{"id":26,"date":"2026-10-04T20:15:10","date_gmt":"2026-10-04T20:15:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/fourfingerrule.colinleemacleod.com\/?page_id=26"},"modified":"2026-10-04T20:29:33","modified_gmt":"2026-10-04T20:29:33","slug":"about-colin-the-story-behind-the-four-finger-rule","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/fourfingerrule.colinleemacleod.com\/?page_id=26","title":{"rendered":"About Colin \u2014 The Story Behind the Four Finger Rule"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<article style=\"max-width:900px;margin:0 auto;padding:24px 16px;line-height:1.75\"><nav aria-label=\"Explore Four Finger Rule\"><a href=\"\/?page_id=23\">Free Week 1<\/a> \u00b7 <a href=\"\/?page_id=26\">About Colin<\/a> \u00b7 <a href=\"\/?page_id=28\">Course preview<\/a> \u00b7 <a href=\"\/?page_id=11001\">Course details<\/a> \u00b7 <a href=\"\/?page_id=11004\">Free practice<\/a> \u00b7 <a href=\"\/?page_id=11011\">Gold River<\/a> \u00b7 <a href=\"\/?page_id=11002\">FAQs<\/a> \u00b7 <a href=\"\/?page_id=11003\">Support<\/a><\/nav><div style=\"background:#102c3a;color:#fff;padding:32px;border-radius:12px\"><p style=\"color:#f2bf50;font-weight:700;letter-spacing:2px\">BRITISH COLUMBIA \u2192 JAPAN \u2192 REAL CONVERSATIONS<\/p><h2 style=\"color:#fff;font-size:clamp(28px,5vw,44px);line-height:1.15\">Meet Colin Lee MacLeod.<\/h2><p>Creator of the Four Finger Rule. Practical language. Real places. Useful outcomes.<\/p><\/div><h2 style=\"font-size:clamp(24px,3vw,32px);line-height:1.25;margin:32px 0 12px\">A practical idea, born in Japan<\/h2><p>Colin grew up in coastal British Columbia before crossing the Pacific and beginning a new chapter in northern Honshu, Japan. Living in the rice-farming town of Kashimadai put language in its everyday context: people, places, responsibilities and things that needed to get done.<\/p><p>His teaching work led to a simple question: <strong>What if students learned the English they were actually going to use\u2014first?<\/strong><\/p><h2 style=\"font-size:clamp(24px,3vw,32px);line-height:1.25;margin:32px 0 12px\">Give language a job<\/h2><p>In the classroom, Colin focused on useful language in familiar situations: greetings, choices, questions and requests. Instead of treating every sentence as a separate thing to memorise, learners could practise a reusable structure and change its details.<\/p><p>The same approach guides the Four Finger Rule today. Start with the situation. Decide what you want to do, what you have to do, what you need and what might happen. Then prepare language that helps you act.<\/p><h2 style=\"font-size:clamp(24px,3vw,32px);line-height:1.25;margin:32px 0 12px\">Part of the community<\/h2><p>While living in Kashimadai, Colin joined the Osaki City Fire Brigade, Kashimadai Branch. His father-in-law, who was active in the brigade, encouraged him to join. Training, fire-prevention visits and community activities became another part of his life in Japan.<\/p><p>It reinforced the connection between preparation, communication and service\u2014themes that run through this language system.<\/p><h2 style=\"font-size:clamp(24px,3vw,32px);line-height:1.25;margin:32px 0 12px\">The goal: practical independence<\/h2><p>The Four Finger Rule helps you prepare for your next conversation, make a useful request, listen for what matters and recover when something changes. The question after practice is simple: <strong>Did you communicate what you needed?<\/strong><\/p><div style=\"border-left:5px solid #e5ac35;background:#f4f6f8;color:#152934;padding:24px\"><p><strong>Learn it. Prepare for it. Go use it.<\/strong><\/p><p>Build useful language. Change the details. Practise the unexpected. Take the next step.<\/p><\/div><h2 style=\"font-size:clamp(24px,3vw,32px);line-height:1.25;margin:32px 0 12px\">Try the method<\/h2><p>Start with a free lesson you can use today\u2014one place, one task and ten minutes of practice.<\/p><p><a href=\"https:\/\/fourfingerrule.colinleemacleod.com\/?page_id=23\" style=\"display:inline-block;background:#102c3a;color:#fff;padding:14px 22px;border-radius:6px;text-decoration:none\">Try the free Week 1 mission \u2192<\/a><\/p><\/article>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Free Week 1 \u00b7 About Colin \u00b7 Course preview \u00b7 Course details \u00b7 Free practice \u00b7 Gold River \u00b7 FAQs \u00b7 Support BRITISH COLUMBIA \u2192 JAPAN \u2192 REAL CONVERSATIONS Meet Colin Lee MacLeod. Creator of the Four Finger Rule. Practical language. Real places. Useful outcomes. A practical idea, born in Japan Colin grew up in [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-26","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fourfingerrule.colinleemacleod.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/26","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fourfingerrule.colinleemacleod.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fourfingerrule.colinleemacleod.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fourfingerrule.colinleemacleod.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fourfingerrule.colinleemacleod.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=26"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/fourfingerrule.colinleemacleod.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/26\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11015,"href":"https:\/\/fourfingerrule.colinleemacleod.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/26\/revisions\/11015"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fourfingerrule.colinleemacleod.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=26"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}