Systemic Functional Perspectives of Japanese - Descriptions and Applications - Elizabeth A. Thomson

Systemic Functional Perspectives of Japanese - Descriptions and Applications - Elizabeth A. Thomson

Modelling writing: using the genre approach in the Japanese as a foreign language classroom

Systemic Functional Perspectives of Japanese - Descriptions and Applications - Elizabeth A. Thomson

Yuko Ramzan [+-]
Ritsumeikan University
Yuko Ramzan is an Associate Professor at Ritsumeikan University, Japan. Her research interests include Japanese education, foreign language education, pedagogy and educational sociology. Among her publications is Ramzan, Y. (2009) The construction of interculturality and foreign language education: Japanese language learning in Australian schools. Germany: Verlag.
Elizabeth A. Thomson [+-]
University of New South Wales
Elizabeth A. Thomson is the Director of Studies, Defence Force School of Languages, and Research Fellow at the University of New South Wales. She coordinates The Genre Project, an ongoing research initiative aimed at mapping the genres of Japanese, particularly those found in the workplace and in Education. She teaches linguistics, Japanese language and English for Academic Purposes. In 2003 she was awarded the Vice-Chancellor’s Award for Outstanding Contribution to Teaching and Learning (Arts) and in 2001 her co-authored CD-ROM, Academic Writing was the winner of the Tertiary Technology Showcase Category in The Australian Awards for Excellence in Educational Publishing.

Description

Over the last 15 to 20 years, the teaching of Japanese as a Foreign Language (JFL) in the Australian education context has been based on a communicative approach. This approach establishes an ‘information gap’ between speaker and listener, thereby setting up a ‘real’ need to communicate, introducing and practicing language patterns in a social context. However, while this approach has been popular with teachers, particularly at a beginners level in the teaching of speaking and listening, the same cannot be said in relation to the teaching of writing to more advanced students. Constructing ‘information gaps’ in social situations without reference to the bi-directional effect 1 of the context on the text is inadequate. Another approach which foregrounds the social purpose, the genre and the context of a text that is based on linguistic analysis of the characteristic lexico-grammatical features is needed. One such approach that has been successful in the ESL classroom is the Genre Approach based on Systemic Functional Linguistics as developed by the Sydney School (Johns, 2003). This paper presents an argument for the adoption of the Genre Approach in the JFL classroom. The approach in demonstrated in two parts. Firstly, a model text of the type that students are expected to write is analysed in terms of its context, social purpose and lexico-grammatical features. This, in turn, is incorporated into a proposed lesson plan based around the framework of the Genre Approach, which embeds writing in a lesson module extending over 7 weeks, for two hours per week. This kind of description provides JFL teachers with an example of a writing pedagogy that locates learning in the cultural context of the target language, highlighting not just the lexicogrammatical features of the text but also the social purpose and registerial characteristics which serve to identify the text as one instance of the genre to which it belongs.

Notify A Colleague

Citation

Ramzan, Yuko; Thomson, Elizabeth A.. Modelling writing: using the genre approach in the Japanese as a foreign language classroom. Systemic Functional Perspectives of Japanese - Descriptions and Applications. Equinox eBooks Publishing, United Kingdom. p. 254 - 284 Apr 2013. ISBN 9781845530532. https://www.equinoxpub.com/home/view-chapter/?id=18665. Date accessed: 28 Mar 2024 doi: 10.1558/equinox.18665. Apr 2013

Dublin Core Metadata