Recently in Events Category

The food was fantastic and the conversation very interesting. We only had a small number, but the people who came had a great time I think. Shinobu took some pictures of the food that I will post later.

My natto omelette. I think most people thought it was okay. Paul said he wants to try natto a different way before he makes up his mind about it.

Travel Around was a lot of fun and there was so much information about many different countries. Mika (3K) talked about Dubai and had a good slide show. She also brought some her souvenirs. I hope more people will come next time.

This is a picture of me learning about New Zealand from Eiko.

I hope everyone had as much fun as I did at the party. A lot of people had a chance to talk to Trish and Paul and say goodbye to Eva and Carlos. Carlos and Eva did a great job with their speeches even though Eva was very nervous beforehand.

Eva and Carlos decided to surprise everyone with a dance at the end of the party. I was surprised that so many people decided to dance. I think this was only the 2nd or 3rd time that we have had dancing at a JOY party. Will it become a regular feature?

The kid's winter carnival yesterday was a lot of fun. The kids really had a good time and the teachers did, too, but everyone looked pretty tired at the end. We will be doing the same event on Wednesday, so Eva, Carlos and Joe will really appreciate the drinks at the party that night. Make sure to ask them about the activities that they created. There should be some photos at the JOY photoblog sometime next week.

We were blessed with a beautiful Tokachi day today. It was a little windy, but the blue sky made up for it.

The number of guests was has big as we had hoped and all the presentations were well attended. I think my presentation went well and to make it easier for the people attended I will put links to the sites I showed.

New English File
Interchange
Activities for ESL Students
Dave’s ESL Cafe
Karin's ESL Partyland
About.com ESL Guide
EnglishCLUB.net
English Page
Purdue University's Online Writing Lab
Jim Breen's WWWJDIC Japanese Dictionary Server
Dictionary.com

After my talk one of the participants wanted to know if I knew of a site that could make bingo cards. I did a quick search and found this one. I haven't used it yet, but I hope you will give it a try and let me know how it works. I should have also mentioned this crossword and word search making site.

The first of English Expo was a lot of fun and it was nice to meet all the people who I only get to see once a year. Everyone enjoyed the two lectures, but there was one surprise. Those of you who read Urashima-san's blog already know this, but Toyama Ken can't make it, so luckily Kaishi-san was able to come and replace him for tomorrow.

We also had our 30th anniversary party tonight. I had to give a speech at the end (in Japanese) so I was pretty nervous. I had a few drinks before hand, so I guess that made it a little easier.

I hope to see some of you tomorrow.

Small in number, but full of energy. The group last night had a lot of fun and I am sure they will love to tell you more about it. Ask you classmates next week if they attended.

I would like to thank everyone who came to the end of term party. I think everyone had a good time talking with the people from the JICA Center. I am sure you learned a lot about the different countries and I hope you were able to teach them a little bit about Japan.

In the car on the way back to the center they said how much they enjoyed meeting with you and having a chance to speak to people in English. It sounded like they haven't had a chance to meet with many people yet. This group will be here until the middle of November, so you may have a chance to meet them again before they leave.

This year's English Cooking was a great success! The food turned out well and people learned a lot of new recipes. The biggest hit was Joe's pumpkin pie. I have the reputation of having some unique recipes, but this year's was popular with everyone. We even were able to do a little experimenting with a some extra pumpkin that we had. I will post some pictures later to the JOY Photoblog.

I would like to thank everyone who came to the Rakugo show on Saturday. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did. For those of you who couldn't make it here is a photo of three of us in a kimono. I will try to add more photos to the JOY Photoblog later.

It was a busy week! We had events on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. I think everyone who came had a great time. Probably the best event was Travel Around. Even though we said that people could speak Japanese everyone tried to speak English. I was most impressed with the students from the Basic classes because they tried the hardest. I think we will have to do this event again because I didn't have a chance to hear about everyone's trip.

It was a great party and I think people had a really good time. I didn't have a chance to take pictures, so please send me any photos that you took and I will put them in the JOY Photoblog.

It took the weather awhile to decide what it wanted to do, but the afternoon it was a nice day. We could do the jack o' lantern carving outside on the picnic table. There were some interesting creations. The best was the one done by Carlos. You can see it in Bucky Hall when you come to class this week.

I had 18 people attend my presentation and I hope people found it useful. I showed several websites and so I will put the links here.

Academic Word List

Academic Word List (different site)

General Word List

Word Surfing

Glossaries

You might want to read this article about vocabulary building.

I forgot to link to Kaishi-san's site.

Last night we had the Welcome and Farewell Party. There were about 32 people and there was a lot of good conversation (English and Japanese). I think most of you got to talk to Eva and Carlos, plus say good bye to Braden and Erin. Erin and Braden's speech was really good and you could tell they had really worked on their Japanese. During the speech I watched their Japanese teachers and they looked like parents at a piano recital. Before a difficult part of the speech came up they looked very nervous and when Braden and Erin got through that section they would give a big sigh.

Remember we will be having a party for English Expo, so if you couldn't come to this one I hope you can make it to that one. If you miss that make sure you make it to the Christmas party in December.

It was a beautiful today, so I am glad that everyone still decided to come to the event. I think people who came for the travel English workshops had a good time and learned a lot. The party with the people from the JICA Center was a lot of fun. I was really impressed with how well everyone did communicating in English. I gave the guests a ride back to the Center and in the car one of them said he had such a good time that he even forgot to take pictures.

Don't forget that next Saturday (July 7) from 3:00 to 5:00 we are having Travel English and from 5:30 to 7:30 we are having the JICA International Party. Travel Night is for Basic to Step 3 level students and the JICA International Party is for all levels. It is 500 yen for each event (you can use your JOY coupons). You can sign up at the counter, telephone or send an e-mail. Come and join us because it is going to be a very fun time.

Update: There seems there was a misunderstanding about the Travel Night in the JOY News. The Travel English portion from 3:00-5:00 is for Basic to Step 3 level and the International Party is for everyone. There will be guests from Vietnam, Kenya, India and so on. If you came to the Christmas party you can meet some of the same people again.

The two sessions of the vocabulary workshop went well I think. I was worried that my cold would cause me to lose my voice or I would be coughing so much that I wouldn't be able to talk. I the end that didn't happen. I hope people got some good ideas on how to start building their vocabularies. I mentioned that I would post some links so here they are.

Sight Words

Academic Word List

Vocabulary Tests

Vocabulary Building Site

Tonight's travel night has been canceled because of the heavy snow. As a matter of fact, I am stuck at my house and can't get out.

Well, I hope that everyone who came to the party had a good time. I know I enjoyed talking with everyone. Did you meet any new people? I think a few people met some of their new classmates. If you couldn't make it to this party maybe you can make it to the next one.

Remember there are still classes on Monday and then we have all the events next week. We would still like to have a few more people for the games night and bowling.

Well, the Christmas party just finish awhile ago and the clean up is all done. I had a lot of fun and enjoyed talking to a lot of people. I hope you got to meet a lot a different people, too. Did you talk to our guests from the JICA Center? They were a fun group and they will be here until September of next year, so maybe we can have them come again. I will be posting pictures to JOY's Photoblog next week, do keep checking back.

Last night we put up the Christmas tree and decorated the building. Everything looks very nice. After class or before class please stop by Bucky Hall and enjoy the Christmas tree and fire.

Remember that you can buy your tickets for the Christmas party on Thursday, December 22 at the counter. We will have ten guests from the JICA Center.

Update: I am experimenting with a new way to upload photos, so I am not sure how it is going to work. If I can get it figured out it should make it easier to post photos.

Just a quick note for Expo. It was a really fun day and I glad that so many people came. I will post more later.

Here are the links that I showed you in my presentation.

Learning English for Beginners: Listening Comprehension

Randall's ESL Cyper Listening Lab

Adult Learning Activities

English Trailers

podcasts
ipdder.org

Brainbubbles

Tokyo Calling

Grape Radio

Ebert & Roeper

English as a Second Language Podcast

Also check out JOY's photoblog later this week and you will see some pictures from the Expo.

Great party! The guests from the JICA Center were really nice and it was fun to learn about their countries and hear their impressions of Japan. Once again, as many of the JICA participants have said, they enjoyed meeting people who spoke English well enough to answer their questions. I will post some pictures at the JOY Photoblog. Maybe we can invite another group when we have the Christmas party this year.

It was nice to see Naoko (former Step 4M) again. I don't think I have talked to for over six months. She said she will try to come back in April.

The English Flea Market was last night. There were a lot of good things for sale and Yumiko had a lot of delicious food (Thank you Yumiko.), but we didn't have a lot of shoppers. Hopefully, next time we will have many, many more. If you want to see photos go here.

Remember tonight is the party and you can still get tickets. Please call and let us know if you are coming.

Last night was English Cooking and we had a great time. The food was really good this year and even my chestnut soup turned out okay. If you want to get the recipes, you can get them at the counter. If you want to see pictures, go here.

Tonight is the English Flea Market. It starts at 7:00, so stop by to see if there are any good deals. Remember you need to do your shopping in English. We will help you out if you are not sure how to do it.

If you haven't signed up for the new term please do it as soon as you can. You can send an e-mail to Shinobu or give her call if you like. Also sign up for the English Salons and end of term events. If you plan to sell something at the flea market then sign up if you are only going to shop all you need to do is show up with money and be ready to speak English. If you are planning to come to the party on the 29th you can buy your ticket at the counter.

Last night was the English Beer Garden. We had over 20 people counting JOY teachers. People did a very good job of trying to speak English. Chris's skee ball was really popular. You will have a chance to play it the first week after summer vacation. We also had air hockey, beer tasting and a beer/haposhu tasting challenge. I was surprised that a majority of people could tell the difference, but the funny thing was that the people who were most adamant about their choice were usually wrong.

One student was hoping to have this kind of event once a month, but that might be a little difficult to do. We will be having some special events on September 27, 28, and 29. We will be giving more details after summer vacation.

I hope everyone enjoyed brunch this morning. It looked like everyone had a good time talking with the teachers. I sounded like you were able to learn a lot about them. I am sure in the classes coming up you learn even more. If you think the brunch was please let me know and we will try to do it again sometime.

Well, the party was a lot of fun last night. If you couldn't come last night maybe you can make it next time. We had a surprise music program and people really enjoyed it. Alison couldn't make it, so Hans gave two speeches.