Hello, students! There’s an expression in English known as “burning the midnight oil.” We use this expression to mean that one has been working hard, or late, to prepare for or accomplish something. It means that one has worked past the hours of daylight, and so they must use a lamp.

For example: “I’ve been burning the midnight oil preparing for this test.”

I mention this expression because I like for my students to be able to use natural, functional English expressions when they speak. The difference between an ESL speaker who learns English from a Japanese textbook and one who learns from a native speaker is that the latter typically use idioms, expressions and turns of phrase that distinguish their English from the garden-variety taught in most classroom environments.

Recently, I’ve been burning the midnight oil (it’s after 1 a.m. as I type this) in an effort to finish an ESL workbook that I am preparing for use in my classroom. The finished book will:

*be approximately 150 pages long

*have well over 100 full-color, professional illustrations

*contain 12 units of study

*have nearly 600 questions that the students can answer, either in writing or verbally, based upon 360 targeted sentences

*have three different levels of difficulty (plus it can be used for early-beginners who have not yet mastered writing, but can articulate their responses

*teach English as it is spoken

This workbook will deal primarily with the present tense form of English, but can easily be used to teach the past and future tenses as well. The range of this book is limited, quite literally, by the imagination of the teacher and the students. The targeted sentences and questions that are in the book are only the tip of the iceberg! Literally hundreds more sentences and questions can be formed based upon the illustrations.

Emi and I will be in contact with a professional recording studio to compose a CD for this workbook as it nears completion. We’re getting very excited about this, and hope that you will look forward to getting your first look at it as well.

So…I suppose that I should get back to burning that midnight oil. But before I do, I’d like to share with you how impressed I was lately by one of our H.A. classes…

See, I have most of my students convinced that I don’t speak ANY Japanese. The truth is that my Japanese is horrible, but I can keep up with most 12-year-old children’s dialogue.

Anyway, they are reaching the age where they want to share things with me, both good and bad, but realize that I don’t speak Japanese. You should see how HARD they try to tell me! It’s wonderful! For example, a student wanted to tell me about a trip she took. I told here that I didn’t understand her Japanese. She said, “In the airplane, go to Tokyo.” Was the grammar tense perfect? No. Did I understand what she meant? YES!!! Communication is what I want from the kids at that level, and that’s what she could do. We have examples like that every week, and I’ll make an effort to share more of them with you. We have a lot of bright kids that are working very hard. We’re very proud of them.

For now, good night. Keep working on your English (for this poor gaijin) and I’ll see you in class!

V/R,

Jeff