Japanese 113/513: Oral Interviews

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Guidelines

You should be able to have a short conversation (about 5 minutes) on various topics, including those listed in Section 1 below. Each interview is conducted individually and solely in Japanese. If you bring artifacts, e.g. pictures of people and places you know, they will be very useful to make the conversation more interesting and easy to carry on.

TOPICS

Family members

You can talk about your family: personality, hobby, favorite things to do, etc.

Foods and Shopping

You can talk about anything that is broadly related to foods and shopping. For example, ask yourself:

What do you eat where, when, with whom, and how? Who cooks your meal? Where do you go for grocery shopping? What kind of food do you like/dislike? What can you cook? What restaurants and bars do you go to, when, where, with whom? Where are they? What kind of places are they? Big, small, quiet, noisy, etc.? Who else goes there (students, kids, families, etc.)?

Where do you go shopping? Big malls or small shops? How often do you go? With whom? Do you like shopping? Did you buy anything special recently? Where? Why is it special?

[By asking these and other similar questions, you should be able to expand the scope of your conversation easily.]

FRAME OF THE INTERVIEW

Opening Conversation

Greetings

Small talk about time, date, days of the week, weather and climate, etc.

Your daily life (e.g., what you have been doing recently)

Main Conversation

Initiate the conversation on the topics, by introducing it and describing it. You should add your opinions and be able to answer the interviewer’s questions. Also ask the interviewer pertinent questions about the topics.

Closing conversation

Short comments on the interview (e.g. easy, difficult, fun, etc.)

Tell the interviewer your plans for the summer and next academic year.

Greetings

Vocabulary, Expressions, Grammatical Patterns

Refer to this list to find ways to express yourself and ask your interviewer questions.

* Everyday greetings
* Numbers (e.g. telephone #, counters for different things, time, price, etc.)
* Likes and dislikes
* Locations and buildings (e.g. names of streets, stores, etc.)
* Existence of things and people
* Describing things and people (cf. I-adjectives and Na-adjectives)
* Nonpast and Past Forms of verbs
* Time (months, weeks, days, time)
* Frequency adverbs
* Expressions for making suggestions
* TE-forms of adjectives, verbs, and the copula
* Comparatives and Superlatives
* Probability / Conjecture Expressions: ~DESHOU/~KAMOSHIREMASEN
* Interrogatives + KA/MO/DEMO
* Describing Abilities
* Nominalizers:
* Potential Forms of Verbs
* Te-Form of Verbs + IMASU
* Relative Clauses
* Describing a Chinge in State: ~NARIMASU
* Expression of Experience: ~KOTOGAARIMASU
* Expressing an Opinion: ~TOOMOIMASU
* Excessiveness: ~SUGIMASU
* Quoting Speech: ~TOIU
* Expressing Desire: ~HOSHII/~HOSHOGARU/~TAI/~TAGARU
* Expression of Intentions: ~TSUMORIDESU
* Te-Form of Verbs + MIRU/SHIMAU/IKU/KURU
* Expressing Simultaneous Actions: ~NAGARA
* Temporal Clause with TOKI

Evaluation Criteria

You will be evaluated on your overall conversational proficiency, including (but not limited to) the ability to use a variety of vocabulary and expressions. It is as important for you to initiate conversational interactions (e.g. by asking questions) as to sustain them (e.g. by answering questions and responding to statements). In other words, you are expected to be an active participant in the conversation. Prepare well enough so that you can take the initiative in the interview, which will make it easier for you to lead the conversation in the direction where there are more topics you can talk about with confidence.

Oral Interview Evaluation form (30 points)

* Preparation (6): Thoroughness of your preparation.

* Communicative Strategy (4): Your ability to initiate, sustain, restore and develop an interactive language use.

* Comprehensibility (4): Your ability to produce clear and comprehensible speech.

* Language Variety (8): Your ability to use a variety of grammatical structures, vocabulary, expressions.

* Fluency (8): Your ability to talk smoothly without excessive hesitations and pauses