Seven Months In

[Taylor]

Well we’ve been living in Japan for a little over seven and a half months now.  Everything about those first few weeks — the newness and novelty of just about everything we ate, the heat and humidity, learning to cope for a month without having the Internet at home — feels distant.  I remember one day towards the end of September when Julie and I were driving through the countryside looking at symmetric, amber cones of straw leftover from rice harvests against rolling green hills and a bright blue sky.  I remember remarking on that day how strange it was that it all looked normal now.  Not just the landscape but driving on the other side of the road, the relatively low speed limits, and the tremendous service and hospitality we encountered everywhere stopped along the way to our destination.

Shortly thereafter, once we had finished giving dozens of introduction lessons to our students, we established a comfortable work routine.  Since then life here has been one big blur.  Whereas those first few weeks feel distant, the rest of our time here feels like it all happened over the course of a few weeks rather than a few months.

At school I no longer dwell on the differences between the education systems of Japan and the United States.  I know what is expected of me, how the students prefer to learn, and make adjustments accordingly.  The differences are still there of course, I just focus too much on getting the content across to pay much attention to them.

That is until we have an assembly.  I know I’ve blogged about a few other assemblies before, but the one we had this week was different.  This week the student government held a thirty minute meeting in the gymnasium.  All the members of the student body carried their chairs from their homeroom classes to the gym and sat in silence as their student officers read the budget line by line.  After twenty minutes or so, the students asked for any input.  Nobody had anything to say so they brought a P.E. teacher up to the stage to recite a ten minute speech on behaving and trying one’s best.

So what was so different?  Let’s start with the behavior.  I’ve already documented how calm and silent the students are at assembles compared to the rambunctious pep rallies in the U.S.  I won’t dwell on this further.  I realized this week that the assembly also brought other differences to the surface.  For instance, at this week’s assembly I saw nurturing homeroom teachers carefully watching over their classes.  You also had the bulldog disciplinarians wearing stern faces looking to disrupt students trying to sneak in a morning nap.  On the sidelines were the teachers who also act as administrators.  They are the ones who planned the event and watched from a distance to make sure things ran smoothly.  In the United States, these people would be vice principals.  At my school they serve as both teacher and administrator.

These are just a few of the differences on display.  I don’t think the system here is better or worse than the U.S.  It’s just different.  Although we have immersed ourselves in this system, we haven’t lost track of where we come from.

Population

[Taylor]

I’ve mentioned in earlier posts about the declining school population.  This week our staff received some data on the issue in the form of a colorful, optimistic-looking newsletter.

The numbers below represent how many junior high students were enrolled in the given school year.  Why junior high?  Some students don’t go on to a traditional academic high school after junior high so these numbers do a better job of reflecting the demographics of the general population.

1983:  26,649

1993:  22,148

2003:  16,776

2008:  14,719

Projected for 2018:  11,948

This information is available on the prefecture’s website, but in order to find it you will need to be able to read Japanese.

The newsletter appears to be a gentle reminder that changes will need to be made to the system soon to accommodate the decline in population.  Several people have repeatedly told me that this is happening in just about every prefecture in Japan.  The main reason seems to be that people are having less children.

There is, of course, nothing wrong with a nation producing less children.  But it is interesting and has ramifications in our current professions.

Lesson Planning

[Taylor]

It’s been a busy week.  I have now given my introduction lesson to every class (sixteen total) at my high school.  Since we started a new term last week, that means I am now planning lessons for every class in every grade based off the curriculum.  The teachers I work with have given me permission to develop my own lessons so long as they correspond loosely to what the students are currently studying in their texts.

So how does a former high school math teacher plan ESL lessons?  Here’s my general method.

Know the Audience

When planning a lesson I need to keep in mind the grade level and English ability of the class.  Each grade has four classes, one of which is an advanced track.  Although the three regular classes share commonalities, they also possess significant differences in attitude, behavior, and ability that can alter the success of a well-intentioned lesson.  Classes that are more genki (cheerful but talkative) may need to be toned down whereas a quiet class may need more encouragement for participation.  Disruptive classes may need more individual work to help them stay focused.  A little extra humor and demonstration in a well-behaved class, on the other hand, can help a concept’s roots dig a little deeper into the minds of the students.

This somewhat dialectic approach to lesson planning is obviously oversimplistic.  There are many other variables to consider.  A single class is generally genki, quiet, disruptive, indifferent, and engaged within a single fifty minute period.  Nevertheless, over time patterns emerge and you can plan around them.

Warm-up

I start my English classes the same way I did in math:  a warm-up.  However, they have completely different purposes.  In math I tried to pick challenging problems for my students that triggered prior knowledge and pushed for deeper understanding (with mixed results).  In Japan my warm-up is usually culturally driven.  In the past week I have used this time to inform my students about the presidential election in the U.S., contemporary slang, handshakes (including secret handshakes), peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, cereal, and Bob Dylan.  Next week I will discuss Halloween.

This kind of activity serves a few purposes.  First, I get to introduce aspects of my culture.  Second, and perhaps more importantly, it’s a trick to grab their attention.  Since I may only visit a class once a week, I can’t use the warm-up as a way to access prior knowledge like I did in my math classes.  Instead I use it to catch them off guard.  For instance I taught a lesson on idioms the other day and began class by walking into the door with an umbrella.  My coworker then proceeded to throw small pictures of dogs and cats at me.  Now, was this the most gutbusting educational joke of all time?  Not even close, but it wasn’t intended to be.  It did, however, wake up ’em up and prepared them for the difficulties that awaited later in the period.

Transition

After the warm-up comes the transition.  I make a valiant effort to incorporate the warm-up into the transition activity, but sometimes I can’t quite pull it off.  Recently, however, I managed to link conditional sentences with handshakes and cereal.  I also followed up my presentation on Obama and McCain with two worksheets entitled “Are you all right?”  One worksheet had four pictures of Obama, each one with squiggly lines suggesting pain from a different part of his body (headache, sore legs, toothache, and a sprained ankle).  I then gave the students a worksheet with four ailments and this time they had to draw pictures of McCain under the various assigned conditions.

Main Idea

After the transition activity I generally feel like the neurons are firing at desirable levels and use that opportunity to teach the core lesson of the day.  These main ideas usually relate to conversational English and I try to teach them in simple, direct, and practical ways.  Often my coworker and I will demonstrate the main idea (example, “Are you all right?”  “No, I have a headache.”  “That’s too bad.  Get some rest”) before inviting the students to vocally participate.  We then practice the concept, either orally or through the use of some activity or worksheet.

Cool-down

My most successful lessons usually have some sort of activity at the end to try and get the neurons firing one more time before they leave.  Sometimes we play English games (shiritori, hangtime, crossfire, etc.) and other times we simply practice the main idea using an alternative method.  Today, however, we did not have quite enough time for an enriched English activity.  Instead, I channeled the warm-up one more time and asked the students who they would vote for if they could pick the president of the United States.  Obama won in a landslide in both classes.

School Visit

[Taylor]

Once every two weeks I travel to one of two different high schools in the area.  Yesterday was my first visit to one of these schools.  I traveled by train and foot, listening to music and reading a book of short stories along the way.  On the train I met several students.  Some lived in other towns and were traveling to Noheji.  Others lived in Noheji but were traveling to other schools.  None of them were going to the school I planned on visiting.

I arrived early, perhaps too early, and spent some time in the teachers’ office studying Japanese and continuing to read my book of short stories.  I then gave my introduction lesson to two classes:  a group of 35 first graders and a group of 8 third graders (both at the high school level).  As you might expect, the lesson went more smoothly in the class with eight students.  However in both classes I experienced the normal highs and lows and bumps in the road that any teacher would experience for any given lesson in any given classroom.

While I was there I noticed that the high school appeared to be larger than the one in Noheji.  How could this be?  Then I realized it was because at least half of the rooms were vacant.  I asked my teacher about this and she said there used to be four classes in each grade.  Now there are only two, with the exception of the first grade where there is only one class.

When I returned to my town I told one of my teachers about the diminishing number of students at the high school.  Apparently Noheji used to have 6 or 7 classes in each grade but now there are only 4.  I pressed further and asked her why the student population is dropping so dramatically in the region.  She said it began about ten years ago and there are many factors at play that are all connected.  First, people are having less children.  Second, many of the children that are born eventually leave rural Aomori for educational, financial, and social opportunities in the cities of Japan.  Most do not return and begin raising their own families elsewhere.  Another factor at play is the fact that students choose their high school based on their test scores.  Many maximize their potential by attending high academic schools in Hachinohe and Aomori City, the two largest cities in the prefecture.

I have to admit that I think it is a sad situation.  However I should probably also point out that as someone who grew up in rural Alaska, went to college in Oregon, and stayed in the Portland area, I can relate to the students who venture out of the prefecture.

I have heard but can’t completely verify that it is not too uncommon for a child who finds success in the city to buy a large house for the family he or she left behind in the rural prefecture.  As you drive along the countryside in Aomori you can see such houses beautifully decorated and landscaped, often featuring a large driveway and garden amidst the meadows and rolling hills.  I have seen these houses.  They are surprisingly large and silent.

Blowin’ in the Wind

[Taylor]

The textbook for my Oral Communication class features lyrics to songs in English at the beginning of each lesson.  Musicians ranging from Hillary Duff to Bette Midler have songs published in the text.  In other words, mostly artists that don’t come to mind when I think of music that captures the essence of the culture of the United States.  So, naturally, when I saw the lyrics to Bob Dylan’s “Blowin’ in the Wind” I couldn’t resist the opportunity to teach them a classic American folk song.

The First Time

Although “Blowin’ in the Wind” is one of the few songs I can play on harmonica, I thought it would be better to stick with the guitar (another ALT gave me a guitar she wasn’t using a few weeks ago).  I still think this was a wise decision.

As I mentioned above, the lyrics appear in the textbook.  However, just to be safe, I made individual copies in case the students forgot their books, which they did.

I played and (*gulp*) sang in front of 40 first grade high school students.  For those of you who do not know me very well, I can play chords on a guitar just fine but I cannot carry a tune with my voice.  My strategy is usually to sing as low as possible because I like to imagine I have better control with those notes than the high or mid-range ones.  You would have to ask Julie is this is actually true.

Anyway, I played the song once by myself and then invited the students to sing.  As I began my mediocre strumming and terrible crooning the students decided not to participate.  They did a great job of listening but were too nervous to sing.

When I was done they gave me a round of applause.  I should have stopped there but I was set on having them sing a little bit.  I went through the lyrics with them and starting singing the song one more time.  Again, nobody participated.  When I finally finished one person gave me two courtesy claps and we moved on to the next activity.

The Second Time

The teacher I worked with told me that they (understandably) had a difficult time with the song because they had never heard it and did not know what the lyrics meant.  She surprised me a few days later with a translation of the lyrics in Japanese alongside the lyrics in English!  After I thanked her profusely she explained that she has always loved music and used to translate songs in English into Japanese to figure out what they meant.  She enjoyed it so much that she continued to study English and eventually became a teacher because of it.

Armed with copies of the song in English and Japanese, we made another adjustment.  Rather than have the students sing each verse, we decided it would be best to just have them sing the chorus.  We practiced the phrases without the music beforehand and then cued them when it was their turn to sing.

Did it work?  Yes!  They participated and sang a little bit of “Blowin’ in the Wind.”  Was it the best use of our time?  I’m not sure.  I wish I could adequately explain the cultural significance of the song and it would also be nice if it was more well known in Japan.  Nevertheless it was fun and I plan on performing the song in my other two first grade (high school) classes.

Vocabulary Lesson Number One: Know Your Students

[Taylor]

Shortly after completing my introduction lesson, one of the teachers I work with wanted me to get started on developing other lessons.  She put me in charge of developing activities that would help students learn a specific list of vocabulary words.  It was a challenge.  I had to find an interesting way to introduce such unrelated words as best, soft, and fill into a single fifty minute period.

Warm-up, pt 1

I decided during my first lesson that I would start the class off by playing a game of 2 Truths and a Lie.  For those of you not familiar with this icebreaker, you basically have the students pick three statements to write about themselves.  Two of the statements are true and one is an absolute lie.  They share the statements and guess which one is not true.  In my experience it has been a consistently effective icebreaker, until last week.  I had a rather unruly class with low motivation and English speaking ability.  After I explained the game and turned them loose to create their statements, they just sat in their seats in silence.  The JTE and I tried to encourage them (in English and Japanese), but it just wasn’t going to happen.  We decided to move on.

Transition Activity

I decided that a word search would be an ideal way to introduce a random assortment of vocabulary to the students.  If you go here you can create your own word search free of charge.  This part of the lesson worked well.  The students were engaged in the activity.  I also gave out prizes (pennies) to the first five students to finish.

Heart of the Lesson

The students had a major exam coming around the corner so I wanted to make sure we hit the definitions of the new words hard.  I explained the meanings in the most interesting ways I could using a combination of pantomiming, photographs, and drawing on the chalkboard.  Thankfully my JTE was also there and willing to translate these definitions into Japanese.

After we went through the list, which took twice as long as anticipated, I told the students to write five sentences using the new words.  In a classroom of about 40 students, only three to five actually wrote something.  Although this class is extremely difficult behaviorally (stemming from experiences they had in junior high which I will refrain from dwelling on), their English ability is currently low.  I tried to push them too far and lost them.

Adaptations

One of the great things about teaching is you always get a second opportunity.  I tweaked a few of my procedures for the next class.  First, I dropped 2 Truths and a Lie from the lesson (except for the advanced class) and instead had them make nametags for their desks in English.  I also allocated a longer period of time to go over the definitions and retooled the sentence idea (again, advanced class excepted).  Instead of creating five sentences from scratch, I created five sentences myself.  In each sentence I left out a key vocabulary word.  The students’ task was to pick the missing word.  For example:

I ate _________  much ramen.

1. too
2. seldom
3. fresh
4. soft

Too easy?  Probably not.  After talking with my teacher I discovered that learning through definitions is a new concept for these students.  I wanted an activity that focused more on the meaning of the words than sentence structure.  However, for those who breezed through the first five sentences, I also left space for them to create their own sentences using the words in the new list.

I found that these adaptations made for very successful lessons.  The students had fun, participated, and were challenged.

The Lesson of Lesson Planning

Know your students.  Although it was initially frustrating that my first lesson didn’t go as well as I hoped, as an educator it is not my job to complain about my students’ abilities.  You have to meet them where they are.  My job is not to create crafty wordsmiths and English conversation artists; it’s to help them improve their current skills and abilities and hopefully instill motivation to continue learning English in the years ahead.  Now that I know more about my students I can begin implementing lessons that are practical and relevant to their lives.

Introduction Lesson

Julie and I have both completed our introduction lessons.  Our teachers gave us 50 minutes to tell a classroom of forty students about our country, state, hometown, family, interests, and hobbies.  How did we do it?

Following the advice of a former ALT at an orientation meeting in Portland, we decided to make cards that look like this:

My cards do not look as nice as Julie's

As you can see, one side of the card contains a number while the other contains a question.  We each made about 12 cards and distributed them at random to our students.  Rather than just talk for fifty minutes, we called on students to read their question to us.  After we would answer the question, often using photo pages created before we left the U.S., we would ask the same question to the student sitting next to the student who had the card.  Afterwards we would walk up to each student, shake their hands, congratulate them for their bravery and pronunciation, and inform them how nice it was to meet them.

We each had two to three cards that allowed the students to ask any question.

Julie's "wild" card.

The cards allowed the following to take place:

1. Instead of one person talking about themselves for fifty minutes, at least twenty-four students actively participated in the presentation part of the lesson.
2. The students practiced their pronunciation.  It was a great way to sneak in an English lesson.
3. Having mostly prearranged questions helped filter out questions that may have been difficult or uncomfortable to answer.
4. The cards provided a nice structure and helped the lesson move at a quick pace.
5. Asking questions helped us get to know the students a little better, too.

What else did you do?

Introducing myself took about half an hour.  Then I took five minutes to say a few encouraging words to the students that mostly centered on the difficulty of learning a second language.  I tried to explain how we can learn from our mistakes by using a colorful example of me trying to speak Japanese my first day in Japan.  On that day, when I was formally introduced to a coworker (my superior), instead of saying “nice to meet you” I accidentally said “mornin’ pal, let’s eat!”

I also wanted to use my lesson to get to know the students.  Although the cards helped with that I decided it wasn’t enough for me.  I gave my students an interest survey that took them about ten or fifteen minutes to fill out.  With the extra five minutes at the end of class, I quizzed them over my interests and rewarded them with stickers for correct answers.

How did it go?

Great!  If you are an ALT who happened to stumble upon this blog looking for ideas, I highly recommend this lesson.  The students were interested and eagerly participated.

Julie taught a very similar lesson to junior high students.  It went great but there was one striking difference:  her students went gangbusters over the stickers.  Mine simply thought they were amusing.

Her students also recognized me in the pictures she presented.  One student in particular became very excited when he saw me.  He pointed to his ears, pantomiming a use of headphones.  Apparently he sees me walk to and from school everyday while I listen to my iPod.

Assembly

A few days ago I gave my introduction speech during an assembly in my high school’s gymnasium.  There were no chairs or bleachers.  Students stood in single file rows, alternating boy-girl-boy-girl, arranged by grade level.  Every student wore a uniform that matched down to the socks and shoes.

Everyone stood for the duration of the assembly (about 30 minutes), including teachers.

It was an interesting contrast to assemblies in the United States.  In my experience in Oregon, students are asked to sit in the section that corresponds to their grade but may sit freely with friends.  Talking and texting were problems but usually the goal of the assembly is to generate a rowdy enthusiasm in the crowd, and in this sense, they were largely successful.  The purpose of last week’s assembly was also achieved.  Students were given important information and introduced to a new teacher in an environment with zero distractions.

I’m not sure how common these assemblies are.  I’ll be sure to make another post when I find out more information.

I hope this goes without saying, but in these posts where I compare education systems I do not necessarily think that one way is better than the other.  As I mentioned, assemblies in Japan and the United States seem to serve different purposes.  I only wish to point out the differences since, to me at least, they are interesting and a little surprising.

Ibasho

The other day a staff member at my school asked me for an equivalent expression in English for the Japanese phrase ibasho. He described it as a heartwarming phrase for students. My Japanese-English dictionary was useless, as were various language translators on the web. However, a good old fashioned Google search revealed that ibasho refers to a place that is safe for an individual both physically and mentally to the point where they feel they belong in that particular place.

Obviously there is no direct translation in English. The best I could come up with, based on my limited understanding, was: Rest assured, you are always welcome here. When asked for an abbreviated version I came up with “a safe place.”

It may be tempting to associate ibasho with the concept of community building in public school classrooms in the United States, but there are differences. First, it should be noted that in Japan, teachers act as surrogate parents. They are both counselors and educators. In fact, if a student ever gets in trouble with law enforcement, the police contact the school before they call home. In contrast, teachers in the United States are encouraged to draw lines with students on personal issues and send them to separate counseling offices to take care of problems relating to matters outside of class. Although American educators work hard to promote a sense of community in the classroom, it appears to fall short of the concept of the Japanese concept of ibasho.

Which is better? I think it’s debatable and I’m not going to pick sides. Also, I think my understanding of ibasho, and many other Japanese cultural nuances for that matter, is very limited and perhaps even naïve. So Japanese scholars of the Internets, please educate me and those reading this about the finer points of ibasho.