A STUDY OF ORAL COMMUNICATION SKILLS, TASK DIFFICULTIES AND STUDENTS’ SATISFACTION

To speak English as a foreign language, it is necessary to know a certain amount of grammar which includes vocabulary and pronunciation (Bygate, 1987; Ur, 1996; Harmer, 2001). Form-focused practice, however, limits students’ choices of variation to talk. In addition, paying attention to accuracy sometimes discourages students from using the target language. As many of the Japanese students have anxiety about communicating orally in English, it is important to gain their confidence through speaking tasks. Having successful experiences can make students gain confidence (Locke, 1996), but the difficulty of achieving goals can also encourage students even though they fail to attain challenging goals (Mikami, 2017). To have a clear view of an appropriately difficult task level is a problem for language teachers. This study aims to examine both appropriate levels for English speaking tasks and students’ satisfaction in a regular 4-skill English course where only written exams were carried out. In order to reduce students’ unwillingness to communicate in English, goal-relevant speaking tasks were used as a pair work activity for freshmen in each class over a 15-week term in a Japanese university. Students in the test-group used slightly more difficult materials than the control-group. The students in the test group also invariably had different partners, whereas the ones in the control group usually had the same partners. To quantitatively investigate students’ improvement of speaking skills, the number of words they uttered within speeches about a predefined topic was counted. Also, satisfaction surveys were conducted to measure the qualitative data.  In conclusion, students in the test group found the tasks more difficult, but they produced richer speech and they were also more satisfied with the course. More importantly, the percentage of the students who gained more confidence in using English was higher in the test-group than the control-group

Oral health and general health at the early stage of ageing: A review of contemporary studies

SummaryIn 2012, persons over age 65 reached 24.1% of Japan's population, and this population will continue to grow. The relationship between oral health and general health has been examined in many studies, geriatric dentistry in particular. An increasing need for long-term care for older adults is expected with the ageing of Japan's population. This will result in escalating costs for these services; thus, we are now prompted to identify predictors for eligibility for long-term care funding. Recent studies have revealed that many factors of oral health are associated with general health conditions. Of these, we focused on factors responsible for a decline in functional capacity that could facilitate long-term care certification. In the present review, we examine the relationships between oral conditions and general conditions, i.e. nutrition, physical performance, functional capacity, the need for long-term care, and longevity. Associations between oral and general condition have been established in many cross-sectional studies, and a number of longitudinal studies have shown associations between the need for long-term care, longevity, and some oral health factors including dentition status and masticatory ability. Further studies are required to show influence of oral health at the early stage of ageing on subsequent healthy life expectancy

Salivary Levels of Hemoglobin for Screening Periodontal Disease: A Systematic Review

Periodontal disease is a common inflammatory disease. It affects about 20–50% of global population in both developed and developing countries. Early detection of slight changes of periodontal tissue plays an important role in prevention of onset and progression of periodontal disease. Hence, there is a need of a screening test to assess periodontal tissue for health check-ups. Salivary levels hemoglobin (Hb) has been proposed to assess the conditions of the inflammation of gingiva. The aim of this systematic review was to evaluate and summarize critically the current evidences for Hb as periodontal screening test. We performed a literature search of report published using PubMed databases. A total of 55 articles were retrieved and 16 were selected. Our review focuses on corelation coefficient with periodontal clinical parameters or sensitivity and specificity. As a result, fourteen studies calculated sensitivity and specificity of Hb. Six studies measured salivary levels hemoglobin at laboratory: three studies used polyclonal antibody reactions and other studies used colorimetric tests. Eight studies used paper strip method: 4 studies used monoclonal antibody reaction and 4 studies used colorimetric tests. Youden’s indexes by antibody reaction were better than those of colorimetric methods. Evidences are described above and further studies are necessary to set the cut off values stratified by gender, age and number of remaining teeth

Health System for Dengue Control : Early Case Detection and Focal Control

"Aedes aegypti and dengue virus infection continue to spread in the tropical and subtropical world. Since there is no effective dengue vaccine, mosquito control and dengue patient treatment are the most important and practical way for dengue control. Many attempts have been made to control Aedes aegypti (adultcidal and larvicidal) to prevent dengue epidemic by large vertically-organized teams of workers. However, most of these methods have not been successful in the aspect of continuation of the effective dengue control. By reviewing several dengue control activities, one possible approach for Dengue Fever (DF)Dengue Hemorrhagic Fever (DHF) control is presented: 1) development of early case detection by using simple IgM detection methods at the level of health centers, 2) quick fogging of the house and the area of detected case, and 3) development of active community participation in the above activities

P4‐426: Waist Circumference And Domain‐Specific Cognitive Function Among The Non‐Demented Japanese Elderly: Results From The Takashima Study

Peer Reviewedhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/152729/1/alzjjalz2019064098.pd

レプトスピラの抗原変異と宿主の殺菌作用に対する感受性の変化

Variant strains, induced by co-cultivation of Leptospira interrogans serovar copenhageni strain Shibaura with its homologous antiserum in a liquid medium, showed reduced agglutinability to the antiserum in comparison with that of the original parent Shibaura strain. The reduction was inversely correlated to the concentration of the antiserum in the medium. Furthermore, these variants showed reduced agglutinability to anti-leptospiral lipopolysaccharide (LPS) serum and antileptospiral LPS monoclonal antibodies. The variants became resistant to complement-mediated and macrophage-mediated bactericidal effects in the presence of antibody to the LPS. The level of resistance was related to the degree of the reduced agglutinability. The clearance time of these variants from the blood of the mice was observed to be longer than that of the parent Shibaura strain when these bacteria were inoculated into the mice immunized with heatinactivated parent Shibaura strain. It was concluded, therefore, that these variants acquired the ability to survive for a longer period in vivo than that of the parent organism. These results suggest that variation of Leptospires, which has been considered as a temporary modification of LPS, is one of the ways it escapes from the host defense mechanisms