Shigeru Eguchi

Short readings each class and casual discussion in Japanese--not stressful at all!

Great Professor. Great class. Eguchi sensei does care about his students and how they learning Japanese, respects various cultural backgrounds and welcomes all different kinds of information and opinion into his classroom. Attendance is the basic requirement, all take-home exams with vocab quiz every session but nothing arduous.

Eguchi Sensei is a great professor. Classes are relaxing and fun. As long as you do the necessary studying for homework, the class is a breeze and yet you learn a lot. The workflow is set up in a very easy to conquer way. You learn a new grammar point along with some vocab for homework. You spend the next 1-2 classes reviewing the grammar + vocab, then you take the quiz. As long as you do the homework and come to class, these daily quizzes are free points. Eguchi Sensei is very easy to approach and responds to emails on the same day or the next day.

Eguchi-sensei is amazing! I absolutely love starting my day with his energy, enthusiasm, and clarity. In a school full of lecturers and professors who seem to not care, the foreign language department has always stood out -- Eguchi-sensei is the epitome of a good language teacher! Not only does he legitimately care about his students, but he legitimately cares about learning. Yes, the pace is rather brisk, but Eguchi-sensei's teaching style (methodical, organized, routine-based) makes it enjoyably so. While he does call on people to answer questions, he doesn't make it intimidating. There are a lot of verbal drills in class where you work in pairs or groups. Eguchi-sensei makes it clear he wants us to develop fluency in the language in all senses of the word. The vocab/grammar quizzes aren't bad. As long as you focus in class, all you're left studying is memorizing the vocab for the next day (10-15 words). The homework is usually a worksheet and, once in awhile, an accompanying blog post, plus verbal exercises. None of it takes too long so long as you've paid attention to the lesson. Overall, if you get the chance, I highly, HIGHLY recommend taking Japanese with Eguchi-sensei! He's amazing for people who (like me) have no prior Japanese/character language experience and he's an endearing teacher with a great personality!

I'm now taking Fourth-Year Japanese with a different teacher, and I am just realizing how much I miss Eguchi-sensei's class and what truly fantastic teacher he was. There is no doubt that taking Japanese at Columbia is a lot of work (those who have survived it can attest). But Eguchi-sensei can make it so much more doable, bearable, pleasant, and even FUN than any other Japanese teacher I've had here. He is so lively and energetic in his teaching, and there is never a lull in his class. Eguchi-sensei makes the class run like butter — he starts and ends the class on the dot, and begins each class by writing on the board our homework and quiz for the next class. He is extremely punctual, very clear about instructions for assignments, and makes sure that everyone needs to know what they need to know in order to do well. He does a better job at explicating the reading assignments than any other teacher I've had. Every day in class he will go through the section of the text we're working on for the day and, sentence by sentence or paragraph by paragraph, discuss the grammatical nuances, highlight vocabulary, and actually EXPLAIN what the passage is saying, which is critical in Japanese since texts can be very difficult to crack, especially when the class moves at the pace that ones at Columbia do. All in all, Eguchi-sensei is the best Japanese teacher I've had at Columbia. Definite…

The other people who have written reviews obviously aren't serious students of Japanese -- and haven't got much of an idea about how lucky people are who take Japanese at Columbia. The Japanese department here is *fantastic* and Eguchi Sensei is a standout teacher even with a such a high level of teaching. Eguchi Sensei is organized, excellent at explaining grammar, and maintains a strict sense of discipline which keeps annoying students on track. He hates people who chew gum -- as do ALL Japanese teachers. I've also done Japanese here with Yamada-Sensei (also fantastic), Nakamura-Sensei (amazing) and Hue-Sensei (NIGHTMARE) and can attest that Eguchi-Sensei is the best Japanese teacher I've ever had. On a side note, if Hue- Sensei ever comes back -- don't be sucked into the mythology that her 'way' is somehow superior. It's not and she's crazy and mean. All of the Japanese teachers are highly proficient at what they do -- but all the other ones are humane and supportive of students' learning process. ESPECIALLY Eguchi-Sensei!

Eguchi-sensei is a brilliant professor and very kind. I had a lot of personal issues this semester and the professor's understanding meant a lot. It allowed me to continue studying the language and stay on pace without falling behind. 1 Columbia University: Arts & Sciences Fall 2022 Course: JPNSUN2201_002_2022_3-SECONDYEARJAPANESEI : SECOND YEAR JPN I (Sec 2)-JPNSUN2201_002_2022_3 - SECOND YEAR JAPANESE I Instructor: Shigeru Eguchi

I learned more vocabulary, grammar, and sentence patterns. I felt that I learned how to speak more fluently and was challenged to express myself in Japanese.

Medium to light. three exams plus a final with oral exam, 5 mins for each person.

Out of curiousity and expecting numerous rave reviews, I looked up eguchi-sensei and was surprised to find his reception more critical than I, and I think most of the students in my class, would have expected. eguchi-sensei is a fantastic teacher: enthusiastic, knowledgable, helpful, witty, easy-going, and popular with students, certainly not someone who emanates any sort of "daggers and negative vibes," poised to fry you on on some humiliating grill unless you're obviously not paying attention or doing the work. I had orie yamada for my first year, and she had a stricter attitude by far, as good as she was. what's important to remember when you're choosing a professor for japanese is, I think, their general attitude during class rather than specifics like workload or organization, which will be pretty much the same (rigorous and virtually perfect, respectively), regardless of what professor you have. suffice to say that if you want to get better at japanese enough not to be afraid to participate, by all means take eguchi's section if you can. I would particularly recommend his class if you're the type to ask a lot of "why" questions about grammar, as I've heard he's a grammar specialist, and he always seems to come up with a pertinent and thorough answer. his "engrish" ain't half bad, either.