Teach for America (Video)

1. In terms of presentation skills (using your voice, body language,
visuals etc.), what did you learn through the three presentation projects
and lessons in AEP?
- By observing my own presentation, I learned that I'm not good at giving eye contact, and use of voice and body language are not great yet... But, at least I learned what I'm not good at when giving presentation, so I will work on those weak points when I give presentations in other classes.

2. What do you want to continue to improve?
- I would like to continue to improve three presentation skills, use of voice, body language, and eye contact, so that I can attractive people by my presentation.

3. (Optional) Any other comments or reflections?
- In this class, I got to know my strong points and weak points of presentation. And I also learned that practice is very important for good-presentation. Thank you, Mark, Sylvan, and lovely classmates!

Teach for America (group presentation)

presented with Noriko, Sayaka and Saori.

Teach For America on Prezi

Pechakucha 20X20!

I liked pechakucha because it is already organized to make 20slides and we are allowed to speak for 20 seconds for 1 slide, which was easier for me to make a presentation compared to start with no restriction. Sometimes it's easier to do something if there are some rules to follow. In addition time and slides are limited, so people think carefully what to present and practice a lot, which means each presentation should be polished and improved in comparison to the normal presentations.

Here is my pechakucha movie:
https://w3.icu.ac.jp/people/payne/asuka.html

Goals for my next presentation:
- reduce a frequency of saying "like"s and "and"s.
- talk smoothly without script.

My reflections and goals (Presentation 1.)

HAPPY NEW YEAR!! I hope that everyone had a nice holiday.
I mostly worked for my part-time-job, went back my home(OKayama Pre.), and spent time with my family and friends for a couple days.

1. Voice (Volume, rate, pausing, emphasis etc)
Reflection: The volume was smaller than I had expected. I sould've clearfied the emphasis that I wanted to put, also the pausing.
Goals: To talk more clearly and put emphasis and pause at the points I should put.

2. Body Language (Eye contact, gestures, posture etc)
Reflection: I was looking at the screens, not the audience. Gesture was not too bad.
Goals: To have good eye contacts!

3. Visuals (Images or text on slides, timing etc)
Reflection: Image was not too bad. I was quite happy about my slides.
Goals: I want to understand the timing to change to next slide, which means I need to practice more.

4. Preparation Process (Topic selection, notes, visuals creation, rehearsals
etc)
Reflection:Topic selection was good?! Well, hope everyone enjoyed it. I think I should have done more rehearsals in order to be confident in my presentation. More rehearsal creates better presentation, I learned.
Goals: Many rehearsals!! Maybe I should practice in front of mirror as I do rehearsals.

5. Any other reflections or goals?
- My body was moving all the time... so I want to be careful about it for the next presentation.
- overall, I should be more confident in my presentation so that I can look at the audience, not the slides, and to speak more clearly.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vkqPGl0bbiI&feature=email
here is my presentation

My goals for the first presentation

Purpose:
-To introduce myself to my classmates so that they know a bit more about me.
-To improve my presentation skills, especially gesture and the use of voice, by recording my presentation.

Audience:
-my classmates in AEP class, Mark and Sylvan.

Logistics:
-time limit of 3 min
-one question can be asked after the presentation
-computer
-slide
-presenter is able to bring anything that is related to one's presentation.

1. Preparation/ Rehearsal
-I did brainstorming to come up with good presentation topics.
-I made my reasons why I am passionate about having meals with my friends clear to make easier to make presentation slides.
-I want to know my presentation is coherence, easy to understand, and interesting to the audience.
-I want to rehearsals many times in order to be confident in my presentation.

2.Content/ Overall impression
-I want to everyone to know about my favorite thing to do and know about me.
-Hopefully, I want to get some good info. of good restaurants near school!


3.Voice
-I want to talk with cheerful voice because I will be talking about what I love to do.
-I want to put emphasis on what I want to really tell mu audience.

4.Body Language
-I want to have good eye contact because I usually look at the computer screen when I give presentation with slides.
-I want to show what I want to emphasize by doing gesture.

5.Visuals
-I want to make some slides on google doc to show the pictures of having meals with my friends, and to make my presentation memorable.

Homework: analyze the TED video

URL:http://www.ted.com/talks/jason_fried_why_work_doesn_t_happen_at_work.html

1) General impression of the video
- persuative
- a new idea which I never thought about
- familiar topic

2) In terms of speaking skills, what are the strengths of the presenter?
- he questions a lot so that audience actually thinks about the topic
- good timing of pause
- gives very familiar examples which make easy for poeple to understand his point
- his topic claim is very clear
- I like when he says M&M, which means manager and meetings, because usually we think of chocolate when we hear M&M. it was pretty funny.
- he says numbers many times which gives specific ideas.
- good use of voice!
- I think it is good to just walk around on the stage as he talks


3) What are the weaknesses of the presentation? How could it be better?
- he talks a bit fast?
- it would be better if he had slides for his presentation. presentation with no slides is sometimes boring....and slides make easier to understand.

Hello everyone in APE class!!

This is my first blog post for the Advanced English class. How are you guys doing?
In today's class, we introduced ourselves to classmates and memorized everybody's names. I'm not sure if I still remember the names though... haha

Anyway, today's homework!

Characteristics of GOOD presentations:
- presentation with good sources
- presenters are confident
- good eye contacts
- start presentation with good attention getter
- topic and claim are clear and specific

Characteristics of BAD presentations:
- repeating the same things over and over
- saying "like"s and "ummmm"s many times
- reading papers that presenter prepare, not presenting
- presenter is not confident in the content of presentation
- not looking toward audience
- boring
- slides include lots of letters

See you on Wednesday!

Thank you all!! xoxo

Today was the last day of Freshman ELP! I can't believe it actually finished....Even though I had hard times doing all the homework, I really enjoyed ELP classes.On the last day of ELP, we continued to watch the movie "This is What Democracy Looks Like". I was wondering what was the position of the police side. We have to listen to them before making judge of the movie. I also thought that Japanese young people do not demonstrate because we do not know about what is going on in the world, we do not care what is going on because we are busy with personal problems and we know that only people on the top can control the world. I personally feel that the world exists somewhere else, I mean I feel it is far away from us. I also got surprised that demo against the Iraq war, only 30,000 people out of 30million did demonstration , although there are much more around the world. Iraq war is not directly related to our life in Japan, which can be the reason for not having demo in Japan. have to thank Rab for giving us many useful knowledge, especially computer skills. I'm sure that those skills will be used in my future work. Also, thank my section mates! Even though we had SEKUKON once in the spring term, I really like you guys that you always go your own way! Best wishes to you all<3Have a great fall break!

Presentations!

Today, we gave our presentations to our classmates to explain the website we made for the group project.

Every group did such a great job and I was actually amazed all the works they had done!

We had classes in 2nd and 5th period today, and in 5th period, we watched the movie"this is what real democracy looks like."(am I right with the title?) I was once interested in media and wanted to get job related to media. However, now I don't because now I figured out that the majority of the media doesn't tell reality to audience. If I worked in the field of media, I would like to tell reality to audience, making documentary, etc.

Anyway, I enjoyed listening to everyone's presentation and watching the movie!

ELP is almost done!

Today, we were supposed to give presentation in the class, but we are good students that nobody had completed websites. haha So we will do that tomorrow morning in the class.

Well, I was working on my website today as well.

We have only two days left. Time goes by so fast. I'll miss you all, and Rab.

gotta enjoy the rest of the class!

Fall break is almost there!

Hello! I finished my essay today! soooo happy, even though task of finishing making presentation and website is waiting for me...

anyway, today we worked on our group project as usual, but somehow Yugo was so high today. lol I'm worried about him... haha I like my group members because they are hard workers that I respect!! Thanks for the all works you do to encourage me to work harder!

As Saki mentioned on her blog, we both are going to Canada for the Fall break coming up. So is Rab! Saki is going to Quebec, and I'm going to Saskatchewan, very very country side, to visit my host family and friends! wonder where Rab is going!

okay, have a good weekend!

Hello Hello!

Wow, we've been working on our group project... so there is basically nothing to write about lol

On Tuesday, our group was so passionate about the project that we came early in the morning and polished up our essays! haha
Rab told us a lot of things that we didn't know, such as how facebook is not private... etc
actually, we only have 4 classes? of ELP left. Time goes by so fast!

Group Work Group Work!!

Rab, thank you for your comment! I understand your point that you don't want to give your money to such a company..... Maybe I'll start to drink Pepsi instead of coke!?! Anyway, the way that corporations earn money should be changed to avoid incidents such Coka Cola did.

In today's class, we got time to work on our group project like yesterday! I worked on my essay because we decided to finish it by next Monday...!
Even though we have school festival on this weekend... have to do this!!!!! lol

By the way, P.E. in 1st period was sooooo much fun! We played softball( baseball) and had a lots of fun!

Working for the group project!

Today, we used the class to work on the group project.

-I uploaded the video on our website and tidied up it a little bit.

-Rab gave us good sources for our essay.

-gained the new knowledge for website...

These are the things that I did in today's class, basically.

To answer Rab's question from yesterday, I think most people know that coke is not healthy, even if they don't know about the fact of 13 cubes of sugar are in coke. It is their choice to decide whether to keep drinking coke, sacrificing their health, or stop drinking it. knowing it has bad affect on their health. Also, I think what coke did to the university students in the past is very cruel and not ethical, but it doesn't change the taste of coke.

What would be like living in the afterlife?

Today, Rab gave us NP lecture of GM foods. Keywords are "For corporations, benefits are much more important than people". I had not known anything about GM foods until Rab told us. Well, I'm scared of food because I usually don't look at the ingredients in the food and where it is from. People really don't care about GM foods until they actually get sick by it. I think I'll keep drinking coke even though it has 13 cubes of suger in it.

In the class, we talked about Morioka's reading! He is a professor of philosophy and ethics at Osaka Prefecture University. We talked about the afterlife and xeno as well. Xeno was kind of groos but interesting topic.

G-night!

I-movie is awesome!

On Friday, we played with I-movie, which was fun and amazing!
We practiced how to use it, and after that we worked with our group members for the group project.
Our group were making introduction video to put on the website! I was the editor of the video, and I really enjoyed doing it. I'm gonna finish editing it tomorrow morning, so Saki, Eri, please check it out!

We only have a couple weeks left for ELP class!

What do I know about bioethics?

Today we watched the short movie called "Constructing Public Opinion". It was very interesting that how media affects when people make decisions and it also affects on politics. It was interesting to me that people support conservative ideas and liberal policy. The example of land use that Rab gave us in the class was easy to understand this theory. I wanted to watch some documentaries on the website of Media Education Foundation and I registered, but I couldn't figure out how to watch for free( maybe do I have to call or something?). It will be great if Rab can teach us how to do it. Anyway one of the movies on MEF, "Gloucester 18, The Realities of Teen Pregnancy",got my attention. You can watch trailer here: http://www.mediaed.org/cgi-bin/commerce.cgi?preadd=action&key=242

After watching the movie, we had a discussion about bioethics. "What did we know about bioethics before reading Radical Evolution and Fukuyama's airticle?" The answer for this question is "I basically knew nothing about it." Well, people usually don't know about things that they are not interested in.
Another question: why politicians pick the topic of cloning, not the topic of free health care? I think it is because politicians like the new things( that will actually be beneficial) and they don't care about citizens. To me, topics of coning is not my business, I mean I don't find any meanings of discussing cloning, because I feel it is far from realistic. There are many everyday problems that we have to consider.

Cloning is good or bad?

We talked about Fukuyama's reading today as well.
According to Rab, our next PWT is going to be about topics on "Radical Evolution". So we kinda connected Fukuyama's reading to Radical Evolution.

Today's main topic was cloning.
I am against to having cloning children because there is no connection between dad( or sometimes mom?) If a child was born by having sex, then dad feels connection or bound to the child.

I think, it is such a rare thing to do cloning, we are against to it. But what if it becomes normal to have cloned children? I don't know what I want to say and I can't find out my answer for the cloning... It might turn out to be good solution for some people.
In my group, we came to the conclusion that we have to make laws of cloning. Under which situation we can use cloning? Should cloning be treated equally to human beings?
As technology advances, we will have to consider these kind of problems. And politicians are the ones who make the law. ughhh

neoconservative

Yesterday, we went over Fukuyama's reading.
Rab told us about politics, such as Right/Left, and Liberal/Conservative. Although I have heard those names, I did not really understand what they mean. So it was very meaningful to know about the basic knowledge of politics. I was gonna try the political compass, but I figured out it would take a ling time, then I quit doing it. haha I'll try it when I find time to do.

After that, we discussed stem cell research. Rab asked us the question "when can human beings have stem cell research?"/ "When human beings become human?". In my opinion, human beings become human beings when they recognize themselves us human. And the life starts after having sex. So, I disagree with stem cell research.
Oh, and I had a good discussion(fight?) with Yugo today. We were having the totally opposite opinions, which made the discussion interesting.

Group Project!

Fun Friday!

Today, we graded our PTW tests. My score was quite accurate as the 1st grader. I didn't study much, so it was such a disaster.... but oh well, it is the story of past.

After that, we gave a short speech about our research topics so that we can works with people who have similar topics. My research topic is going to be about technology and education, and how technology affects on education, especially how it develops/improves education.
It not very clear yet, but I'm gonna compare Japan with USA.
In my group, we have Eri, Saki, and me! well, we gotta work hard to make a great website, presentaions etc....

Good luck to everyone and myself...
and have a good weekend!