Toyo Gakuen University Freshman English 2 - Reading Final Exam Information

Photo by dieselbug2007

The final Exam will be on the 14th of July 2008. The exam will cover Units 1-5. There will be 6 types of questions:

1. Timed reading: scan a reading for 1 minute in order to find specific information. This is a short answer type questions. You will have to write one word or phrase for the answer.
   
2. Reading for the main idea. This is a multiple choice type of question. You will have to choose from 4 choices.
3. Reading for details. This is a multiple choice type of question. You will have to choose from 4 choices.
4. Making inferences. This is a multiple choice type of question. You will have to choose from 4 choices.
5. Matching activity. Match the vocabulary from the textbook with the Japanese translation.
6. Personal response. This is a short paragraph type of answer. You will have to write 2 or 3 sentences in order to answer the question. Your answer should be at least 50 words.
   

The test will be 60 minutes.
Use the following resources from Sarah's blog in order to study for the final exam:

• On-line exercises from American Headway (Units 1-5)
• A timed-Reading about shopping. Click start reading.
• Vocabulary flash cards for Unit 1, Unit 2 and Unit 3.
• Readings with exercises about life as an immigrant to the USA:
• Newaz's Story
• Hannah's Story
• Sarah's Story
• Victor's Story

If you have any questions please e-mail me on michael.stout@tyg.jp

Finally, please post a comment on Sarah's blog. Please say, "Thank you !" to her for giving us all these wonderful resources.
Good luck!

San Francisco by Maria, Yulia and Karina

Shibaura Institute of Technology Listening Comprehension Mid-term Exam

The Midterm Exam is next Tuesday. You can prepare by watching and listening to some videos. Click this link to watch the videos: http://mrstoutsblog.blogspot.com/search?q=videos
You can get more practice by listening to these podcasts:

• English Journal Podcast
• ELT Podcast
• ESL Radio Show
• ELLLO Podcast
  

You can find links to many other podcasts by clicking this link: http://iteslj.org/links/ESL/Listening/Podcasts/


Happy listening and good luck on the exam!

Making a Date

Recently we have been learning about dates and time in the FE4-Speaking Class at Toyo Gakuen University. For the next test you will have to make a date to go to a movie. Here's a video from EF Education First to help you. The video talks about polite ways to make a suggestion in English. There are various ways to make a suggestion including:

• How about....?
• Would you like to...?
• I was wondering if...?

Which of the ways above do you think is the most polite? Watch the video and find out.

Here's another video about making dates. This video is an animated video. My friend Paul made this video. Paul has a video podcast called ESLpodTV. It's a great podcast. This video is about an English man called Ed. U. Cator. He calls his new friend to invite her to his house. You can learn more about making suggestions, invitations and polite requests (丁寧語、招待) in this video. here's some vocabulary to help you:

guy - person, usually a man

anytime - whenever

nothing special - nothing different or unusual

accent - the way your voice sounds shaped by where you’re from

housewarming party - special event celebrating moving into new home

neighbours - the people living nearby

got nothing on - not doing anything at that time

few - a small number of something

funny - strange

I was wondering if… polite expression requesting somebody do something

If you’re free… - expression often used to ask for a date or request favour

Educator Diaries 3 from kibishipaul on Vimeo.

When we make a date in English we need to be able to say dates. For example: June 11th, August 30th, December 25th. We need to be make to make the "th" sound. You can watch some videos about making the "th" sound by clicking here.

When we make a date in English we need to be able to talk about time as well as dates. Here's a video from Real English about time.

Here's another video that talks about prepositions of time. This video comes from JenniferESL

For your next test you will have to make a date to see a movie. Good luck!

Talking about family

This is a great video from EF Education First. The topic of the video is talking about families.

Here's another video about families. This one is from Real English. Enjoy!

JALT CALL Conference 2008 at the Nagoya University of Business and Commerce

This past week-end, from the 31st of March to the 1st of June, I attended the JALT CALL Conference at the Nagoya University of Business and Commerce. CALL means Computer- Assisted Language Learning.

I met many old friends at the conference. I made new friends too. My new friend Martin is in the picture above. He is standing on the left. My old friend Adam is standing on the right. I'm in the middle, of course.

Some Toyo Gakuen University teachers attended the conference too. Andy Boon was one of the conference organisers.


Clair Taylor and Sarah Louisa Birchley were there too. I attended some presentations with them. I attended some preentations with Adam too. We went to a presentation about wikis. Another presentation I went to was about blogging. My new friend Steve Henneberry gave the presentation. Perhaps we will work on a blogging project in the future. Below is a voicethread slideshow of Steve's presentation.


The campus of NUBC is gorgeous. Below are some pictures of the Language Centre.



Here are some pictures of the campus. There are many beautiful trees and flowers on the campus of NUBC, and theres lots of grass!!


I hope I have a chance to visit NUBC again!