June 2026 archive

Jun 29

EL本棚紹介(103) Say WhAt? The Weird and Mysterious Journey of the English Language, by Gena K. Gorrell

[Welcome to the EL Book Introductions series. These posts are all short (<180 words) introductions/reviews of books in the EL library. They focus on telling you what we think will be interesting for you, a college student and English learner, so use them to help you find the right book for you. You can also use the tags to find books about topics you might be interested in.] _______ This book has a very boring cover, but we have a saying in English: “Don’t judge a book by its cover.” Say WhAt is a very easy to approach book about the history of the English language. It contains many pictures, …

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Jun 29

EL本棚紹介(102) Scholastic Children’s Thesaurus

[Welcome to the EL Book Introductions series. These posts are all short (<180 words) introductions/reviews of books in the EL library. They focus on telling you what we think will be interesting for you, a college student and English learner, so use them to help you find the right book for you. You can also use the tags to find books about topics you might be interested in.] _______ I do not like recommending “children’s books” on this blog, because most of you are in college. However, Scholastic’s Children’s Thesaurus is a really useful book for learning difficult vocabulary. A thesaurus (類語辞典) contains words like a dictionary; however, it organizes …

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Jun 01

EL本棚紹介(101) The Nocturnals: The Mysterious Abductions, by Tracey Hecht

[Welcome to the EL Book Introductions series. These posts are all short (<180 words) introductions/reviews of books in the EL library. They focus on telling you what we think will be interesting for you, a college student and English learner, so use them to help you find the right book for you. You can also use the tags to find books about topics you might be interested in.] _______ When you think of stories about animals, what do you think of? Dogs and cats? Maybe birds, or even tanuki? Well, The Nocturnals is a very different book. The main characters are all animals, but interesting animals you may not have …

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Jun 01

EL Game Series (09): “Visual Eyes”

[Welcome to the EL game series. These posts are all short introductions to games you can play in the EL. Because learning to play games in English can take a long time, some posts will explain how to play simple versions of games. Other posts tell you why you should use games to practice English. You can also use the tags to find other posts you might be interested in.] （ELゲーム連載へようこそ。このコラムはELで遊べるボードゲームやカードゲームを紹介します。本来のやり方通りにやってしまうと、遊ぶまでの時間が大変かかるかもしれないので、ある投稿では簡単な遊びの工夫が紹介されます。ほかの投稿ではなぜゲームで英語を勉強するのがよいかが説明されます。投稿のタグを使ってほかに興味ありそうなポストを見つけられます。） _______ This game is all about being creative with English. The box is full of dice with strange pictures on each side. It’s your job to use the pictures to make words. The basics: Roll all of the dice …

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