Welcome to the Meiji Language Program's Summer Intensive English Seminar (hereafter cleverly known as SIES)! This seminar is, as you certainly already know, a skills course designed with the specific focus of helping students improve their skill in oral communication.
The seminar will take place from September 5th through the 15th at the Izumi campus of Meiji University.
The morning activities will focus on the movie Back to the Future, a 1985 comedy starring Michael J. Fox and Christopher Lloyd.
Here is the original 1985 trailer as well as the the movie script.
In the movie we quite often hear "The Power of Love" by Huey Lewis and the News. This is the official video—enjoy!
We will encounter zoot suits in the movie, and you should
be wondering what exactly those are. The picture to the right shows a nattily-clad gentleman
wearing one, which you can see includes very baggy pants that taper at the ankle, a long
suit jacket, and a hat.
Courtesy of the Smithsonian, here we have
a
brief history of the zoot suit. That history extended as well to social unrest in
the US with a series of incidents
called the "Zoot Suit Riots" in Los Angeles in 1943.
In class we will be using the following worksheets:
- ✔ Chapter 1: Late for School / pdf / script
- ✔ Chapter 2: Doc's Experiment / pdf / script
- ✔ Chapter 3: Hill Valley, 1955 / pdf / script
- ✔ Chapter 4: Lorraine / pdf / script
- ✔ Chapter 5: High School / pdf / script
- ✔ Chapter 6: Skateboard / pdf / script
- ✔ Chapter 7: The Big Dance / pdf / script
- ✔ Chapter 8: Farewell / pdf / script
- ✔ Chapters 9: 10:04 p.m. /
pdf /
script
- ✔ Chapters 10: I'm Home / pdf / script
Sept 9: For my dandy Advanced A students, here are some PowerPoint files for your consideration.
As I mentioned in class on Friday, please look at the layout, the font, the use of animation, and
anything else you happen to notice. In addition, please note that not everything you'll see is good ...
- ✔ The Humble Crescent Wrench
- ✔ American Islands
- ✔ The Nuts and Bolts of WUT
- ✔ To Juku or Not To Juku
- ✔ Sarawak (This is a heavy file that will take quite a while to download, but it's worth your time.)
One of the stars of the movie is the car itself, which was (and is) a DeLorean (the
schematic of which is to the right). The history of John DeLorean and his company
is an interesting tale of how to not to succeed in business, and it's also a
valuable history lesson. Here I've included a couple YouTube clips entitled
Great Blunders in History: The DeLorean Story
and
Car Crash, the DeLorean Story.
If you enjoy reading, here is a lengthy piece by Aaron Severson about the demise of the DeLorean Motor Company.
OK, enough drudgery about failed companies—here we have a list of 10 gadgets from Back to the Future 2 that have come to be (well, mostly).
Just for (more) fun, here is a clip of Marty, Doc, and Lorraine 30 years later
Just in case you're wondering, here are the morning classes, levels, and the respective (respected?) teachers:
- ✔ Advanced A—Jim
- ✔ Advanced B—Robert
- ✔ Intermediate A—Merwyn
- ✔ Intermediate B—Don
- ✔ Intermediate C—Nico
- ✔ Intermediate D—Joel
- ✔ Beginner A—Jerome
- ✔ Beginner B—Joe
- ✔ Beginner C—Steve
In the afternoon students will be enjoying the various options we offer, which will include the following in this iteration of SIES:
- ✔ Don—Newspapers
- ✔ Merwyn—Drama
- ✔ Robert—WeTube
- ✔ Nico—Discussion(s) on Culture
- ✔ Jerome—Discussion & Debate
- ✔ Joe—Creative Expression
- ✔ Steve—American Pop Culture
- ✔ Joel—Board Games
From Seminars Past
March 2017: The webpage for the March 2017 SIES in which we used Sherlock Holmes.
September, 2016: The webpage for the September 2016 SIES in which we used School of Rock.
March 2016: The webpage for the March 2016 SIES in which we used About A Boy.
September, 2015: The mighty webpage for the September 2015 SIES in which we used Stand By Me.