Event

Seeking for the Interface between SLA Research and Language Teaching

Saturday, February 27th, 2021, 2:00 PM - 5:00 PM

Speaker: Shinichi Izumi (Sophia University)

Osaka Center only provides this seminar on campus. The admission for the on campus public session is limited to 30 (first-come-first-served basis). Students taking this seminar for credit will be required to attend the entire weekend. People who are interested in attending the online public session for this seminar is recommended to sign up for the online public session for the same seminar offered in Tokyo Center on Saturday, March 6. Pre sign-up is required for anybody attending the public session except for those credit students. The sign-up process must be completed through "Distinguished Lecturer Series Seminar Sign-Up Form" that is available on TUJ Grad Ed website. The sign-up deadline for Osaka is Friday, February 26 at 12:00.

In this seminar, the lecturer would like to discuss issues related to the interface between Second Language Acquisition (SLA) research and language teaching (ELT). It is a welcoming thing that SLA has finally become a necessary part of the national teacher license curriculum in Japan, and universities nationwide have thus started to offer courses in SLA to prospective language teachers. However, what is needed is not simply to make SLA a mere "knowledge base" for language teaching, but to actively use such knowledge by critically examining our own learning and teaching in light of what SLA research has uncovered about the intricate processes of L2 development. This may be somewhat similar to the still controversial issues in SLA research concerning the interface between metalinguistic explicit knowledge and communicable implicit knowledge, that is, whether and how the two types of knowledge interact with each other to enable better learning. It is the lecturer's contention that, instead of an either/or answer, this all depends on how one tries to bridge the two in the course of one's learning (and teaching)--an issue that he wishes to discuss in some detail as part of his talk in the seminar. In a similar manner, it is incumbent on us to actively seek for ways to connect SLA research and language teaching if we wish to create the interface and derive any benefits from it. In this seminar, the lecturer would like to first start off by introducing what research in First Language Acquisition has revealed about the processes of L1 acquisition, discuss some major theoretical approaches to L1 acquisition, and later use these as a basis for examining and discussing issues raised in SLA research and language teaching. In the latter part of the seminar, the lecturer would like to introduce a Soft CLIL (Content and Language Integrated Learning) lesson for high school in Japan as a way to apply SLA research findings/insights to practical classroom teaching. No prior knowledge of SLA is required to take this seminar. Anyone who wishes to seek for the interface between SLA and language teaching are welcome to join in.

Organization: Temple University Japan

Cost: free

Venue: TUJ Osaka Center Osaka Ekimae Bldg. 3, 21st Floor, 1-1-3-2100 Umeda, Kita-ku, Osaka 530-0001 (map: https://www.tuj.ac.jp/tesol/maps/osaka.html)

Location: Osaka City, Osaka Prefecture, Japan

Contact Temple University Japan

Temple University Japan

Work phone: 03-5441-9800