Cultural differences - debating and shyness

A couple of minor cultural difference I've really noticed this week... (Of course any time you talk about cultural differences, you're generalising. Plenty of Japanese people *don't* fit this mold. But I'm just talking from my own observations...)

Debating

Hmmm... a couple of weeks ago, I was talking to one of Jim's advanced-level students about the Japanese education system. He commented that Japanese people generally have poor debating skills, since students don't really practice or develop such skills in school. He asked me, 'have you noticed that your students can't debate a topic?'

I hadn't noticed it, but today, we were having a debate topic in our advanced level class, and I thought he had a point.

Now, these students have perfectly adequate English skills to communicate arguments. It's just that they didn't really *make* arguments supporting their case. Rather, they kept restating the same facts in different ways. The facts were loosely related to the topic but didn't really support their argument. When I asked them to try to rebut the opponent's ideas, what they said actually *corroborated* those ideas, rather than refuted them.

It's actually strange to see this kind of thing happen. None of the Japanese students really made any 'proper' arguments. (This is not to say that no Japanese people *can*. I've seen other debates, and know of two or three students who can do it quite well. But it seems like Jim's student was right.)

They just couldn't seem to marshal their thoughts in that way - meanwhile, our Mexican student had no problem making several strong arguments for his position.

You realise that you are the product of the training you had at school. The Japanese educational system, of course, has its strong points, but I suspect that debating is not a mental exercise they really practice there...

Shyness

It's a common stereotype that Japanese people are shy. Plenty of my students are not shy. But on the whole, yes, I think Japanese people in general are definitely more shy and reserved than Westerners.

For example, we often have beginner prospective students come in. They - especially the women - are often terrified to meet, and be spoken to by, a foreigner. Even though Jim is charm and personableness itself, and don't think I'm particularly intimidating, they are often very timid and nervous, and find it hard to say anything.

Imagine a similar situation in Australia. For example, if you want to learn Spanish, you go into a Spanish school. There, the director speaks to you in Spanish for a while so he can evaluate your level and decide which class to put you in.

Now, you might think, 'ehh, my Spanish is pretty poor and I can't say everything I want to. I can't understand everything he says, so I might feel a bit stupid. But after all, this is a school for learning Spanish. They must get heaps of people in who can't speak any Spanish at all. This is their job, just to work out how much I know. No big deal.'

Few Aussies would get nervous about such an 'interview'. I can't imagine a single Australian I know sitting in paralysed fear when someone tried to speak to them in a friendly way. But in Japan I've met a number of people who respond that way - often, when the manager comes out to ask you to speak to them, she warns you 'she's very nervous about meeting a foreigner'. So you try extra hard to smile and be kind and soft-spoken.

I'm aware that even my normal manner, which I intend to be friendly, can sound a bit brisk and intimidating to these people who are really, really shy... I feel like I often screw up with these very sensitive people; you have to be very careful to leave them feeling positive about their interaction with you, but sometimes I mess up by asking them questions they can't answer, or I don't enunciate my words clearly enough (an ongoing problem with me).

Another difference is in the lobby. It's rare that a student will come up to me and say hello, if I'm standing there, or have just finished talking to someone else. In a week, maybe half a dozen of the 300+ students would come up to me, but most wouldn't. It's especially rare that any new person would come up to you and introduce themselves.

Sure, I'm the teacher; it's my job to make an effort. But you must agree that if you were in Australia, people would readily come up to you and chat. Again, I remember my old French school and the atmosphere there. Lots of people chatting to each other and to their teachers. But here, even students in the same class will rarely speak to each other in the lobby. That's not to say the lobby is cold and unfriendly. Especially during the evenings, there's often a pleasant buzz as students talk to the managers and teachers. But it's usually the teachers who facilitate it...

Positives :)

Since I mentioned a couple of 'negatives', it's only fair to mention a couple of positives. I'm impressed by how hard working so many students are. They really do a lot of homework, and do it faithfully each week. And, so many of these students work overtime every day. I've had students say they work until 10, or midnight, every day. Some of them work weekends. Yet they still come to class.

The other thing is that everyone is really nice. Over 300 students in the school, and not one person I dislike. Everyone smiles, they're pleasant; nobody is obnoxious; people are considerate of each other and polite, they give everyone an opportunity to speak. It's rare to have a student who tries to dominate conversations, and even more rare to find a student who will argue with anyone in any way!

***

Hmmm... anyway, it's all interesting, isn't it!

I'm pretty chuffed that one new student decided to join a class after a trial lesson he took with me. He said the class atmosphere was fun. I don't know why it is that some lessons go so smoothly and are fun, and others are woeful. I think it's usually dependent on the specific mix of students, and (I guess) on how readily I can think of appropriate things to do in the lesson. I don't do very thorough lesson preparation - there's no time - so the exact things I do in a lesson are a bit hit-and-miss.

I was a bit nervous about his taking that particular class, because the previous week, that same class was an absolute stinker. It was boring, I was ill-prepared and continually shuffling through papers (I'd done my lesson prep earlier in the day, but then later someone had put new lesson materials in, so I got confused), and I spent five minutes failing to explain the key grammar point. (What do you say when someone asks you 'what is the difference between 'I tried to do my homework' and 'I tried doing my homework'?!)

You do get some challenging questions sometimes. Today I got asked: "please tell me the nuance, what's the difference between 'She's too young to have a boyfriend' and 'She's too young to start seeing boys'?" 'Nuance' questions often strike fear into my heart, haha... "What's the difference between 'help me' and 'help me out'?"

Anyway, I'm rambling on... I need to do some sewing and get my immigration stuff together, not to mention wash some dishes (not to mention clean my apartment; it's Disgraceful again. I've been looking for my makeup bag for the last week, but this place is such a sty I still haven't found it. And this is only a one-room apartment!! Today a student said to me 'you look really tired!' (I don't think she meant to be unkind, haha) which made me think, I should really start putting on makeup for work again... I stopped doing it because my bathroom is so small, the mirror gets completely wet and fogged for about two hours after every shower, so I can't see in it in the mornings.)

Yawnnnn... I need to buy some new work clothes too. I am having very bad luck with shirts. Three of my shirts have stretched so that I can't wear them any more; two need sewing; one I bought for mid-winter and realised I can never wear because it's far too warm indoors, seriously it's literally 29 degrees in our office of an evening, and outside it's about 4... geez... both pairs of work trousers have also stretched slightly. It's so annoying. Why must I buy new clothes only a few months after I bought the old ones?

My temporary enjoyment of shopping in Japan has since abated and I'm back to hating going clothes shopping...

Anyway I really should get offline... it's, like, 1:40am...