These last two days have been very interesting!
Monday, the 2nd, was my first day of school. I got up at 6:00am, got ready, and hopped on a 6:42 bus to the Sanyo-Himeji train station (it's downtown). Got on a random train, so that I can get to the Shinkama station (all the trains stop there before they start heading in different directions), and then boarded the Aboshi Line. My stop was at the Tenma station, the closest one to Hirohata Middle School. It's about a 20 minute walk from the Tenma station, but I can power-walk it to much less than that.
By the time I arrive at Hirohata, it's usually about 7:30. Not a bad commute at all! (Although the bus sure gets crowded in the morning!)
A typhoon made landfall Sunday night (we were out eating sushi when it hit... lots of fun!), so it was still raining on Monday morning. I got to Hirohata and noticed that all the teachers were standing outside by the gate; I now know that when this happens, it means school has been cancelled due to the bad weather. Though this only applies to the students; teachers still have to go, unless the weather gets really bad. So, due to the weather, there were no students at school on Monday.
I gave a speech (in Japanese) in front of all of the teachers, and then was pretty promptly put to work grading. I've been grading the second-year students' (equivalent of 8th graders) Creative Writing notebooks. I'm primarily looking at two assignments that they had to write in English: their "dream room," and what they did during their summer vacation. After speed-grading all those AP essays last year, it's been a bit surprising how long each of these journals is taking me to mark. I'm getting used to figuring out what the students are trying to say (and to tell when they're using Google Translate), and then how to carefully correct them.
English is such a hard language. These students are, for the most part, doing an excellent job considering how recently they've begun studying it.
Japanese students are incredibly creative. Ken Robinson ought to check them out. Almost all of them really take the time to draw nice pictures of their room and their summer vacation, which makes them a real pleasure to read. (And, it sometimes helps me with translating, too!) The Japanese have a lot more "emoticons" or symbols for emotions than we do, and the kids are very good at using them.
Also, they're just so adorable. You kind of miss out on the adorableness of students when you work with high schoolers (no offense, Chandler Wolves! You guys are cool, if not cute.)
Also, I think just about every kid has mentioned that they want an air conditioner in their dream room. It really makes you think about how we Arizonans take that for granted--I don't think kids here would put that down as an important part of a dream room, they'd just assume that all rooms are air conditioned.
On Tuesday, it was another rainy day. However, the students did come to school in the morning. I was able to see them a bit during the Opening Ceremony, where they all gathered in the gymnasium. (And they didn't whisper... or fidget... and organized themselves very quickly. You have to see it to believe it!) I had to give another speech in Japanese in front of all of them, which is probably the biggest audience I've ever had (that I can think of, at any rate.) I believe there's somewhere between 600 and 800 students at this school.
In the afternoon, though, school was cancelled again due to the rain, so the students were gone by lunch time. They'd spent the whole day testing, though, so they were probably grateful for the break. (Though they get to finish the rest of the tests tomorrow.) I spent the entire day grading more of those journals (I had a the whole 8th grades' worth of them). I'm almost done!
Tomorrow I get to teach my first lesson! (Only one, since the schedule is a bit weird.) It will be a self introduction: "Hello! My name is Julia Daley. I am 22 years old. I am from Arizona. This is my mom..." etc. I have lots of photos and postcards, which should be a lot of fun. Then I'll probably play a bit of crossfire with them (they stand up, and can't sit down until they answer a question. "How old am I?"). If I really run out of time, I thought introducing them to Hangman might be fun. (This particular class just finished learning how to say what they like to do in English.)
I'll try to get pictures of the school once the weather gets a bit nicer. Right now, we're due for rain all week, and have another typhoon making landfall this weekend. I'm enjoying the weather, though!
Hard American thing to explain of the day:
"It's raining cats and dogs." Why this means it's raining hard, though, I have no idea. It just is. English is weird that way!
Monday, the 2nd, was my first day of school. I got up at 6:00am, got ready, and hopped on a 6:42 bus to the Sanyo-Himeji train station (it's downtown). Got on a random train, so that I can get to the Shinkama station (all the trains stop there before they start heading in different directions), and then boarded the Aboshi Line. My stop was at the Tenma station, the closest one to Hirohata Middle School. It's about a 20 minute walk from the Tenma station, but I can power-walk it to much less than that.
By the time I arrive at Hirohata, it's usually about 7:30. Not a bad commute at all! (Although the bus sure gets crowded in the morning!)
A typhoon made landfall Sunday night (we were out eating sushi when it hit... lots of fun!), so it was still raining on Monday morning. I got to Hirohata and noticed that all the teachers were standing outside by the gate; I now know that when this happens, it means school has been cancelled due to the bad weather. Though this only applies to the students; teachers still have to go, unless the weather gets really bad. So, due to the weather, there were no students at school on Monday.
I gave a speech (in Japanese) in front of all of the teachers, and then was pretty promptly put to work grading. I've been grading the second-year students' (equivalent of 8th graders) Creative Writing notebooks. I'm primarily looking at two assignments that they had to write in English: their "dream room," and what they did during their summer vacation. After speed-grading all those AP essays last year, it's been a bit surprising how long each of these journals is taking me to mark. I'm getting used to figuring out what the students are trying to say (and to tell when they're using Google Translate), and then how to carefully correct them.
English is such a hard language. These students are, for the most part, doing an excellent job considering how recently they've begun studying it.
Japanese students are incredibly creative. Ken Robinson ought to check them out. Almost all of them really take the time to draw nice pictures of their room and their summer vacation, which makes them a real pleasure to read. (And, it sometimes helps me with translating, too!) The Japanese have a lot more "emoticons" or symbols for emotions than we do, and the kids are very good at using them.
Also, they're just so adorable. You kind of miss out on the adorableness of students when you work with high schoolers (no offense, Chandler Wolves! You guys are cool, if not cute.)
Also, I think just about every kid has mentioned that they want an air conditioner in their dream room. It really makes you think about how we Arizonans take that for granted--I don't think kids here would put that down as an important part of a dream room, they'd just assume that all rooms are air conditioned.
On Tuesday, it was another rainy day. However, the students did come to school in the morning. I was able to see them a bit during the Opening Ceremony, where they all gathered in the gymnasium. (And they didn't whisper... or fidget... and organized themselves very quickly. You have to see it to believe it!) I had to give another speech in Japanese in front of all of them, which is probably the biggest audience I've ever had (that I can think of, at any rate.) I believe there's somewhere between 600 and 800 students at this school.
In the afternoon, though, school was cancelled again due to the rain, so the students were gone by lunch time. They'd spent the whole day testing, though, so they were probably grateful for the break. (Though they get to finish the rest of the tests tomorrow.) I spent the entire day grading more of those journals (I had a the whole 8th grades' worth of them). I'm almost done!
Tomorrow I get to teach my first lesson! (Only one, since the schedule is a bit weird.) It will be a self introduction: "Hello! My name is Julia Daley. I am 22 years old. I am from Arizona. This is my mom..." etc. I have lots of photos and postcards, which should be a lot of fun. Then I'll probably play a bit of crossfire with them (they stand up, and can't sit down until they answer a question. "How old am I?"). If I really run out of time, I thought introducing them to Hangman might be fun. (This particular class just finished learning how to say what they like to do in English.)
I'll try to get pictures of the school once the weather gets a bit nicer. Right now, we're due for rain all week, and have another typhoon making landfall this weekend. I'm enjoying the weather, though!
Hard American thing to explain of the day:
"It's raining cats and dogs." Why this means it's raining hard, though, I have no idea. It just is. English is weird that way!
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