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1. What prompted you decide to participate in the "JSPS Science Dialogue" program?
I strongly believe that the JSPS Science Dialogue Program is a golden opportunity for a foreign scientist like me to share with the little ones some aspects of my research outcomes. Apart from experiencing teaching in a different context, I also think it is the occasion of a life time to be face and to interact with high school students especially in a social context like this one where such opportunity are extremely rare.
2. To what did you give greatest attention in preparing and giving the lecture?
Frankly speaking, I knew right from the start that this wasn't going to be a "child's gane". I had to face two big chakkenges including: The topic and the language. But I also understood that these two are chakkenges that can be turned to opportunities. Therefore I mostly concerntrated my attention on choosing an exciting topic that dose not required a sophisticated glossary.
3. Did you find it difficult to give a lecture in English to Japanese students? Could you give some advice to future lecturers on how to facilitate communication with Japanese students?
Actually, this wasn't my first experience so I already knew the kind of problems I was going to face. As a matter of fact, language wasn't really an issue for me since I used less long sentences and many visual aids. I would even confess that the Yamanashi lecture was a success story of all the lectures I have given so far in Japanese academic institutions. My advice to further lectures is quite simple: Choose an exciting topic where students can even contribute by asking question, use many visual aids, and refrain from distributing handouts as this may prevent students from following your lecture.
4. Could you give your impression with regard to participating in this program?
My participation to this program represents for me a wonderful opportunity not only in term of capacity building, but it also represent another opportunity to understanding the complex Japanese culture and social life. What I would modestly recommend is that JSPS should give foreign researchers more that one of such opportunity.
5. Was it meaningful in terms of your fellowship activities?
Although Science Dialogue has no immediate impact on my research activities, I am very happy to bring mathematics into a public discussion. It is useful for the field of mathematics as a whole if students are given many opportunities to learn about what mathematical research is, and how interesting it can be.
6. Was it meaningful in terms of your fellowship activities?
I personally consider the JSPS Science Dialogue as an integral part of the capacity building activities, which I believe is also very important for the fellowship program.
7. In what ways do you think the students benefited from the program?
The title of my lecture was as follow:"The Environmental and Human's Health Impact of Waste Invasion in Mega-cities". This topic was quite an exciting one for everyone including the teachers who participated to the lecture. Exciting because everyone is a waste producer and Japan is presently one the countries toping the list of waste producers in the world. My lecture efficiently trained the students how to systematically apply the 3 "R" namely: Reducing waste, Reusing waste, and Recycling waste. So my lecture was a small capacity building for environmental management in its own.
8. Could you give some overall advice or comments to future participants in the program?
To all JSPS fellows, I would strongly advise not to miss such an opportunity as it is not only challenging but also exciting and amazing. To future participants to the program, I would modestly recommend they chose not a highly sophisticated topic for their but the one that may even be familial to the day-to-day life of the students. They should also use more visual and audio materials to foster the student's attention during the lecture and to counter the language problem. It may also be a good idea not to distribute as students may only be busy trying to reading them.
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