Our catch phrase is on its way.

Dear Fellow Earthlings,

Some 25 years ago I came out with a book called “Summit English for Beginners” (See Installment 170.). The book was written to address the need for teaching English to Japanese children. It took me only about five years to realize that the book was so good that it was equivalent to a sharp knife that was capable of slashing the native allophonomes of Japanese children to pieces. The techniques and pictures used in the book were such that children who used it for at least a year or two actually began to favor speaking English over their own native language!

I WAS NOT GOING TO BE A PARTY TO THIS!! MORE HAS BEEN (AND WILL BE) WRITTEN IN OTHER BLOGS ABOUT MY OPINIONS REGARDING EARLY IMPOSITION OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE TRAINING TO JAPANESE CHILDREN!

Now, however, I am engaged in a battle on a different front – that of saving the Seneca language. The little chilren I met in Salamanca, New York this past November are – to put in bluntly – native speakers of American English. They are Seneca by birth and Seneca in feeling. However, their native language is definitely English!

By rewriting “Summit English for Beginners (SEB) in Seneca and using the resulting text “Seneca Language for Beginners” (SLB) as the primary teaching tool for the Seneca 4- and 5- year olds I met this past November, I will be providing a frontline, highly efficient means for those children to salvage the Seneca language, albeit as a secondary allophonome – since their primary allophonome is English.

Steve Walker, Earthsaver and Jingles Creator

© 2013 Steve Walker, The Jingles-The Japan Foundation for English Pronunciation, Summit Enterprises.