HAVE FUN While Learning English

One of the exercises I had to do while taking a voice class at Temple University was to stand up and secure one bent leg with one hand behind me while extending the other hand in front of me.  Why?  That's what I was wondering at the time too.  The point is not only to help you "center" and "direct" your voice, but to distract you while trying to do it.  And it helped!  Letting go of inhibitions can really help when it comes to anything to do with vocalizing whether it be learning to sing, or learning a new language.
I've always been told I'm a serious person.  Having integrity is important to me, but a sense of humor can be important too.  After establishing what a student's goals are, and targeting their problem areas, I like to help them "become distracted" and have fun while making improvements.
Using clips from sit-coms (comedy programs) for exercises is one way students can have fun while learning English.  A short vocabulary list is given for the student to learn before watching the brief video clip, and then some questions are provided for the student to answer.  So along with building vocabulary, the ability to utilize context for comprehension is also being developed.  Having a laugh about something funny we've read is also a great way to find ourselves distracted while making improvements during a lesson.

Lastly, alcohol is a natural muscle relaxer.  As the tongue is a muscular organ, why not have a glass of wine before practicing your English.  I'm not recommending making a habit of it, but once in a while might be ok!

My students in China win awards at an English competition!

I’m very proud of my students in China who won a lot of awards at an English speaking competition.  We work very hard on diction and pronunciation (online).  I love my students!

Chinese culture and traditions documentary

Idioms

(1:18) "He comes on the king tide."

King tide is a colloquial term for an especially high spring tide, such as a perigean spring tide. "King tide" is not a scientific term, nor is it used in a scientific context.

• A perigean spring tide is a tide that occurs three or four times a year when the Moon's perigee (its closest point to Earth during its 28-day elliptical orbit) coincides with a spring tide (when the Earth, Sun and Moon are nearly aligned every two weeks).

"The Enjoyment of Summer Changed"- The Diary of Three Sisters

Translated by Masaharu Yamauchi, edited by Rebecca Silva
“Summer vacation is just around the corner.”

I’m getting excited about the first summer vacation since moving to the Kanagawa prefecture in April. Although the summer vacation in Kanagawa is supposed to be longer than in Iwate, I feel it might be shorter, because I have many things I want to do during the summer vacation－watch horror movies, watch fire works with my friends, and so on.  

During an ordinary summer vacation, I spend time lying around at home or playing with my friends after coming back home from the club activities that the school provided. Since there was a small department store near my home, what I did there was the same－play on the same corner and talk with my friends in the food court－it was like a routine job.

But I had one thing that made me happy. There was a shop that sold dumplings filled with sweat bean paste in winter and sold shaved ice in summer- it was smothered in a lot of ‘Calpis-Lemon’ syrup, which was very delicious. If I could go to Ofunato City during summer vacation, I would go there to eat it definitely.

Our Hometown is Far Away ― The Diary of Three Sisters

translated by, Masaharu Yamauchi, from the Asahi Newspapar, Japan                      

山内　雅晴

edited by, Rebecca Silva

‘The fear of aftershocks comes to mind’  

Five months have passed since the big earthquake happened. I still remember clearly the experience of the earthquake, and I think I won’t ever completely forget.

What bothered me most after the earthquake was the problem with water and electricity.

Since we couldn’t flush the toilets, we poured water that the army brought in a big tank into buckets and used them after two or three people went to the toilet.

 Five days later, I could take a bath. In an emergency, I thought I wouldn’t die if I didn’t take a bath for a while. But I had a hard time because my hair became so greasy. The bath that we three sisters took wasn’t hot, it was almost cold water, that made us shiver, but I felt nothing less than happiness.

Also, I have coming to my mind the fear of aftershocks. It was soon after that powerful aftershocks followed a large number of times a day, not just a few times.

But I gradually came to understand that big aftershocks followed －we needed to decide whether to evacuate or not－according to how strong the aftershocks were. ‘Wobbly’ isn’t a big deal. But the aftershock that starts with small vertical vibrations followed by a roaring from underground becomes powerful.

Recently my concern grows very big every time I hear the news predicting a big earthquake and powerful aftershocks. Since simply worrying doesn’t take you anywhere, I think we have to decide where we evacuate to and how we will contact other family members in preparation for future earthquakes.  

（Nanako）

◇

The life of these three students who suffered from the big earthquake and the nuclear power plant disaster, and transferred to the Kanagawa prefecture have seemed to settle down gradually.　But they have lived a life that they could have never imagined living over the last year.

This is a commentary about how they feel on a daily basis in the Kanagawa prefecture that is far from their hometown. We have three sisters who moved to Fujisawa city in the Kanagawa prefecture from Ofunato city where the big tsunami hit.

(From top to bottom) Mariko Hayashizaki(17), Nanako(16), Sayako(13). March 11^th, they suffered in Ofunato city, Iwate prefecture. Although all family members- 5 including the parents - were safe, their house was partially destroyed by the tsunami. For three weeks, they moved around from shelters to their grandmother’s house,  and so on. At the end of March, they transferred to Fujisawa city.

Punch Line

The idiom, Punch Line, is used in a recent CNN Video about U.S. Governor Chris Christie's weight.

Silent Aftermath - Yamauchi Masaharu

“The scene where human figures had evaporated within a 20km radius of the Fukushima Nuclear Plant－and one can hear only the voice of the wind”

All sounds were gone from the town where the nuclear power plant is, and three weeks had passed since the big earthquake happened. Only the sound of the wind blowing strongly could be heard in a dead calm main street. There was a Siberian Husky lying down on the center line of a two lane road. And then a mongrel dog came along on the sidewalk, and another one from out of nowhere. All of them were still wearing collars. They were looking at me as if they were asking something, standing in front of an arch saying ‘Bright Future Nuclear Energy.’
Not only were dogs stranded. I found a cowshed within a ten kilometer radius from the nuclear power plant. I approached and said, ‘Hello’, but no response. When I stepped into the cowshed, it smelled pretty bad. As my eyes adjusted to the dark, I recognized that there were some cows standing motionless or crouching on the floor. Looking closely, I realized the cow lying down in front of me didn’t have eyeballs. Birds or something must have picked at them. Six cows that appeared to be just lying down were dead.