What is the Japanese language that will be qualified in universities and graduate schools?


Masanori Sato
Shinjuku school

 

At ARC, project work lessons are very active. They are not the lessons whereby teachers just keep on talking on the podium, but where students will participate in. There are also visits to Japanese primary school, and poster or documentary videos production for a certain theme. There are profound themes such as "Eating Customs of Japanese Orphanage", "What did we want in coming to study in Japan?”. This studying in kind of participatory format will increase the opportunities for students to communicate in Japanese within themselves. Obviously, the technical skills of Japanese language will also improve. However, there is even more important thing. That is "the ability to communicate with and convey yourself to other people in a language a foreign you are not used to". I have interviewed ARC graduates who have gone on to universities and graduate schools and more than half of them said that "their Japanese communication skills are better than those of normal foreign students". I feel very happy when I hear this.

Japanese language school is often seen as "pre-education", by students who aim for Japanese universities or graduate schools, which will help prepare them for exams such as Japanese Language Proficiency Test. If you just see it like that, things will fall apart when you have pursued your higher study. Even if you have achieved your goal to study in the universities, you have to continue studying Japanese which is a foreign language. If you are a lively and outgoing person when you speak your mother tongue, and suddenly turn into an introvert when you speak Japanese because you are stuck on technical skills, there will be no meaning in having learned the language. You will have to go back home without learning much in the universities. It will become a situation where "you have memorized Japanese language for exams but cannot use it to communicate yourself".

Therefore, we emphasize on communication skills in our classes even for people who want to pursue higher study. For example, in "Graduate school advancement curriculum", each student will bring their own research proposal and present them to the class where everyone comments on them. You will be able to use advanced Japanese to explain complex concepts so they are simple to understand. You will also be able to express yourself to other people. This, indeed, is the real "pre-education" of the skills required by your graduate studies.

At ARC, percolator format classes are very active in this way. In addition, there are also lessons that use elements from drama performance, and improvised play to reenact daily life scenes. Although I have said some difficult things, the percolator format classes are mostly very "fun", so please don't worry.