Learning Journal Week 5

1. How do people learn best?

In my opinion, the best way to learn something is that learners relate a subject with what they like to do. If learners are motivated to study, learning will get more efficient. In my case, I combine my English learning with my interests, video games, comics, and animation works. They are really good opportunities to improve vocabulary since I can see a lot of words when I play, read, or watch them. Moreover, I can train my listening skill with animations dubbed in English. Learners are able to study without feeling tiresome, carrying out this way of learning. However, there are some faults in this measure. When learners use their interests for studying, they will get limited information. For example, I can learn scientific words, technical terms, and slang using my interests, but there are few academic words in them. In other words, I have to learn some words without this way. Using learners’ interests indeed motivates them and makes their study more efficient; however, it cannot cover all fields of English learning. When people use this means for their studying, they have to apply it as assistance. If they do so, they will be able to strive to study without annoyance.

2. Strategy and Skill

I think Strategy and Skill are totally different things. At first, Strategy means “plan”. We make it before doing something to carry out effectively. We are careful about a thesis, supporting sentence, and conclusion in essay writing because we are sure that we can write good one following this method. Thus, Strategy helps us practice something smoothy. On the other hand, Skill means “ability”. When we do something, we usually use some skills to complete it. For example, we infer meanings from grammatical matters and familiar words when we read a complicated sentence. It is the skill of inferring. In this class, the topic about importance of Strategy and Skill was taken up, and we are asked which is more important. I think that Skill is more important since we could not do anything if it were not for Skill. No matter how great Strategy we have, it will be worthless without abilities to make use of it. We should not neglect Strategy just because Skill is more important. We can carry out something with Skill, but it is never good quality. To progress our English, we have to focus on both Strategy and Skill.

3. Ideas for my final presentation

・Learning associated with one’s interest

・How to create GO for a novel

Learning Journal Week 3

1. One new thing that I learned in week 3 in any of my classes at HELP

My grammar class focused on the verb this week. First, I studied tense: simple present, present continuous, present, perfect, present perfect continuous, simple past, past continuous, past perfect, past perfect continuous, simple future, and future continuous. I knew most of the usage because I had already learned it in high school, but it was hard to explain the usage. In particular, the past perfect was the most difficult one. It means what had already been continued, experienced, or finished in the past. If it were not for a handout with illustrations of a time current, I could not understand its definition. Then, I studied the passive voice. In a TOEFL exam, distinguishing between the active and passive voice is one of the most important skills. The passive voice usually does not have an object, and the preposition comes after the verb; however, the verbs that have an indirect object like “give”, “show”, and “provide” are exceptions. Finally, what I studied in this class is the usage of infinitive and gerunds. They can be a direct object of verbs and change the meaning. For example, “He stopped smoking” means that he does not smoke anymore, but “He stopped to smoke” means that he stops there and starts smoking. Thus, it is important to understand the role of infinitive and gerunds. The verb is the most fundamental factor to English grammar; accordingly, I have to grasp it correctly.

2. One new thing that I learned in week 2 outside of my HELP classes

This Tuesday, November 6^th, was Election Day. It is the day when an election for the President, the Vice-President, and members of Congress is held, and Hawaii State provides that Election Day is a holyday to let people go for a vote. The Presidential election was held this year, and 44^th president Barack Obama was reelected. Obama has some good records during his first term. For example, he had passed the Act of reformation in medical insurance to introduce the system of the public health insurance for the whole nation. In addition, he converted the policy of security from a hard line against hostile countries such as Iran and North Korea to dialogue with them; on the other hand, he carried out the operation that killed Osama Bin Laden, the leader of the international terrorist group named Al-Qaeda and a ringleader of the simultaneous multiple terrorist attacks on September 11^th 2001. Obama accomplished his reelection, but he still has several problems. I expect him to lead the U.S. well because the U.S. is influential for the whole countries including my homeland, Japan.

3. Steps of creating GO

First, I read the sentence from the beginning to the end once and distinguish what type of sentence it is. I have to change the way of writing GO depending on the type. For example, I itemize every keyword when it is “listing”, and I write a chart when it is comparison or contrast. To discern what type it is, I have to find a main idea. It is usually in the end of an introduction paragraph, and it is an important process for creating GO. Then, I decide how I write GO. I create it as visually as I can with using some signs and pictures. I draw two circles overlapping each other as compare/contrast GO, and I use arrows to show sequence or cause and effect. After that, I find keywords to fill in the chart. They are often after the signal words. In a contrasting sentence, there are keywords after the words like “but”, “however”, “on the other hand”, and “while”. Finally, I fill in the chart. When I do this step, I never copy the sentence completely but summarize or paraphrase it. That is how my GO is up at last.

4.

According to Jiang and Grabe, how writing is organized is significant for readers’ understanding skills. A recent study shows that GOs are helpful because they can explain the key points and their relations at a glance. However, there are questions whether some studies help GOs’ advantages, which form the most effective GO is, whether GOs are useful for L2 learners, and whether short-term study is enough for learners to acquire GOs.

Leaning Journal week 2

1. One new thing that I learned in week 2 in any of my classes at HELP

I studied an article, the word showing whether it is definite or indefinite, in the grammar class this week. When listeners can perceive what the word is, they use a definite article “the”. For example, if someone says “I like the dog”, both a speaker and listener are supposed to know what kind of dog it is, what it looks like, what its name is, or who owns it. In addition, the article is used for what there is only one in the world, such as the earth, the Pacific, and so on. On the other hand, an indefinite article “a” or “an” is used when speakers show unspecific things, not to mention showing the singular. If someone says “I like a dog”, it means that he likes every dog, in other words, he does not show which dog he likes. Thus, an article can change meaning of sentences depending on its usage. My first language, Japanese, does not have the article, so it is difficult for me to understand it. However, I will be able to comprehend English more deeply if I am master of the article.

2. One new thing that I learned in week 2 outside of my HELP classes

The large-scale parade was held last Wednesday, Halloween, in Waikiki. There were many people with different costumes, such as a monster, witch, fairy, and even animation character. Children dressing up marched saying “Trick or Treat!” near my house. I knew that custom, but I do not know why people do so. When I say the question to my friend, she told me the origin of Halloween. Halloween is primarily New Year’s Eve for Celtic faith, and people believed that ghosts of the dead visited a family and that a witch or fairy appeared at the night of October 31. A priest gave a fire used for a ceremony to each family. If people heat their houses by the fire, evil spirits cannot come in the houses. When the Celts were forced to convert to Catholics, Halloween was adopted as Eve of All Saints’ Day, the holiday when people respect for all saints. Now the only custom that evil spirits pay a visit to houses is left, and people enjoy this day as one of the entertainments. I thought that it was interesting and important to know the origin of what is close to me.

3. Are there any reading strategies in my L1?

My Japanese has reading strategies, just as English does. However, I do not remember the strategies because I use them unconsciously. Because I started to study English as L2 when I was in junior high, I cannot help reading sentences with recollection of strategies. I try to understand a message from an author or a character and to find a main point from whole sentence. Perhaps the strategies of Japanese are not different from those of English. In other words, it will be not too much to say that I have acquired the way of reading English when I can use the strategies without consciousness.

4. What I want to know at this point

I do not understand one of the types of logical connectors “Condition” well. The handout says “Provides conditional information―the condition under which the event takes place or will take place (which may only be hypothetical)” and gives “otherwise”, “either”, “even if”, “whether”, “in case of”, and “regardless of” as examples. However, I cannot get the meaning of Condition from these examples. Though the other types like Contrast and Sequence is easy to understand, Condition is difficult because it seems more abstract. To comprehend logical connectors correctly, I want to know the definition of Condition in detail.

Learning Journal Week 1

1. One new thing that I learned in week 1 in any of my classes at HELP

In the class named TOEFL Grammar, I took Pre-Test. It is the same questions as Section 2 of TOEFL: Structure and Written Expression. After marking my answer paper, I noticed that I had made a mistake in the question, “Although a product of the twentieth century, the work of poet Robert Lowell is inspired by that those of his nineteenth century predecessor, Edgar Allan Poe”. I had to find the point that was grammatically wrong, so I thought “Although” was wrong because there was no clause despite the conjunction. However, the wrong point is “those”. I could not understand why it is wrong and asked the teacher about it. She said that the subject and verb could be omitted if the main clause has the same one. Then she also told me that “that” in the sentence was a pronoun for restating, so “those” should be removed. That was the most impressive thing that I learned in week 1.

2. One new thing that I learned in week 1 outside of my HELP classes

When I hung out with my friend, she told me an interesting subject about a misunderstanding of English that the Japanese have. We usually use “will” or “be going to” to express the future tense. In Japan, students learn that both “will” and “be going to” have same meaning or that “will” is the undetermined future and “be going to” is the determined future. In fact, I learned it from teachers like that. However, the definitions are wrong. The two words do not have the same meaning or such usages. “Will” expresses speakers’ intention, and it can be used for an immediate decision. Because it shows what the speaker does from now on, the definition, the undetermined future, is wrong. On the other hand, “be going to” means the future that has already been determined and that happens without speakers’ intention. If we misuse the word, the meaning included in the sentence widely changes. For example, if you answer that you are going to come when you are invited the party, it implies that you have already decided to join the party before you are invited. It is quite strange, isn’t it? We should be careful about the usage because the wrong word choice can lead serious misunderstanding.

3. What I think about language learning and other types of learning

I think that language learning is quite different from other types of learning. First, what students have to remember is much more than other subjects are. To form sentences, it is essential to grasp the grammatical rules and to understand the meaning of words and phrases. In addition, students must keep using them, that is, language learners are not allowed to forget them. Even if a certain grammatical thing finished in the class, it will be used in the next chapter. Learners need to keep the knowledge for a long time. Finally, language study demands many kinds of skill: reading, listening, writing, and speaking. It is impossible to train the skills at the same time, so school provides classes on individual skills for students. Language is not just a study but what is based on the daily life. It natural to take a long time to acquire language, and language learning should be different from other subjects.

4. Why do we need learning strategies?

Without the device to acquire something, our brain simply throws memories away because the brain judges them worthless to store. So what can we learn something effectively? Applying the action except studying like singing, dancing, and so on to language learning is good for learner. Unlike the boring way, just reading the textbook or cramming words with cards, the action impresses a brain and makes memories preserve for a long time. The brain straighten up memories connecting an information with others, so this means to acquire language is reasonable. That is why learning strategies are significant to make the brain effectively and to retain memories as long as possible.