About This Site
This site has been constructed to meet assessment criteria for the course Internet Based Language Instruction (IBLI) LIN8016 as part of my Masters Degree in Applied Linguistics at the University of Southern Queensland (USQ), Australia. The pre-requisite to this course is Computer Assisted Language Learning (CALL) LIN8006.
Site Contents:
- Browse the tabs above for:
A brief self introduction.- My Teaching Philosophy.
- My educational background.
- Visit Writings for:
- My Research interests.
- A research review on synchronous relay chat.
- A brief reflective journal.
- An internet based language instruction lesson.
- A collection of web based language learning tasks.
- A collection of web resources for teachers' professional development.
About me:
Hi, my name is Roger Underwood and by nationality I am South African. I was born and grew up in the city of Welkom 
in the Goldfields area now known as Lejweleputswa in the Freestate province. I completed my tertiary education at the University of Cape Town and later spent a couple of years in London where I gained my first teaching qualifications and entered the ESL profession. I have spent most of the past 10 years teaching English in Japan in the Kansai Region and am now a permanent resident of Japan. My students are predominately working adults or tertiary level students. I have spent the last three years teaching employees at various Japanese companies and as such can be termed a dispatch teacher. I have also done some teaching in Thailand and at present I am living in the city of Kobe.
My Teaching Philosophy
My basic teaching philosophy is to create practical, communicative lessons where students can enjoy learning language in ways that have a direct relationship to how the language is used in its social context. I try to use a task-based approach where appropriate in order to give my students as much creative scope as possible. I also consider it important to maintain an environment where students can learn and experience the value of taking the initiative to construct their own learning experience with the help and guidance of the teacher. Apart from that, I aim to clearly understand my students' needs, the goals of the course I am teaching and always hope to develop in my students the motivation and enthusiasm to become independent and life long language learners.
My Education:
Name: Roger Charles UnderwoodBorn: July 02, 1970
Place: Welkom, South Africa
| 2007 - 2009 | Master of Applied Linguistics *expected graduation April 2008* This was a non dissertation Masters and courses taken were:
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|---|---|
| 1996 | Trinity Certificate in TESOL Oxford House College, London. |
| 1989 - 1992 | Bachelor of Arts (English) University of Cape Town (UCT), South Africa. Department of English |
| 1988 | High School Graduation Welkom High School, South Africa. |
Professional Association:
Japan Association of Language Teachers
I belong to the Kobe Chapter and participate in the special interest groups (Sigs) of :