Interview by Ken Schmidt

A summary of this interview originally appeared in the following article:

Schmidt, K. (2007). Five factors to consider in implementing a university Extensive Reading program. The Language Teacher, 31(5), 11-14.

Beniko Mason Interview
Shitennoji University (IBU), Osaka

Note: This interview is considerably longer than the others because Beniko and I got into an extended exchange of ideas with lots of examples and clarification. In editing the interview, I felt that drastic shortening would have left out too many insights into Beniko's thinking and approach, so I decided to err on the side of completeness. I hope you'll find the depth helpful.

Summary:
I asked each interviewee to start with a brief summary/overview of an ER program they are involved with.

One ER program I'm involved with is for pre-school education majors at IBU Junior College. The class meets once a week for 90 minutes. This is their only required English course. Almost all activities are comprehension based. Students read graded readers at home and listen to fairy/folk tales in class told by me. The goal is to gain 800 to 1000 words in two semesters from listening and reading, and progress from 200 word-level Penguin readers to 1100-1600 word-level Macmillan graded readers in two semesters. They are required to read 70 to 100 pages per week-all together about 1000 pages per semester. They listen to 20 to 25 different stories in class for two semesters for listening and vocabulary development. They read during the summer too. I suggest to them to listen to an additional story per week at my webpage on the IBU campus Internet where my colleagues and I do our storytelling on video.

After receiving the summary from each interviewee, we progressed into the follow-up interview.

Were you assigned to teach a "reading" and/or "listening" class, or did you decide to make your "general" English class into a reading & listening class?

IBU told me to teach a required course called "Communication." They wanted me to teach conversation. I suggested to them that students should first learn to listen and read instead of speak and write because they would not be able to speak and write if they could not listen and read. I further stated that if this was the only English course that these students were going to take, the time had to be spent well. I stressed that input, not output, was the cause of language acquisition, and finally, that output was the result of acquisition.

I explained to them that students needed to acquire language and needed to learn how to learn (pick up effective methods for independent acquisition). I continued by saying that it was a waste of time to teach lower-level students phrases and expressions and have them memorize conversations, and that in such a class teachers go through the motions of teaching and students through the motions of learning. I made clear to them that it would not cause anything but indifference in English; that it was not education; that it was a waste of not only time, but also energy, money, and precious resources; that when students read, they would be able to write well; and that when they listened to English that they understood, they would start speaking.

The school (the administrators) eventually said O.K.

So, my students listen to stories in class and read books at home for a course called "Communication". IBU changed the course title to "English 1" and English 2" last year (2007).