Program Foundations

Connect with the Message
Connect with Individuals
Integrate the Study of English into your Life

Connect with the Message

It is natural for you to want to overcome the language barrier, but it is not only a matter of mastering the mechanics of language. The key to overcoming the language barrier is connecting with the message and the speaker, not producing perfect sentences. When meeting an English speaker, you may feel inferior or like a child because you cannot speak the language as well as they can. The temptation is to wait until your English is perfect before you start using it. Approaching conversations in this way will only lead to frustration. Your hesitation to speak will cost you the attention of the person you are speaking with. It may also send the wrong message. The focal point of the conversation should be the other person, not your English skills. In other words, you need to forget about using perfect English in every sentence. Your focus should be understanding the speaker's message and communicating your message to them. This is easy to understand in business terms. If a businessman needs to use English to negotiate in a meeting, the negotiation itself is most important in his mind. If he can communicate what he needs to say and obtain a satisfactory outcome, whether or not he uses perfect English is unimportant. It is the same in everyday conversation. In order to talk with a native speaker and have a productive conversation, you need to concentrate on the messages you are giving and receiving. When you do this, Americans will be more responsive, you will get more exposure to hearing native English, and you will be communicating successfully.

Connect with IndividualFor many students, the temptation is to rely on textbook learning. You may think that when you have mastered a certain textbook you will be ready to speak English, but a textbook cannot teach you how to communicate. The best way to develop your communication skills is by connecting with individual speakers of English. You can think of them as 'live textbooks,' containing more information about American daily life and culture than any book ever could. Through individuals, you can observe the language and behaviors a real person uses to handle different situations. As you look to individuals as your guides to English, you will gain understanding that is based on your own experience and memories, instead of relying on what a textbook tells you.

Unlike studying a textbook, when speaking with an individual, your main focus should not be the mechanics of language. Instead of concentrating on perfecting your English, think about developing the human relationship. Even with your limited English abilities, you will begin to establish trust and friendship. Focusing on your relationship with the individual will help you to create your own reality in the English world. English will no longer be something that you were taught in a classroom or that you have read in a textbook. By building a relationship with certain individuals they, along with their language and culture, will come alive for you.

Relationship-building and communication are not always easy. Because your English is limited, you may feel uncomfortable. You may feel immature because you are not responding like a native speaker. You may think that the American you are speaking with will become uneasy because of your different mannerisms. When uncomfortable, the temptation is to retreat into the student role. This attitude will not help you progress. When things don't go well, you might reassure yourself that it is just because of your limited language abilities. You convince yourself that if people at least see you as a good student of English, they will respect you. But, even in your native language, good human relationships are not automatic. You need to think about the other person and convey your consideration for them.

When you feel tempted to sit back and passively be taught English instead of actively learning it, ask yourself why you began studying English in the first place. Most likely, you wanted to be able to communicate with English speakers without feeling uncomfortable. You can accomplish this is by reaching beyond your fears and being an active, considerate participant in the conversation. Your efforts will be rewarded with better communication skills and a deeper understanding of that person and their culture.
When you concentrate on connecting with individuals, you get the most out of your learning experiences. Learning about a new culture is a big task, and it may be tempting to try to meet as many Americans and find as many new situations in which to use English as possible. However, it is better to focus on a few good opportunities to relate to native English speakers. Find a few select situations and relationships that you can cultivate and put your time and energy into them. By understanding thoroughly the personalities, attitudes, and ways of living of a few individuals, you will begin to comprehend Americans and a part of their culture. They will become real for you instead of just abstract notions. Your study will be rooted in your own life and connected to your own real experiences with Americans. This will allow you to interact with them more naturally and find your own natural style of speaking English.

Integrate the Study of English into Your LifeAnother barrier that language students need to overcome is one of time and space. Because you may not encounter English in your daily life, you need to make a plan for how to acquire it. You might calculate how many years you need to spend at school, or start looking for the perfect textbook to read and master. However, this line of thinking will not help you reach your goal. If your goal is to converse and experience comfortable situations with native speakers, keep in mind that learning English is a lifelong task. It is not something that can be achieved by taking a certain number of courses or studying the right textbooks. To be successful, you have to find a way to fit English into your life. Meaningful interactions with English-speakers are needed to continue and progress in your English journey. You need to find a way to fit English into your life in a way that can be maintained over a long period of time. But how do you fit English into your life? At NACOS we have created a plan to help you to achieve this goal. It begins with our program, the Daily Life Workshop. It is possible to gain a lot of English knowledge in Japan, but nothing can compare with exposure to authentic English used by native speakers in their home environment. That is why we developed the Daily Life Workshop, which allows you to obtain concrete experiences in the English language and American culture.

First, we help you to express and describe yourself in English with a 'Self Portrait.' You write a description of yourself and your background in your native language, which we then translate into a model of perfect English for you. Then we match you with individuals with whom you can communicate and begin to form a relationship. Observing and participating in daily life situations, you start to understand the culture through these individuals. Next,we help you to create comfortable situations within a group of English-speakers through family contact. Living with a hand-picked, average American family, you will learn how to function within a group and discover your own place in it.

The Daily Life Workshop is a focused, organized experience in which you take an active, more aggressive approach to solving difficult situations and learning in real life environments. At NACOS, we believe it is best to limit your project to several days or a week. In this amount of time, you can succeed in concentrating and maintaining a high energy level. After that, you will likely become exhausted and find it difficult to focus on your project. In addition, because it is only for a short time, the Americans who share their lives with you will also be able to give you the attention you need to understand their lifestyle.

(Refer to: 'Our Program: The Daily Life Workshop,' for a more detailed description of this program.)
To help you get the most out of your experiences, NACOS will help you review and build on them by assisting you in creating your own personal text album. Your text album will include collections of words and phrases you were exposed to during your project, journal entries by the individuals you spent time with, your own journal entries, pictures, and more. You can use this text album to review the English you learned and reflect on the daily life experiences you had. Using it, your study will no longer be abstract, but be rooted in real life experiences. Your text album will become your future guide to personal study. As you reread it, understand it better, and dream about the chapters to be added, you will find a lasting joy in your learning.

But your program does not end there. Once you are back home, relationships formed during your Daily Life Workshop program can be maintained. Through calls, letters, E-mail, and future visits, you can continue to build your language skills. In this context, you might use other textbooks as a resource to help you understand new grammar points or vocabulary you heard or would like to use in a particular situation. Because what you are learning is based on your personal experiences, the English you study will continue to be a tool for communication rather than an end in itself.