The Global Teacher Program (hereinafter referred to as GTP) is a study abroad program that Stapia Co., Ltd. cooperates with local organizations to teach at public elementary schools overseas. Started in 2016 at three bases in the United States (Hawaii), with a cumulative total of more than 200 students participating.
In the Finnish program, students visit local public elementary schools, junior high schools, and vocational schools, and interact with teachers and students.At the end of the program, a class will be held in English at a public elementary school on the theme of "Japanese culture."
(GTP program: https://gtp.ph.icc-npo.com/)
A total of seven students from the Faculty of Education and the Faculty of International Communication participated in this program, which was held online because they were unable to travel to Finland due to the novel coronavirus.
The general flow of the program is as follows.
① Pre-learning: Self-introduction, put into words what you want to learn and what you want to gain from the program
(XNUMX) Guest lecture: Lectures on Finnish education and culture by Finnish education specialists
(XNUMX) Class preparation: Create class instruction plans and scripts, and conduct mock classes
④ Class practice: Two classes for elementary school students and one class for university students
⑤ Post-learning: Feedback on class, presentation of what was learned
<Pre-learning>
In the first class, we conducted self-introductions and an orientation for the program.For the self-introduction, all participants created a collage image of their "likes", which is often used by Finnish children to introduce themselves.
<Guest Lecture>
As a guest, Mr. Niilo Kervinen, who works in education while going back and forth between Finland and Japan, talked about Finnish education and culture.
Finland is now famous as an "advanced country in education," but 20 to 30 years ago when Mr. Niilo was a child, Finnish education was still not attracting attention worldwide. Since around the 1980s, as a result of steadily putting effort into education, it seems that it has been attracting attention around the world since around the 2000s.
In addition to this kind of Finnish history, Niilo, who has three children, also told us about Finnish parenting circumstances.
<Class preparation>
Each group was divided into the following lesson themes.
《For elementary school students》
・Differences between Asian and Finnish "dogs"
・About Japanese dialects and comedy
《For college students》
・About the Japanese culture of "Honne and Tatemae"
We prepare by creating lesson plans, scripts, and PowerPoint materials.GTP staff will give feedback on the mock class.For example, during the first mock lesson, "Overall, the amount of knowledge you want to convey is too much, and it is difficult to convey the important points. Let's reduce the volume of speaking to about half and increase interactive work." Feedback was given. Over the course of three weeks, we repeated mock classes two or three times to prepare for the actual classes.
<Lesson practice>
In addition to the language barrier of English, all students conducted classes in a difficult environment where classes were conducted using zoom.
For example, the team that gave a lesson on the theme of "dogs" taught about the differences between dogs in the three regions of "Japan, Thailand, and Finland" while mixing in quizzes and games.It seems that the children were well informed that the color and length of the fur varies greatly depending on the temperature.
Classes are conducted in English, but for important points, with the help of local teachers, some ideas were put in, such as adding Finnish subtitles.
<Feedback after class>
Some of the applications I had planned to use didn't work well, some were running out of time, and some were pressed on the contrary... Although there were some minor problems, the local children and teachers said that they had a very good time. rice field.
When we took the time to do self-feedback on our own, we often heard comments such as, "I didn't manage the allocation of time properly, and I want to improve my English."On the other hand, on the whole, many people seemed to feel that "although it was difficult, it was a good opportunity to have an international exchange in English even though I could not travel abroad."
<Future plans>
As of July 2021, vaccination is progressing in Finland, but due to the influence of the new coronavirus, it is still difficult to interact directly locally.
In 2022, we plan to hold an online program about twice a year, with a view to traveling to Finland to hold the program.
Faculty of International Communication Department of English Communication Professor Takuno Shimizu
Stapia Co., Ltd. Shinya Hiraoka, Tomotaka Chika
⇒Faculty of International Communication Department of English Communication Page
