Greetings everyone. ?≧◉ᴥ◉≦ I hope everyone had a good break and got things ready to begin a new year from this April. As the title suggests, I am here to deliver the information for the upcoming April meeting. Additionally, after this meeting, the next two meetings will be face to face on Sunday May 8th and Sunday May 29th.

Time: Sunday, April 17, 2022 – 1:30pm to 4:00pm
Location: It will be a face to face at ‘Plat’ Toyohashi Arts Theatre where we have been having all face to face meetings. ᕙ(`▿´)ᕗ
Cost: The event is free to all in attendance

Presenter: Keita Kodama. He is a lecturer of English education at Department of Foreign Studies, Sugiyama Jogakuen University. His research mainly focuses on English education and second language acquisition. His research area includes the use of literature in the EFL classroom in Japan and second language vocabulary acquisition.

Focus of meeting: Incorporating the use of literature into the EFL classroom: Pedagogical approaches to develop critical thinking of Japanese learners of English. The purpose of this presentation is to explore the benefit of using literature as a material for “the training of critical thinking” (Kramsch and Kramsch, 2000: 567) in the EFL classroom in Japan. Although developing critical thinking skills has been seen as a primary goal in higher education for decades (MEXT, 2008), opportunities to acquire these skills are limited and Japanese undergraduate students tend to possess inadequate critical thinking skills (e.g., Sugimoto, 2015). However, little has been discussed about the effective use of literature to foster critical thinking in the EFL classroom in Japan. With these in mind, this presentation aims to look at some of the most practical teaching methods of using literary texts to develop critical thinking skills of Japanese learners of English (JLEs) in the university EFL classroom setting.

Everyone at JALT Toyohashi looks forward to seeing everyone. If you have any questions please contact us either through the JALT homepage or through the JALT Toyohashi website. (◠‿◠)✌

JALT Toyohashi: https://jalt.org/event/toyohashi/22-04-17
Facebook Toyohashi: https://www.facebook.com/JALT-Toyohashi-Chapter-190756014335850