I am planning to enhance our content during the second semester, and one thing I have been thinking of doing is evaluating the papers we read in our English seminar. At Yamada Laboratory, following the tradition of Kanji Akahori Laboratory, where I completed my graduate studies, we hold a weekly English seminar. Our laboratory is famous (or so the rumor goes) for having a rigorous seminar, but it is directly effective for students’ master’s theses and research presentations, and it is a major strength for getting used to English and disseminating research findings at international conferences and the like. In particular, in Educational Technology, research confined only to Japan is unthinkable, and as a research field, it is borderless, so there is no way we can avoid reading overseas literature. The ability to master English literature and summarize it easily is a skill that is useful not only in research but also in various places such as companies. It is tough at first, but you gradually start to realize that you are becoming capable.

Therefore, I think I will have the person in charge of the English seminar write a frank and simple evaluation of the papers they were responsible for. I thought it would be great if we could share this information and have the opportunity to talk at academic conferences or other occasions if there are people with the same interests, and it would also be an opportunity for people to learn about the variety of research in Educational Technology. Although I say variety, before I knew it, the content had all become language learning-related (laughs). Even though the technologies and perspectives handled are different.

For the first installment, we will start with Hirata-san, a first-year master’s student.

Thank you for your support.