Where 十五？

 Hi fellow linguists,

The other day (この間) in one of my beginner classes, I wrote the following on the whiteboard: "Where 十五？" At first, the students looked at my mixture of English and Japanese and didn't know what to make of it (それをどう考えたら良いか分からなかった). However, after reading it aloud (それを音読したら) at native speed and then very slowly, everyone could understand that "Where 十五？" was actually "Where did you go?" 

Native speakers often use contractions (短縮形) in their conversations. An example in Japanese is「そりゃ」for「それは」. Some common English examples are "gonna" (going to) and "wanna" (want a / want to). "Where 十五？" is a little different because there is no way to write it out exactly (正確に) as it sounds. "Where'd you go?" (contracting "where" and "did") is probably the closest, but it is still not perfect.

This is a rare case in which Japanese fluency can help one's English. Because by reading the kanji for "fifteen" after the English word "Where," my students were able to sound just like native speakers from the U.S.A. And by practicing it over and over, they were also able to understand the question even when I asked it at "native speed." In no time (すぐに), not only had my students improved their communication skills, but they had also had a little fun in class while doing it.

Time to 五,

Alan