I would like to write about a certain very special new student of mine at Smith’s School of English in Fuse who is an absolute pleasure to teach!
She is so focused on the lesson, she asks for time to write down everything on the board, especially the new vocabulary words, she does her [...]
Just earlier today I received an email from a former student of mine who is currently living and working in New Zealand and she absolutely loves it!
I keep in touch by email with countless numbers of students but just today I realized how many “international” pen pals I have developed while teaching at Smith’s School [...]
I don’t know if this has been mentioned on the soapbox before but it just occurred to me this afternoon while teaching a class at Smith’s School of English in Fuse.
I guess when people read about teaching English at Smith’s School of English, or anywhere else in Japan for that matter, we just assume that [...]
This is a country which I have not had the pleasure to visit yet though I know several of my fellow franchisees have visited, especially given the amount of holidays we have here at Smith’s School of English, and it seems to be a very popular destination for Japanese people as well.
Just today at [...]
February 24, 2008 – 10:39 pm
Yesterday we had our first Osaka regional franchisee seminar of 2008.
It was nice to see some older familiar faces of franchisees that have been around for years and also to meet a couple of new franchisees who joined us recently by purchasing developed schools!
A big welcome to:
Smith’s School of English in Kamishinjo and
Smith’s School of [...]
February 23, 2008 – 3:57 am
I am a bit slow sometimes to update my soapbox here, though I always have a list of things to write about; however I recently received a big motivator to log on here and write.
A few days ago at a trial lesson at Smith’s School of English in Fuse I asked my student how she [...]
February 12, 2008 – 12:40 am
And maybe you are too…
And I’ll bet there are numerous other franchisees out there who have acquired this same name in their areas too.
It seems that after being seen in my school area for years now, passing out flyers, shopping, etc… many of the locals greet me by the name
“スミスさん”
They just assume I am Mr. [...]
January 4, 2008 – 2:10 am
In a recent posting by Al Bartle at Smith’s School of English in Okamoto he made reference to some of the challenges all of us face in the classroom in helping our students to improve their English and specifically he mentioned pronunciation which is definitely a challenge, especially when trying to change the sometimes deeply [...]
January 4, 2008 – 1:14 am
ちっとも見当がつかないよ。
全然［さっぱり］分かりません。／見当もつきません。／全く考え付きません。
Here at Smith’s School of English we use a loop type lesson format which includes teaching our students what we call a “One-point” at the end of every lesson. It’s basically a useful expression which they can memorize and immediately begin using.
http://www.sse-franchise.com/soapbox/category/english-lesson-plans/
I always encourage my students to use what they have learned as much [...]
To even out the throngs of summer festival revelers, the cities of Osaka and Kobe have had their Yodogawa and Meriken Park Fireworks festivals on the same night for the past three years. That was August 4th, last Saturday night if you didn’t get to either!
But the big question each year is [...]