It's 1:36am. The last couple of mornings, I did try this whole 'getting up earlier' thing. It's just not for me. If I don't have to, I won't. I really prefer to do everything - relax, read, watch TV, go online, look over stuff for work, study Japanese - after work, not before work.
It's a bit hard to dress for the weather. It's very cold outside, but very warm inside. You will be standing on the train platform freezing, and then get on the train and you'll have to take off your jacket just for the five minute journey. I want to wear a warm top for the walk too and from work, but it gets pretty warm in the office.
The other foreign teacher (I'll call him Jim just so I can give him a name) says this continual hot-cold-hot-cold thing wreaks havoc on your immune system. I'll bet it does. Fortunately I haven't gotten sick but I am consciously drinking lots of jasmine tea and juice, eating mikan (mandarines) and enough vegetables.
I prefer teaching classes to preparing for classes. Sometimes I still feel slightly apprehensive before teaching a class. But then when I'm in the class it's usually fine. On the whole, I do like teaching. But what I said the other day is the main thing - it's the students that make it a good class or not. When the students are open and warm and ready to participate, I come out feeling good and I love teaching. When the students are very quiet and don't seem interested, I come out groaning inwardly.
But one thing I do like is when students have lots of questions for me, and most of all, when I can go home and prepare info for them. They don't expect it and aren't entitled to it so it makes me feel like a better teacher to take some effort for my students. For some reason I am some sort of grammar nerd who enjoys writing up examples of grammar rules. Today I just spent two hours at home writing all about 'neither' and 'either'. (I bought a printer.) I don't have to do it, but it's fun.
***
Yesterday morning I had my first Japanese lesson. I found it online; there were a few volunteer Japanese classes listed, and this was the only one that I could conveniently attend.
I went to this kind of community centre. There were no signs in English anywhere and I couldn't find the classroom. As it turned out, I was the only white student. The others there learning were Chinese, Korean, etc, so from a distance I didn't realise it was a Japanese class; I thought everyone in the room was Japanese.
Basically, all the students work from these books which are written entirely in Japanese. Volunteer teachers work with different students - either one-on-one or in groups of 2 or 3 - and go through the textbook. So it's not a classroom setting exactly, more like a collection of people working with personal tutors.
It was an hour and a half lesson. My head hurt afterwards. The lesson was almost entirely in Japanese - with the very occasional word in English if the teacher knew the English word - so I was struggling to follow her explanations which were all in Japanese. Now I know how my students must feel (they are all Japanese students taking classes which are solely taught in English)...
Also, I was reading the textbook in hiragana and katakana (the simpler two of the three writing scripts that make up Japanese). I have learned hiragana and katakana, but not very well. I'm very slow and there are a few characters I always confuse (eg 'wa, 'ne' and 're'). So even though I was reading very simple sentences, the grammar of which I knew very well, it was hard mental work.
Still, this is perfect for me and I want something challenging.
Next week there are no classes - there is some sort of party which I won't be attending. So my goal is that by my next class, I want to be able to read at least twice as fast as now. That shouldn't be hard - I've set a pretty low standard to begin with!
I am also thinking of taking private lessons from someone who speaks English as well. I think the two types of lesson will complement each other. For about three weeks I never opened my Japanese textbook, but suddenly in the last few days I've become very motivated and have been revising stuff I studied before I left Australia. I suppose I should be motivated, considering all the failed transactions I've had... times I haven't understood a clerk's question or have received something I didn't intend to order...
***
I found a church I might visit this Sunday. I would have gone last Sunday but last Sunday I went to a former teacher's house with a few staff members from my school. It was my first time at a Japanese person's house. It was really nice; a lot more spacious than my apartment... we had nabe, which is a kind of hotpot. They cook it in a pot on the middle of the table and everyone helps themselves.
Right now I have a policy of accepting all invitations. Because I don't know that many people (apart from the huge number of students I am meeting), I am up for anything that anyone suggests. So far I've mostly just been out with people from work, like we had a few farewell dinners for the outgoing teacher. In general I don't mind being on my own at home though, because I have so much contact with people at work. It's such a good part of the job. I am gradually beginning to recognise students and starting to remember more names.
Wednesday, November 28, 2007
Saturday, November 24, 2007
More misc stuff
[I wrote most of this post a few days ago.]
By the way, you'll notice that I don't really mention names, or even the name of my school, in this journal. It is actually a stipulation of my contract that I be circumspect in blogging and not post anything negative about the school or compromise its students, etc. So although I am not saying negative things per se, I think it's just best not to go there. Even though only family and friends read this blog, I'm sure it could still be found in a web search.
***
Yay, I'm finally on the grid! Today I bought a laptop. It was a bit of an undertaking. I wanted a PC, but to get an English OS on them would be a big hassle, so I have ended up with a cute little MacBook instead, and that was surprisingly easy. I know they're supposed to be better computers anyway, I just have to get used to the interface. I should have paid more attention to Stace. :)
I'm happy now I can write down whatever comes into my head. I want a good diary of my first few weeks in Japan, but to have to write everything by hand into a notebook, and then occasionally make the odd entry when I get access to an Internet cafe... well, so many details get lost.
This MacBook is pretty cool. When I first turned it on it gave me the option to run it in English. It also let me set up my keyboard English-style. So even though my 7 key may say it's an apostrophe, it does the & symbol as it should, and even though my apostrophe key says it's a * key, it types an apostrophe. So basically if you didn't already know your keyboard symbols, you would be confused by my keyboard. But I'm happy. :)
It also has a webcam built into it, yay! The only thing currently irritating me is I don't have the flexibility to edit pictures that I'd like. I just want to copy and paste my pics into a folder, open some of them and resize them, but I don't seem to be able to do that directly.
I do have wireless Internet access in my apartment but at the moment it's not really mine, so the connection is not good. If I move my laptop 3cm from its current position, I lose the connection.
Working at my school
Every time I go into a class I check and re-check that I'm teaching the correct unit for that week. I keep thinking I'll accidentally start teaching the wrong subject. Today, I finally did it. I did a pre-activity that must have made no sense to the students, and then said in a loud, confident voice:
'Please open your books to page 79.'
Blank pause.
'Page 79?'
'That's right. Unit 13.'
'But this week is unit 12.'
I look at all the students. Every one has their book open to unit 12. I ended up having to run out the room to get the real lesson materials. Fortunately I had quickly gone over these the previous week... hahah... oh well, at least I'm well prepared for unit 13, which starts on Thursday. :)
Living alone
Living alone is going okay. True, I have been living insqualor slightly more mess than I would have with Catherine or Stace, but I blame that on the garbage system. I felt overwhelmed with plastic bags and bits of packaging, and everything in my apartment was new and had packaging. It took me an hour and a half to sort my first week's garbage. I think, henceforth, a System needs to be implemented...
I think it's kind of rough that we have to follow such a rigorous system of recycling, because the wastage you see every day is horrific. I mean, yesterday I bought a small plastic container of gyoza (Chinese dumplings). They wrapped the plastic container in plastic wrap. Then they put it in a paper bag. Then they put that in a plastic bag. The amount of packaging on everything doesn't just border on the ridiculous, it's crossed way over...
Sadly the legacy of IKEA follows me, and I have already assembled an item of furniture. My apartment didn't come with a chair, which is typical - my first ryokan had no chair, per se, either. I bought a kind of cheap, basic office chair and put it together. I've also bought my MacBook and a DVD/VCR player (quite cheap really).
The downside with this is that newspapers, magazines, papers and cardboard boxes are only collected ONCE a MONTH. And of course, I started buying things The Day After that day. Now I have so much packaging from all my purchases. And my apartment is none too spacious, for storing this!
The other annoying thing about garbage here (oh, there are so many annoying things about it, actually!) is that there are different days for everything. I'd be happy to be able to just put out all my garbage on, say, a Tuesday. Instead you have to think, oh, I can put out burnable garbage on Tue, Thur or Sat; I can put out plastic packaging on Wednesdays, etc etc...
As for cooking, I have made progress this week. I'm slowing making the transition from buying all my meals around Kawasaki station, to 'cooking' frozen meals in my toaster oven. Hahaha! Right now my apartment smells of burnt cardboard. The illustration on the packet clearly showed the meal being heated in a toaster oven (the only kind of oven I have), but I must have misunderstood the directions somewhere along the line...
[It's a few days since I wrote the above paragraph and since then I've started doing actual cooking, but only the most basic, lazy sort - frying some mince, stir-frying some vegetables, pouring garlic powder, salt and pepper over it, and then adding in soy sauce. Only I don't think it's actually soy sauce. I thought I was buying soy sauce, but when I opened it, it smelled exactly like miso soup. But then, miso is made from soy, right? So I don't know. But it tastes fine, although it's definitely a 'single person cooking for themselves' kind of meal!]
By the way, you'll notice that I don't really mention names, or even the name of my school, in this journal. It is actually a stipulation of my contract that I be circumspect in blogging and not post anything negative about the school or compromise its students, etc. So although I am not saying negative things per se, I think it's just best not to go there. Even though only family and friends read this blog, I'm sure it could still be found in a web search.
***
Yay, I'm finally on the grid! Today I bought a laptop. It was a bit of an undertaking. I wanted a PC, but to get an English OS on them would be a big hassle, so I have ended up with a cute little MacBook instead, and that was surprisingly easy. I know they're supposed to be better computers anyway, I just have to get used to the interface. I should have paid more attention to Stace. :)
I'm happy now I can write down whatever comes into my head. I want a good diary of my first few weeks in Japan, but to have to write everything by hand into a notebook, and then occasionally make the odd entry when I get access to an Internet cafe... well, so many details get lost.
This MacBook is pretty cool. When I first turned it on it gave me the option to run it in English. It also let me set up my keyboard English-style. So even though my 7 key may say it's an apostrophe, it does the & symbol as it should, and even though my apostrophe key says it's a * key, it types an apostrophe. So basically if you didn't already know your keyboard symbols, you would be confused by my keyboard. But I'm happy. :)
It also has a webcam built into it, yay! The only thing currently irritating me is I don't have the flexibility to edit pictures that I'd like. I just want to copy and paste my pics into a folder, open some of them and resize them, but I don't seem to be able to do that directly.
I do have wireless Internet access in my apartment but at the moment it's not really mine, so the connection is not good. If I move my laptop 3cm from its current position, I lose the connection.
Working at my school
Every time I go into a class I check and re-check that I'm teaching the correct unit for that week. I keep thinking I'll accidentally start teaching the wrong subject. Today, I finally did it. I did a pre-activity that must have made no sense to the students, and then said in a loud, confident voice:
'Please open your books to page 79.'
Blank pause.
'Page 79?'
'That's right. Unit 13.'
'But this week is unit 12.'
I look at all the students. Every one has their book open to unit 12. I ended up having to run out the room to get the real lesson materials. Fortunately I had quickly gone over these the previous week... hahah... oh well, at least I'm well prepared for unit 13, which starts on Thursday. :)
Living alone
Living alone is going okay. True, I have been living in
I think it's kind of rough that we have to follow such a rigorous system of recycling, because the wastage you see every day is horrific. I mean, yesterday I bought a small plastic container of gyoza (Chinese dumplings). They wrapped the plastic container in plastic wrap. Then they put it in a paper bag. Then they put that in a plastic bag. The amount of packaging on everything doesn't just border on the ridiculous, it's crossed way over...
Sadly the legacy of IKEA follows me, and I have already assembled an item of furniture. My apartment didn't come with a chair, which is typical - my first ryokan had no chair, per se, either. I bought a kind of cheap, basic office chair and put it together. I've also bought my MacBook and a DVD/VCR player (quite cheap really).
The downside with this is that newspapers, magazines, papers and cardboard boxes are only collected ONCE a MONTH. And of course, I started buying things The Day After that day. Now I have so much packaging from all my purchases. And my apartment is none too spacious, for storing this!
The other annoying thing about garbage here (oh, there are so many annoying things about it, actually!) is that there are different days for everything. I'd be happy to be able to just put out all my garbage on, say, a Tuesday. Instead you have to think, oh, I can put out burnable garbage on Tue, Thur or Sat; I can put out plastic packaging on Wednesdays, etc etc...
As for cooking, I have made progress this week. I'm slowing making the transition from buying all my meals around Kawasaki station, to 'cooking' frozen meals in my toaster oven. Hahaha! Right now my apartment smells of burnt cardboard. The illustration on the packet clearly showed the meal being heated in a toaster oven (the only kind of oven I have), but I must have misunderstood the directions somewhere along the line...
[It's a few days since I wrote the above paragraph and since then I've started doing actual cooking, but only the most basic, lazy sort - frying some mince, stir-frying some vegetables, pouring garlic powder, salt and pepper over it, and then adding in soy sauce. Only I don't think it's actually soy sauce. I thought I was buying soy sauce, but when I opened it, it smelled exactly like miso soup. But then, miso is made from soy, right? So I don't know. But it tastes fine, although it's definitely a 'single person cooking for themselves' kind of meal!]
The Art of Teaching English
Now I have a laptop of my own, and Internet access in my apartment, and I can type my heart out. So be prepared for some wordy posts, sorry. This one in particular is probably not very interesting to most people, especially when I start going on about grammar...
This post is about The Art of Teaching English. (Like I really know anything about that after two weeks, haha. But then, I have already taught 39 classes and already have picked up some things and have something to say.)
Each week I teach a wide range of levels. I don't teach raw beginners, but my lowest level classes are fairly low; I also teach the most advanced level 'discussion' style classes, though only a couple of them. I have some repeat classes in a week, so though I may teach 27 classes a week, I teach only 17 'unique' classes. It must be admitted that the second or third 'repeat' class in a week tends to get a better lesson than the first, as I think of things I should have done the first time.
Subject matter
I also teach a variety of subject matter in a week. For example, some of the classes I have taught this week included:
describing food ('what is it?' 'what's in it?' 'what does it taste like?' etc - this particular lesson went down like a tonne of bricks because nobody really had the vocab necessary to describe the food properly)
the subjunctive tense* - to talk about regrets (phrases like 'if only I had...' and 'I felt as if I were...' and 'I'd rather he...')
reporting speech (as an example, turning "Thank you for your hard work" into "The boss thanked us for our hard work"... or "Please come in early tomorrow" into "He asked us to come in early tomorrow")
talking about feelings
using 'have to' and 'had to' (eg, 'what do you have to do today?' 'I have to study my English homework', etc)
irregular past tense (eg, break -> broke, fall -> fell, leave -> left)
an 'article summary' class where advanced students had found an article and summarised it - so I proofread them, they read them, and we discussed them
modals of probability and possibility (eg, 'it should be sunny', 'he must be an actor', etc)
asking permission with 'can I'/'could I', and asking someone to do something with/for you with 'can you'/'could you'
talking about jobs ('what do you do?', 'how do you like it?' etc)
There were a few others, I can't remember them all. I kind of peek in the textbook in the few minutes before class to remind myself 'oh yeah, this is a lesson about reporting speech', or whatever.
We have two main types of lesson - 'function' based and 'grammar' based. So you might have a 'function' based lesson on a theme like 'ordering food' or 'talking about jobs'. And you might have a 'grammar' based lesson on a theme like 'using words like 'could I' and 'may I' to ask permission', etc.
*(This was really fun. For example, do you say 'I would rather he had persuaded me...' or 'I would rather he persuaded me...' Well, personally, I would never make such a horrendous sentence to begin with, but if I did, I would say the first one. But I think it's actually the second one which is grammatically correct.)
Questions
I encourage questions in my classes. I like answering questions. The thing is, the lessons can be a little bit formulaic*, so I think there is more value to be found where I can find things I can actually teach.
*(Note that the point of our lessons is to give students the opportunity to speak English. That is the main goal, because Japanese students famously learn a lot of English grammar and writing at school, but have virtually no practice speaking it, and so can't use it well at all. That's why our classes are aimed at activities to get the students speaking. They essentially 'teach' themselves the main grammar points at home before class, then they come in and we practise them.)
But yeah, I think it adds a little value if I am paying enough attention to what I'm teaching so that I can find points to emphasise, although I am not required to do that. Then I can point to a particular phrase in a dialogue and check if students understand it. Or I can mention an idiom used in the listening exercise - eg today I remember explaining 'needle in a haystack' and 'talked my ear off'. Or I can point to a particular sentence on a drill card and ask questions to make sure they understand it. Or show them a note on the grammar page and add my own view on it.
So yeah, I encourage questions, because I want to feel like students are learning from me and having their difficulties answered, not just having speaking time. I tend to think that when you're learning a language, sometimes what you need most is someone to bring your questions to. Sometimes the students are too shy to ask questions when I ask the class 'any questions?' but I can usually get a question out of them if I ask while everyone is practising speaking to each other - then they don't feel 'in the spotlight' or like they are holding up the class.
So I've had a few this week. Most of them I can answer easily. For example, we were talking about jobs, and in the book was the example sentence structure:
It's kind of/really boring.
They asked if 'kind of' and 'really' meant the same thing. That was easy to answer and explain and I said that 'kind of boring' meant that it was often, but not always, boring. Then they asked if 'kind of boring' and 'kind of exciting' meant the same thing (a logical question, actually, if you think of 'kind of boring' as meaning 'boring 50% of the time). So I explained that 'kind of boring' meant that it was 'more boring than not boring' (in fact I wrote up a random percentage, 60% boring, since these nuances are often most easily explained in percentages).
So yeah, lots of things like that, which you never think about in daily life. You just hope that you don't think of too many random answers 'off the cuff' and end up teaching them ridiculous things!
I did have one question today that kind of stumped me.
Example problem...
We were looking at probability - should and must. The book, you see, had given a kind of 'possibility line', with 'not certain - could/might/may', 'somewhat certain - should/shouldn't', 'almost certain - must/must not' and 'most certain - will, won't, can't, couldn't'.
The problem is, these words aren't all interchangeable, and some can be used in some situations where others can't. Like, you can say 'it could/should/might/will rain later today' but it's rare to say 'it must rain later today'.
My student was having trouble understanding the nuances of the difference between should and must. Well, you can't blame him. For example:
If the doorbell rings, you can say 'that must be the pizza delivery guy' or 'that should be the pizza delivery guy'.
If you go shopping you can say 'one of these shops must sell computers' or 'one of these shops should sell computers'.
And there is not a lot of difference between the two statements, except that 'must' is slightly more certain.
But then in other sentences, you can use these same words, but the sentences have a more different meaning, eg:
'This should be their best game' has a somewhat different meaning to 'This must be their best game'.
And then you have sentences that are completely different, eg:
'He should be a musician' vs 'He must be a musician'
I have thought through this quite carefully now and have a better answer to give the student next time we meet, but at the time it was hard to think of a good answer 'off the cuff'.
Classroom English
In some ways it's easier to pitch your English level to the lower level beginner's classes, than to the higher level beginner and lower level intermediate. That's because with the lower levels, you know you need to be very simple and use no difficult or unnecessary words.
So you will sound like this:
'Please look at the picture. What is he doing? What is this? Good! And what is this?'
'You are at a party. You are talking about jobs. Person A, please ask about person B's job. Person B, please respond. For example... 'Hi! What do you do?'' etc...
And you will need to elicit all keywords before every activity. For example, next week my lower beginner's class has the topic 'asking simple questions about the past'. (Eg, 'did he go scuba diving?', 'was he scared?', 'was it sunny?' etc). There is an exercise where they have to ask simple questions, and their partner will answer them based on a picture. Eg, 'did John go to the beach?' 'Yes, he went to the beach.' For lower beginners, you know that before you do this exercise, you should go through each picture and make sure everyone knows that this picture is of 'the beach', this one is 'surfing', this one is of 'scuba diving', etc.
But with higher beginners and low intermediate, sometimes it's hard to judge exactly where to aim. You feel like you can use slightly more complex language and they will understand, but sometimes you don't know when they understand or don't understand. Sometimes you don't want to patronise them by going through lots of simplistic pictures if it's obvious what they are. But then later they will stumble over one or two questions and you'll realise you should have done it.
Private Lesson
I have one private lesson. It's okay, I don't mind it at all. I like the student. The problem is that the private lesson course he is doing is far higher than his level.
For example, he can barely understand me when I say simple things like 'last weekend was very fun' and 'Will your store be very busy?' Yet in this course he is trying to memorise set phrases like "I'm sorry, the stock manager is currently unavailable. However, if you'd like, I can take a message and he will return your call'."
It's a bit sad and futile, because you know that if a real English-speaking client rang and deviated from the script my student has memorised, he would be in in over his head. And I try to mix it up slightly - change the name, the time, the request, etc - but there's only so much I can do, because his level is too low for me to actually explain phrases or concepts in English. All we can do is kind of go over set phrases, reading and re-reading them aloud, practising intonation and pronunciation, etc.
Australian accents
Most of the characters who speak on the CDs have a kind of generic American accent, but a few speak different accents, to 'mix it up' a little. There is an Australian girl in one of the advanced books, but her accent is unspeakably vile. I already told one of my classes I think her voice is annoying, and a disgrace to Australia, and they laughed (I think they agreed with me). She sounds a bit like Toni Collette in Australian Story, only more so.
Speaking of my accent, I've only had two comments.
The first was from a lady who said that when she heard I was from Australia, she thought I would be unintelligible and speak in a kind of mumbling drawl (she didn't use those words but that was the gist of it), but that in fact, I spoke very clearly. Hahaha! We have a reputation abroad.
The second was when I asked a guy 'did you have a late night too?' He couldn't understand the question. 'Late night,' I kept repeating, with slightly different prounciation. Everyone looked at each other blankly. 'Nought?' repeated the student. I wrote 'late night' on the board. They said it was my accent. I tried to say it in an American accent but it came out even more Australian than before. Oh well. :) That particular class (which was also the one in which I dissed the CD dialogue girl's hideous Australian accent) is one of my favourites. :)
Favourite classes
When I started, I was apprehensive about Saturdays. On weekdays I have 4, 5 or 6 classes a day; on Saturday I have 7. But the other foreign teacher here said he loves Saturdays; they're his favourite day because there's no 'dead time'. I thought 'well, if he really does like them, they can't be that bad'. And actually, they're not. I think they'll be my favourite day too. The thing is, I have no bad classes on Saturday. Somehow, every class is quite lively and enjoyable; on weekdays, it's kind of 50-50.
This post is about The Art of Teaching English. (Like I really know anything about that after two weeks, haha. But then, I have already taught 39 classes and already have picked up some things and have something to say.)
Each week I teach a wide range of levels. I don't teach raw beginners, but my lowest level classes are fairly low; I also teach the most advanced level 'discussion' style classes, though only a couple of them. I have some repeat classes in a week, so though I may teach 27 classes a week, I teach only 17 'unique' classes. It must be admitted that the second or third 'repeat' class in a week tends to get a better lesson than the first, as I think of things I should have done the first time.
Subject matter
I also teach a variety of subject matter in a week. For example, some of the classes I have taught this week included:
There were a few others, I can't remember them all. I kind of peek in the textbook in the few minutes before class to remind myself 'oh yeah, this is a lesson about reporting speech', or whatever.
We have two main types of lesson - 'function' based and 'grammar' based. So you might have a 'function' based lesson on a theme like 'ordering food' or 'talking about jobs'. And you might have a 'grammar' based lesson on a theme like 'using words like 'could I' and 'may I' to ask permission', etc.
*(This was really fun. For example, do you say 'I would rather he had persuaded me...' or 'I would rather he persuaded me...' Well, personally, I would never make such a horrendous sentence to begin with, but if I did, I would say the first one. But I think it's actually the second one which is grammatically correct.)
Questions
I encourage questions in my classes. I like answering questions. The thing is, the lessons can be a little bit formulaic*, so I think there is more value to be found where I can find things I can actually teach.
*(Note that the point of our lessons is to give students the opportunity to speak English. That is the main goal, because Japanese students famously learn a lot of English grammar and writing at school, but have virtually no practice speaking it, and so can't use it well at all. That's why our classes are aimed at activities to get the students speaking. They essentially 'teach' themselves the main grammar points at home before class, then they come in and we practise them.)
But yeah, I think it adds a little value if I am paying enough attention to what I'm teaching so that I can find points to emphasise, although I am not required to do that. Then I can point to a particular phrase in a dialogue and check if students understand it. Or I can mention an idiom used in the listening exercise - eg today I remember explaining 'needle in a haystack' and 'talked my ear off'. Or I can point to a particular sentence on a drill card and ask questions to make sure they understand it. Or show them a note on the grammar page and add my own view on it.
So yeah, I encourage questions, because I want to feel like students are learning from me and having their difficulties answered, not just having speaking time. I tend to think that when you're learning a language, sometimes what you need most is someone to bring your questions to. Sometimes the students are too shy to ask questions when I ask the class 'any questions?' but I can usually get a question out of them if I ask while everyone is practising speaking to each other - then they don't feel 'in the spotlight' or like they are holding up the class.
So I've had a few this week. Most of them I can answer easily. For example, we were talking about jobs, and in the book was the example sentence structure:
It's kind of/really boring.
They asked if 'kind of' and 'really' meant the same thing. That was easy to answer and explain and I said that 'kind of boring' meant that it was often, but not always, boring. Then they asked if 'kind of boring' and 'kind of exciting' meant the same thing (a logical question, actually, if you think of 'kind of boring' as meaning 'boring 50% of the time). So I explained that 'kind of boring' meant that it was 'more boring than not boring' (in fact I wrote up a random percentage, 60% boring, since these nuances are often most easily explained in percentages).
So yeah, lots of things like that, which you never think about in daily life. You just hope that you don't think of too many random answers 'off the cuff' and end up teaching them ridiculous things!
I did have one question today that kind of stumped me.
Example problem...
We were looking at probability - should and must. The book, you see, had given a kind of 'possibility line', with 'not certain - could/might/may', 'somewhat certain - should/shouldn't', 'almost certain - must/must not' and 'most certain - will, won't, can't, couldn't'.
The problem is, these words aren't all interchangeable, and some can be used in some situations where others can't. Like, you can say 'it could/should/might/will rain later today' but it's rare to say 'it must rain later today'.
My student was having trouble understanding the nuances of the difference between should and must. Well, you can't blame him. For example:
If the doorbell rings, you can say 'that must be the pizza delivery guy' or 'that should be the pizza delivery guy'.
If you go shopping you can say 'one of these shops must sell computers' or 'one of these shops should sell computers'.
And there is not a lot of difference between the two statements, except that 'must' is slightly more certain.
But then in other sentences, you can use these same words, but the sentences have a more different meaning, eg:
'This should be their best game' has a somewhat different meaning to 'This must be their best game'.
And then you have sentences that are completely different, eg:
'He should be a musician' vs 'He must be a musician'
I have thought through this quite carefully now and have a better answer to give the student next time we meet, but at the time it was hard to think of a good answer 'off the cuff'.
Classroom English
In some ways it's easier to pitch your English level to the lower level beginner's classes, than to the higher level beginner and lower level intermediate. That's because with the lower levels, you know you need to be very simple and use no difficult or unnecessary words.
So you will sound like this:
'Please look at the picture. What is he doing? What is this? Good! And what is this?'
'You are at a party. You are talking about jobs. Person A, please ask about person B's job. Person B, please respond. For example... 'Hi! What do you do?'' etc...
And you will need to elicit all keywords before every activity. For example, next week my lower beginner's class has the topic 'asking simple questions about the past'. (Eg, 'did he go scuba diving?', 'was he scared?', 'was it sunny?' etc). There is an exercise where they have to ask simple questions, and their partner will answer them based on a picture. Eg, 'did John go to the beach?' 'Yes, he went to the beach.' For lower beginners, you know that before you do this exercise, you should go through each picture and make sure everyone knows that this picture is of 'the beach', this one is 'surfing', this one is of 'scuba diving', etc.
But with higher beginners and low intermediate, sometimes it's hard to judge exactly where to aim. You feel like you can use slightly more complex language and they will understand, but sometimes you don't know when they understand or don't understand. Sometimes you don't want to patronise them by going through lots of simplistic pictures if it's obvious what they are. But then later they will stumble over one or two questions and you'll realise you should have done it.
Private Lesson
I have one private lesson. It's okay, I don't mind it at all. I like the student. The problem is that the private lesson course he is doing is far higher than his level.
For example, he can barely understand me when I say simple things like 'last weekend was very fun' and 'Will your store be very busy?' Yet in this course he is trying to memorise set phrases like "I'm sorry, the stock manager is currently unavailable. However, if you'd like, I can take a message and he will return your call'."
It's a bit sad and futile, because you know that if a real English-speaking client rang and deviated from the script my student has memorised, he would be in in over his head. And I try to mix it up slightly - change the name, the time, the request, etc - but there's only so much I can do, because his level is too low for me to actually explain phrases or concepts in English. All we can do is kind of go over set phrases, reading and re-reading them aloud, practising intonation and pronunciation, etc.
Australian accents
Most of the characters who speak on the CDs have a kind of generic American accent, but a few speak different accents, to 'mix it up' a little. There is an Australian girl in one of the advanced books, but her accent is unspeakably vile. I already told one of my classes I think her voice is annoying, and a disgrace to Australia, and they laughed (I think they agreed with me). She sounds a bit like Toni Collette in Australian Story, only more so.
Speaking of my accent, I've only had two comments.
The first was from a lady who said that when she heard I was from Australia, she thought I would be unintelligible and speak in a kind of mumbling drawl (she didn't use those words but that was the gist of it), but that in fact, I spoke very clearly. Hahaha! We have a reputation abroad.
The second was when I asked a guy 'did you have a late night too?' He couldn't understand the question. 'Late night,' I kept repeating, with slightly different prounciation. Everyone looked at each other blankly. 'Nought?' repeated the student. I wrote 'late night' on the board. They said it was my accent. I tried to say it in an American accent but it came out even more Australian than before. Oh well. :) That particular class (which was also the one in which I dissed the CD dialogue girl's hideous Australian accent) is one of my favourites. :)
Favourite classes
When I started, I was apprehensive about Saturdays. On weekdays I have 4, 5 or 6 classes a day; on Saturday I have 7. But the other foreign teacher here said he loves Saturdays; they're his favourite day because there's no 'dead time'. I thought 'well, if he really does like them, they can't be that bad'. And actually, they're not. I think they'll be my favourite day too. The thing is, I have no bad classes on Saturday. Somehow, every class is quite lively and enjoyable; on weekdays, it's kind of 50-50.
Monday, November 19, 2007
To give you an idea of what I'm doing here...
The only bummer about living in Yokohama is that their recycling rules are many and complicated. You have:
a) burnable garbage which is collected Tue, Thur and Sat, and you must drain all excess liquid from kitchen scraps, and put it in transparent bags;
b) packaging, which is collected Wed and which must be cleaned before being thrown in the garbage;
c) bottles and cans which are also collected Wed (and the plastic bottles must be crushed);
d) 'small metal items', I don't know what day;
e) aerosol cans and glass which are supposed to be put into a plastic bag and labelled;
f) newspapers, magazines, papers and cardboard boxes, which are supposed to be squashed flat, and tied together with string or put in a paper bag, put out the third Mon of every month
Plus a variety of other 'special' collections like clothes, dry cell batteries, umbrellas, I mean I have three different recycling guides and it's more confusing than any lesson plan I've had to do. :) I will look at a scrap of cardboard packaging and think 'okay, this could be burnable garbage, packaging, OR paper...? I'm too afraid to throw my garbage out...
***
A typical day goes something like this:
Get up at about 10am. Get ready for work. (My apartment has this cool hot water service. You turn it on instantly with the press of a button, and can set it to whatever temperature you like. So I turn it up to 75 when I want a cup of tea, it's far quicker than boiling the kettle on the stove.)
Walk to the train station. My apartment's on the third floor, and I go through a couple of train stations to get to work, so I take a lot of stairs in the course of a day. (Train stations all have lots of stairs; many have no elevators at all.) I take the train to my connecting station, then switch to get to Kawasaki.
Kawasaki station area is really cool. There are several large, very modern department stores and loads of places to eat and drink. So I have breakfast - a cheap toastie - here usually. My school is in one of these department stores, surrounded by restaurants, and it often has live music playing outside it when I come out. My school is just by the station.
I usually come in an hour before work to do a little lesson prep. Then I'll teach several classes throughout the day. My easiest day has four classes; my busiest has seven.
Most classes follow a similar structure which involves a few elements like:
-drills, where you use drill cards to practise example sentences and phrases.
-roleplay activities where students try to use a particular teaching point (ie, 'you are moving house, please ask your friend for help' to practise sentences like 'could you ---?' and 'would you mind ---?'
-exercises from the textbook and students reading aloud
With the lower level classes especially, you often have to do a lot of 'setting up' and making sure they know words so that they will understand what you're talking about, or be able to follow an exercise in the book.
So you do a lot of eliciting keywords, eg: 'what is she doing? Yes, good, shopping. And where is she? Yes, downtown. At a market. And what is he doing? Studying? Yes, she's doing her homework.
Some of the classes have different components and emphases, but that's the gist. This is why it's pretty easy to learn. My first class last week took me an hour and a half to prepare for; by the end of the week I'd got it down to about 15 minutes per class. (I taught 17 classes last week, but some were repeats.)
Really you just have to do a quick look at the materials and think 'okay, what's the point of the lesson - how do I use the drill cards - what's the best way to explain this - what comprehension questions should I ask - what ideas should we brain storm', etc.
The roleplays are when you see the personality of a student and their attitude to the class. Some of them will develop quite long conversations, and make jokes, and others will follow the little 'script' you give them to the letter.
After work, I have dinner and go home; I usually get home at about 10. It's getting pretty cold now. It's like winter came in the last couple of days.
***
Today is Monday and I spent the day (well, what was left of the day after I got up at 11am) going for a little walk around my neighbourhood, then checking out some stores around Higashi-Kanagawa (a nearby train station). I've been shopping. I'm afraid I already bought quite a few things. It is a strange novelty being able to find clothes and shoes that I like, which fit, for a reasonable price. I was a bit worried because the teacher I replaced, who is taller than me but much slimmer, said she could hardly ever find clothes. But I have already found many. :)
Right now I'm in an Internet cafe in Yokohama.
Yesterday when we went into Yokohama, we went to the Minato Mirai area, which is the harbour. My friend said it reminded her a lot of Seattle (where she lived previously). We rode the biggest ferris wheel in the world and visited the biggest Chinatown in the world.
Today I'm in the area around Yokohama station, and it's a happening place. I came out of the station and saw all the neon lights and a little refrain chanted in my head 'this is only a few stops away, a few stops away!' (The station near my apartment is not far from Yokohama station; I can get there quite quickly.)
I am definitely hoping to get a mobile phone and a laptop in the next two days, so hopefully I will be more contactable then. I'm really craving my music; I keep having the TV on in my apartment just for some background noise, even though what's on is usually deeply annoying. There are far too many loud, over-excited yelling guys hosting game shows on Japanese television.
I am not going to get a landline, but intend to use a webcam. There's some free program called Skype that everyone keeps recommending, so I'll get that.
a) burnable garbage which is collected Tue, Thur and Sat, and you must drain all excess liquid from kitchen scraps, and put it in transparent bags;
b) packaging, which is collected Wed and which must be cleaned before being thrown in the garbage;
c) bottles and cans which are also collected Wed (and the plastic bottles must be crushed);
d) 'small metal items', I don't know what day;
e) aerosol cans and glass which are supposed to be put into a plastic bag and labelled;
f) newspapers, magazines, papers and cardboard boxes, which are supposed to be squashed flat, and tied together with string or put in a paper bag, put out the third Mon of every month
Plus a variety of other 'special' collections like clothes, dry cell batteries, umbrellas, I mean I have three different recycling guides and it's more confusing than any lesson plan I've had to do. :) I will look at a scrap of cardboard packaging and think 'okay, this could be burnable garbage, packaging, OR paper...? I'm too afraid to throw my garbage out...
***
A typical day goes something like this:
Get up at about 10am. Get ready for work. (My apartment has this cool hot water service. You turn it on instantly with the press of a button, and can set it to whatever temperature you like. So I turn it up to 75 when I want a cup of tea, it's far quicker than boiling the kettle on the stove.)
Walk to the train station. My apartment's on the third floor, and I go through a couple of train stations to get to work, so I take a lot of stairs in the course of a day. (Train stations all have lots of stairs; many have no elevators at all.) I take the train to my connecting station, then switch to get to Kawasaki.
Kawasaki station area is really cool. There are several large, very modern department stores and loads of places to eat and drink. So I have breakfast - a cheap toastie - here usually. My school is in one of these department stores, surrounded by restaurants, and it often has live music playing outside it when I come out. My school is just by the station.
I usually come in an hour before work to do a little lesson prep. Then I'll teach several classes throughout the day. My easiest day has four classes; my busiest has seven.
Most classes follow a similar structure which involves a few elements like:
-drills, where you use drill cards to practise example sentences and phrases.
-roleplay activities where students try to use a particular teaching point (ie, 'you are moving house, please ask your friend for help' to practise sentences like 'could you ---?' and 'would you mind ---?'
-exercises from the textbook and students reading aloud
With the lower level classes especially, you often have to do a lot of 'setting up' and making sure they know words so that they will understand what you're talking about, or be able to follow an exercise in the book.
So you do a lot of eliciting keywords, eg: 'what is she doing? Yes, good, shopping. And where is she? Yes, downtown. At a market. And what is he doing? Studying? Yes, she's doing her homework.
Some of the classes have different components and emphases, but that's the gist. This is why it's pretty easy to learn. My first class last week took me an hour and a half to prepare for; by the end of the week I'd got it down to about 15 minutes per class. (I taught 17 classes last week, but some were repeats.)
Really you just have to do a quick look at the materials and think 'okay, what's the point of the lesson - how do I use the drill cards - what's the best way to explain this - what comprehension questions should I ask - what ideas should we brain storm', etc.
The roleplays are when you see the personality of a student and their attitude to the class. Some of them will develop quite long conversations, and make jokes, and others will follow the little 'script' you give them to the letter.
After work, I have dinner and go home; I usually get home at about 10. It's getting pretty cold now. It's like winter came in the last couple of days.
***
Today is Monday and I spent the day (well, what was left of the day after I got up at 11am) going for a little walk around my neighbourhood, then checking out some stores around Higashi-Kanagawa (a nearby train station). I've been shopping. I'm afraid I already bought quite a few things. It is a strange novelty being able to find clothes and shoes that I like, which fit, for a reasonable price. I was a bit worried because the teacher I replaced, who is taller than me but much slimmer, said she could hardly ever find clothes. But I have already found many. :)
Right now I'm in an Internet cafe in Yokohama.
Yesterday when we went into Yokohama, we went to the Minato Mirai area, which is the harbour. My friend said it reminded her a lot of Seattle (where she lived previously). We rode the biggest ferris wheel in the world and visited the biggest Chinatown in the world.
Today I'm in the area around Yokohama station, and it's a happening place. I came out of the station and saw all the neon lights and a little refrain chanted in my head 'this is only a few stops away, a few stops away!' (The station near my apartment is not far from Yokohama station; I can get there quite quickly.)
I am definitely hoping to get a mobile phone and a laptop in the next two days, so hopefully I will be more contactable then. I'm really craving my music; I keep having the TV on in my apartment just for some background noise, even though what's on is usually deeply annoying. There are far too many loud, over-excited yelling guys hosting game shows on Japanese television.
I am not going to get a landline, but intend to use a webcam. There's some free program called Skype that everyone keeps recommending, so I'll get that.
Sunday, November 18, 2007
End of the first week
Hi,
I've finished my first week at my new school. My apartment is in a quiet neighbourhood, it's very small but nice enough.
I found the week wasn't too bad, a fair amount of coming in early and preparing for lessons, and lots of forgetting names, especially the four-syllable names of my male students. :) I feel like I've been fending for myself a bit, living on my own, finding my way around, working out my classes and whatnot. I've answered 'where are you from', 'why did you come to Japan', 'do you like Japanese food' and 'what do you think of Japan', about a hundred times now...
Thanks for your birthday wishes everyone, I'm glad I could finally get online tonight. Mum I got your card, thanks. Sorry I don't have time to reply to emails at the moment. I've not had the chance to get online this week yet, and also I haven't got a phone or anything. I have to get my Alien Registration Card first.
I had a good birthday today; when the new day started I was in a bar in Kawasaki with about thirty students and teachers. I had my welcome party on Saturday night/Sunday morning and I didn't get home until 6am. :) We started in an Italian restaurant owned by one of the students, then progressed to the bar, then finished with several hours of karaoke, which was great fun. They had a tiramisu cake for me with 'Happy Birthday' written on it in chocolate powder. Even at 5:15, when the party was wrapping up, there were still about 30 people there. It was a lot of fun.
The trains here are good but stop 'early' - around midnight. This is ridiculous because the last train of the night always has hundreds of people in it - businessmen who've been out for dinner and drinks after a long day in the office, etc - and if they ran trains all night, there would definitely be a demand for it. I got caught out like this on Wednesday; we went to an izakaya for the outgoing teacher's farewell - just five of us - and I forgot about the trains. Fortunately I only missed my second train, so the taxi wasn't very expensive. The alternative to leaving a party early is to leave very late - ie, in time for the first train of the next day at 4:30 or 5am.
It's worrying when everyone asks me if I like Japanese food, because I don't. I don't like raw fish, or wasabi, or chicken cartilage skewers (yes, I ate chicken cartilage), or octopus too tough to even bite, or pickled radishes, or any of the other horrible things I am confronted with! At the izakaya they had an English menu and it was worrying looking through the translations and thinking 'mmmm, beef diaphragms, sounds tasty'...
This afternoon I met up with a girl from training to explore Yokohama. (I'm in her apartment now 'stealing' wireless Internet.) It was pretty cool, I've never been there before (even though I technically live in Yokohama, my neighbourhood is very quiet and feels far away from the action. :)) The harbour area is really cool and we went on the ferris wheel.
I found that this week I have already 'un-learned' a lot of stuff from training, haha. Nobody adheres to the Official Lesson Plan exactly, and it kind of works nicely when you use your own discretion - you know, try two exercises if there's lots of time left, start the lesson with a bit of a chat, etc...
Teaching classes was okay. It's quite formulaic, so it's not so hard to teach multiple classes. It's very clear that it's the students that make it a good class or not. I had this one group lesson that was like pulling teeth - nobody wanted to volunteer anything or get creative with their dialogues - so I thought 'oh, I don't like teaching that lesson'. Then I taught the same lesson to a different class on a different day, and had a great time - the students were fun, and asked questions, and seemed to actually want to be there.
The other foreign teacher at my school is a nice guy, I think we'll get on well. The Japanese teachers are my school are quite nice too, haven't really clicked with them. Actually I've been mostly working autonomously anyway.
Hope everyone is well, sorry my emails are so sporadic, but I enjoy getting yours. Hope to get in touch properly soon. :)
I've finished my first week at my new school. My apartment is in a quiet neighbourhood, it's very small but nice enough.
I found the week wasn't too bad, a fair amount of coming in early and preparing for lessons, and lots of forgetting names, especially the four-syllable names of my male students. :) I feel like I've been fending for myself a bit, living on my own, finding my way around, working out my classes and whatnot. I've answered 'where are you from', 'why did you come to Japan', 'do you like Japanese food' and 'what do you think of Japan', about a hundred times now...
Thanks for your birthday wishes everyone, I'm glad I could finally get online tonight. Mum I got your card, thanks. Sorry I don't have time to reply to emails at the moment. I've not had the chance to get online this week yet, and also I haven't got a phone or anything. I have to get my Alien Registration Card first.
I had a good birthday today; when the new day started I was in a bar in Kawasaki with about thirty students and teachers. I had my welcome party on Saturday night/Sunday morning and I didn't get home until 6am. :) We started in an Italian restaurant owned by one of the students, then progressed to the bar, then finished with several hours of karaoke, which was great fun. They had a tiramisu cake for me with 'Happy Birthday' written on it in chocolate powder. Even at 5:15, when the party was wrapping up, there were still about 30 people there. It was a lot of fun.
The trains here are good but stop 'early' - around midnight. This is ridiculous because the last train of the night always has hundreds of people in it - businessmen who've been out for dinner and drinks after a long day in the office, etc - and if they ran trains all night, there would definitely be a demand for it. I got caught out like this on Wednesday; we went to an izakaya for the outgoing teacher's farewell - just five of us - and I forgot about the trains. Fortunately I only missed my second train, so the taxi wasn't very expensive. The alternative to leaving a party early is to leave very late - ie, in time for the first train of the next day at 4:30 or 5am.
It's worrying when everyone asks me if I like Japanese food, because I don't. I don't like raw fish, or wasabi, or chicken cartilage skewers (yes, I ate chicken cartilage), or octopus too tough to even bite, or pickled radishes, or any of the other horrible things I am confronted with! At the izakaya they had an English menu and it was worrying looking through the translations and thinking 'mmmm, beef diaphragms, sounds tasty'...
This afternoon I met up with a girl from training to explore Yokohama. (I'm in her apartment now 'stealing' wireless Internet.) It was pretty cool, I've never been there before (even though I technically live in Yokohama, my neighbourhood is very quiet and feels far away from the action. :)) The harbour area is really cool and we went on the ferris wheel.
I found that this week I have already 'un-learned' a lot of stuff from training, haha. Nobody adheres to the Official Lesson Plan exactly, and it kind of works nicely when you use your own discretion - you know, try two exercises if there's lots of time left, start the lesson with a bit of a chat, etc...
Teaching classes was okay. It's quite formulaic, so it's not so hard to teach multiple classes. It's very clear that it's the students that make it a good class or not. I had this one group lesson that was like pulling teeth - nobody wanted to volunteer anything or get creative with their dialogues - so I thought 'oh, I don't like teaching that lesson'. Then I taught the same lesson to a different class on a different day, and had a great time - the students were fun, and asked questions, and seemed to actually want to be there.
The other foreign teacher at my school is a nice guy, I think we'll get on well. The Japanese teachers are my school are quite nice too, haven't really clicked with them. Actually I've been mostly working autonomously anyway.
Hope everyone is well, sorry my emails are so sporadic, but I enjoy getting yours. Hope to get in touch properly soon. :)
Thursday, November 8, 2007
Let's sing the 'hello' song!
Greetings from Omiya! There's a light at the end of the tunnel - only one more day of training to go. Of course, then next week it'll be actual work, which isn't exactly a reprieve!
Feeling quite stuffed at the moment but it's been a good week.
Maybe I should change the name of my blog because as it turns out, while I'm working in Kawasaki, I'm actually living in Yokohama. (They're right next to each other. It's only half an hour commute to work, switching train lines, which is pretty good for the Tokyo area.) I think this is great. Of course, I don't know anything about Yokohama, having tried to research Kawasaki, but Kawasaki sounded like a slightly uninspiring industrial town, whereas Yokohama is supposed to be very lively and cool and pretty.
I have my apartment and schedule information. Some of it goes like this:
All my classes are 'standard' lessons - grammar and function classes. No kid's classes, no private lessons, no business classes, or any other curve balls.
I teach 26 classes a week, but 10 of these are repeat lessons, so I only have to prepare for 16.
I work from 1pm-9pm three days a week, 12-9pm one day, and 11am-8pm one day. Apparently my school is in a shopping centre with lots of restaurants on the same floor.
My apartment will be new (as in, no other teachers have lived in it), but very small. (Which I expected anyway.) From the address I think it's on a somewhat main road, which is good.
There's only one other 'foreign' teacher at my school, and as I already found out, he's a guy from Chicago.
Gee I feel tired...
Ummm, what is there to say... training week has been quite good, considering how full on it is. We have heaps and heaps to learn, about how to teach each type of lesson. As I mentioned in my last post, the lessons are quite structured. So once you're on top of how to do them, you can prepare your lessons quite quickly, since you have all the materials. So for example you'll have a listening exercise from the textbook, and a section where you use drill cards, and a section where you do a scenario roleplay, and so on.
I'm finding it a lot of fun to be sharing this training centre with all these people. Everyone gets along really well. Since being here I haven't felt down like I did when I was travelling by myself; I guess it'll be quite different next week when I move into my apartment by myself, but this is a good transition week.
It's good having broken routine so completely; I'm doing things I've never done, hanging out with people I've never met, and enjoying myself.
All of us had to do a little bit of kid's training. Not all of us are going to schools where they have kids - I'm not - but we all did the basics just in case our schools or situations ever change. So it was pretty funny seeing all these guys holding hands and singing the 'hello' song (accompanied by the 'hello' dance).
Hello, hello, hello, hello, we are glad to meet you...
Hello, hello, hello, hello...
It's a pretty catchy tune, and you can't go more than an hour here without hearing *someone* singing it, so it's been in my head pretty well continuously for three days. Other popular favourites are 'walking, walking', 'how's the weather' and 'I can make a letter'.
The other thing is that you catch everyone, in everyday conversation, doing their 'Classroom English' voice. Classroom English is where you really simplify your instructions and eliminate all unnecessary words, so that beginner students can understand you.
Eg, instead of: "Could you all please open your books", you just say:
"Please open your textbook."
And instead of:
"Keiko, would you please come up here and practise this with me," you just say:
"Keiko, please be my partner." (gesture)
So even outside of training, everyone here is intoning their words very clearly, saying 'please _____' and gesturing excessively. Today I said a couple of things and used the words 'appropriated' and 'surreptitiously'. The trainer told me that I'd soon lose my vocabulary. Haha :)
We're in Omiya, which is a fairly small city but has a bustling area near the train station about half an hour's walk away. We've gone there a few times for meals. We're in a quiet suburban neighbourhood here. There's also a nearby park with a shrine and zoo.
I've taught two half-lessons so far. On Tuesday and Wednesday evenings, they had a bunch of Japanese students come in from the surrounding areas to get a free English lesson from us new teachers. Both of mine went quite well. Apparently I use good classroom English and a good talking speed, have good lesson structure and a nice, friendly teaching manner. On the other hand I need to do more eye contact, think of different ways to elicit answers when they students aren't talking, etc etc...
Tomorrow's the last day of training and we have to give our first full lesson, with all the component parts. I'm pretty exhausted so I should go and prepare so I can get a nice long night's sleep... see you!
Feeling quite stuffed at the moment but it's been a good week.
Maybe I should change the name of my blog because as it turns out, while I'm working in Kawasaki, I'm actually living in Yokohama. (They're right next to each other. It's only half an hour commute to work, switching train lines, which is pretty good for the Tokyo area.) I think this is great. Of course, I don't know anything about Yokohama, having tried to research Kawasaki, but Kawasaki sounded like a slightly uninspiring industrial town, whereas Yokohama is supposed to be very lively and cool and pretty.
I have my apartment and schedule information. Some of it goes like this:
Gee I feel tired...
Ummm, what is there to say... training week has been quite good, considering how full on it is. We have heaps and heaps to learn, about how to teach each type of lesson. As I mentioned in my last post, the lessons are quite structured. So once you're on top of how to do them, you can prepare your lessons quite quickly, since you have all the materials. So for example you'll have a listening exercise from the textbook, and a section where you use drill cards, and a section where you do a scenario roleplay, and so on.
I'm finding it a lot of fun to be sharing this training centre with all these people. Everyone gets along really well. Since being here I haven't felt down like I did when I was travelling by myself; I guess it'll be quite different next week when I move into my apartment by myself, but this is a good transition week.
It's good having broken routine so completely; I'm doing things I've never done, hanging out with people I've never met, and enjoying myself.
All of us had to do a little bit of kid's training. Not all of us are going to schools where they have kids - I'm not - but we all did the basics just in case our schools or situations ever change. So it was pretty funny seeing all these guys holding hands and singing the 'hello' song (accompanied by the 'hello' dance).
Hello, hello, hello, hello, we are glad to meet you...
Hello, hello, hello, hello...
It's a pretty catchy tune, and you can't go more than an hour here without hearing *someone* singing it, so it's been in my head pretty well continuously for three days. Other popular favourites are 'walking, walking', 'how's the weather' and 'I can make a letter'.
The other thing is that you catch everyone, in everyday conversation, doing their 'Classroom English' voice. Classroom English is where you really simplify your instructions and eliminate all unnecessary words, so that beginner students can understand you.
Eg, instead of: "Could you all please open your books", you just say:
"Please open your textbook."
And instead of:
"Keiko, would you please come up here and practise this with me," you just say:
"Keiko, please be my partner." (gesture)
So even outside of training, everyone here is intoning their words very clearly, saying 'please _____' and gesturing excessively. Today I said a couple of things and used the words 'appropriated' and 'surreptitiously'. The trainer told me that I'd soon lose my vocabulary. Haha :)
We're in Omiya, which is a fairly small city but has a bustling area near the train station about half an hour's walk away. We've gone there a few times for meals. We're in a quiet suburban neighbourhood here. There's also a nearby park with a shrine and zoo.
I've taught two half-lessons so far. On Tuesday and Wednesday evenings, they had a bunch of Japanese students come in from the surrounding areas to get a free English lesson from us new teachers. Both of mine went quite well. Apparently I use good classroom English and a good talking speed, have good lesson structure and a nice, friendly teaching manner. On the other hand I need to do more eye contact, think of different ways to elicit answers when they students aren't talking, etc etc...
Tomorrow's the last day of training and we have to give our first full lesson, with all the component parts. I'm pretty exhausted so I should go and prepare so I can get a nice long night's sleep... see you!
Sunday, November 4, 2007
At the training centre
Hi everyone! I'm writing this from our training centre in Omiya. It's like a school camp, since we're all living in the training centre together in rooms like dorms. There are ten of us new teachers here. I'm sharing a room with a girl from small town New Zealand. There's also one other Aussie, a Canadian, and the rest are Americans. It's such a relief finally being around other people who speak English. I feel like a normal human being again!
Today is our day off training, but tomorrow we have five consecutive days of 11am-8pm training. It's going to be full on and we'll have to teach real Japanese students three different lessons. The lessons seem very formulaic though, so once you get used to it it should be easy enough.
Nikko was really nice. It was a lot of effort to get there - took about 7 hours from Kyoto, and as usual I took a train I didn't intend to take... But it was really stunning there, and I got a free room upgrade. I had a double room, my own personal dining room, and the hot springs bath was really fantastic after a long day walking around in the cool.
It's funny, sometimes I travel in a kind of 'I've heard of this place, I think I'll go there' way, without really knowing where I'm going. For example I went to Lake Chuzenji from Nikko, not realising it was up in the mountaing. We went up 700m in altitude - it was a stunning bus ride - and you could feel a tangible drop in temperature up the top!
In one of the temples - they all sell good-luck charms - I saw a 'dragon arrow talisman'. This item 'protects from misfortune for eternity'. When I saw that I thought 'for 3000 yen, an eternity without misfortune is a pretty good deal'!
I'm very adept at recognising the katakana for 'cappuccino' now.
I had dinners at my ryokan in Nikko, and I couldn't believe it. It took me a full hour to eat. My first night, I sat down and there were only about five small dishes in front of me. I thought 'bonus! This is achievable! I can eat all of this!' Five minutes later, a lady came in with eight more dishes... oh well...
Sometimes I can hardly believe what I'm eating. There are occasions where I don't even know whether it's meat or vegetable. Still, I can be more adventurous at dinner than breakfast. There are lots of pickled or vinegar-y flavours. The other night I had whole anchovies, and what looked like the cross-section of a fish, including all its internal organs, only the whole thing was a dark, ominous, purplish-grey.
Sometimes I feel like Bill Murray in 'Lost in Translation'. You know the part where he's filming the TV commercial, and the director gives him heaps and heaps of instructions - just talks on and on - and then the translator gives a three-word translation. It's so true. You'll be on a train and there'll be this very lengthy spiel in Japanese, talking about arrival times and which stations you'll stop at, and it will be followed by the English:
"The train at platform 8 is going to Joyo."
Yes, thank you.
Better still is when they cut off the 'unnecessary' English translations in mid-sentence, eg: "The train at platform 9 is the local train bound for -". Yes? Bound for where?
I saw a food stall with the interesting sign:
"Would you like to have a Rice Clacker?"
I decided I would like to have a rice clacker, but I regretted it. It wasn't very nice, and like most things I buy here, it went in the bin.
I actually bought a jar of Vegemite today. I'm such a sad Australian...
Last week I actually had my first ever Big Mac, in Kyoto. I was fairly unimpressed with it; it was a pretty sad excuse for a burger, in my opinion. But I've never eaten Hungry Jacks or Maccas burgers, I'm used to home-made ones, or gourmet ones, or even fish-and-chip shop ones, so this was pretty sad in comparison.
All this trip, surrounded by the Japanese who are light packers, I've felt like I've had a ridiculously excessive amount of luggage with me. It hasn't helped that I've been hauling it around several cities and train stations. But compared with most of the other new recruits, I've packed very light indeed. It's all a matter of who you compare yourself with, right?
Anyway, I should probably go and prepare my lesson material and read my notes for tomorrow... fun fun... wish me luck, I'm a bit nervous about teaching in front of people... hope you're all well! :)
Today is our day off training, but tomorrow we have five consecutive days of 11am-8pm training. It's going to be full on and we'll have to teach real Japanese students three different lessons. The lessons seem very formulaic though, so once you get used to it it should be easy enough.
Nikko was really nice. It was a lot of effort to get there - took about 7 hours from Kyoto, and as usual I took a train I didn't intend to take... But it was really stunning there, and I got a free room upgrade. I had a double room, my own personal dining room, and the hot springs bath was really fantastic after a long day walking around in the cool.
It's funny, sometimes I travel in a kind of 'I've heard of this place, I think I'll go there' way, without really knowing where I'm going. For example I went to Lake Chuzenji from Nikko, not realising it was up in the mountaing. We went up 700m in altitude - it was a stunning bus ride - and you could feel a tangible drop in temperature up the top!
In one of the temples - they all sell good-luck charms - I saw a 'dragon arrow talisman'. This item 'protects from misfortune for eternity'. When I saw that I thought 'for 3000 yen, an eternity without misfortune is a pretty good deal'!
I'm very adept at recognising the katakana for 'cappuccino' now.
I had dinners at my ryokan in Nikko, and I couldn't believe it. It took me a full hour to eat. My first night, I sat down and there were only about five small dishes in front of me. I thought 'bonus! This is achievable! I can eat all of this!' Five minutes later, a lady came in with eight more dishes... oh well...
Sometimes I can hardly believe what I'm eating. There are occasions where I don't even know whether it's meat or vegetable. Still, I can be more adventurous at dinner than breakfast. There are lots of pickled or vinegar-y flavours. The other night I had whole anchovies, and what looked like the cross-section of a fish, including all its internal organs, only the whole thing was a dark, ominous, purplish-grey.
Sometimes I feel like Bill Murray in 'Lost in Translation'. You know the part where he's filming the TV commercial, and the director gives him heaps and heaps of instructions - just talks on and on - and then the translator gives a three-word translation. It's so true. You'll be on a train and there'll be this very lengthy spiel in Japanese, talking about arrival times and which stations you'll stop at, and it will be followed by the English:
"The train at platform 8 is going to Joyo."
Yes, thank you.
Better still is when they cut off the 'unnecessary' English translations in mid-sentence, eg: "The train at platform 9 is the local train bound for -". Yes? Bound for where?
I saw a food stall with the interesting sign:
"Would you like to have a Rice Clacker?"
I decided I would like to have a rice clacker, but I regretted it. It wasn't very nice, and like most things I buy here, it went in the bin.
I actually bought a jar of Vegemite today. I'm such a sad Australian...
Last week I actually had my first ever Big Mac, in Kyoto. I was fairly unimpressed with it; it was a pretty sad excuse for a burger, in my opinion. But I've never eaten Hungry Jacks or Maccas burgers, I'm used to home-made ones, or gourmet ones, or even fish-and-chip shop ones, so this was pretty sad in comparison.
All this trip, surrounded by the Japanese who are light packers, I've felt like I've had a ridiculously excessive amount of luggage with me. It hasn't helped that I've been hauling it around several cities and train stations. But compared with most of the other new recruits, I've packed very light indeed. It's all a matter of who you compare yourself with, right?
Anyway, I should probably go and prepare my lesson material and read my notes for tomorrow... fun fun... wish me luck, I'm a bit nervous about teaching in front of people... hope you're all well! :)
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