Event
Home(1) From Phonics to Literacy; (2) Teaching Critical Thinking Skills
Sunday, May 20th, 2012, 1:00 PM - 5:00 PM
Speaker: (2) Brad Semans; (2) John Finucane
From Phonics to Literacy: Leading young EFL students to become effective and communicative readers
Brad Semans
Methodologies for teaching EFL students reading have advanced a lot in Japan over the last 20 years. However, there is an expansive gap between texts and programs aimed at teaching the basics (phonics/word recognition) and those aimed at managing and manipulating content (reading for specific information/summarizing a passage). In this presentation a teaching style developed to remedy this will be presented, discussed and tried.
Brad Semans has taught in Japan for just over 10 years. In that time he has built a successful private tutoring business, and also worked at every level of education for the Saitama City Municipal Board of Education. He is currently working as their Head ALT Instructor and is responsible for planning, implementing training, curriculum design and development, and supervision of more than 70 ALTs. Brad is involved with Omiya JALT and is a co-founder of SCE. He is an assistant editor for the journals of both of those organizations.
Teaching Critical Thinking Skills
John Finucane
A workshop about the importance of teaching critical thinking skills to students as EFL learners - how to get started and how to practice. We will discuss what skills are needed for critical thinking and debate. We will discuss what kinds of language are required for critical thinking and debate. We will learn some simple classroom exercises for introducing debate. We will do some activities created specifically to teach critical thinking skills.
John Finucane is an EFL professional. He is also the President and co-founder of さいたま市教育家会 (Saitama City Educators). He edits さいたま市教育家会ジャーナル (the Journal of Saitama City Educators). His interests are debating and critical thinking. He is based in Saitama City. Find out more at saitamacityeducators.org
Organization: Yokohama Chapter of the Japan Association for Language Teaching (Yokohama JALT)
Cost: JALT Members: free
Non-members: 1,000 yen (500 yen for students)
Venue: Kannai Hall (map)
Location: Yokohama City, Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan
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