THIS IS A PEN

It's always interesting to teach in Japan because even the little things are quite a bit different. A long while back I was telling my 1st grade kids that, "This is a pen." . Shortly after I recieved numerous confused looks. I wondered why until my teacher told me that I say "a" differently to how the kids are taught. Seems to be that in Japan students are taught "a" (あ) with the use of the "ah" sound. But the "a" sound I was using was the "e" (え) sound. Just thought it was interesting as I was reviewing the 1st graders lessons. Well this time around I will tell them that there are two ways to say "a".

So I was discussing the "a" with one of my teachers and mentioned complete sentences, including particles. Then the teacher pointed out that in spoken Japanese language they don't need to include the particle but written wise they do. So sometimes it seems to be that skipping of particles has overflown into English study when the students come up with a sentence such as, "This pen" rather than "This is a pen". Interesting to anlyze how these mistakes come to be and how to correct them. This would probably go to my Master's degree thesis section.