Shibaura Institute of Technology Writing 1A: Students write movie reviews

Students in the Writing 1A class at Shibaura Institute of Technology have written some great movie reviews. I decided that it would be fun to present their reviews as animated movies. Thanks to Larry Ferlazzo, a teacher in Sacramento California, I discovered xtranormal.com. Xtranormal is a web 2.0 application. You can change text to speech using xtranormal. You can make an animated movie with one or two characters. It's fun and easy. So, here are some animated movies of cartoon characters presenting Writing 1A students' movie reviews. Enjoy!

Shibaura Institute of Technology Writing 1A: Students write about their special places Part 2

Here are some more paragraphs about special places written by Shibaura Institute of Technology students. Enjoy.

Shunsuke's special place

Next to my high school there was a McDonald's. One day when I was a student, my friends and I were hungry and bored after school. We thought that we would buy 100 hamburgers from McDonald's, because we wanted to make a funny story. We paid ten thousand yen and started to eat the hamburgers. Thirty minutes later, many people surrounded us and took pictures. The clerk cheered us on, but finally we could not eat all the hamburgers. I was impossible for only five people to eat a hundred hamburgers.

Shunsuke K.

Katsunori's special place

Near my house, there is a public park. One holiday when I was an elementary school student, some of my friends and I looked for a good place to play baseball. I said to my friends, “There is a park near my house. That is a nice place for baseball.” So we went to that park, and started playing baseball. I was not good at playing baseball then, so I had no hits. When I fielded as an outfielder, one of my friends hit the ball to my position, but I lost sight of the flying ball because the day was a very fine day, and the sun was shining brightly. When I was looking up in the sky, the ball fell and hit me on my head! My friends laughed and said, “You got a different “hit”!”

Kousuke's special place

My special place is my school-road. When I was a high school student, I found four cats. I took them to my house. I wanted to keep them but I could not. One of them had a sickness. I took it to an animal hospital. I consulted the doctor about what I should do. He was very kind. He took care of them. I was very happy but I was sad because I wanted to keep them. They were very cute but I decided to say good-bay. One day, I had a telephone call. They got an owner that would take care of them. I was very happy. I want to see them again.

Kousuke T.

Yuta's special place

There is a small park near a house. I played soccer there with a friend when I was a primary school child. My friend kicked the ball into the rice field next to the park. I told this to the old man in the farmhouse and apologized, I got the ball with a stick from a tall tree. I gradually made friends with the old man after a while. I talked to him. I still meet him in the neighborhood and get along well with the old man

Yuta N.

Kouki's special place

Next to my home was a small hut. One day when I was a high school student, I played with my friend in front of this hut. I wanted to climb on the roof of this hut. When I was able to achieve this goal, I felt supremely satisfied, but I soon noticed a problem. I asked myself, “How do I get down from here.” There weren't any stairs or a ladder. I couldn’t get down from there. The only solution was to jump off the roof. However, this hut was about 2.5 meters tall. I felt fear. Time was getting on, and eventually it was night, and a noisy crowd gathered around the hut. I was impatient about this. I finally took courage, and I jumped off. I hurt my foot at that moment, but I healed soon. This incident became a lesson. I shouldn’t take a thoughtless risk.

Kouki H.

Toyo Gakuen University students have written about their special places too! You can see writing by student's in Sarah Louisa Birchley's class here: English Elective Writing 9A/9B
Please leave a comment.

Shibaura Institute of Technology Writing 1A: Students write about their special places

The students in the Writing 1A class at Shibaura Institute of Technology are doing great work this year. Over the next few weeks I'm going to post some of their work on this blog. We are using Writing from Within Intro by Curtis Kelly and Arlen Gargagliano. I really like this textbook, and I usually don't like textbooks.

In class we do the exercises and tasks in the textbook and then the students write a first draft. They send their first drafts to me by e-mail. I check them and error code them. The students then edit their first drafts using a bilingual English - Japanese Grammar Error Code Key that I have given to them. After that we review some points in class. Then the students exchange their first draft with a partner for peer feedback. Finally, they write a second draft and e-mail it to me for final assessment.
The examples below are edited versions of the students' second drafts. Most did not require much editing. Sometimes I have left in some vocabulary that might seem a bit unnatural when I'm not sure exactly how to interpret what the writer wants to say. I have tried to respect each student's voice. I have decided to edit them for two reasons. First, I hope that my students will compare the edited version with their second draft and notice the differences. I think this will help them to improve their writing. The second reason is that the students are sensitive about their mistakes. They don't want them dispalyed to the whole world. Even great writers have editors to help them. I don't see a problem with editing my students' writing before it is published. So then, here are some examples of my students' writing. Enjoy!

Yuko's Special Place

My special place is my elementary school, which is about 3 minutes on foot from my house. What happened there was when I was in 2nd year. I was playing with my friends after school. I don’t remember exactly what we were doing, but I think we were playing on the monkey bars. Then, I slipped from a bar, and fell. I slammed my left arm into the ground, and my bone broke. It hurt so bad, and I cried a lot. This is one of my most painful memories, though it’s also a nice memory, because when it happened, my friends helped me, and I knew the preciousness of friends.

Yuko I.

Yuri's Special Place

My high school is in the country. There are a lot of trees and fields near my school. I was going to school in the morning, and I saw my friend sitting in the street. I was worried about her, so I ran up to her. When I got to her I was very surprised. There was a tanuki with her. She was feeding a rice ball to the tanuki. I asked her, "What are you doing? Is that your lunch? She said to me, "Yes, but he looks so hungry. Look! He's eating it. He's so cute. I felt happy too. This is my funny memory from high school.

Yuri K.

Masako's Special Place

When I was a junior high school student, I went to an elementary school for a work experience as a teacher. I taught second year students, and read a picture book to them. I had a very good time. After my stay at the elementary school, all the students in the class gave me a lot of letters, and I became very happy then.

Masako I.

Tomohiro's Special Place

My special place is a park in front of my house. When I was a child, I practiced riding a bicycle without the training wheels with my father in the park. I disliked this because I fell down many times. I was discouraged many times, but my father encouraged me. At last, I could ride a bicycle alone. When I could ride a bicycle for the first time I felt very refreshed. I thanked my father. Now I like riding a bicycle because of this experience.

Tomohiro K.

That's all for now. I'll post some more soon. Please leave a comment. I know my students would appreciate hearing what you think of their writing.