Learning Management Systems

 

Bishoku in Japanese Minicourse

Students explore various aspects of contemporary Japanese lifestyle while furthering their language studies in this intermediate Japanese in Context class, called My Bento Journey.

 

This minicourse addresses the convenience culture around bento and washoku, traditional Japanese cuisine. Though cooking is not necessary, it is another medium by which certain students can choose to engage with the language. 

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Features thus include:

• Video lectures or narrated slide show: Overview of different dining options and everyday cooking tradition of washoku. The video or animated slide show would be presented in no more than 2 minute chunks with embedded quiz questions (4-7 min)

• Game-based learning interactive quizzes: 

 

These provided the framework for the form (top level navigation points on form, highlighted and in bold).

 

I attempted to design the form for maximum efficiency on the left column and more details on the right column. As a lot of the key points to consider felt like yes or no questions, they fell to the left column. On the right side, I placed grayer zone considerations and areas for explanations and opinions. I am still on a learning curve when it comes to copyright and permissions, so I felt the spaces would also enable me to take notes on licenses while I learned. Overall, it's been a great exercise in familiarizing oneself with key points to review and a good communication tool to work with team members and come to an shared understanding.

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Checklist template

Open Educational Resource:  Primary Source – Elizabeth Andoh on TEDx Talks

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wPVViKV3aG8

 

My course is not academic but about lifestyle changes to one's diet. Categorically adult education and lifelong learning, academic OER sources didn't work. Instead, I sought the author of an authoritative coffee table cookbook I own, Washoku, Elizabeth Andoh. She had a good web presence, which included a TEDx Talk, her own website, and Craftsy courses. This first entry helped me design my form and provided the space to define CC attribution: BY-NC-ND 4.0 International.

Washoku, published 19 years ago, ensures there's proper fact checking and author authenticity. She trained at the Yanagihara School of Classical Japanese Cuisine and won an IACP Award. With that level of credibility and the polish of the TEDx Talks, stage, this find can be considered high quality in production and content. Her talk presented a personal account of her first encounter with washoku and a brief slice of the five principles of Washoku. It was refreshingly engaging. This American perspective on Japanese food philosophy clearly spelled out simple ideas, accessible to a broad audience, and relatable. Text-based formats existed as a running transcript that followed her conversation as well as closed captions for greater accessibility.