Effects of written language (English/Japanese, private/published) on journal writing for teacher development

My poster presentation at AILA 2014 on the Mezzanine Level of the Brisbane Convention and Exhibition Centre on Friday August 15, 2014.

WHAT TEACHERS MAKE

Below is a copy of a message that my friend wanted me to share.
Thank you, Julia. And now here's for you from Julia and me.


*****

How much do teachers make? Tribute to all teachers.....


WHAT TEACHERS MAKE

The dinner guests were sitting around the table discussing life. One man, a CEO, decided to explain the problem with education. He argued, 'What's a kid going to learn from someone who decided his best option in life was to become a teacher?'
He reminded the other dinner guests what they say about teachers: 'Those who can, do. Those who can't, teach.'

To stress his point he said to another guest; 'You're a teacher, Bonnie. Be honest. What do you make?'

Bonnie, who had a reputation for honesty and frankness replied, 'You want to know what I make? (She paused for a second, then began...)

'Well, I make kids work harder than they ever thought they could.

I make a C+ feel like the Congressional Medal of Honor.

I make kids sit through 40 minutes of class time when their parents can't make them sit for 5 without an I Pod, Game Cube or movie rental.

You want to know what I make?' (She paused again and looked at each and every person at the table.)

''I make kids wonder.
I make them question.
I make them apologize and mean it.
I make them have respect and take responsibility for their actions.
I teach them to write and then I make them write.
Keyboarding isn't everything.
I make them read, read, read.
I make them show all their work in maths.
They use their God given brain, not the man-made calculator.
I make my students from other countries learn everything they need to know in English while preserving their unique cultural identity.
I make my classroom a place where all my students feel safe.
Finally, I make them understand that if they use the gifts they were given, work hard, and follow their hearts, they can succeed in life.'

(Bonnie paused one last time and then continued.)

'Then, when people try to judge me by what I make, with me knowing money isn't everything; I can hold my head up high and pay no attention because they are ignorant...

You want to know what I make?

*I MAKE A DIFFERENCE.* What do you make Mr. CEO?'

His jaw dropped, he went silent.

THIS IS WORTH SENDING TO EVERY TEACHER YOU KNOW.

Even all your personal teachers like mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters,grandparents, and your spiritual leaders/teachers - Pastor's/Priests/Clergy.

Narrative of narrative

I was really glad to participate in Prof. Karen Johnson's workshop (Kobe campus of Hyogo University of Teacher Education, March 11, 2008), where we listened to the voices of teachers as practitioners.

We were encouraged to read narratives of teachers taken from Teachers' Narrative Inquiry As Professional Development and discuss in a group.

A narrative of a teacher explicates how she finds herself in a classroom. It shows a selection of her knowledge, interest, context and others in the description of her reality. Since 'reality' is beyond anybody's reach with its complexity, the description and explanation she gives reveal her own choice of perception. As we no longer innocently believe in THE reality, her selection of a perspective is not just an arbitrary prejudice, but a unique contribution to our pluralistic understanding of reality.

Another (meta-)narrative on her first narrative makes our understanding more diverse and flexible. This second narrative must be based upon and resonate with the first one, but the second narrative reveals the second narrator's way of dealing with complexity in his interpretation of the first narrative. Bringing up different second narratives on the table enriches plurality of our understanding.

Given the complexity of practice, we give up the idea of finding the one and only one way of description and explanation. Sharing different versions of reality and discussing them to further differentiate their diversity seems a very reasonable way of inquiry to me.

We unite in diversity.

Teachers' narrative as literature

A suggestion I made during the discussion session of Prof. Karen Johnson's workshop (Kobe campus of Hyogo University of Teacher Education, March 11, 2008) was to treat teachers' narrative as literature. We need to try hard to understand the narrative with its due dignity and sensitivity.

The suggestion was agreed by Prof. Karen Johnson, but not by one participant (who is actually my friend.) She argued that making the teachers' narrative "scientific" would be a better strategy for narrative inquiry. She adopts a loose definition of "science" as you see in an expression like "human sciences" and argues that calling narrative inquiry "scientific" gives it more academic legitimacy.

Even if this is a matter of terminology, I disagree. If you claim that narrative study is a "science," you as a researcher of the method are begging to be included in the hierarchy of science at the bottom, hoping to rise to a higher layer of the hierarchy some day.

This strategy is doomed as a failure, for as we learn the complexity of TESOL practice more, the distance from the top of the hierarchy (hard science) increases. Narrative inquiry as science will ever be downgraded, if it is regarded as science at all.

Regarding teachers' narrative as literature (at least a genre of it), on the other hand, puts us in a better position. Narrative inquiry is by far closer to the canonical literature (whatever it is) than to hard science. We even claim that narrative inquiry is "deeper" than science.

Even if this is only a matter of academic politics, we should express our sympathy with literature.

Before TESOL industry flourished, language teachers were respected as literary persons. This is a tradition too great to miss.

That there is something that can only be expressed in a careful, but free use of words is beyond contention. Teachers' narrative is literature in name and substance.


P.S.

This argument concerning science and literature is based on the distinction made by Bruner in Acts of meaning: paradigmatic mode of thought and narrative mode of thought. Among the books Prof. Johnson cited I also found Dewey's Experience and education and Polkinghorne's Methodology for the human sciences.

Wu Zongjie on words in practice

Words always leave something unsaid. You can recall the classic distinction of literal meaning and speaker meaning. While literal meaning is explicitly expressed, speaker meaning is just implicitly there without any form. The distinction is often explained by a typical (and rather boring) example of “It’s hot here.” Whereas the literal meaning is IT IS HOT HERE, the speaker meaning is often explained as something like ‘Would you be kind enough to open the window?” Here, the speaker meaning is simply something left unsaid for politeness or parsimony of speech. However, as Relevance Theory claims, not all sentences are like this. In fact, in our daily discourse, utterances more often have weak speaker meaning than strong speaker meaning like the above. Think of the weak speaker meaning when your spouse says on holiday, “Oh, how relaxing!” What does she mean exactly other than the literal meaning of the sentence? Certainly not something identifiable precisely. Rather she meant to express her being in a holiday resort, or understanding of the being, giving the mind of the listener ripples of multiple effects, of different kinds and degrees, the whole of which nobody, even the speaker herself, cannot enumerate. Words express what can be expressed and what cannot be expressed at the same time.

When I exchanged e-mail with Judith Hanks, she kindly told Dick Allwirght that I was interested in connecting Exploratory Practice with Heidegger’s philosophy. Dick in turn was kind enough to call my attention to Zongjie Wu, who wrote “Understanding practitioner research as a form of life: an Eastern interpretation of Exploratory Practice” (Language Teaching Research 10, 3 (2006); pp. 331-350). I thank Judith and Dick very much, for I read the article with excitement.

Wu connects Exploratory Practice with not only Heidegger, but also other Western philosophers like Gadamer and Dreyfus and Eastern philosophers like Zhuangzi and Laozi. As someone who learned many fables of Taoism from childhood and studied German philosophy in adulthood, I greatly enjoyed the argument.

The argument might be best summarized by the following quotation.

Following the route from being and understanding to naming, an inquiry is undertaken for the harmonization of teachers’ professional life, where (following Thomson, 2001: 259) teaching is revealing being though words embraced by understanding; and learning, conversely, is experiencing what a teacher reveals. Being is here conceived as life on an ontological basis. Quality of life means authenticity of being. Understanding takes the form of the unity of knowing and doing, where the unsayable intelligibility experienced by teachers is named in a language that vibrates with the silent call of learning. Language here serves the function of bringing understanding into consciousness and manifestation, but to make itself into the unknown in the sense that language itself offers nothing directly plausible and meaningful but helps transform life into essential insight. (p. 333)

I cannot resist the temptation of quoting the last three sentences of this article as well, which are also beautifully written.

In the practice of naming, understanding reveals itself as being in the nameless. Naming is to bring people together, not to fragment them into different parts in a hierarchical structure. Thus naming is ‘to create a space in which the community of truth is practiced’ (Palmer, 1998: 90). On the Way from being, understanding to naming, EP brings research and teaching, work and life into a harmonious wholeness. (p. 348)

I believe this is one of the very important articles in which the delicate and somewhat paradoxical nature of language use in practice is academically explored by way of connecting Eastern (Chinese) and Western (German) philosophies. As someone who appreciate Chinese philosophy and German philosophy, it was indeed a pleasure reading

Understanding ‘understanding’

The following is a reconstruction of my oral report of the session “understanding ‘understanding’” on Day 3 of the 1st Oxford-Kobe Seminar (March 17th, 2007). The session was called for by Prof. Leo van Lier when he expressed some concern with the central notion of ‘understanding’ in Exploratory Practice after the plenary speech by Dr. Dick Allwright was delivered on Day 1. My oral report was presented in the final plenary session of the seminar.

****

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. This is a report of the session “understanding ‘understanding.’”

For literally 90 minutes, we kept talking about the notion of understanding. For me, it was one of the best intellectual discussions that I’ve ever participated in. And now your request is to summarize the whole 90 minute argument in a few minutes. What a demand! So you have to forgive me that what I’m going to report from now is my version of summary.


OK, let’s start with a hypothetical episode.

A good teacher understands her class very well. When asked what she really understands, though, she may be lost for clever words. “I know my kids.” She may say. “I understand what’s going on in my classroom.” However, she may stop there.

Is she stupid? No, I don’t think so.

She knows what to do in her classroom and how to do it, both in usual situations and in problematic situations. She’s a wise practitioner with a good understanding of her practice. What does this discrepancy between words and deeds suggest?

What I believe it suggests is that we need to distinguish the following two: a representation of understanding and understanding itself.

A representation of understanding here means roughly articulated understanding or an explanation of understanding in words. My theory is that a representation of understanding is different from understanding.

First, let’s think about understanding itself. Understanding shows itself in perception and action in the world, as Prof. van Lier clarified this morning. A person with a good understanding knows what to do in the world. The better she understands, the better she sees and acts. The better she sees and acts, the better she understands. Understanding, perception and action work interactively in this ‘lived world.’ Understanding in this sense is acting in the world. It is living in the world. If we dare to use a Heideggerian term, understanding is being in the world.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heidegger
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Being_and_Time
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Being-in-the-world#Being-in-the-World
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dasein
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hermeneutics
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hubert_Dreyfus

If understanding is acting, living or being in the world, this explains how difficult it is for a practitioner to explain her understanding to an outsider or third person, someone who does not belong to the world, by means of words which are only abstraction from her being in the world. That someone does not act together in the world. He is not in the same world. If only he acts together, live together, is together, he’d probably understands better.

Is it impossible, then, to show our understanding to an outsider altogether? No, again. Understanding shows itself in our action, life and being in the world. If you’re making your classroom a better place to live in, it means your understanding is good and valid.

Also, a representation of understanding isn’t necessarily useless. Dialogue with your colleagues or inner dialogue with yourself in the form of reflective writing probably leads to a better understanding. By verbalizing your understanding, you become more explicitly aware of your being, living and acting in the world, although there always remains some part that is ‘too deep for words.’ What it is like to be in a classroom is a difficult question to answer in words. However, by trying to answer that question, you make your understanding clearer in a different way from leading and showing the life of your classroom.

Trying to understand understanding is a never-ending process (and perhaps a never-successful endeavor). To repeat, understanding is not equal to a representation of understanding. Relating to that point, I’d like to tell a joke about a ballet dancer who was interviewed what she wanted to express in ballet dancing. She allegedly answered that if she was able to express that in words, she wouldn’t dance! Any words would fail to explain your understanding completely, too.

To sum up, understanding is acting, living, and being in the world. It is different from a representation of understanding. But trying to represent our understanding may sometimes help us for a better understanding, thus a better life. Perhaps we should not stop trying to understand our understanding in our open dialogue.

On the last note, I’d like to mention what Prof. Dick Allwright said towards the end of our session. He suggested that perhaps in our discussion we limited ourselves to an intellectual or conceptual understanding. What we may need more may be an empathetic understanding.

Thank you for your attention.

Inés K. Miller on Exploratory Practice

Some features transcend national boarders. As I learned more about Inés K. Miller (Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil) in the Oxford-Kobe Seminar, I just kept recalling the good teachers I meet in Japan, like TAJIRI Goro, for example. They’re all so enthusiastic, eager to convey something to us, always smiling, and ever trying to entertain us intellectually. Those who are good at teaching must share a lot of features in common no matter where they live.

Inés K. Miller was also a brilliant theoretician. Her presentation on Day 1, “Bringing Exploratory Practice into Teacher-Learner Development,” was full of insightful clarification and useful references. The following is my partial reproduction of her presentation material. I thank Inés K. Miller for her generous permission to publish this report on this blog. Any errors in this reproduction are of course mine.



Miller sees Exploratory Practice primarily as ‘work for understanding.’ She justifies this view by quoting the statement by Allwright (1997) that “understanding is the logical pre-requisite to any intelligent problem-solving or change for improvement, and that focusing on trying to solve a problem or change a situation before it is properly understood is a recipe for expensive mistakes.” She then extends the notion of Exploratory Practice as “discursive space that offers learning and/or awareness-raising opportunities for involved practitioners – learners, teachers, teacher-consultants and teacher-learners.” (cf. Allwright, 2005; Miller, 2001)

According to Allwright and Miller, Exploratory Practice “aligns itself theoretically with human, non-technicist, non-reductionist, as well as developmental, process-oriented views of education.” Exploratory Practice, therefore, is in line with a number of theoretical perspectives such as:

(1) The sociointeractional perspective on ‘what is going on’ in human interaction (Goffman, 1974) and interactional inferences (Gumperz, 1982)
(2) The inherent complexity and idiosyncrasy of classroom life (Gieve and Miller, 2006)
(3) The ‘situatedness’ of human learning (Lave and Wenger, 1991)
(4) The inextricability between participant involvement and understandings in knowledge-making (Bourdieu, 1977, in van Lier, 1994; van Lier, 2000).
(5) Learning as social interaction (Gieve and Miller, 2006) or as a process of participatory inquiry (Reason, 1994, 1998), in communities of pracitce (Wenger, 1998)

With these theoretical backgrounds, Miller claims “the teaching practice component of a teacher education course appears as a privileged moment for recontextualising the Exploratory Practice principles and for bringing a reflective, human and non-technicist posture—into teacher development.” She wishes to “engage future teachers in thinking of pedagogic practice as ‘work for understanding’, and as a way of ‘being’ in the classroom and of valuing the ‘quality of life’ experienced in it.” She also wishes to create space in which a critical and reflective posture, curiosity, courage, creativity and trust for personal professional ‘intuition’ are encouraged. This is to “familiarize future language teachers with such notions as ‘the post-method condition’ (Kumaravadivelu, 1994), teachers’ ‘sense of plausibility’ (Prabhu, 1990), the ‘tact of teaching’ (Van Manen, 1991), and with the move from ‘teaching points’ to ‘learning opportunities’ (Allwright, 2005).”

In Inés K. Miller, I see an excellent example of a teacher-researcher who listens to the voices of learners and colleagues. I very much enjoyed being with her, as much as other participants of the seminar did. Being together. Isn’t this most important in life?


REFERENCES

Allwright, D. 1997. “Exploratory Practice.” Unpublished manuscript.
Allwright, D. 2005. From Teaching Points to Learning Opportunities and Beyond. TESOL Quarterly, Alexandria, Virginia. 39, 1: 9-31.
Gieve, S. and Miller, I. K. 2006. Understanding the Language Classroom. Hampshire, United Kingdom: Palgrave Macmillan.
Goffman, E. 1974. Frame Analysis: An essay on the organization of experience. Harmondsworth: Penguin.
Gumperz, J. J. 1982. Discourse Strategies. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Kumaravadivelu, B. 1994. The Post-method Condition. TESOL Quarterly, 28, 1:27-48.
Lave, J. and E. Wenger. 1991. Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Miller, I. K. 2001. Researching Teacher-Consultancy via Exploratory Practice: A Reflexive and Socio-Interactional Approach. Unpublished Ph.D. diss., Lancaster University, United Kingdom.
Prabhu, N. S. 1990. There is no best method – why? TESOL Quarterly, 24, 2:161-176.
Reason, P. (ed.) 1988. Human Inquiry in Action. London: SAGE Publications.
Reason, P. (ed.) 1994. Participation in Human Inquiry. London: SAGE Publications.
van Lier, L. 1994. Some Features of a Theory of Practice. TESOL Journal, 4, 1:6-10.
van Lier, L. 2000. From Input to Affordance. In J.P. Lantolf (ed.) Sociocultural Theory and Second Language Learning, 245-259. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Wenger, E. 1998. Communities of Practice: Learning, Meaning, and Identity. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.

Judith Hanks on Exploratory Practice

Workshop “International Perspectives on Exploratory Practice” and Symposium Speech “Inclusivity and Collegiality in Exploratory Practice”, both by Judith Hanks (University of Leeds, UK) on March 15th, 2007, the first day of the Oxford-Kobe Seminar, were very helpful for illuminating the concept of Exploratory Practice. The following is my partial report of the two presentations (Some materials are reproduced as quotations from her handouts.). I appreciate Judith Hank’s kind permission to let this reproduction appear on this blog. Any mistakes in this article are of course entirely mine.

In her workshop speech, Hanks introduces the principles of Exploratory Practice as follows:

(1) Put ‘Quality of Life’ first
(2) Work towards understanding (not problem-solving or ‘improvement’; reject change for change’s sake)
(3) Work collegially (share with colleagues)
(4) Work inclusively (work to bring people together)
(5) Work for mutual development
(6) Put learning first, and make the research help the learning, and so avoid burn-out through overwork.
(7) Work towards a sustainable enterprise of learning, teaching and research.
Judith Hanks (2007)

It seems to me that Exploratory Practice can be interpreted as a third wave of research movement in TESL research. The first wave, scientific research, established itself in the 1980s probably, but its rigorous approach turned out to be sometimes frustratingly irrelevant for practitioners. Action research as a second wave in the 1990s was in one sense a reaction to the rigorous first wave in that it promoted actions than truth-finding. However, when action research becomes extremely action-oriented (or action-obsessed), it does not prioritize the quality of life of those involved. Contemporary educational institutions are indeed under heavy pressure for constant changes and reforms. Plans are always prepared for ‘problem solving’ and ‘improvement’ must be measurably demonstrated to a third party for ‘accountability.’ However, this trend sometimes leads to burn-out of the practitioners. In the long run, an unsustainable enterprise (‘change for change’s sake’) benefits no one. Furthermore, if the problem is a misconceived one due to lack of proper understanding, neither the result nor the process of the action will be of any help for anyone except, perhaps, for an administrator who only reviews the action on paper. Rather a teacher should be encouraged to better understand herself and her colleagues. Together with her colleagues, she should involve her students (and some researchers as well) for their mutual development in the language classroom. A joy of fellowship and mutual cooperation must be brought back to the practice of education. Quality of life, sustained by deeper understanding of the practice of education, must come first, for without it, no proper action or improvement is possible.

In the conclusion of her workshop speech, Hanks writes as follows:

In many ways, EP is not trying to do anything new or radically different in the classroom. Rather it is advocating the integration of classroom language learning research with teaching and learning. In this way, we hope to harness what we already do in order to find out what we (teachers and learners) want/need to know about our lives in the classroom. The aim is to deepen our own understandings of what it is to be involved in classroom language learning – to ‘live’ the experience.
Judith Hanks (2007)

The expression of “to harness what we already do in order to find out what we want/need to know” just reminded me of Wittgenstein’s Philosophical Investigation. Wittgenstein gives a more radical view of description (taken here by me as verbalization of understanding) as opposed to explanation (as advancement of a new theory). Perhaps his contrast between description and explanation or between philosophy and science is sharper than necessary, but it is helpful (and even therapeutic) to neutralize our urge to theorize everything by scientific method.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wittgenstein

It was true to say that our considerations could not be scientific ones. It was not of any possible interest to us to find out empirically 'that, contrary to our preconceived ideas, it is possible to think such-and-such' ---- whatever that may mean. (The conception of thought as a gaseous medium.) And we may not advance any kind of theory. There must not be anything hypothetical in our considerations. We must do away with all explanation, and description alone must take its place. And this description gets its light, that is to say its purpose, from the philosophical problems. These are, of course, not empirical problems; they are solved, rather, by looking into the workings of our language, and that in such a way as to make us recognize those workings: in despite of an urge to misunderstand them. The problems are solved, not by giving new information, but by arranging what we have always known. Philosophy is a battle against the bewitchment of our intelligence by means of language. (Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations Section 109)

Indeed we may not have to advance a radically new scientific theory to know our classroom language learning properly. Teachers and learners may already know enough, if only tacitly. All we need may just be to communicate with each other to learn ourselves in the classroom better. Researchers may promote that communication by providing proper terms and expressions, or by translating spoken discourse of practitioners into written discourse for publication.

As Hanks cites Flybjerg (2001: 2), “phronesis goes beyond both analytical, scientific knowledge (episteme) or know-how (techne) and involves judgments and decisions in the manner of a virtuoso social and political actor.”
Bent Flyvbjerg (2001) Making Social Science Matter
http://www.amazon.com/o/ASIN/0521772680/102-0797655-6030522
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phronesis
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Episteme
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Techne

I wonder if we may roughly correlate scientific research and episteme, action research and techne, and exploratory practice and phronesis. Episteme (in the sense of scientific knowledge), revealed by scientific research, may be very fundamental to the practice of education. Techne, demonstrated by action research, may be very useful for those who need some new action for improvement of teaching. Yet, episteme and techne may not reach the heart of the matter. Phronesis, which is often tacit and implicit in the understanding of practitioners, may be the real potential for truth and action. It may be the case that unless episteme (scientific knowledge) and techne are incorporated into phronesis (understanding) of practitioners, episteme and techne are not properly understood in the context of practice. As practitioners, teachers and learners have their own phronesis. Their phronesis lies in the core of their judgments and behaviors, waiting for our explication. Exploration of that phronesis through proper use of language in communication may be our priority.



Forthcoming is her coauthored book with Dick Allwright, The Developing Learner (Palgrave Macmillan).
http://www.palgrave.com/

Judith, we’re very much looking forward to this book!

“Exploratory Practice” in the Oxford-Kobe Seminar

The following is my first report on the Oxford-Kobe seminar (see the bottom of this article for the detail of the seminar). On behalf of all the participants of the seminar, I’d like to express my deep gratitude to the chief organizer, Tatsuhiro YOSHIDA (Hyogo University of Teacher Education), other organizers and financial and non-financial supporters. For me, it was by far the best academic conference.


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One of the important features of Exploratory Practice is inclusiveness. Exploratory Practice tries to incorporate the lived understanding of learners into the practice of teaching. It regards learners as full collaborators in the research process because they are recognized as practitioners in their own right.

This is, in a sense, a declaration for a new direction for language teaching research. It is important that this statement is made by one of the most renowned TESL researchers in the world, Dr. Dick Allwright. I may paraphrase the statement as “Researchers should listen to the voice of teachers who listen to the voice of learners.” A friend of mine further paraphrased it jokingly as “Researchers should have a listening skill!”

Over many years, researchers have tended to preach to teachers without really understanding teachers. They often select their favorite theoretical topic and impose their perspective upon the practice of teachers as if they knew better. Teachers, in turn, often preach to learners and give unsympathetic criticism without really understanding what it is like for them to learn a second/foreign language in their local context. They tend to pay less attention to their students’ identities.

This “pecking order,” as you might say, may represent our hierarchy of control and dominance. Researchers protect their social authority by trying to control and dominate teachers, and teachers, then, protect their own by doing the same to learners. This is not a structure of mutual cooperation.

It is not of course true, though, that learners always know better than teachers, and teachers than researchers. They are all puzzled by the reality of the practice from their own point of view. This is why they have to bring their understanding to the mutual arena for joint-exploration. Some researchers may have better academic skills for exploration than teachers and learners, but that does not mean that they should take control of what teachers and learners should think and do.

This direction of language teaching research may not be entirely new, though. I, for one, have been trying to understand competent teachers in Japan over the past 10 years. I listen to what they say. I also observe what they do to further listen to what they don’t say. This approach, however, has not always been accepted as an academic inquiry, as it has often been regarded not as “scientific.” I refrained from writing for academic publication by this approach for the fear of being rejected with unkind words of non-understanding. Instead, I kept writing reports and essays on my Japanese homepage. The text of the homepage now exceeds 8 MB.
http://ha2.seikyou.ne.jp/home/yanase/

This sheer amount of the text may partly explain my joy when I heard the Plenary Lecture by Dick Allwright, the Workshop by Judith Hanks (University of Leeds, UK), and the Symposium by Judith Hanks, Assia Slimani-Rolls (European Business School London, UK) and Ines K. Miller (Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil), all on Exploratory Practice. My joy turned into excitement when I had a conversation over dinner with Prof. Leo van Lier (Monterey Institute of International Studies, USA), with whom I shared much philosophical interest.

Exploratory Practice, as I understand it, a democratization of the practice of education. Democracy is preferred here because it will explore more truth and justice in the complexity of the interwoven life of education. Natural science reveals truth in a highly rigorous way, but the highly regimented scientific truth may not always be relevant for exploring our pluralistic life in its socio-cultural context.

Exploratory Practice is a humanistic enterprise as well. It seeks a better life of learners, teachers and all those involved in education. I, as a researcher-teacher, would like to join in this practice of exploration.




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The 1st English Education Seminar
KOBE, JAPAN, 14-17 MARCH 2007


INTRODUCTION:

In August 2005, St. Catherine’s College (University of Oxford) Kobe Institute, Hyogo Academic League, and Hyogo University of Teacher Education planned an international seminar on innovative research in the filed of English language teaching by inviting scholars from UK, Europe, USA, and Asian countries.
In the seminar, “Understanding the Language Classroom and New Directions for Language Teaching Research”, will invite leading scholars of ‘classroom research’ to discuss various issues for three days. The main feature of the seminar is Exploratory Practice (EP), emphasizing the ‘quality of classroom life’.
Other topics are research on learner strategies, experiential learning, teacher education, ecological approach to language learning, and English language teaching in Asian countries. Poster sessions also are held.
It is our expectation that the seminar will give an impact on both academic and practical language teaching worldwide.

The organizers are grateful to the Daiwa Japanese-Anglo Foundation and the Great Britain Sasakawa Foundation for their grant; and Hyogo Board of Education, British Council and Hyogo Academic League for their support.

Key organizers:
T. Yoshida, Hyogo University of Teacher Education
D. Allwright, Lancaster University
E. Macaro, University of Oxford



INVITED SPEAKERS:

Speakers are by invitation only: they are all famous researchers who are working actively in each area and present their work for discussion. Poster presentation is also set for younger researchers. We will help and encourage young researchers, undergraduates and postgraduates to attend and present the poster.
The following scholars have agreed to present papers at the Seminar:


Dick Allwright (the former professor of Lancaster University, UK)
Naoko Aoki (Osaka University, Japan)
Judith Hanks (Leeds University, UK)
Yongsuk Kim (Daegu National University of Education, Korea)
Viljo Kohonen (University of Tampere, Finland)
Ernesto Macaro (University of Oxford, UK)
Ines Miller (Pontificia Universidade Catolica do Rio de Janeiro, Brazil)
Yoshiyuki Nakata (Hyogo University of Teacher Education)
Assia Slimani-Rolls, (the European Business School in Regents Park, UK)
Craig Smith (Kyoto University of Foreign Studies, Japan)
Osamu Takeuchi (Kansai University, Japan)
Ken Tamai (Kobe City University of Foreign Studies, Japan)
Ngo T. P. Thien (University of Social Science and Humanities - Ho Chi Minh City, Viet Nam National University, VietNam)
Leo Van Lier (Monterey Institute of International Studies, USA)
Shinichiro Yokomizo (Saga University, Japan)