4. Make up a dialogue discussing what you have done this week to develop your character.

Student A (resourceful, curious and cultured, deals with currencies which are meaningful) listens to student B (rebellious, taciturn and passive) giving him some positive reinforcement.

5. Match two columns:

1. reach full potential	a. to manage, handle; to deal with
2. have ambitions	b. to take something on, to take charge of
3. personal responsibility	c. to effect thoughts, to impress
4. model/modeling	d. inclined to do something
5. option	e. best outcome
6. incentives	f. coerce or blind
7. cope with	g. choices, alternatives
8. compromise	h. to set an example
9. vigilant	i. temperament, personality, spirit
10. imaginative	j. to work out an agreement/ concession
11. influence	k. to keep an eye on something
12. consistently	l. to reach for one’s desires
13. disposition	m. inducements, enticements, lures
14. obligate/ obligation	n. regularly
15. prone to	o. creative, inventive

6. Read the extract from the article about young people in Japan. Find the answers to these questions: Who are the shinjinrui? What are their attitudes?

Japan is a country in turmoil: traditional values, attitudes and culture are being challenged by the nation’s youth. Japan’s old guard is under siege. As well as external international pressure to become a more open society, Tokyo’s elders face a new and a more serious threat to traditional Japanese values – the shinjinrui. Translated literally, shinjinrui means “new people”: the first generation of Japanese teenagers to challenge authority, to do their own thing, to be young, rebellious and free. These new people grew up in a time of incredible national affluence during the 1980s. When the bubble officially burst in 1991, many young people actually benefited by increased leisure time and the possibility of exploring alternative lifestyles.

Micki Ebara, a young journalist working as a European correspondent, has noticed a fundamental difference in attitudes between her peers and their parents. “My generation has a very different view of importance of work and money. The immediate post-war generation saw the creation of wealth as the most important thing in life, while people of my age have other concerns and priorities” she said. “We’ve learnt to economic prosperity for granted and do not feel the need to be workaholics. Family life, leisure time, and holidays are much more important to Japanese people than before”.

As one Japanese teenager said: “They (the older generation) think differently; they have staid ideas and won’t listen to new ones. Young people do not get listened to by either parents or teachers. Some older people think the young are getting very lazy”.

For Japanese young people these are excing times, in many ways comparable to the USA during the 1950s and 1960s – the period of liberation for American teenagers – and, as a complex web of formal social structures begins to blur, the shinjinrui’s time is here.