Paul Kei Matsuda
http://matsuda.jslw.org/

Consulting

In addition to his work as a teacher and researcher, Paul has been working actively as a consultant for various colleges and universities as well as literacy centers both in the United States and abroad as they develop or revise language support programs of various kinds.

He has presented public lectures and workshops on first- and second-language writing theory, research and instruction at various colleges and universities both within and outside the United States. He has also presented keynote and plenary addresses at a wide range of local, national and international conferences.

The focus of Paul's consulting may include (but are not limited to) the following areas:

For more information, please see Paul's curriculum vitae.

Workshop Participants' Comments

Here are some of the comments from participants in recent talks and workshops:

"When teaching, I feel like I'm pressured to find any time saver I can in order to stay on top of coursework, lesson planning, grading, among other things, but I am always worried that my time savers will be detrimental to my students, especially second language users who enter my classroom with a different set of experiences and obstacles to learning. Paul Matsuda's lecture was incredibly comforting and useful to me at a very practical level. He outlined ways of thinking about the unique problems facing second language writers that avoid negative stereotyping, and he provided concrete ways to teach and accommodate them in the classroom. With this knowledge and knowledge of resources where I can learn more, I feel better prepared to teach my students."

“Professor Matsuda opened my thinking to a broader appreciation for the cultural plurality we meet in the English writing curriculum. This has allowed me to read papers from a much better, informed perspective, finding common ground with students that might have before frustrated me. He was clear, concise and helpful.”

“Matsuda's inquiry into our daily practice in the college writing classroom opened up a dialogue that ranged from broader pedagogical issues to specifics about the kinds of writing assignments we give and how we evaluate these assignments. In the discussion that followed his talk ‘Multilingual Writers in the Writing Classroom’ faculty asked questions and offered scenarios from the classroom that spoke to the complexities of multilingual writers.  I also appreciate the follow-up meetings/discussion among our writing faculty, as we continue to address the questions raised at the symposium.”

“As a non-native speaker of English and as a neophyte in teaching composition to ESL students, I found Prof. Matsuda's talk equally stimulating and reassuring. Not only it provoked profound contemplation on the mechanics of second language literacy and performance, but it also reiterated the academic and educational principles by which we were trained in the department.”

“As a teacher of writing currently working with a population of students that includes a significant percentage of multilingual writers I found the lecture by Paul Matsuda both timely and thought provoking.... This has led to some very rich and interesting discussion with students.  The lecture has also made me consider, and reconsider, and reconsider again the questions regarding assessment of writing with both native and multilingual students. This was a very interesting talk and one with immediate practical implications in my classroom.”

“I attended Dr. Matsuda's small group talk/workshop and the public lecture and found both stimulating and informative.  I learned much that I hope to bring to my teaching practice to benefit international students, but I was especially struck by Matsuda's ‘Parallel Continua of Student Characteristics’ where he offered a method to profile of a single student. This continua, which identified characteristics such as a student's content knowledge in L1 and L2, L2 metalinguistic knowledge, heritage and target culture knowledge, and instrumental and integrative motivation, will help me much more sensitive to a student's identity position.”

“I attended Paul Matsuda's ‘Writing program talk/Workshop’ and his ‘Public Lecture.’ Combined they reinforced my confidence in the classroom strategies I have come to use in my College Writing ESL classes while also providing me with greater understanding of the challenges ESL students face. His interactive activity ... was telling and remains memorable. When I am working with ESL students, I use the experience to remind myself of the difficulties my ESL students face as they tackle numerous challenging reading and writing assignments."

“It was invaluable for NEU writing center tutors, who encounter a number of ESOL students everyday. Professor Matsuda's workshop and lectures taught us useful techniques for working with ESOL students, but, on a personal level, he also urged us to approach our tutoring of ESOL students with sensitivity and awareness of the difficulty of learning fluency in another language.”

“Over half of the students that 826 Boston works with come from households where a language other than English is spoken. As a result, 826 Boston's staff and volunteers regularly face the challenges of working with struggling writers who are writing in their second, or sometimes even third or fourth language. That can be a daunting task for any educator, let alone a volunteer writing tutor. Paul's training equipped us all with practical strategies to work effectively with this student population. We're incredibly grateful for the opportunity to learn from Paul. We are already putting his strategies into use at Boston International High School, which has an incredible student population hailing from countries around the world.”

Updated on November 2, 2011