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Designing a Culture-Based English Unit for Japanese Junior High Students
Designing a Culture-Based English Unit for Japanese Junior High Students
Helping students move from personal opinions to objective cultural explanations
Context
This instructional unit was designed for Japanese junior high school students studying English as a required subject in Chuo Ward, Tokyo. This eight-class-period unit met twice per week and culminated in a cultural presentation intended for a non-Japanese audience.
Project Overview
Learners: Third-year Japanese public junior high school students in Tokyo
Performance Task: Students explain a Japanese cultural practice to a non-Japanese audience through a written explanation, visual poster, and oral presentation.
Duration: Eight 50-minute class periods
Instructional Modules: 5
Instructional Assets: 200+ module slides, student worksheets and presentation materials
Unified Canvas Architecture: Both slides and worksheets are designed on a unified horizontal B4 canvas, ensuring seamless visual continuity between live digital presentations and direct-to-print student materials.
Delivery: Teacher-led classroom instruction
Typography: UD Digi Kyokasho（UDデジタル教科書体）is used for learner-facing English. For instructional text and interface elements, Yu Mincho (游明朝) and Adobe Garamond are paired to deliver a unified bilingual hierarchy: Yu Mincho for Japanese elements and Adobe Garamond for English. The serif typography supports the unit's formal and cultural context.
Tools: Microsoft PowerPoint, Figma, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Photoshop, Google Workspace
Unit Introduction: The opening slide introduces the cultural explanation task and establishes how visual elements can guide attention and support understanding.
Instructional Challenge
Instructional Challenge
Students could produce basic personal statements in English, but often relied on first-person constructions such as “I think…” and “I like…” when explaining cultural topics.
This became a limitation when students were asked to explain objects and practices such as kotatsu or karuta to a non-Japanese audience. They needed to shift their attention from personal experience toward the subject being explained, but lacked the language structure and conceptual framework to make that shift.
The instructional challenge was not simply teaching the passive voice. It was helping students understand when and why English uses the passive voice to present information objectively, and then apply that structure within a meaningful cultural explanation.
Design Approach
Design Approach
The unit was developed using Backward Design (Understanding by Design). The final performance task, a cultural presentation for a non-Japanese audience, was defined first, and the instructional sequence was designed backward from the language, content, and communication skills required to complete it.
Rather than teaching the passive voice as an isolated grammatical form, the unit connected:
grammatical form
communicative purpose
cultural explanation
expository writing
visual presentation
oral communication
The design emphasized meaningful use of language within a communicative task while still providing explicit support for grammatical accuracy.
Learning Architecture
The learning sequence moves from understanding the language and concept to applying them in a complete cultural explanation.
Cultural Topic Selection
↓
Model Sentences & Passive Voice
↓
Guided Expository Writing
↓
Visual Poster Design
↓
Oral Presentation
Written explanation is positioned before visual and oral presentation. Students first develop the content and language needed to explain their topic before transforming that explanation into a visual and spoken form.
Key Design Decisions
Passive Voice for Objective Explanation
Target Structure:
English passive voice (be + past participle)
Communicative Function:
Objective description and explanation in expository contexts
A key design decision was to present the English passive voice as a tool for directing attention toward the subject being explained rather than the speaker.
Japanese passive constructions include a distinctive use for expressing situations in which someone is negatively affected or inconvenienced by another person's action. The unit contrasted this use with neutral English applications found in contexts such as museum descriptions, guidebooks, and encyclopedic writing.
Cultural objects and practices, including sushi and kotatsu, became the subjects of the grammatical practice. This allowed students to move from personal statements toward objective explanations while learning the passive voice within a meaningful communicative context.
From Personal Statements to Objective Description: The examples shift the focus from the speaker to the subject being explained, giving students a concrete model for using the passive voice in cultural explanations.
Building Sentence-Level Support: The structured examples give students a repeatable pattern for forming passive sentences before they are asked to use the structure in their own cultural explanations.
From Sentence Practice to Connected Writing: Passive constructions are combined into a model paragraph, showing students how individual sentences can be developed into a connected cultural explanation.
Structuring Expository Writing
The writing task was divided into clear sections so students could focus on developing the content of their cultural explanation without having to organize the entire essay at once.
The framework provided structural support for the introduction, historical background, rules or characteristics, and modern relevance of the selected topic. Grammar cues were embedded within the worksheet so students could apply the passive voice while developing their ideas.
Writing Scaffold: The worksheet breaks the cultural explanation into defined sections, giving students a clear starting point and a structure for developing the full essay. Embedded grammar cues support use of the passive voice while students develop their content.
From Written Explanation to Visual Presentation
Students transformed their written cultural explanations into visual posters before presenting them to the class.
Visual elements were used to direct attention and reinforce the meaning of the written content. Students were also taught to consider layout, color, imagery, and visual hierarchy when designing their own posters. The goal was to help them make deliberate choices about how a viewer would read and understand their cultural explanation.
The poster provided a visual reference during the presentation, allowing students to focus on explaining their topic rather than memorizing a complete script.
*Student Sample, Visual Communication: This student used layout, color, imagery, and visual hierarchy to organize cultural information for an audience. The poster shows how visual design was incorporated into the communication task rather than used simply as decoration.
Learning Goals
By the end of the unit, students were able to:
explain a Japanese cultural practice using English passive constructions;
write a structured, multi-paragraph cultural explanation for a non-Japanese audience;
transform written explanations into a visual poster that supported comprehension;
present cultural information orally using visual support.
Assessment Strategy
Assessment was embedded throughout the learning process rather than concentrated in a single final task.
Written Development
Students received formative feedback while developing their cultural explanations. This allowed grammatical and organizational problems to be addressed before the final presentation.
Final Performance
The completed poster and oral presentation served as the summative assessment. During the presentation, students were also asked questions about their selected topic and were evaluated on their ability to respond.
Students were informed in advance that their responses would be part of the assessment. This encouraged them to understand and communicate their subject rather than relying entirely on memorized text.
Assessment Criteria
The assessment considered both linguistic accuracy and communicative effectiveness. Students were evaluated on their use of the target passive constructions, organization of information, clarity of cultural explanation, and effectiveness of the final presentation.
Outcomes
Students demonstrated a shift from personal statements toward more objective cultural explanations.
During peer review, students began identifying when sentences sounded overly personal and revising them toward a more objective style. This showed that the distinction between personal experience and objective explanation had become part of how students evaluated their own writing.
The poster also provided useful support during the final presentations. Students were able to use the visual material as a reference while explaining their topics rather than relying entirely on memorized text.
Student Performance Samples
*Cultural Explanation: Japanese Sweets Student Sample
This student applies the passive voice repeatedly within a complete cultural explanation, demonstrating transfer from guided sentence-level practice to connected expository writing.
*Cultural Explanation: Ukiyo-e Student Sample
This student uses passive constructions to describe the artwork and its historical context, applying the target structure to present information in an objective explanatory style.
*Student work shown with permission and identifying information removed.
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