The first period was 6th grade. Luckily, the teacher has a pretty good understanding of English and actually has English classes outside of the days that I go to their school. The subject yesterday was the numbers 1-20. We did the typical “repeat after Mr. Scott. Look at his mouth carefully to see how he pronounces the words”. After that was some sort of key number game that I managed to play without fully understanding the rules. I had to clap and say a number and the kids would grab a card with that number printed on it. Then we played “number pyramid” game, practicing the phrase “What ___ do you like?”/ “I like ___”. The teacher apologized beforehand saying that asking the kids what number they like was kind of strange, but we agreed that since they already had the numbers down, practicing a key phrase was the next step. In the game, (another one I wasn’t too sure of the rules) the kids would play rock, paper, scissors, and depending on who won and who lost, they asked each other what number they liked. If they matched (or something…) they could black out a square. The goal was to black out all of the fifteen squares. As expected, this took quite a while, so time ran out. All in all, it was a pretty successful class. No one cried, no one said “I hate English”, etc.
Second period was 2nd grade. The teacher wanted to do days of the week. I have done this with this age before, so I didn’t think it would be too much of a problem. Little did I know that this class has about five kids with behavioral problems, and about 15 more with attitude problems. Something I have noticed about Japanese kids, is that the parents/teachers don’t know what to do with “bad kids”, so more often than not, they just assign them as a “special child” and give them a paraprofessional. In the US, we give them Ritalin. Every country has its way not to deal with its problems. Anyway, the class went as expected. Most of the time was spent with the quiet sign being held up or chasing one of the mini-devils out of the classroom. A few students got the concept, but most were either distracted or beaten by their fellow imps. After the days of the week, the teacher had some English picture books that he had wanted me to read. This went…better. Except for the little brat who wanted to put her face right into the book without letting the other kids see it. She would hit another kid, hit me or the other teacher, cry, run away and claim that she was being bullied. She reminded me of a 8 year old Pat Roberts.
After that debacle was third period with the 5th grade. We followed what the sixth graders were doing. We practiced the numbers 1-20, played the key number game and began the pyramid game. I hadn’t understood the rules, and still didn’t understand what was going on. The funny thing is that the 5th grade teacher didn’t understand the game either and so we just let the kids to their own devices. They were smart enough to figure out a way to play. It was nice to know after the last lesson that demon spawn can transform into intelligent beings with souls. I had my doubts. After the game, I wanted them to make nametags that we could use all year for English classes. I wanted them to write their names and draw three simple pictures: their favourite food, their favourite sport and their favourite subject. I’ve tried to emphasize writing their names because a major point in the first few weeks of junior high school English is they have to re-learn how to write their names and other words in Japanese. This is because in elementary they write words like this: susi, Huzi, Hirosima, huton, tunami, etc. These words are used in English too and are: sushi, Fuji, Hiroshima, futon and tsunami. I tell the elementary school teachers that it would be so much easier to learn this way of writing Japanese in the Latin alphabet (called Hepburn style) as opposed to the Japan-only style they learn in elementary school.
Next, fourth period followed with the 4th graders. I’m extra popular with this grade level, which makes class fun. We were doing “How are you?” with responses in this class. Things like: I’m sleepy, tired, sick, sad, hot, cold, etc. We played a gesture game to further the point of feelings. Japanese culture is infamous for killing feelings and requiring a poker face for all situations. This makes these kind of activities that much better. The kids usually exaggerate the gesture way beyond anything you expect. This class was cut short as the school had a “hand-over drill” that day.
What is a “hand-over drill”, you may ask? Good question, I asked three different people and got three terrible answers. Finally I asked the janitor-like lady and she told me. If there is a lot of rain or stormy weather, the school will call the parents to ask them to pick the students up. (almost all of the kids walk to school) Japanese schools just aren’t made for picking up and dropping off kids. They usually barely have enough parking for the staff, so they will open up the prison yard-looking playground, and all the parents will park there.
After lunch and the drill was fifth period with the 1st graders. This was my first class with the new 1st graders. Since I have probably seen them (this school is practically next to my house), they are all very excited to meet me. I just said my name and where I was from. I showed them some pictures of Kansas from one of my many classy Kansas books. Since the Japanese idea of a diverse state is having one side with sunny weather and one side with partly cloudy weather, the pictures I show them of Kansas usually amaze them. True, I exaggerate and show them places like way out in the west where it looks like a desert, and the flint hills, which looks like mountains (to Japanese people). I also showed them some American money, which they weren’t too terribly amused with. The older kids usually go crazy over getting to see foreign money. Then we did a short lesson on colours. We played a game where I would yell out a colour and they found something of that colour and touched it. Thrilling.
In non-school news, I thought you’d like to see this Dad. This is the new Diet Coke product in Japan: No Calorie Coca Cola Plus Green Tea flavor. It wasn’t bad. There’s barely any flavor of green tea.
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