Wednesday, December the 5th, 2007

The English teachers in high level high school used to be supposed to have their students prepared for entrance examinations with their grammar-translation method. About two decades ago, people began to have the frustration for practical English usage, or rather for English conversation. The course of study has been giving emphasis on communicative English classes. Now partly concerned with the fall down of Japanese economy, and with their own interests in climbing up the social ladder, people are shifting their emphasis of demands toward cramming again. Accordingly, English teachers are supposed to have teaching competency in practical English usage as well as cramming techniques. We have to cover "the enormous extension of the domain" in spite of "the comparative shallowness of the knowledge" we have.