Steve: We have Mayu here, Mayu E Room.
Steve: And today we're going to talk about English language,
Steve: education or language education in general
Steve: with specific reference to Japan, but not only.
Steve: And I leave a link to Mayu’s YouTube channel
Steve: in the description box.
Steve: Hi Mayu.
Mayu: Hi! Thanks for having me.
Steve: OK, I’ve been looking forward because you know,
Steve: I lived in Japan for nine years at the country that I, I really enjoy.
Steve: I love being in Japan.
Steve: So many interesting things happen there,
Steve: And one of the things that always comes up is that,
Steve: you know, Japan,
Steve: They have more people taking TOEIC than any other country
Steve: and they don't do very well.
Steve: And I like to talk to you about this
Steve: because you speak such excellent English. Mayu: Thank you.
Steve: Not only have learned English, and I gather,
Steve: you're learning Spanish,
Steve: and you also study at the Middlebury College in the United States
Steve: language acquisitions. So…
Steve: Tell me. Why is it you think that
Steve: Japanese people seem to have more difficulty with English than…
Steve: I mean,
Steve: Geographically I can understand that too, but what are some other problems?
Steve: Let’s put it this way. What are some other problems with English language education in Japan.
Mayu: I think we're actually not so bad at English like on paper.
Mayu: As in like, We are good at reading
Mayu: and writing I think relatively
Mayu: but for listening and speaking is very difficult for us
Mayu: because we have really zero opportunity in Japan
Mayu: to listen to real English.
Mayu: And we have like…
Mayu: We don't have any reason to speak English outside of the classrooms
Mayu: in the only, like reason we study English is Steve: Absolutely.
Mayu: because we need that knowledge for the exams to…
Mayu: you know, enter University.
Mayu: And also
Mayu: I think we are told like there is right and wrong in a lot of things
Mayu: So like…
Mayu: If a pronunciation or grammar isn’t good enough
Mayu: We are not really like… people are going to be judgmental.
Mayu: That's what we think like deep down, Steve: Right.
Mayu: And that's not just language education
Mayu: That's like instilled in our education like, even in the, the family, I think
Steve: Okay. I should say by the way that we are going to speak half in English and half in Japanese.
Mayu: But I wanted to have at least half in English
Steve: so people can hear your excellent English. Mayu: Thank you.
Steve: And obviously It's true.
Steve: I mean if you live in Japan,
Steve: it's 130 million people
Steve: and that you don't really need English for most situations
Steve: and yet at some level in Japan,
Steve: I mean if I go to a bookstore in Japan I go to the language section,
Steve: all the books, so many books about learning English so many book about TOEIC.
Steve: There is, there is a lot of interested.
Mayu: And there's a lot of like, online platforms that you can learn English.
Mayu: Now that’s like… after, I think after COVID started it has expanded a lot
Mayu: because people had so much more time at home,
Mayu: and they wanted to start something new,
Mayu: they maybe wanted to prepare themselves to study or work abroad.
Mayu: So there is a lot of resources,
Mayu: yet, we still struggle to learn acquire the language.
Steve: Now, you went to Middlebury College.
Steve: So, first of all that would be,
Steve: you know, obviously I have the same experience
Steve: when they went to live in France as a nineteen-year-old
Steve: when we as a student, go to another country, a different culture, different language.
Steve: It's a wonderful experience,
Steve: but you started language acquisition, I think among other thing.
Steve: And what did you learn in Middlebury College,
Steve: that was different from how languages are taught in Japan.
Mayu: OK, I think, one of most interesting things was I took Spanish at Middlebury.
Mayu: And I also took Spanish in Japan
Mayu: and there was a huge difference.
Mayu: In Japan, it was more focused on.
Mayu: Like, how much vocabulary do you know.
Mayu: How…
Mayu: like a lot of like, you know, these like…
Mayu: [ Speaking Spanish ]
Mayu: most of a lot of that
Mayu: In Japan,
Steve: Conjugations Mayu: Yes! Conjugations but in middlebury
Mayu: we were forced to speak the language in every single class
Mayu: and we also had to read a lot, like it was…
Mayu: It was… above My Level of the book
Mayu: the books were like… I couldn’t read them
Mayu: but we had to, so difficult because I had… Steve: That’s good.
Mayu: I had my dictionary next to me all the time when I was like
Mayu: OK, I don’t know this one this one like I don’t know anything
Mayu: So I was like… much harder than my level
Mayu: So… Steve: But you know,
Mayu: And we also had to like present in Spanish
Mayu: like we have to make a presentation in Spanish
Mayu: that wasn't anything like what I learned in Japan.
Steve: Right, but you know,
Steve: one thing you said the Japanese people can all read well
Steve: but how common is it is
Steve: it in Japan for people to read novels in English, a full novel.
Mayu: Why do we not do that? Steve: No no, I’m saying,
Steve: Do people do that?
Steve: Is that common that people would read novels in English?
Mayu: No, I think…
Mayu: When I discuss some of things with my friends from America
Mayu: He says… like why,
Mayu: He asks me like, why do you not read books?
Mayu: but you learned like, like even in Japanese.
Mayu: We don't really read like the whole books.
Mayu: Like that's like a ancient books like…
Mayu: Classical Japanese literature or something and in the US.
Mayu: When I also studied in high school in the US,
Mayu: we had to read a lot of literature, like you know,
Mayu: a lot of The Great Gatsby, Catcher in the Rye or something,
Mayu: and I never had that experience in Japan.
Mayu: and we would read like an excerpt from the books,
Mayu: but not the whole thing.
Mayu: So we would just like read the summary of the books like…
Mayu: pretend that we understand.
Mayu: So we don’t really do that in Japanese. Steve: So I'm a great believer in reading books.
Steve: I'm a great believer in reading books.
Every language
Steve: I've learned it when I can read a book from cover to cover,
Steve: that's a major achievement,
Steve: I often hear people say “Oh, I can read as well. What do you read? I read newspaper articles, read a book.”
you know, people who read well
Steve: and that's part of what's in laying
Steve: because with laying
Steve: You can actually… You don’t have to keep on looking words up in the dictionary,
Steve: You can actually look them up and they…
Steve: developed, you know,
Steve: List of words and how many words you've learned something
Steve: That the whole function of, I think reading is underestimated.
Steve: And I'm not just reading short articles but actually reading books
Steve: I think it’s very important in terms of getting the language into your brain.
Steve: Japan…
Steve: But of course there are people who learn English to a very high level of proficiency in Japan
Steve: it’s not everyone, but…
Steve: I think the Japanese tend to think of themselves as being poor Learners of English.
Steve: We are doing poorer than the Koreans or the Chinese.
Steve: Other people in Asia are better than we are,
Steve: I'm not sure that that's the case.
Steve: So, Let’s speak in Japanese.
Steve: Basically, For Japanese people, English is just a different kind of language.
Mayu: Yes. Steve: Japanese is such a specific language.
Steve: So many words are from China but it’s not like Chinese.
Steve: Japanese is really… Unique. Mayu: Unique.
Steve: But these vocabularies, there’s a common vocabularies like Chinese and Korean.
Steve: But there’s no common vocabularies on the language in Europe.
Steve: That’s what makes it more difficult.
Steve: But I could say the same thing when foreigners study Japanese.
Steve: In my opinion,
Steve: rather than difficulty and difference of language,
Steve: it depends on the attitude of the person who studies and…
Steve: how much you use those language, These are more important.
Steve: It’s not about how objectively difficult Japanese is.
Steve: It’s not about that.
Steve: It’s about wanting to study. Among those reasons like it because Japan is a interesting country
Steve: or Japanese movies are nice and doing lots of reading and listening every day,
Steve: I think that’s the important factor rather than level of difficulty of language.
Steve: What do you think? Mayu: Well…
Mayu: I think…
Mayu: I think they shouldn’t let students read some summary of complicated books.
Mayu: They should read more easy stories. Steve: Right.
Mayu: They can start with those books like toddlers in the US are reading and find it it’s interesting.
Mayu: Or School should adopt stories like Harry Potter or Disney that everybody already likes.
Mayu: Then I think people would take English more willingly.
Mayu: Now, These are difficult. Steve: Yes indeed, I agree with you.
Steve: I think Harry Potter did such a contribution at education of English.
Steve: And as you mentioned earlier, the book “Catcher in the Rye” is not so difficult either, Right?
Mayu: Yes, I think it was easy to read.
Steve: Right.
Steve: People should use those type of books, something that they would enjoy reading.
Steve: You should read modern books rather than reading books that is hundreds of years ago.
Steve: Right.
Steve: But for Japanese people, English is a language that they just forced to study.
Steve: I think it’s just like that for most of them.
Steve: They don’t start studying because they would love to.
Mayu: Yes… Well.
Mayu: How they teach at school,
Mayu: they start with “ABCD“ song.
Mayu: But as soon as I enter to middle school,
Mayu: they taught me like “I have a pen.” is using “Have” and “Have“ is one of general verb.
Mayu: They started like that with conceptual way and…
Mayu: I think this is one of the reason why people show no desire towards English language.
Steve: Right.
Steve: I could say the same thing in Canada.
Steve: They have to study French at school. Mayu: Right.
Steve: People told to acquire the language because it’s just one of common language,
Steve: that’s where they loose their interest.
Steve: In Sweden and Netherlands,
Steve: all of their shows on TV are originals.
Steve: Let’s say if the show is from England, they just put it on in English.
Steve: They don’t put dubbed shows.
Steve: Therefore when 5 or 6 or 7 years old children start going to school,
Steve: they are already familiar with English.
Steve: That is such a big factor.
Steve: If the beginning of… I forgot the word…
Mayu: Wing it? Steve: Yes, Wing it!
Steve: If you start from “I have, You have, He has,” something like that,
Steve: of course people would have an adverse reaction to it.
Steve: That’s why you need to start with another way.
Mayu: Actually, when I was small.
Mayu: I was acting on theatrical performance in English and I didn’t understand the meaning
Mayu: But I was singing something like “Weather weather is fine.“
Mayu: and I didn’t know what it meant.
Mayu: I think about it now and I know it was about good weather.
Mayu: Back then,
Mayu: I felt like this song is just so fun, not like Japanese songs.
Mayu: And then I entered middle school.
Mayu: And I found out that weather song was based on these rules.
Mayu: It was like something extra to learn after I enjoyed the song.
Mayu: Therefore it was good starting point for me.
Mayu: So I would recommend to start with something attract people’s interest.
Steve: Starting with something fun, that is important.
Steve: If you don’t enjoy studying language, it would be difficult.
Mayu: Yes, you can not continue.
Steve: So Today, for people who is watching this video.
Steve: There’s many advices and tips of studying English for Japanese people on Mayu san’s channel.
Steve: So I would leave a link on description box. Mayu: Thank you.
Steve: And for foreigners who is studying Japanese.
Steve: I would put part of discussion in Japanese as one of Japanese lesson of LingQ.
Steve: People who is studying Japanese can use those and hopefully this would help to improve their Japanese.
Steve: So Thank you Mayu san for your time. Mayu: Thank you.
Steve: Thank you. Mayu: Goodbye.