2016 Fiscal Year Research-status Report
Creating a Corpus-informed Online University Medical English Course
| Project/Area Number |
16K02923
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| Research Institution | Hiroshima University |
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Principal Investigator |
Fraser Simon 広島大学, 外国語教育研究センター, 教授 (10403510)
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| Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha) |
達川 奎三 広島大学, 外国語教育研究センター, 教授 (00290528)
榎田 一路 広島大学, 外国語教育研究センター, 准教授 (20268668)
Davies Walter 広島大学, 外国語教育研究センター, 准教授 (30448261)
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| Project Period (FY) |
2016-04-01 – 2019-03-31
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| Keywords | medical English / online materials / corpus analysis / anatomy / word lists / e-learning |
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| Outline of Annual Research Achievements |
The aim of this research is to create an online English course for students of medicine and other medically-related fields which builds upon the success of our existing corpus-informed course for third-year students.
In the first year of the project, we carried out the initial planning for the creation of the materials, and considered how to determine the content, the type of tasks to be used, and the selection of a suitable web-based platform to deliver the materials. The decision was made to target second-year students, with a focus on anatomy, supported primarily by aspects of physiology. Trial units of several units of material have been completed.
In the past year, we have presented our findings both domestically and internationally. We have published an article outlining our basic plan for building an online course for second-year medical students, which parallels their medical studies in Japanese and dovetails with our existing course for third-year students.
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| Current Status of Research Progress |
Current Status of Research Progress
2: Research has progressed on the whole more than it was originally planned.
Reason
By coordinating closely with anatomy professors in the medical faculty, we have been able to determine the most appropriate topics for the online materials, adopting a holistic approach which incorporates both gross anatomy and microscopic anatomy within topics organized around body systems. Sample materials have been developed, and these are now being trialed in the classroom prior to being converted to digital format.
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| Strategy for Future Research Activity |
With feedback from medical experts and classroom trials, materials will be adapted, refined, and put online using the ‘Blackboard Learn’ learning management system. Texts will be structured so that they can easily be accessed on a range of digital devices, and a variety of tasks will be developed for each key paragraph of material. We plan also to continue to work on the compilation of a core medical word list. This list, which will be informed by corpus analysis of relevant medical texts, will be a synthesis of the most salient medical terms from both this and our previous project.
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| Causes of Carryover |
The first year of the project involved a great deal of planning, and we did not have as many opportunities to present our research as we had anticipated. However, the budget to be carried over means that it will be possible for more members of the research team to present at important international conferences in the next fiscal year.
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| Expenditure Plan for Carryover Budget |
Simon Fraser, Walter Davies, and Kazumichi Enokida are all presenting at the CAES Conference in Hong Kong in June, and at the JASMEE conference in Nagoya in July. We are all also planning to attend the the BAAL Annual Conference in the UK in September. In addition, budget is required for reference materials and the purchase of Shutterstock images for the development of our online materials.
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