(July 2016) Message from the Coordinator 

Dear MW-SIG Members,

It seems that we’ve survived rainy season and the summer weather has finally arrived. In this brief message, I’d like to keep everyone informed on the happenings of your SIG. The Between the Keys team is hard at work on the next issue. Expect to receive it in your in-box sometime next month. Of course, we are always looking for quality submissions. If you or one of your colleagues have something of interest, please don’t hesitate to contact us. One of the biggest changes is open access to every issue of BtK from the current issue 24(1) back to 9(3) – way back in 2001!

Contents of this message:

1. JALT2016

2. Links/Articles of Interest

1. JALT2016

Although JALT2016 (November 25 – 28) feels to be in the distant future, now is the time start thinking about your accommodation and transportation arrangements. It is now possible to make your hotel bookings with JALT’s official travel agent.

Greg Goodmacher, our Program Chair has organized an exciting SIG Forum, “Materials Writers Forum: Writing & Publishing” on Sunday, November 27 from 1:05 PM to 2:35 PM in Room 1208.

An important SIG-related event at the conference is the SIG’s Annual General Meeting (AGM) which will be held on Sunday, November 27 from 11:35 AM to 12:20 PM in Room 1208. Please try to make time to attend this important meeting. It not only gives you a rare opportunity to see/meet other SIG members face-to-face, but it also helps with the planning of SIG activities for the upcoming year.

Speaking of meeting up with SIG members, I would really like to organize a SIG social event sometime during the conference. I’d really appreciate it if a Nagoya-savvy member would contact me (off list) about possible locations for a get-together.

Finally, if you know of events that would be of interest to everyone (including and most importantly, your presentations), please send me an email with the details. I’d be more than happy to share them in these email messages!

2. Links/Articles of Interest

A short article by Fiona Mauchline about choosing topics for textbooks intended for teenagers. It would be great if we could collect similar information from Japanese young people!

An article by Veronika Moiseenko about learner-created materials. She shares five activities which she used with various levels of university students.

I hope that the end of the semester goes smoothly for everyone!

Yours in service,

Adam Murray