It seems like only yesterday that we were introducing A Running Start, but we are already getting very close to the publication of its partner book, Hitting Your Stride: 大学英語で自信を育てる. And I have to say...

This week, I am in Osaka for the 65th JACET International Convention, being held from August 26–28. My presentation, co-authored with Matthew Wilson of Miyagi University, is titled “AI-Mediated Feedba...

I have just finished checking speaking tests for around 230 students. As you can probably imagine, after watching that many videos, I have heard quite a wide range of topics! For the test, students we...

Last week, I reflected on the first year of SielpA Books as a corporation and the many lessons I learned along the way. I was delighted to share that we successfully published four books in our first ...

Tomorrow, August 1st, marks an important milestone for me. It has been one year since SielpA Books officially became a corporation (株式会社). Looking back, it's hard to believe how much has happened in j...

Summer vacation is something we all look forward to. After a busy semester of classes, assignments, quizzes, and exams, it's important to relax, spend time with friends and family, and recharge your b...

This week in my reading class, we discussed the phenomenon known as the Spotlight Effect. As we explored the topic, I couldn't help thinking about how relevant it is to language learning and teaching....

Last week, I wrote about the podcast Sold a Story and the idea that reading is not as “natural” as we sometimes assume. If you haven’t read that post yet, this is very much a continuation of those tho...

Recently, my brother, who is a primary school principal in Australia, recommended a podcast to me called Sold a Story. He simply said, “You should listen to this.” That was enough to get my attention.

I may have mentioned this before, but in addition to all the other projects I seem to get myself involved in, I am currently the editor-in-chief of JACET Journal and JACET Selected Papers. These are t...

Back in December 2024, I was asked to give a workshop for teachers on the JET Program (Japan Exchange and Teaching Programme) in Tokyo. As a former JET, it is always quite surreal for me to give these...

This week brought the Winter Olympics to a close. Two years ago, I wrote about the Summer Olympics, so it seemed fitting to turn my attention to the winter edition this time.

Well, this week’s blog post brings together two major milestones for yours truly:

With classes having finished for this academic year, it also means that the books in the Dictogloss in Action series have reached their one-year anniversary. The books were created based on years of c...

Earlier this month, I was in Okinawa for a small conference focused on materials design in task-based language teaching. When I first heard about the event, I thought it would be a perfect opportunity...

This week, I have my final classes for the academic year with my students. For five of my classes, I have spent around 30 lessons with the same group of learners. As always at this time of year, it fe...

When I visit other professors at their universities, I always enjoy seeing what’s in their offices. Of course, there are books, files, and the usual academic tools, but I’m often more curious about th...

When I was younger, I played a lot of cricket. I was very passionate about the sport, probably too passionate, and it took up time that I could have spent doing other things. I played at an okay level...

First of all, I would like to wish everyone a very Happy New Year. In particular, I want to extend my thanks and New Year wishes to the teachers and students using the Dictogloss in Action textbooks. ...

As the year comes to an end, I’ve been taking some time to reflect on 2025: a year that was busy, sometimes demanding, but ultimately very clarifying.

I recently read an interesting, yet somewhat sobering, article regarding the declining level of English communication proficiency in Japan. According to the EF English Proficiency Index, while Japan’s...

This week, we moved into Week 10 of my class on motivation research. Last week, the students did poster sessions where they presented their research themes. They covered previous research, gaps they h...

As the weather gets colder, I have noticed a sharp rise in sneezing, coughing, and red noses in my classes. Many of my students have caught colds or the flu, and even those who are still healthy look ...

Next Monday, I’ll be heading off to Shiojiri, a small town in Nagano Prefecture, to give a workshop for local high school teachers. This will actually be the fourth year in a row that the Nagano Board...

I’ve mentioned a few times that I’m currently leading a course on motivation. This week, we looked at the final theory of motivation covered in the course: demotivation. I won’t go into the theory its...

About a year ago, I was chatting with my friend Gary Ross at a conference. Gary’s an expert in AI; he seems to know absolutely everything that’s happening in the field. Honestly, he’s the most talente...

This week, I was honored to host Martha Ramirez from Universidad de Los Andes in Colombia, who came to my university to give two lectures. One, on Wednesday afternoon, was for students and focused on ...

I mentioned this on my private social media channels earlier this week, but today—October 10—is the official publication date for a new book I’ve been involved in: Screen Media in Language Education.

This semester I’ll be leading a course called 課題探究演習 (Kadai Tankyū Enshū, perhaps translated as "Project-Based Research Workshop"). The idea of the class is to give first- and second-year students a t...

This weekend, I’ll be heading to Kobe to give a workshop on the growth mindset to university students. Thank you, Ai-sensei, for the invitation! I’m really looking forward to sharing some ideas about ...

Earlier this year, together with colleagues from Iran and China, I put out a call for papers for an edited volume tentatively titled Intervention Studies in Motivating Language Learners. As the name suggests, the book br...

As many of you know, SielpA Books is still a young publisher, and at the moment we have only three textbooks. That is about to change. Over the past year, together with my university colleagues, I hav...

August is always a busy time of year. Classes finish at the end of July or in the first week of August, so there’s marking and grading to do. It’s also the season for two of the biggest conferences fo...

One of the greatest highlights of visiting Japan has been meeting Adrian Leis Ph.D. It's been about 10 years since I first connected with Adrian. We were both working on flipped learning from opposi...

Every summer in Japan, many fourth-year university students who dream of becoming teachers sit through rigorous tests and interviews. Although I am no longer directly involved in teacher training, I s...

Today (or maybe it was yesterday) marks 28 years since I first came to Japan. Twenty-eight years! Wow. I still remember so many details from that first day—too many to fit into a single blog post.

Last weekend, I participated in the JASELE conference in Saitama. This is a conference I attend every year, and usually I give a presentation. This year, I spoke about self-confidence and self-determi...

I have mentioned in previous blog entries that I sometimes visit a local high school to give workshops on presentation skills. Every year, some students from that same high school visit me in my offic...

Pronunciation training is a crucial aspect of second language learning. However, instructional approaches often struggle to balance accuracy-focused feedback with maintaining learner confidence. Th...

I often like to listen to the Australian radio station, Triple J. It can be streamed live and they play a lot of good music, more often than not, promoting Australian artists and up-and-coming musicia...

We are almost at the end of the semester here in Japan, which means it’s time for tests and final assignments. Throughout the course using the Dictogloss in Action textbooks, I’ve been able to assess ...

This weekend at JALTCALL 2025, I’m presenting findings from a study I conducted last year with my university students on the use of speech-to-text (S2T) technology in English pronunciation instruction...

I’ve heard somewhere that you only regret things that you don’t do: Whatever challenge you are faced with, it is always best to at least give it a try. I certainly have a regret when I was younger: I...

In this week's class with my second-year students (around 20 years old), we explored the topic, “When was a time that you were sad?” The lesson included a pre-class reading about different types of te...

Earlier this week, I led a workshop for students at my university who are preparing for the 教員採用試験 (teacher employment examination) for English teachers. While I’ve been involved in training students ...

In this week’s classes with my second-year students, we moved into Module 2, Lesson 5 — the tenth lesson in this course and the final lesson of Module 2. We’ve explored a range of topics already, but ...