonomy-assessment
relationship in the learner autonomy
literature. Admitting that it is amultidimensional construct, which makes it
difficult to measure, she nevertheless offers
a working definition of autonomy as
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Far more elaborate than Holec’s famousdefinition of autonomy as “the ability totake charge of one’s own learning” (1981, p.
3), this formulation takes account of more
recent avenues of autonomy research suchas learner identity, cooperative learning, andthe effect of social context. It remains,
however, true to Holec’s definition in its
focus on the learner, their own sense of self,
and their ability to take action or makedecisions or change according to different
circumstances. By learning to reflect andassess themselves, Everhard concludes,
learners become more autonomous in waysthat benefit all areas of their lives.
The following three chapters take up thechallenge of assessing autonomy itself. The
first of these three very different chapters is
by Fumiko Murase, who developed aquestionnaire in order to gain a quantitative
measure of learner autonomy of university
students in Japan. The Measuring
Instrument for Learner Autonomy (MILLA)
is a Likert-scale questionnaire based on afour-dimensional model of autonomy(technical, psychological, political and socialcultural). With the final version of thequestionnaire comprising 113 test items
distributed to 1517 students from 18
universities, Murase used the data she
obtained to test the validity and reliability ofthe model, as well as to gain a better
understanding of the construct of autonomy
itself. What is intriguing about this study isthe finding that there is a strong correlation
between the psychological and politicaldimensions of autonomy, and Murase’s
decision to respecify them as a single subdimension. My intuitive sense is that these
FOCUS ONLEARNING LEARNING 

dimensions are basically contradictory, and I
would be fascinated to see further
exploration of what this correlation mightmean.
The second chapter, “Assessing Learner
Autonomy: A Dynamic Model” by Maria
Giovanna Tassinari introduces a “dynamic
and dialogical approach” to the assessmentof autonomy. Like Murase, Tassinaripresents her own model of autonomy,
although whereas Murase’s model expresses
what autonomy is, Tassinari’s is comprisedof interconnected “components” that
describe what learners do (e.g., managing myown learning, cooperating, evaluating,planning, etc.). These components are built
into descriptors, which are derived fromprevious developed materials on strategies
and autonomy, and which are listed in a task
sheet that invites learners to evaluate theirskill or willingness to learn a skill within any
particular component. After a trial
investigation of the model, a procedure wasadopted at the author's university whereby
learners advance through a series of steps inwhich they reflect on their experiences anduse the assessment sheets to focus oncomponents of the autonomy model thatthey would like to work on first on theirown and subsequently in a session with anadvisor.
The third chapter, “Assessment as Learner
Autonomy” by Lucy Cooker offers yet
another model of learner autonomy, one
which, like Murase’s, also derives fromstatistical analysis. Q Methodology, a researchmethod that combines subjective views ofindividuals through card sorting withstatistical factor analysis, is used to identify
six “modes” of autonomy, and these modes
can then be used in a self-assessment
exercise that enables learners to identify
their own autonomy mode and the strengths
and weaknesses within that mode, as well as
to consider alternatives. Like Tassinari’s
model, the modes of autonomy developed
by Cooker are intended for formative selfassessment purposes as a tool of reflection
and guide to decision-making about ongoing
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Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017self-development. The methods by whichthese assessment tools were created and theuses to which the authors have put themoffer ample food for thought, and better
still, the tools themselves—Murase’s
MILLA questionnaire, Tassinari’s dynamic,
dialogic checklist, and Cooker’s modes ofautonomy are provided in appendixes or
via links for the reader to copy or
download and try out for themselves.
Following these chapters come two chaptersthat put a different spin on the relationshipbetween assessment and autonomy. Rather
than trying to measure autonomy, thesechapters describe practices where the task ofassessment in a formal educational context
is given to, or shared with the learners. In“Peer- and Self-assessment of Oral Skills in
Higher Education,” Everhard presents a
study in which assessment of oral skills in a
general EFL course was triangulated
between teachers, peers and individual
students’
self-assessment.
Everhard’s
carefully designed study revealed that there
was remarkable consistency among the threedifferent kinds of assessment, although thediscrepancy of higher peer assessment in
one group suggests that group dynamics
might disrupt the criteria that is more
successfully used for assessment elsewhere.
Finally, in “Autonomy in Assessment,”
Linda Murphy describes an experimentconducted with materials based on Kolb’s
learning cycle that were intended to help
learners of French succeed in tutor-assessedassignments. The materials consisted of askills audit, a self-assessment sheet, areflection sheet, a tips sheet, and a skills
sheet, all of which gave learners guidance on
how to complete them. Tutors were asked
to support this scheme by delivering thematerials to their students and by explaining
their function and hoped for benefits, but
the scheme was entirely voluntary for bothtutors and learners. An investigation into thereactions of tutors and learners wasfollowed up by interviews with tutors andlearners selected from among those who
answered positively and those who had
FOCUS ONLEARNING LEARNING 

answered negatively. Needless to say, bothtutors and students who had answered
positively found that they were beneficial
not only in terms of enhancing learning, butalso in improving communication between
tutors and students. An encouraging finding,you might think, except that only one thirdof the students opted to do the selfassessments; two-thirds did not bother.
For me, this points to the heart of the
problem of juxtaposing assessment andautonomy. The students in Murphy’s study
were given the autonomy to choose whether
or not to undertake the guided selfassessment exercise that was provided,
something that was intended, and indeed
proved to be beneficial for their learningand their academic success, and the majorityof the students exercised their autonomy bychoosing not to do it. This is a quite
different view of autonomy, however, to the
one that tends to prevail throughout thiscollection. Rather than the learners’
capacities and attitudes, this view focuses on
the political dimension of autonomy
whereby institutions, more than learner
psychologies, determine the extent to which
students can be autonomous.
The chapters in this book are written fromthe perspective of a range of different
geographical and educational contexts,
including self-access centres and mainstream
language classes. Self-access centres,
designed to maximise the learner’s control
over the learning process, are in this respectvery different to compulsory general English
language classes in a university curriculum.
As a teacher working in the latter type of
educational context, I have to grade mystudents, and although, like Everhard, I’ve
tried giving responsibility for assessment to
students or sharing it with them, it neverfeels comfortable. I do believe in learnerautonomy, I talk about it in my classes, andI try to give students opportunities to takecontrol over various aspects of the learning
process. But then grading them at the end of
the course feels like I’ve just snatched

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Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017control back again. It feels like a violation ofautonomy.
There is plenty to admire in this book andsome good things to take away from it too. I
was particularly impressed with the threetheory-building chapters and now intend totryout
Murase’s
MILLA
questionnaire, Tassinari’s dynamic anddialogic autonomy task-sheet,
andCooker’s“modesof autonomy”
materials. But I also liked the twochapters describing assessment-sharing
practices, since this is where the subject andits inherent problems came most vividly tolife. If there is anything to criticise, it is that,to my mind, there is too little account takenof the political dimension of autonomy.
Autonomy may very well be a multidimensional construct, but assessment,
when it is done by someone other than thelearner, is fundamentally a political act. But
there is much more to explore about therelationship between assessment andautonomy. This book sets an important
precedent in highlighting the need to do so.
Reference
Holec, H. (1981). Autonomy and foreign language
learning. Oxford: Pergamon Press for Council ofEurope.
Author correspondence:<Email> stewart1411@gmail.com
Assessment and Autonomy
in Language Learning,(2015) Edited by Carol
Everhard and Linda
Murphy, Basingstoke,
UK: Palgrave Macmillan,
2015, 175 pp., ISBN:
978-1-137-41437-3
For more information:
http://www.palgrave.com/la/book/9781137
414373
Have you come across an interesting read? Pleaseshare your discoveries with the LD community bysending your review tolearninglearning.editor@gmail.com .
FOCUS ONLEARNING LEARNING 

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

REFLECTIONS
Reflections on Creating Community: Learning Together 3 (CCLT3)
Overview
Creating Community: Learning Together(CCLT) is an informal afternoon Learner
Development SIG conference taking placeeach December in Tokyo. The event acts as
the final Tokyo get-together of the year, andboth teachers and their students take part.
CCLT3 took place in December 2016.
Thirty-four students and 30 teachers
attended, and by all accounts everybody had
a very enjoyable afternoon—inspiring
presentations and convivial discussions, withmany different LD SIG members leading
the reflection circles after each of the threerounds of presentations.
Here Jenny Morgan, Mitsui Hirano, andDebjani Ray share their reflections on what
they learned from taking part in CCLT3.
Jenny reflects on how presenting at CCLT3
and talking with participants enabled her todevelop her understanding of questions to
do with creativity and criticality, as well as
explore how learners and teachers may
engage with important social and global
issues in different ways. Jenny’s reflections
are followed by “Studying Makes Your
Prospects Brilliant” by Mitsui Hirano, a
student presenter at CCLT3, who reports on
her autonomy-nurturing experiences ofattending a “free school” in Japan. Debjani
Ray closes the set with “Participating in
CCLT3: A Sense of Achievement” bylooking at the benefits that CCLT3 offers tostudent and teacher participants who takepart together, share, and connect.

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CCLT4 will be taking place in December
this year, and you are very welcome to takepart with your students. More details will
follow in the coming months.

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25

LEARNING LEARNING 

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

Reflections about Co-creating
Criticality and Creativity in
Learning and Teaching
Jenny Morgan
Wayo Women’s University, ChibaAt the third annual Creating Community
Learning Together (CCLT3) miniconference hosted by the Tokyo LD
SIG (December 2016), the number ofstudent participants outnumbered theteachers! This was inspiring to see as it
reflects the motivation by learners to take up
opportunities to present their research
and/or reflections on their learning to acommunity of peers which includes bothstudents and teachers. I picked up many
useful ideas and materials from all thepresentations I was able to see, and enjoyedlively conversations with various learners
and teachers throughout the afternoon.
Unfortunately, none of my students in my
two global issues seminar classes was able tocommit time to preparing and giving
presentations, but with their permission andcollaboration I was able to share theirresearch work, reflections and final reports
in my presentation. My presentation focusedon issues of criticality and creativity in a

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learner-negotiated syllabus for a global
issues content based, seminar-style course.
Two students worked on creating our poster
presentation with me: Using a honeycomb
pattern for the poster, we wanted to show
the interconnectedness of the learning that
happened in our class. In the past, I havetended to view and map syllabus design andlearning stages in a linear fashion. Of course,
some parts of learning are necessarily stepby-step, but I more clearly understandlearning-teaching to be interconnected,
where deep knowledge building and skills
development aren’t linear.
In the first class, the students brainstormed
various global/social issues they wanted to
discuss and learn about in our course, as
well as ways (activities, skills, research tasks)
they could use to achieve this. Then, we
mapped a fifteen-week plan with assessment
breakdown. I suggested a certain order ofthemes to help the learning beinterconnected and accumulative, and not
merely random. So, in terms of themes, ournatural starting point was looking at andsharing about “identities”, “communities”,“societies.” Then, a focus on “gender”
aimed to prioritise the realities of theseyoung women students; we felt “diversity”
to logically extend the knowledge and

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LEARNING LEARNING 

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

experiences of (gender) discrimination,
empowerment, and the reality and value of
diversity in our lives. Research and learning
about diverse “social-change makers andheroic individuals” nicely broadened out to“organisations and NGOs working forsocial-change.” For their final projects
students chose their own research topics,
which were connected to themes we hadalready explored together.
While working with content, learners carriedout activities which required them to engage
more critically and creatively withsocial/global issues; learners did not justhave to research and describe a social problem,
but also activities/prompts guided them totake an interpretative view and a critical view
when they gathered their information,
images, and opinions. Regular reflection
writing along-side Internet research, out-ofclass interviews, peer-share discussions,creating visual materials for theirpresentations, and writing their final reports
all jigsawed together to help my learners todevelop their critical understanding ofcontent, and to understand their research
processes better (unpublished data).
One of my goals for CCLT3 was to find out
from attendees what critical questions might
foster criticality in global issues contentbased classes. I invited CCLT3 attendees towrite on “post-its” any critical questions
they use in their classes to get their learners
thinking and exploring issues more deeply.
Thank you so much to everyone for sharing
and writing their ideas! I gathered many richquestions and prompts for me to take into
my classes in 2017.
WHAT QUESTIONS CAN HELPLEARNERS/YOU WORK TOWARDSCREATIVITY AND CRITICALITY
WHILE ENGAGING WITH
IMPORTANT GLOBAL/SOCIALISSUES?
• How are you/we connected to this issue?
• Who benefits and who doesn’t benefit from thissituation?
• EMOTION - how did/do you feel about this(issue)?
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• What communities/groups do you belong to now?
How do these communities help shape youridentity?
• Which groups/communities would you like to joinor learn about in the future?
• What slogans, quotations, sayings can you findabout this issue? Which are the most interestingfor you? Why?
• Find images of different kinds of (diversity) inJapan or other places- write sentences using theprompts for ‘three ways of seeing, thinking andquestioning’ (factual, interpretative and criticalviews).
• Have students create a survey and find out about
attitudes towards their topic on campus. Can
their research help understanding/change
attitudes?
• What NGOs are doing campaigns on this issue?
Why?
• Do you think you could live as ___? Why/whynot?
• Environment!!!
• How would you feel if this was you?
• What do other people think? Find out. Do you
agree with them?
• Imagine if you were faced with ___, what would
you do?
• How would you feel if you had to be ___?
• Imagine/reflect on...you are one of the actors.
• Nicole Gallagher described a roleplay activity
where there is a ‘lay-judge’ and the class engages
with agree/disagree stances on an issue. The
learners first read some case-studies/stories ofdifferent actors.

Re-reading the “post-its” now in January has
helped me reconnect with the presentations
I enjoyed in December. For example,
Dexter Da Silva commented and reminded
me about allowing space in the classroom
for “EMOTION—how did/do you feel
about this (issue)?” Some of the presentersin Round 1 (Dexter Da Silva, Nicole
Gallagher, Wakana Sakai, and Yurie Ogura)emphasized the importance of psychologicalliteracy in learning, emotions, andimagination/creativity in communicativecompetence. I found these presentations
particularly refreshing as I am often
worrying with my students too much about
the academic-intellectual side of language
learning and knowledge building. It’s good
to be reminded how essential the affective andpsychological aspects of learning-teaching are
for sustaining motivation for learning,

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LEARNING LEARNING 

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

developing the whole person, and simply
having fun while communicating with otherpeople in the classroom.
The other goal I had for CCLT3 was to talkwith many students whose stories I could
then share with my own learners. I had
interesting conversations with Yusei Ando
about learner goal-setting and teachers’ roles
in supporting learners to set their own goals.
He then emphasized the importance forlearners to regularly evaluate and adjustthese goals throughout a learning cycle. I
was very impressed with the quality of
research and presentations by three Chuo
students, Katsuyuki Tsutumi, Keito Imai,and Kohaku Kawada, who visited Myanmar
last summer with Andy Barfield. The
students’ perspectives as young adults onconnecting with local university peers,
Burmese teacher trainers, NGO workers,
and local business owners offered me aunique insight into important issues facing
this emerging nation, issues related toeducation, gender, ethnic minorities, andmicro-finance.
Thisisimportantbackground learning for me as I also visit
Myanmar in spring to participate in teacher
development workshops.
I appreciated talking with Shinobu
Nakamura about her extensive reading (ER)project at her university’s self-access centre(SAC).
Her research showed that byincreasing their pleasure reading of graded
readers, students developed their vocabulary
and confidence communicating in English.
All too often, I tend to let ER fall by thewayside due to time constraints whenplanning my syllabi, but now after hearing
the successes of ER at Shinobu’s SAC, I’m
definitely going to ensure all mycommunication English freshmen classes
get introduced to graded readers early on in
their study. At Wayo, I think it’ll beenjoyable and motivating for them to aim
towards some kind of vocabulary target(with prizes), and to measure their progressat the end of a semester (thanks, Shinobu!).
I was very much inspired by Caroline
Kocel’s PowerPoint presentation about her
research trips to Yap, FSM. Caroline’s
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journey as a reflexive researcher resonatedwith me as it is largely through asking myself
questions and writing reflections in myresearch journal that I can make sense of myown research processes for writing up data
analysis, for understanding the literature,
and applying any findings/theories to enrich
my teaching-learning approaches; also, in
guiding my research students in their own
reflection writing and growth as researchers.
Caroline’s presentation offered a small view
into some of the ways that these resilientisland communities are facing the challenges
of climate-change caused by industrial
nations, through environmental educationand efforts towards food sovereignty.
Caroline shared some photos and thoughtprovoking
visualisationsofthe“organization and management of learning
environments” for environmental education.
These powerful visual analyses revealed
various elements of learning and pedagogy
related to power in a classroom, and posequestions about whether the learningteaching approaches are participant-driven(learner-driven) or outsider-driven? Do
educational
approaches
value
the
participants’ lived experiences and existingknowledge about their natural environments
and how they sustain local knowledge? Is
the learning contextualised, is it co-created,etc? Finally, we discussed the need forparticipant-driven research, meaning that any
research projects must have “value-added”
benefits to the participants not just the
researcher. These were all valuable questions
and reminders for me in my EFL teachingin Japan, and also for working effectively
alongside
teachertrainers
inBurma/Myanmar.
Thank you again to the CCLT3 conference
team and all the participants. I enjoyed therelaxed, collegial atmosphere, meeting old
and new friends, eating the festive treats,
and taking away much to reflect on for the
coming teaching-learning year.
Author correspondence:<Email> jennyromain@yahoo.com

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Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

Studying Makes Your Prospects
BrilliantMitsui Hirano
Department of English Communication
Faculty of Humanities, Keisen UniversityIt was a great honor to be a part of theconference and to share my experienceand my ideas with everyone. Also, it
was a great opportunity for me to think
about English education in Japan because
I’m taking the educational course at myuniversity. I talked with the participants
about why students seldom have the chanceto speak English and to state their own
thoughts in English class, and also
confirmed what teachers can do to givethem motivation and confidence throughEnglish study. I learned a lot through thediscussions. I think this experience will be
helpful and useful for my upcoming teacher
training and that motivated me to study
English more.
“What comes to your mind when you hear
the words free school?” When I asked thisquestion, most of the Japanese people at theconference didn’t know what free school
meant. That showed me the current
situation of free school in Japan. “Freeschool” is a unique school based on diversity
and flexibility. In my presentation, I talked
about how I changed my motivation andattitude to learning through free school. I
was so glad to see that the participants
showed deep interest in this kind of uniqueschool.
I started to go to free school when I was in
my fourth year in elementary school. It wasvery different from public and private
schools. My free school consisted ofelementary to high school classes, with thenumber of the students being nearly 30, allstudying the curricula the Government has
set in Japanese. Because of the small school,
you can have a deep relationship with bothstudents and teachers and learn how to getalong with each other in this community. In
addition, my school has several great
characteristics. For example, you can makeSPRING 2017

your own class schedule depending on yourneeds and sometimes you can study on a
one-to-one basis. Also, you have lots ofchances to meet people from all over theworld. You can learn the importance ofrespecting individual personalities andbuilding relationship with handicappedpeople and people with different
backgrounds.
On the other hand, there are some problems
in free school. Currently, it is not recognized
as an official educational institution by thegovernment. Because of this, the students
who are in elementary and junior high must
be enrolled in regular school because ofcompulsory education. This means that
there is not enough cooperation with regularschools and nearby communities. As for myfree school, it is mainly funded by school
fees and supporting membership donations,
so it is hard to manage the school.
However, I think everything I experienced
in free school was meaningful and helped toshape my personality. I realized that learning
is not for gaining knowledge, but for finding
possibilities through your school life. Also, I
learned that learning builds your confidence.
I believe these things motivate you tocontinue to push forward even if you facedifficulties.
I strongly hope that people in Japan willknow more about free schools and thesociety will be open to accept various waysof education such as free schools.

Participating in
CCLT3: A Sense ofAchievement

Debjani Ray
Tokyo University of ScienceThe varied and unique content of
CCLT Conferences, where teachersand students present side by side, isvery attractive for me. Due to other

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Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

commitments, I was there for only the latterpart of CCLT3, so I missed much of it,which I regret, but during Round 3, I
managed to see two full presentations that I
would like to reflect on here.
The first was by a group of students of
Political Science and Economics from Meiji
University, Tokyo, who presented on acommunicative game, called Husky Race,
which they described as “brain-friendly.”
They also played the game with several
participants. In the game, players need tofollow some rules: first, players are required
to find answers to a list of clues given aboutsome interesting areas of a city or town; theplayers then go to the places physically andat each place they need to take photos withsome landmark as proof that they will later
use in a presentation on those places. A few
teams are meant to play the game at thesame time and to compete with each other.
Each team must try to do the race in the
shortest possible time.

Figure 1. Students playing in “Husky Race”

My impression was that the clues, written in
English, were all well thought out and thatthe game gave ample opportunities of
exercise that helped in improving theperformance of the brain (Ratey & Manning,2015). The game combines movement with
content and makes students actively andeffectively engaged in learning whichemphasizes the use of the target language
throughout the game. The problem solving
involved in this game helps in the essential
part of the team-building process throughbrainstorming and sharing ideas andknowledge. It also enhances co-operationand collaboration within the team and gives
SPRING 2017

plenty of opportunities for improving
comprehension and communication skills,
so that motivated students use the target
language during the game, which in turn will
improve their language skills. This gamefacilitates learning of a variety of processes,
which makes taking part interesting andenjoyable and leads to improved outcomes.
My only concern is that there might besome conflict with the school authorities
about using this game at school as thestudents would have to go to different
places without any supervision. Other
questions I had are about judging the timeused in the game as class time or free time,
how much of class time can be spentoutside the class and school unsupervisedand how much of students’ free time can bedirected to be used for an activity for school.
This could provide the impetus for a debate
about using this particular game in the class.
Overall, the game was very interesting, andthe students did a wonderful job presenting
and playing it with the visitors to theirdisplay. Their teacher, Yoko Morimoto, wasalso present there and helped the students
whenever required, but without interferingin any way.
The other presentation that I spent time atwas by Jenny Morgan, of Wayo Women’s
University, Tokyo. It was on a contentbased course dealing with global issues while
focusing on encouraging students withlimited proficiency of English. The course
tried to enhance engagement, understanding,and critical thinking on prominent global
issues. The main learning goals for theseminar-style course were developing theskills for critical thinking, opinion making,discussion-developing, researching, andfinally, presenting on some chosen global
issues. There were some class materials forviewing as well as some learner products,
such as journal entries and research reports.
The attractive poster used in thepresentation provided the major steps of theprocess, essential information about the
project and displayed the outcomes. The
nicely organized materials made the logicalsequence clear. With its right amount of

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Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

font and graphics, restrained use of colours,
the self-explanatory poster became a
motivational message itself.
Jenny explained how it had been a“challenging puzzle” for her to engage thestudents with limited English in ameaningful and critical discussion on
important social issues. The students
worked on a variety of difficult themes suchas diversity, social change makers, andgender issues. Jenny also talked about how
she guided the students through three levels:seeing, thinking, and questioning, to develop
criticality and help them build the necessary
vocabulary.
She also taught them toresearch various sources, to choose
appropriate topics, to do discussions andpeer-share discussions. Finally, the students
learned how to write reflections that theyshared with each other in class. Then theywrote reports on their research andpresented these to their peers, too. As thepresenter stated, it was “co-creating”
learning.
There were class materials and examples ofreflections written by students on display forattendees to look through. One of them wasa homework assignment sheet on socialchange makers. Students needed to go
through a series of multiple-choicequestions that set them thinking about socialchange makers and then focusing on one
person of their choice. They could choose
from a page of pictures of world-famous
heroes from different countries from avariety of fields. To help them in doing this,the presenter produced a worksheet using
mindmaps to teach them note-taking skills.
It was for the students to fill in the blankmindmap after conducting a research on
something or someone and in case they did
not know or find all the answers, they wereallowed to guess or "imagine" them. There
were questions to lead the students towards
the right direction, for example, why they
are a good role model or hero, and how
she/he made a difference to people’s lives.
There was also a guide for writingreflections. The students needed to write
reflections on their partner’s presentations
SPRING 2017

on global issues. To guide the students
through the steps towards writing proper
reflections, the sheet contained questions,multiple choice questions, and supportive
statements.
As a teacher myself, I know the hardships
when dealing with students with limited
English, and it takes no imagination tounderstand how hard it might be to teachand explain difficult topics of global issues
to them. I thought that the presentation wasvery insightful. The presenter led theviewers smoothly through her challenging
journey with the students. At the end of the
project when the students learned some newsocial issues and made their presentations
successfully, it finally became enjoyable andrewarding for the students and satisfying forthe teacher. Specifically, the class materials
caughtmyattention.
They
were
meticulously created with the mission of
supporting the students. The example
student products indicated that the classmaterials undoubtedly enhanced thestudents’ understanding of the complexityof the content and, at the same time,
facilitated their language learning.
It was my second time to participate in a
CCLT conference: the first time was as apresenter and this time as a viewer.
Generally speaking, it is a well-organized
conference with a variety of presentations
on many different topics and the interactive
opening and closing plenary sessions. Its
unique quality is having reflection circles
after each round of presentations where
both the presenters and the viewers can takepart together, share, and connect. That is
how it creates a sense of achievement foreveryone present as people can learn fromeach other and learn together. And that is
also how, in my opinion, this conference
stays true to its title.
Reference
Ratey, J. J., & Manning R. (2015). Go wild: Eat fat,run free, be social, and follow evolution's other rules
for total health and well-being. London: Little,
Brown Book Group.
Author correspondence:<Email> dray.beta@gmail.com

REFLECTIONS

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LEARNING LEARNING 

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

GET-TOGETHERSTokyo Get-together Report:
Making Plans Together for 2017
JHV VRJHVKHT

Andy Barfield, Ian Hurrell, Jenny Morgan, and
Ken IkedaWe began 2017 with a lively meetingof 14 people in January where we
made plans for 2017. The January
get-together started with an introduction
round to welcome new participants, Peter
Joun and Keiko Yuyama. We then discussed
the new venue for the Tokyo get-togethersfrom April 2017, and dates for the monthly
meetings, which from April are going to beheld at Rikkyo University in Ikebukuro (formore details see http://ld-sig.org/tokyo-gettogethers/).
Our next area of discussion was creating
continuity and development from one gettogether to the next, with a positive sense ofmoving forward together. As a “participantcentred” SIG, the get-togethers are entirely
reliant on those attending co-creating theformat and content of each meeting bybringing along their own pedagogic interests,
puzzles and challenges, and/or researchinterests and concerns, to do with “learnerdevelopment.” People expressed theneed/desire for some kind of structure,some degree of continuity–of themes, ofpeople to talk with. Yet, we also want tobalance any structure with the “open,
inviting culture” of LD, keeping thelooseness and spontaneity that allow us tocreate whatever happens each time with
whoever turns up.

pedagogic issues that they face with
their learners, so the get-togethers
involve “teacher support group”
discussions and sharing. This was doneat different times in the past andworked best when people preparedcopies of student artifacts/work forsuch discussions.
2. Another option is at the start of the gettogether participants share their learnerdevelopment themes/topics/areas offocuses, and then people split
into “like-minded focus groups” todiscuss and learn about a theme or
research focus of interest. At
subsequent
get-togethers
peoplecontinue to meet with the same theme
group to develop and explore ideas
more deeply. From experience, it isgood if people have the option tochange groups, so some flexibility isneeded with this option. Past themebased discussion groups led to somemembers later presenting together at
the national JALT conference andwriting up their learning and research
togetherfortheconference
proceedings.
Anothergroup’s
discussions formed the basis of a bookproject on collaborative learning. Manyof the research team members havesince become active in the LD SIG.

We discussed several different options forthe 2017 get-togethers:

3. Some people said they had very muchenjoyed the short workshops on doing
research that individual members had
presented in the first part of gettogethers last year (e.g., Exploratory
Practice, interview-based research,narrative research, and diary research).
Suggestions for continuing with this in
2017
led
to
the
idea
of
having workshop ideas come from gettogether participants so that sometimes
people could volunteer to give an
exploratory presentation on a learnerdevelopment theme that interests them.

1. Participants bring to each gettogether samples of student work andrelated teacher puzzles/challenges, toshare ideas and explore practical

4. Another possibility that some people
would like to try includes people
giving practice presentations to get
feedback and critique before presenting

SPRING 2017

GET-TOGETHERS

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LEARNING LEARNING 

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017at bigger conferences. People felt thismight be a particularly good focus for
the October get-together whereindividuals could run through theirpresentations for JALT2017 and/or
ideas for CCLT4. Such presentationbased workshops might be 20-30
minutes long with plenty of time for
feedback and Q&A.
5. Another option is to designate loose
time-slots for mingling and sharing
learnerdevelopment
interests,
questions, and puzzles, with a 60- to
90-minute workshop/ teacher puzzles/“free-talk” with student samples/shortworkshop presentations from theparticipants/working
onresearchthemes in small groups. Of course,
these time-slots would be negotiated bywhoever attends on the day.
We also talked about conveying some kindof minimal structure of the get-togethers on
the Learner Development website and in themessages that go out via Mailchimp for eachmonth’s session. People who have been to a
get-together are familiar with what they
involve, but for those who have not yettaken part, it would be helpful to have abasic outline such as:
§
§

§
§
§
§

14.00-14.15 Mingling and meeting inpairs
14.15-14.30 Sharing of people’s learnerdevelopment interests and deciding
pairs/groups and areas of focus
14.30-15.15 Pair and small-group
discussions
15.15-15.30 Short break
15.30-16.30 Pair and small-group
discussions, and next steps
16.30-17.00 Sharing with the wholegroup, announcements, the next gettogether

As part of the rolling discussions aroundstructuring the get-togethers and aiming
for Creating
Community
Learning
Together 4 in December 2017, various
suggestions were made about reaching out
and linking up in an informal way withSPRING 2017

members of other teacher groups andSpecial Interest Groups (SIGs) in the greater
Tokyo area. It might be possible, forexample, to make some connections with a
Reflective Practice group that has started up
at Rikkyo University. We could also invite
CALL SIG members to participate in the
get-togethers
andexplorelearnerdevelopment dimensions of working withdifferent forms of technology. Another linkup would be to encourage teachers with
global issues interests to come and take partin the get-togethers. There is also the
Framework and Language Portfolio SIG
that is interested in a joint event with LD in
2017. Many ideas were mentioned, and weagreed that we want to keep arrangements
informal so that CCLT4 keeps its accessible,
student- and teacher-friendly, interactive
character.
We also discussed how the get-togethers canlead into reflective writing for Learning
Learning. Some participants from CCLT3
last year are writing reflections and shortreflective articles about the conference. The
idea is for each short reflective article to befollowed by two reader responses from SIG
members. Several people at the January gettogether expressed an interest in writing areader response and signed up to do so. It isquite possible that other writing will emerge
from the discussions at the get-togethers
this year, leading later into different
publishing opportunities.
Finally, we talked about a good, sustainable
way to keep a record of each get-together
that can be shared publicly. In the past we
have done collective write-ups, but this has
been somewhat of a burden at times to do
and put together. For 2017 we agreed that adifferent person each time would take theresponsibility of writing up a get-together.
The recorder would be responsible forcreating a Google doc and writing asummary of the get-together that will thenbe posted on the main LD website. For
January Jenny kindly offered to do this,followed by Lee Arnold in February. See
http://ld-sig.org/2017-tokyo-get-togethers/
for more details.

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Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

Kansai To the World: Promoting
learner engagement about
international issues through astudent conference

on the student participants by examining
their feedback, and offer some advice andsuggestions for those interested in holding
similar events in their own contexts.

Sponsored by: JALT LD SIG Kansai Get Together

The Kansai To The World (K2W) student
conference, held in November 2016,
engaged local and international students
from Kansai area universities in discussions
about current globally related issues facing
Japan. Within this student-centered event,participants actively employed theircommunication skills, empathy, and crosscultural understanding. Through poster
presentations, discussion and reflection
activities, we saw students engage indiscussions about topics generated by theirpeers. While the focus was primarily on the
Kansai region, students addressed thechallenges of globalization in the areas ofeducation, tourism, technology, and theworkplace.

Anita Aden, Ann Flanagan, Yoshio Nakai,
Shuji Narita, Agnes Patko, Jennifer Teeter andKatherine ThorntonLearners of English and otherlanguages across Japan are regularly
faced with the same problem: a lackof opportunity to use the language they arelearning. This can influence their language
learning experiences in multiple ways
including never engaging in language
learning due to a lack of perceived need,struggling with low motivation, or
possessing low communicative proficiency
due to a lack of opportunity for interaction.
The social turn in language learning research,which has taken place over the last 20 years,
emphasizes the importance of interaction
with others, not just in terms of proficiency
gains made through language practice, but inthe effect that it can have on motivation,
engagement and learner autonomy.
Murphey (1996) has long advocated for the
power of peer interaction on motivation,with his concept of near peer role models(Murphey, 1996). More recently, Murray(2014) emphasised the importance of thesocial dimension in fostering autonomy.
University students in Japan may have few
opportunities to meet other learners outside
their immediate peer groups (classes, club
activities); as a result, they may have limited
chances to engage in discussion about thesocial issues that face Japan in the 21st
century.
The Kansai Get Together group of the
JALT Learner Development SIG, revived in
December 2015, decided to organise aforum for students from our institutions to
use English to engage in discussion of social
issues in the form of a student conference.
This paper will describe the event itself andhow it was organised, investigate the impact
SPRING 2017

Literature Review
There is a history of student involvement inacademic conferences in Japan, but the
research in this area has tended to focus
more on students in supportive roles at
professional conferences, rather than as
presenters themselves at events organised
especially for students. In one study,
Matsuoka (2015) investigated the impact on
willingness to communicate and thelanguage anxiety of interns at a JALT
conference. In another, Taylor (2012) cited
numerous benefits for students who worked
as interns, including opportunities to use
English in a local environment compared toan expensive study abroad programme,
which increased student motivation andcontributed to developing students’intercultural competence.
Despite this minimal research conducted on
the impact on students as they take part inconferences as presenters, more student
conferences have taken place in Japan inrecent years. The Asia Community
Engagement (ACE) student conference hastaken place in the Kansai area since 2014. At
this conference, groups of participating
students are assigned a current problem in

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LEARNING LEARNING 

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017business in Japan and asked to develop
possible solutions. These solutions are thenpresented and discussed in English on the
day of the conference. The Japan
Association for Self-Access Learning(JASAL) has held three student events since
2013: the Student Involvement in SelfAccess Centers Conference, was organised
by students from Sugiyama Jogakuen
University in Nagoya in 2013 (Ssali, 2013); a
Self-Access Show and Tell event at
Okayama University in 2015 (Fujishima &Ronald, 2015); and the Engaging Students in
Self-Access Centres conference at Kanda
University of International Studies in Chiba
in 2016. In each of these JASAL events,
student users and student staff of self-accesscentres shared observations and talked
about their experiences and research at theirfacilities.
Though similar to ACE, which focused on
engaging students in problem-solving
activities, the student conference describedin this article differs from the previous
events. One distinct difference of the K2W
conference was the personalization, wherestudents developed their own ideas as they
prepared posters prior to the event.
Organising K2W
Discussions about the K2W event started in
April 2015; however, due to varying school
calendars
andprevious
research
engagements, the date of the event was
decided relatively late, in September. Oncethe date was finalized and the venue wasbooked, we created a to-do-list and allocatedtasks among the members.
Table 1. Tasks for conference planning
Create a call for posters handout (include
application method, deadline, notice of
acceptance etc.)
Decide the target group at each institution
Appeal to international students
Start advertising the event to students
Application deadline (get informal numbers
SPRING 2017of posters & students interested inattending)
Make an online registration form forparticipants (Google forms)
Site visit to OIC (Ritsumeikan University,
Osaka, Ibaraki Campus), decide what
equipment to reserve
Make a conference
website: https://k2w2016.wordpress.com
Make a conference booklet
Decide the order of presentations/ poster
sessions/ tasks that students will do at theevent
Decide the final format of the event
Divide the teacher responsibilities (wholeads which activity, etc)
Finalise the tasks
On the day:- arrive early to set up the conference roomand prepare for registration- set up the room, put up signs to help
participants find the room, set up therefreshment area, technology support, etc.
The K2W: Kansai to the World conference
held at Ritsumeikan University, Ibaraki
campus was organzied by Katherine
Thornton, Richard Silver, Agnes Patko,
Shuji Narita, Yoshio Nakai, Anita Aden, and
Ann Flanagan (with support from Jennifer
Teeter). Since students, both Japanese andinternational students were participatingfrom different universities, the event started
with Agnes Patko and Katherine Thornton
leading an introduction activity to encourage
students to get acquainted with eachother. Soon the room was buzzing withenergy, and laughter could be heard fromevery corner of the room.
The conference was divided into two poster
sessions. Poster Session 1 focused on thethemes of Tourism and Technology. The

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LEARNING LEARNING 

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

participants rotated every 8 minutes to newposters, allowing them time to listen to all
the presenters. After presenters were
finished, students were given a 10-minutebreak to read the posters in more depth andget some refreshments. Next, students
paired up in a reflective discussion activity
to discuss the topics. Using colorful sticky
notes, they wrote their possible solutions orquestions for the presenter and stuck themon
thewhiteboardnear
theposters. Members of the LD SIG thengrouped the comments into categories. This
led to the next activity, a “Gallery Walk”,
where students walked around the room toread other students’ comments and further
stimulate follow up conversations. Oncestudents had read all the notes, they chose
one poster’s theme to talk about in small
groups. Following their discussion time, aself-chosen leader of the group gave a shortsummary of what was discussed with therest of the participants. After this activity,
students were given another short break aspresenter set up the second poster session.
The themes for this session were
“Education”
and“Workplace&
Employment”.
The second session proceeded more quickly
due to the students’ familiarity with theactivities and the increased level ofconfidence in sharing their thoughts andopinions. Following the second poster
summaries, students were given feedback
forms to fill out anonymously. The
conference received very positive feedback
about the variety of topics presented and thestyle of conference. Many students werekeen to participate in another event like thisagain.
To conclude the conference, presenterswere given certificates of achievement andthe afternoon event ended with a group
photo.
Students’ voices
Students filled in a seven-item questionnaire
about the event, which included
demographic data (see Appendix). We
considered using an online form; however,SPRING 2017

the idea was discarded as we anticipated thatsome students may not have a smartphoneand some might have restrictions on theirinternet usage.
Because we were notexpecting more than 30 participants, we
decided that using a paper-based survey andentering the answers into an online form
seemed manageable.
Throughout the event, the 20 participants
were actively engaged and seemed to enjoy
the various activities, reflected by the resultsof the survey. We received very positive
feedback. From the 18 respondents, 15 said
they were “extremely likely” to recommend
the event to a classmate, and 3 were “likely”
to recommend the event to a classmate.
Almost all participants rated the event as“excellent” or “very good.” They felt thatthe warm up activities helped to create afriendly atmosphere.
In their comments, many of themmentioned that they enjoyed discussing thevariety of topics and sharing opinions about
the issues in English with people from otheruniversities and international students. One
point that needed to be improved was thetime allocated for each activity. They wanted
to spend more time on their discussions andneeded more time to think. All in all,students felt the event was well organised
and each activity fostered communication.
They were happy to have participated in thisconference and many of them expressedinterest in participating and/or presenting at
a similar event in the future.
Reflections and Conclusion
Conference organizers reflected on the
success of this student-centered event inlight of reaching the target audience,achieving the conference aims andevaluating the outcome for future
events. In the preparation stage, emphasis
was put on adequately planning thecomponents for a half-day conference(Segar, 2010) and defining the tasks thateach contributing Kansai Get-Together
member would do in the three months
leading up to the November 2016conference. The prior conferencing-making

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LEARNING LEARNING 

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

expertise of Katherine Thornton, Ann
Flanagan, Rich Silver, and Agnes Patko
added to the smooth process of creating
checklists, making fliers and commenting onor editing each other’s tasks. Ourcommunication was primarily done via email
and the conference files were accessible toall members on Google Drive. From thetasks listed on our conference planning
checklist, it was possible to stay focused oncompleting each item and then respond todetails that came up as the conference day
approached. Some of the challenges ofpreparing for this conference included thelimited time we had to prepare for it, finding
enough student presenters, the uncertaintyof the number of participants, and concerns
about participants’ understanding of thisconference’s style of activities. Feedback
from participants confirmed that our efforts
to make an engaging student-focused event
were worthwhile and that planning a second
K2W conference would be well received byparticipants in the future.

look forward to applying our knowledge
from the last conference, as we prepare forthe next student-centered conference.
K2W PHOTO GALLERY

Figure 2. Presenters at the K2W conference Nov 2016.

Figure 3. Participants and presenters at K2W Nov 2016.

Figure 1. Celebrating a great K2W Conference.

Photos and video taken during theconference by Shuji Narita reflected theactive participation and dynamic interactionsof participants with each other andconference organizers. These photos were
uploaded immediately following theconference website and the link was sent toall participants the following month, alongwith an online follow up survey made by
Ann Flanagan. Overall, we rated theconference a success, based on the pre- andpost-conference agenda, accomplishedthrough the dedication of the LD SIG
Kansai Get Together members! This year,
the K2W2: Kansai to the World 2 will takeplace on June 11th at Kyoto University. We
SPRING 2017

Figure 4. Participants adding comments to presenters’ posters.

Figure 5. Participants adding comments to presenters’ posters.

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Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

References
Fujishima, N., & Ronald, J. (2015, August 2).
Talking Points August 2015: JASAL Show &Tell @ Okayama University’s L-cafe.
Retrieved from http://ld-sig.org/talkingpoints-august-2015/
Matsuoka, R. (2015). Willingness tocommunicate: The effect of conference
participation on students L2 apprehension.
In S. Horiguchi, Y. Imoto, & G.S. Poole,(Eds.). Foreign Language Education in Japan:
Exploring Qualitative Approaches. (pp. 133 –
146). Boston: Sense Publishers
Murphey, T. (l996). Near peer role models.
Teachers Talking to Teachers 4(3), 21-22.
Murray, G. (2014). Exploring the social
dimensions of autonomy in language learning.
In G. Murray (Ed.), Social dimensions ofautonomy in language learning (pp. 3-11).
Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave.
Segar, A. (2010). Pre-conference preparation.
Conferences that work: Creating events that people
love. Marlboro, VT: Booklocker, Inc.
Ssali, V. (2013) (Ed.) Student involvement in selfaccess centers conference reports. Of the students, forthe students. Retrieved fromhttps://jasalorg.files.wordpress.com/2013/1
0/sisac-conference-reports.pdf
Taylor, C. (2012). Student experiences on ashort internship program. Bulletin of Toyo
Gakuen University 20, 129-147. Retrieved fromhttp://ci.nii.ac.jp/naid/110008915171/en

SPRING 2017

K2W: Kansai to the world
Useful links:
Kansai to the World website:
https://k2wconference.wordpress.com
Kansai get-togethers are open to language
instructors to share together ideas and enjoy
discussing current topics and trends
happening in education in Japan.
http://ld-sig.org/get-togethers/kansai-gettogethers/
Facebook :https://www.facebook.com/groups/1265188541
84011/

Where:When:

GET-TOGETHERS

Kyoto University
June 11th (Sunday)

38

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Appendix: (not the original form)
K2W Conference Feedback Survey
Dear Participants,
Thank you very much for participating in the Kansai to the World Conference.
We appreciate all your hard work for making this a successful event. Your feedback is very
important to us. Please fill out the form below.
Circle:

Male

Year:

1 YearFemalest

2 Year 3 Year 4 Year Graduate
nd

rd

th

Exchange
Student

Student

1. How likely would you recommend this event to a classmate?
2.
Overall, how would you rate the quality of the conference?
• Excellent• Very Good• Fairly Good
• Mildly Good
• Not good at all
3.
4.
5.

What did you like about the event?
What did you dislike about the event?
How organized was the event?
• Extremely organized• Very Organized• Somewhat Organized• Slightly Organized• Not at all Organized

6. Were the following activities helpful in encouraging communication among participants?
Extremely
Very
Somewhat
Slightly Not at all
Icebreaking Activities
Poster and Discussion Session #1
Poster and Discussion Session #2

7. Please write any additional comments or feedback that you would like to give us.
Thank you very much for participating in the Kansai to the World Conference.
We greatly appreciate your feedback. It will be very helpful when we plan next year’s event.
The K2W Conference Organizers

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Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017agreed that some of my university students
and I would lead English Storytime together.

LD GRANTS UPDATE
2016 Project Grant
Report–The
Storytime Projecti

Nathaniel Carney
Kobe CollegeI

was very happy to have received the2016 Project Grant from the JALT
Learner Development SIG. I used the
grant to support a local library English
Storytime project that I have been leading
for the past two and half years.
BackgroundI started the Storytime project incooperation with my local public library in2014 with the goal of giving children in thecommunity a free opportunity to hear
English children’s books and songs read bynative or expert English speakers. Alongwith that goal, I imagined that it might bepossible to involve students from myuniversity as co-leaders of the sessions. Thus,
the project was envisioned as offeringcommunity children free chance to hear
English storybooks and songs in native or
expert English, and providing my students
an opportunity to use the English they study
atuniversity
while
contributing
educationally to the surrounding community.
My local public library already offered  (i.e., reading times) in Japanese anumber of times per month. However, they
had no reading times in English despite
having a selection of 300-400 English books
for children. I thought that offering English
Storytime for children might be popular,
and suggested the idea to the library staff in2013. At that time, I was told there was no
open time to schedule English Storytime.
After a year, I decided to ask again. In 2014,
the staff was more enthusiastic about theidea. After discussion with the library, it was
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Implementation
In the fall of 2014, three students and I led
the first two Storytime sessions, each ofwhich lasted 20-30 minutes. There were 3040 children and parents at each meeting—both large groups compared to usual
Japanese reading times. This was
encouraging. However, as I explored getting
more students involved, I found a problem I
had not considered—transportation costs.
Because English Storytime took place on
Saturday mornings, I would have to pay forstudent transportation costs. Moreover,various policies prevented me from using
university research funds. Reluctantly, I gave
up having students lead the reading timewith me, and from 2014-2016, I led English
Storytime on my own.
From 2014-2016, I continued to feel that
the Storytime project was worthwhile. It wascontinuously well-attended, and certain
children would come often and interact withme more and more each time. Also, thelibrary staff were pleased it was being
offered. Nevertheless, I continued to feelthat involving university students would
greatly improve Storytime for everyone
involved. For my students, I felt that it
would give them an opportunity to use
English in Japan in a meaningful way in thecommunity. Students at my university often
say that a main reason for learning English
is to communicate with foreigners. Yet, inthe future my students might also haveopportunities to teach English to children
here in Japan, and many of them will likely
have children of their own someday towhom they will want to teach English. For
the children attending the sessions, I feltthat listening to a variety of English speakers,
not just a “foreigner” or “native speaker,”
could help them develop a broader image of“English speakers.” Seeing and listening toJapanese college students reading andspeaking in fluent English could be inspiring
to young people attending the English
Storytime sessions.

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After joining the Learning Development
SIG in 2016 and receiving the LD-SIG
communications, I learned about the Project
Grant. I immediately thought to apply forfunding for the English Storytime project. I
wanted to use the grant for two purposes:
funding
studenttransportation
andpurchasing new books for English Storytime.
Since Receiving the LD-SIG Grant
Since receiving the grant, I have purchased
eleven new books and conducted English
Storytime with three students for whom I
covered transportation costs.
At the last Storytime meeting in November,each of the three participating students readone book by themselves. One student read
The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle,
another read Five Little Monkeys by Eileen
Christelow, and another read Pete the Cat: I
Love My White Shoes by Eric Litwin. In orderto prepare for reading, I met with thestudents twice before the Storytime session
to model reading aloud and to listen to themread. I also recorded myself reading thebooks so they could listen to how I readthem. I cautioned them to especially pay
attention to intonation changes, as I havefound this to be the most difficult aspect ofreading aloud for my students. All three
students did excellent preparation for the
English Storytime reading. They were all
nervous to read in front of the group. I was
contacted afterwards by one student who
said she was “very nervous” but it was a“good and very memorable experience”.
Reflection
Successes
The next English Storytime session will beat the end of March, and I am involving
three new students at that time. Anotherstudent has expressed interest in joining fora future session. Receiving the LD-SIG
grant has encouraged me to continue
involving students going forward, eventhough the costs will gradually go beyond
the grant.

SPRING 2017

I am generally pleased with the English
Storytime project. Though it is a small
project, I feel the goal of giving community
children a free opportunity to hear English
storybooks and children’s songs has beenachieved. Now, with the involvement of mystudents, the project has gained a new layerof meaning: university students make acontribution to the surrounding community,
and also gain an authentic experience using
English. Though I have not received formal
feedback from the library, they continue toseem pleased to have English Storytime
offered at the library.
Future Issues to Consider
Despite my enthusiasm for continuing theEnglish Storytime project and continuing to
involve students, there are certain elementsof the project with which I am notcompletely satisfied.
One issue I am dealing with is how tofurther enhance the experience forparticipating college students. Ideally, I
would like students to join the project for along period, for example, at least three
Storytime sessions. With a longer
commitment from students, I feel students
could improve their communication abilities,
and as a group we could add more variety to
Storytime activities (e.g., a short puppetshow).
Another issue for me to consider is whether
the experience is appropriate at all for lower
level students. In November, the three
students who participated were among themost proficient students that I knew. Theirpronunciation was clear, they could read
fluently, and they had confidence. I would
enjoy drawing from a bigger pool of student
volunteers, but if I were to open
participation to more students, I will likely
get volunteers who do NOT speak English
so well. In that case, further training willprobably be necessary. However, even withfurther training, I do not feel that most
students could read well enough in front ofa group of children and parents. Thus, theissues are: What type of English is

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Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

appropriate for Storytime? How much of anaccent is acceptable? What level ofintonation?

anyone lives in the Nishinomiya area andwould be interested in being involved with
the Storytime project, please contact me.

On the one hand, Storytime is a freeoffering to the public; on the other hand,the presentation quality in Storytime isimportant to me. Storytime is not primarily
meant to be a forum for students practicing
English; rather, as expressed earlier, it is an
opportunity for children to hear English
books and songs spoken by native andexpert English speakers. With the three
students who participated in November, I
definitely feel that goal was met. However,with lower-level students, I think the qualityof the Storytime experience could becompromised.

Author correspondence:<Email> carney@mail.kobe-c.ac.jp

A final issue on my mind is the actual valueof the Storytime Project for the children andparents who attend. One of the students
who participated in November mentionedthat “It is a little strange to read English
books, because the children do not speak
English.” I understood the comment.
Though Storytime is not completely
monolingual (i.e., using Japanese sometimes
is encouraged), it is true that some of thechildren who come to Storytime do not
speak much English, and they probably do
not completely understand the stories thatare read. Some of the children do not (orperhaps cannot) sing along with the songs.
What value are they gaining from Storytime?
Are their parents forcing them to attend forthe wrong reasons? Obviously, I cannot
definitively answer these questions.
However, I continue thinking about how I
can make Storytime as accessible andinteresting as possible to the children
attending, while also generally maintaining
the use of English and the goal of exposing
children to the sounds of English throughchildren’s books and songs.

he theme of this year’s JALT
conference was transformation inlanguage education, with the goal
being to explore the transformative powerof education from many vantage points.
Looking through the conference handbook,
I was thrilled to see some of the biggest
names in the field of language teaching andresearch as well as many presentations
related to how computer technology cantransform the way language is taught andlearnt. The use of technology in language
learning and teaching is of special interest tome, so I felt like a kid about to enter a huge
candy store. What a golden feeling!

Conclusion
I am looking forward to another year ofEnglish Storytime events. My thanks again
to the Learner Development SIG for seeing
value in the project and for supporting it. If
SPRING 2017

Reflections on and
Takeaways from
JALT 2016
JALT2016

Daniel G. C. Hougham
40

Hiroshima University

T

I am delighted to report on how theconference has affected my development asa language learner and teacher-researcher.
For me, the main takeaways from theconference were collaborative action
research, digital teaching/learning tools, andsecrets of transformation in language
education in Japan.
Collaborative Action Research
I began the weekend with Professor Anne
Burns' plenary titled Transforming the Shape of
the Way We Work. Burns, of the Universityof New South Wales (Australia), is mostwell known for her work introducing
teachers to the excitement and usefulness of

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Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

doing collaborative action research (AR) in
their particular teaching contexts. Her
reader-friendly book, Doing Action Research in
English Language Teaching (2010), has beenused by language teacher-researchers
worldwide, and helped guide my own
master’s dissertation project which,incidentally, I presented at the University ofBirmingham’s Graduate Student Showcase
at JALT2016. In her plenary, Burns
discussed different shades of the meaning oftransformation and how we can change theshape of what we do in several different
ways. For example, by introducing changes
to our practices of language learning andteaching, and improving the way we interact
with our colleagues and learners throughdoing collaborative AR. She talked about
the basic steps in AR: Plan, Action, Observe
and Reflect (see Figure 1).

Figure 1. Cyclical AR model based on Kemmis and McTaggart (1988).

For me, the takeaway message from her talk
was an encouraging reminder that carryingout AR is a practical and methodical way forteachers to continually and collaboratively
strive to deal with common issues andimprove teaching practices. Her talkrefreshed my fond memories of carrying out
the AR cycle, and it made me feelempowered to continue with my efforts to
SPRING 2017

improve interactions and learning outcomesthrough doing collaborative AR in mycurrent university teaching contexts. It also
encouraged me to seek out further
opportunities to share with others with aview to recognizing and crystallizing themost important aspects of the AR I havealready completed and the AR I am
currently working on.
One such opportunity presented itself while
participating in Burns’ practice-oriented
workshop called Transformation in yourClassroom: What Works? on Sunday. In thisworkshop, Burns guided participants insharing how we are transforming or
intending to transform our classrooms,
teaching, and how we work with learners.
One of the very “hot” issues discussed in
my group was the transformative power ofeducational technology and how it canindeed help to engage students, promotelearner development, and facilitate thecreation of effective and efficient
opportunities for learning. I greatly enjoyed
the opportunity to share with my groupmembers about my successful experiencesusing online learning/teaching tools toengage students and train them in language
learning strategies which help them develop
their English vocabulary efficiently andeffectively.
DigitalLearning/TeachingTools
One of the Saturday
afternoon
posterpresentations
that
immediately attracted myattention was Websites &Apps that will Change yourClassroom by Erin Morrisand Herman Bartelan of Kanda Institute ofForeign Languages. Their poster presented awide-ranging list of websites and apps incategories of all skills, speaking & listening,reading & writing, vocabulary, andmiscellaneous. For me, one of the key
points to be remembered came from a
conversation with Morris in which I asked

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Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

her which one of the foremost online
vocabulary learning tools listed on her
poster she thought is more useful, Quizlet
or Memrise. Her response was that she finds
Memrise, which I had not used much before
the conference, particularly useful. Shortly
after the conference, I had another go atusing Memrise to study Japanese vocabulary
and I am pleased to say that I have since
become captivated by Memrise’s userfriendliness and usefulness. I am now
steadily and efficiently learning new
Japanese vocabulary at a remarkably highrate of retention and progress toward mygoal of acing the Japanese Language
Proficiency Test (N2: upper-intermediatelevel) this coming July. I find Memrise’s
mobile app for iPhone especially brilliantly
designed and easy-to-use. What I havelearned firsthand is that Memrise’s recipe for
effortless learning comprises several simple
ingredients, one of which is science which
involves giving our brains just the rightworkout by continuous choreographed
testing and adaptive “spaced repetition” ofwhat we've learned at scientifically
optimized times so our memories of newwords are always growing stronger, andnever forgotten. Another ingredient is fun,which involves turning learning language
into a compelling, competitive game where
we grow a colorful garden of memory;
planting the seeds of new words andnurturing them through reviews and tests
until they grow strong, take root andblossom into flowers in our long-term
memory. I now plan to create my own
multimedia flashcard courses and introduce
Memrise to my students as supplementarymaterial to be used alongside textbook
materials, and as a very useful tool to help
them achieve their language learning goals
such as getting a high score on the TOEIC
test. To learn more about Memrise (and sign
up—it’s
totallyfree),
gotowww.memrise.com and enjoy learning more!
Another one of the poster presentations
that particularly appealed to me wasTransforming Vocabulary Learning with Quizlet
by Brent Wright of Kanazawa Institute of
SPRING 2017

Technology. Wright presented his research
project in which he aimed to enable his
students to experience how easy it is tomake digital flashcards and thus motivatethem to use Quizlet to study vocabularyautonomously and effectively. In his project,
he attempted to measure not only theamount of time it took his university
students to make 20 English-Japanese
flashcards using Quizlet with smartphones,
but also the accuracy of the flashcards theycreated. His findings were that the averagecompletion time of 7 minutes 50 seconds
was a reasonably low burden to students,
and that accuracy may be an issue that canbe addressed by, for example, having
students check each other’s work using
Quizlet’s built-in audio to check how words
on their word cards sound. The key idea forme was that it is certainly worth training
students to make their own word card setswith Quizlet in class, especially as they cancheck each other’s work using Quizlet’s
excellent audio feature.

Quizlet is undoubtedly a very popular tool
among language teachers. This was shownby the large number of other JALT2016
presentations showing how it can transformthe way vocabulary is studied. Among thesepresentations was a workshop called Quizlet:
The Optimum Digital Flashcard Tool by Bruce
Lander of Matsuyama University. Lander
introduced some of Quizlet’s newest
features, such as the collaborative teambased classroom game “Quizlet Live,”
which requires participants to work together
to correctly match the target words anddefinitions of a Quizlet set. Quizlet Live is,by all accounts, now taking the world bystorm (Wolff, 2016). I have also experienced
great and rapid success in introducing
Quizlet Live in my own classrooms, having
received overwhelmingly positive feedback
on it from my students over the past several
months. The most memorable experience
for me from Lander’s workshop was playing
a very enjoyable game of Quizlet Live for

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Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

the first time from a student’s perspective
using our smartphones. This experiencestrengthened my resolve to continue using
Quizlet Live and other Quizlet activities tomake lessons more enjoyable for students.
Lander also encouraged us to attend theJALTCALL 2017 conference that will beheld in Matsuyama in June, inspiring me to
not only attend the conference but also givepresentations to share my successful
experiences promoting active learning andlearner development through computerassisted language learning, especially using
Quizlet.
Among other key
digital takeaways, ofparticular note is
how Google Docs
cantransform
student writing. In
his poster session
titledTransform
Student Writing with Google Docs, Nick Boyesof Nagoya University of Foreign Studies
explained that Google Docs, which is a free
web-based word processing software, can beused to foster collaboration and autonomy
among students. With proper support froma teacher, Google Docs allows students toquickly and easily share their written workwith their peers and give each otherimmediate, personalized error-correction
feedback, working together on the same
document at the same time. As an added
anxiety-reducing bonus, we never have tohit “save” again, as all of our changes areautomatically saved as we type.
Secrets of Transformation in Language
Education in Japan
In their presentation called Transforming
Teacher Development, Chuck Sandy, Barbara
Sakamoto, and John Fanselow ofInternational
TeacherDevelopment
Institute (iTDi) led a thought-provoking
discussion about our beliefs about language
teaching and learning. Fanselow reminded
us of Socrates’ wise words on ignorance:“True knowledge exists in knowing that you
know nothing.” Indeed, these wise words
SPRING 2017

prompted me to reflect on my ignorance
and seek out other nuggets of Socrates’
wisdom, one of which I found is especiallyrelevant here: “The secret of change is tofocus all of your energy, not on fighting theold, but on building the new.” For me, then,an additional and crucial takeaway from
JALT2016 was a renewed focus of all of myenergy on “building the new,” with a view
to furthering collaborative action research
and making further use of innovative digitalteaching/learning tools, especially Memrise,
Quizlet, and Google’s suite of productivityapps.
One other secret of transformation is of
special importance and relevance here. In
his presentation titled The Power of the Senpai,
David Barker of BTB Press explained frompast experience that there is no use trying tofight against Japanese university students’tendency to observe hierarchies, as Japanesesociety places strong emphasis on hierarchy,
and the senpai/kohai relationship is a
powerful example of this: the senpai (senioror older student) may even have more
influence on the kohai (junior or younger
student) than the sensei (teacher). It istherefore advisable for us teachers to try andharness the power of senpai/kohai
relationships in order to transform ourclasses into more cohesive and supportive
learner groups. To harness the “power ofthe senpai,” I plan on trying to get to know
my university students more deeply byparticipating in more of their extracurricular
activities, creating more opportunities forthem to learn about each other in class, andstructuring in-class activities in culturally
sensitive ways that make use of the naturaldynamics of the Japanese classroom. For
example, it has been suggested that certain
group members can be assigned specificroles such as “leader” to coordinate a
discussion, “secretary” to record groupdecisions, and “spokesperson” to reportback to the class (Anderson, 1993, p. 108).
Conclusion
In conclusion, I received a great deal of
takeaways, handouts, inspiration, and

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LEARNING LEARNING 

Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017encouragement at JALT2016. As a result, I
am encouraged to keep striving to transformmyself into a better learner, a better teacherresearcher, a more supportive colleague, amore successful materials creator, and amore productive citizen of Japan and theworld.
I encourage everyone to participate in the
JALT International Conference in the future.
The conference allows participants a venue
for meeting experts in the field, learning
about new research, ideas, and materials,
networking, learning about graduate study atmany top graduate level TESOL programs,
transforming yourself, and building yourcareer. There was such a wide range of
excellent workshops and presentations, thehard part was deciding which to attend
because there were often several interesting
events being held concurrently. Overall,most of the presentations I attended werevery practical.
As the grateful recipient of the JALT2016
International Conference Grant, I would
like to express my sincere thanks to the
Learner Development Special Interest
Group (LD SIG) for awarding me the grant
and making my journey to attend andpresent at the conference in Nagoya
possible. It is thanks to the LD SIG grantthat I had such a valuable experience at theconference, so I am deeply grateful to all
LD SIG team members, especially Jim
Ronald who posted information about the
grant and tagged me through Facebook,thus encouraging me to join the SIG andapply for the grant in the first place. I am
incredibly thankful to be a member of sucha supportive, well-developed group, and I
strongly recommend that other eligible LD
SIG members (or soon-to-be members) canand should apply for LD SIG grants ofinterest to them. Finally, I would also like toexpress my heartfelt gratitude to Arnold
Arao and Yoko Sakurai for their valuableadvice and comments on this report. I am
also particularly grateful to Aaron Sponseller,
Philip Head and Jim Ronald for their great
help with proofreading /copyediting.
SPRING 2017

References
Anderson, F. E. (1993). The enigma of thecollege classroom: nails that don’t stickup. In P. Wadden (Ed.), A handbook forteaching English at Japanese colleges anduniversities (pp. 101-1l0). New York:
Oxford University Press.
Burns, A. (2010). Doing action research in
English language teaching: A guide forpractitioners. New York: Routledge.
Kemmis, S., & McTaggart, R. (1988). The
action research planner. Melbourne: Deakin
University.
Wolff, G. (2016). Quizlet Live: Theclassroom game now taking the world
by storm. The Language Teacher, 40(6),25-27. Retrieved from http://jaltpublications.org/node/27/articles/552
8-quizlet-live-classroom-game-nowtaking-world-storm
Author correspondence:<Email> d.hougham@gmail.com

LEARNERDEVELOPMENTGRANT DEADLINESRESEARCH GRANT
Friday, 30 June 2017 (23:59 JST)PROJECT GRANTS
Friday, 30 June 2017 (23:59 JST)
JALT INTERNATIONALCONFERENCE GRANT
Friday, 25 August 2017 (23:59 JST)LD GRANTS UPDATE

For more information please visit:
http://ld-sig.org/grants/

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LD CONNECT

Learner Development Events
PanSIG 2017
Akita International University, Akita, May 19-21, 2017
http://www.pansig.org/

This year’s Learner Development SIG forum gives participants a chance to expand their interests by focusing on avariety of topics related to student development. Focusing both on research and practice-based topics, the forum will
highlight different aspects of autonomous learning, visual metaphors, meta-cognitive strategies and important noncognitive factors in learning. Timed rounds of interactive presentations will be followed by a discussion circle, giving
participants the opportunity to synthesize the information from the presentations with their own experiences
assisting learner growth.
PanSIG 2017 LD Forum Presenters:
Arnold Arao, Non-cognitive Factors in Student Development
Daniel Hooper, Testing the waters: Gauging the viability of autonomous language learning in an eikaiwa
Robert Morel, Student Responses to Learning Strategy Instruction
Matthew Porter, Collaborative Reflection Using a Visual Metaphor

JALTCALL 2017
Matsuyama University, Matsuyama, Shikoku, June 16-18, 2017
The theme for this year’s conference is “Active Learning through CALL.” Active learning isan essential part of language learning. JALTCALL 2017 will focus on how educational
technology can encourage learners to take a more effective role in their study both inside andoutside the classroom.
http://conference2017.jaltcall.org/

JALT 2017
Epochal Tsukuba, Tsukuba, Ibaraki, November 17-20, 2017
This year’s conference theme addresses the vital need for foreign language skills in ourmulticultural world and the special mission of classroom instructors to prepare students tosurvive and thrive in a global age. The theme highlights the increased contact that our learners
have with foreign tourists, residents and co-workers from around the globe, the newcommunication technologies that enhance borderless language learning, and the need for
language instructors to "think globally, teach locally."
http://jalt.org/conference

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GET TOGETHERSTokyo Sunday, May 28, 2017
Rikkyo University (Ikebukuro campus), Building 7, Room 7204, 14:00-17:00
The Tokyo get-togethers aim to provide a flexible, supportive, and convivial environment for
exploring learner development according to people’s particular interests and concerns. At the
May get-together we will be continuing to explore learner development interests, puzzles, andissues, as well as developing more specific plans together. You are always very welcome to join
us (no worries if this is your first get-together of the year!). We welcome the participation ofteachers from diverse teaching contexts—including elementary school, junior high school, seniorhigh school, university, distance learning & graduate studies, and language school settings—andteachers teaching languages other than English.
Please check out more information about the event on our LD webpage: http://ld-sig.org/tokyo-get-togethers/ . Feel free to contact the get-together organisers (Andy
Barfield, Ian Hurrell, and Jenny Morgan) at ldsigtokyogettogethers@gmail.com .
Kansai Sunday, May 28, 2017
Sunday, May 28, 2017
Sunday, June 25, 2017
Sunday, July 23, 2017
For further information please contact Agnes Patko at ldkansaigettogethers@gmail.com
Hiroshima (Dates to be decided)
Hiroshima’s Learner Development Get-togethers meet eight or nine times a year, every one or
two months. One important role of our get-togethers is to support and promote teacher
development, providing a sounding board, listening ear, and other sources of encouragement foreach other. In the past year, quite a few teachers have joined us for the first time and some,thankfully, have gone on to become involved in roles within the LD Sig beyond local gatherings,
including writing projects, grant applications, and LD-focused presentations.
While we have an active mailing list of about 20 people, our get-togethers are typically muchsmaller affairs where members share experiences and practices related to teacher and learnerdevelopment. We often see many new faces at our gatherings, which sometimes makes it feelthat every time is the first time! As such, it gives us a good opportunity to consider afresh bothwhat learner development is and the roles that our get-togethers may play. On the other hand,the development of longer term projects has seemed hampered by this lack of continuity, and so
far there has been no concerted effort (by me!) to work out the best way to proceed. Writing
now, it seems clear that just as many other parts of the LD SIG are conducted very successfully
without the luxury of regular face-to-face contact, longer term projects for the Hiroshima group,
including plans for working on future publications, may be best conducted via email, Google
Docs, or other such tools. This will involve more work, more time on the computer for more
people—but it will also give more of us chances to be actively involved in working together on
LD SIG-related projects. The next step, then, hopefully started by the time this is published, is
to invite one or two people to be part of a Hiroshima LD Get-together planning committee. If
you are interested, we'd love to hear from you. Please feel free to contact Jim Ronald, atjmronald@gmail.com
and I will be more than happy to tell you more.
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LD SIG NEWSILA 2018 - 8th International Conference of the Independent Learning Association
We are excited to announce that the 8th International Conference of the Independent Learning Association(ILA 2018) will be held in September 2018 at Konan Women's University in Kobe, Japan.
More details will be following soon. Meanwhile, we are currently welcoming ideas for potential
conference themes and keynote speakers, as well as suggestions for presentation formats andevents which will make the conference more collaborative and inclusive.
Please send your ideas to ilajapan2018@gmail.com

CALL FOR PROPOSALS
JALT2017: Language Teaching in a Global Age: Shaping the Classroom, Shaping the World
Epochal Tsukuba (Tsukuba, Ibaraki)

November 17-20

International Communities: Fostering Learner Development on A Global StageIn the global age, it could be argued that an outward-looking mindset would be an invaluable
tool that would embolden students to participate in a worldwide community of English speakers.
The teacher can play a role in promoting notions of international awareness, and dialogue withthe world outside of Japan. However, if these ideas are to be truly ‘owned’ by students, learners
must find their place in the global community. The Learner Development SIG Forum at
JALT2017 is based on the theme of fostering international mindsets through autonomous
learning both inside and outside the classroom, and we are seeking presentations in this area.
Presentations could be based on completed or ongoing research in this area, or practical teachingideas from a range of teaching and learning contexts.
We encourage you to submit proposals for the Learner Development SIG Forum at the JALTInternational Conference soon. This year’s conference is taking place at Epochal Tsukuba inTsukuba, Ibaraki (about an hour north of Tokyo) from November 17 to 20. The theme of thisyear’s forum is International Communities: Fostering Learner Development on a Global Stage.
• Have you used any activities that helped students develop an international mindset?
• Do you promote inter-cultural awareness in your classes?
• Is there an international exchange program or study abroad experience that you could

report on?
• Do you have any advice for the teacher trying to implement an increased internationalawareness in their classroom?
COMPLETING THE PROPOSAL
Applicants are asked to carefully consider their topics as they relate the theme of theforum. Applicants who best reflect this theme will be given priority. In some situations,applicants might be asked to re-submit their abstracts to better reflect the theme.
Please complete the application, including a title and an abstract, by the absolute deadline of
FRIDAY, MAY 12th.
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScVyehc5GFuCKdPjlKjgmM1lGOb_y2qXGF
ZK_PLo5KSvkZnfQ/viewform
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Research Grant
Deadline for 2017 applications: Friday, 30 June 2017 (23:59 Japan Standard Time).
One research grant of ¥25,000 is open to a Learner Development (LD) SIG member (or aresearch team comprised of LD SIG members) willing to write an article (1000-2000
words/3000 Japanese characters) about their research in Learning Learning. Priority will be given
to those who do not have access to institutional funding. Early-career Japanese researchers are
particularly encouraged to apply.
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Project Grants

Deadline for 2017 applications: Friday, June 30, 2017 (23:59 Japan Standard Time)
The Learner Development (LD) SIG is offering two ¥20,000 Project Grant to LD SIG
members conducting or leading education-related projects or volunteer activities as individuals
or in groups, who are willing to write an article (approximately 1500 words/3000 Japanesecharacters) about their project for Learning Learning. Applications may include, but are notlimited to, the following examples. If you are unsure whether your project qualifies or not, pleasecontact the Grants Team.
*Teachers and/or students engaging with and/or helping communities or groups of people
outside of their educational context, at either a local, national, or international level;*Encouraging student development through supporting student participation in conferences, LD
SIG Forums, LD SIG get togethers, etc.
Recipient/s can use the grant in any way within reason that will support their project. Pleaseindicate in your application how the grant will be used to support the successful completion of
the project.
Project Grants are open to individuals who receive research money from their workplaces.
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Volume 24 Issue 1 May 2017

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International Conference Grant
Deadline for 2017 applications: Friday, August 25, 2017 (23:59 Japan Standard Time).
One grant of ¥50,000 is available to a Learner Development (LD) SIG member who will attend
the 2017 JALT International Conference and is willing to write a conference report or anotherpiece of writing to be published in Learning Learning after the conference. The grant recipient
can use the grant to cover their travel, hotel, and/or conference fees for the 2017 JALTInternational Conference at the Tsukuba International Conference Center (Epochal Tsukuba),
November 17-20, 2017. The grant will be awarded to the recipient in person at the LD SIG
Forum held during the conference.
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http://ld-sig.org/research-grants/

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