New textbooks - how are YOUR JTEs taking it?

[horgh]

With the new course of study comes new textbooks. In my case, folks use New Crown just about everywhere in Himeji for JHS.

In some ways, it improves upon the old (better grammar, focus on casual yet widespread expressions for more natural English, appendix dealing with pronunciations, more tables and reference material at the back etc.), yet fails to touch upon some key points (successfully linking JHS and ES, accounting for the widespread use of increasingly efficient eikaiwa in a post-NOVA world, increasing disparity between students going to good eikaiwa vs. cheap cram schools, misuse of expressions etc.).

One major concern of mine was how teachers would adapt to the new book, especially older teachers who had been running on auto-pilot for years now. The new course of study means more work for them and given the relatively low amount of time consecrated to actual teaching related tasks, when would they find the time to dissect and master this new book?

Already, I noticed that my JTE have simply NOT done more than cast a cursory glance at the book. It's much busier than the last, offering numerous options with varying levels of necessity, so teachers are obviously overwhelmed by it - even if Japanese dominates the book. It so far seems as if the main talking point is all they care about in each lesson, leaving all other things aside. Discussions about "word corner" and "idea box" tend to summed up with a confused, vague answer as if they aren't sure what these portions of the book are for. One JTE grumbled about all these new words and how to fit everything in one neat little lesson.

The increase in vocab is large enough to be noticeable, and the inclusions of common expressions seems to be confusing my JTE who don't fully understand them. "What's the plan?" had them mumbling about lesson plans and what this had to do with anything.

As the books move towards "natural English", many teachers may be left in the dust. ALTs might rejoice that this may mean more freedom for them, but I would be careful.

Right now, I fully expect for 2 nensei to have gone through the first third of the book by early May. I'm sure the JTE at my old, bigger school would balk at this. I recall them filling up two distinct lessons with material from a few pages of the old book.

What about you folks out there? Are your JTEs on the ball with clear ideas of how to approach the changes or are they struggling? Any denials that there even is a new course of study?

[word]

My area of the prefecture also uses New Crown exclusively.

I am lucky to have two JTEs who are really, really on top of this action. My visit school JTE ordered copies of the book months in advance (and even thought to order an extra set for meeee!) and has been planning for some time. In fact, he ordered the electronic textbook, which, while very expensive, is kinda cool if you've got the technology and a willingness to give it a go. He's goin' all out on it, and getting good results.

My home school JTE is new this year, and it's her first year as a JHS JTE (she was an ES teacher before). She also studied in the US, speaks fluent, near-flawless English, and has traveled to more places than I will probably see in my lifetime. She has a few hiccups every now and then, and is learning as she goes, but she's doing fantastically well, and I do my best to help in every way possible. She doesn't have the electronic textbook, but she does have the DVDs, and is very tech-oriented--she's already used a projector + vid/pptx in class for several occasions.

I kinda like the books; there're some :/ areas, but this is inevitable in any textbook, I'm sure, and I do think the books are an improvement on the previous version. Edit: LOL at the picture of Paul about to crap his pants.

All in all, I would say I am extremely (extremely) lucky to have some JTEs who're embracing this, doing the best they can, and wading in swinging.

[GunmaBrentPA]

I wouldn't be too concerned if the older experienced teachers aren't giving the book more than a cursory look over. This isn't the first new edition of a textbook and it won't be the last.

Honestly, with all the talk of the new curriculum and how this new edition was going to be so much thicker and more intense I find myself underwhelmed. In almost all the textbook series there are things that I like and things that I don't like, but in the end it is only a slight alteration of the previous edition which was only a slight alteration of the edition before that.

Why should a JTE have a hard time adjusting when the largest change is to the illustrations?

[horgh]

We're native speakers, some with an ounce of an idea on how to teach efficiently and plenty of time to prepare for lessons.

JTE are not created equal, with a number of them who simply can't communicate in English and struggle with the material at hand. They often have little time to prepare for lessons (their time spent doing various clerical tasks, preparing for school festivals, PTA matters, union stuff, etc.) and may or may not have any clue about teaching.

In my experience, my JTE have been to various degrees averse to change however incremental due to the above.

And I find that the new version of the NC books offer a wider range of non-grammar related content that befuddled my current JTE. Unless my JTE are spectacularly dense (I don't think they are, just not very good with English, especially conversational English that deviates from what they learned as youths/taught for years) it does seem that the books offer at least some new challenges. And the extra class seems to have thrown their timing off...

[scarreddragon]

Don't the textbooks get changed every 5 years anyway? Especially the older JTEs ought to be used to it by now. I still have the last set of Sunshine books from two changes ago (10 years, woo!) Plus the New Horizon books we've been using for 5 years, then the new set of New Horizon they updated, and finally the newest ichinensei book they are phasing in (going back to Sunshine). So there are 10 sets of English textbooks in my desk. Oh yeah.

[kawaiijutsu]

we changed over to a new book called Atlantis, which basically does nothing to help tell the teacher how to teach anything. its more like a workbook for students, and teachers are expected to figure it out. My JTEs flipped out completely. they kept shouting "theres no cd!!! what will we do?" "well, you could have me read the things, since a large part of my job is to be a living tape player..." "no, we need a cd!!"

[horgh]

As time goes on, I realize just how weird the whole Japanese education system can be.

My former supervisor at the BOE became a kyotou sensei at an ES where I teach. We talk a lot since he's new and feels a little isolated. After all, most of the teachers know reach other well and he's not used to being the new guy after many years in different positions in the BOE.

He told me that he has issues adjusting to his new position. For one thing, it's pretty heavy in terms of responsibilities and on top of that he has to teach kids. However, he has zero experience teaching kids. His only teaching experience being teaching English to white collar Japanese workers in Egypt.

He was given zero training for his new position.

I guess training takes time and money, something the BOE just can't spare.

Given this, I wonder about my JTE. A lot of them are so busy working at making the school run that anything having to do with lessons seems like a hassle. This Saturday (PTA day), I could hear one of the JTE audibly groaning as he prepared a lesson for his students. He revealed that lesson planning was hard and frustrating. despite having been at it for a good 6 years now. He talked about how he he wished he could just open a book and have everything spelled out for him and how the new book was so much more complicated than the last. Here I thought the books did just that...

Then the JTE from my initial post commented on my lesson plan for the next class saying it dealt with two grammar points. I patiently pointed out that it didn't - it merely made use of the future tense as is and in question form as the book asks. The book teaches both the future tense and questions in the future tense in the same lesson.

He checked the book himself and grumbled about the difficulty level.

I calmly suggested we split the lesson into two lessons, one for each page. The idea of slowing down the pace and *gasps* spending two in class lessons on one in book lesson sounded like pure insanity to him.