Participating in the A.Y. 2018/2019 third-year Japanese Language course (LT007N) infused with NoLBrick philosophy, made me aware of some core elements that I had never heard of but I felt to be quite important in who I am and in the facilitator role I was about to take on. Specifically, during our first class presentation I was struck with Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS), their development through Japanese Language Education and their relation to a Foreign Language Autonomous Learning, the kind of path I chose to go down during my high school year.

This brought me, along a few other facilitator colleagues, to conceive some papers and posters that eventually led us to present our research as a multi-faceted although connected NoLBrick team at The 23rd Association of Japanese Language Teachers in Europe (AJE) Symposium in August 2019, held at University of Belgrade, Serbia. It was my first research speech at an international symposium and I am deeply grateful and indebted to my colleagues, prof. Marcella Mariotti, dr. Takuya Kojima and the NoLBrick project for providing me with a solid support network and constant feedback. You can read my paper, titled “Development of Higher Order Thinking Skills through Foreign Language Autonomous Learning – An autoethnographic case study” as part of The 23rd Association of Japanese Language Teachers in Europe (AJE) Symposium proceedings.

In October 2019, I was also invited to Nanzan University in Nagoya, Japan, to give a lecture to second-year Japanese Language Education students about my research on HOTS and autonomous learning path. For that, I am deeply grateful to prof. Noriko Iwasaki for the much appreciated invitation.