PM Encouragement Award 2025

We received the PM Encouragement Award and gave a speech at the award ceremony. Using photos, I, Wakabayashi, explained that the SMILE Project is run primarily by school teachers, and that since 2020, more than 3,000 elementary, junior high, high school, and university students have participated in this international online collaborative program for small group activities. We believe the participants saw the high school students speaking with smiles, energy, and gestures, and realized that this SMILE-filled experience of actually speaking with a foreign person can lead to rich language learning. At the social gathering following the award ceremony, many people commented on the great educational value of speaking a foreign language freely. We would like to thank all the teachers and students who participated in the SMILE Project. We will continue to work hard to spread the excitement of the SMILE Project. Let’s enjoy chatting with smiles and make lots of friends!