Never too old to learn!

My year 11 students are making English brochures about different countries. As an example, I researched and made a brochure about Iceland. I choose it because it’s not a place they’ve probably ever thought about, which worked out well as I found lots of interesting stuff!

* Iceland is the 4th happiest country in the world.

* The famous foods of Iceland include boiled sheep heads and rotten shark. And yes I mean rotten as in left to rot for months before being eaten!

* Most people in Iceland believe in elves.

* They still keep to the ancient tradition of using patronyms rather than family names. Someone called Magnus Peturson is Magnus, son of Peter. If Magnus has a daughter, she might be called Margret Magnusdottir. Also women don’t change their names when they get married so, as often happens, a wife, husband, son and daughter of the same family can all have different surnames!

Cool stuff!

I <3 Hitsuyukan!

My students are so talented – I love the culture festival at school as each club (sport, music, culture) put on a show for the entire school. For anyone not in a club, they have the challenge of making food, snacks and drinks and selling them in the classrooms during the two hour lunch group. With a school as big as Hitsuyukan, and kids as talented as this lot, it’s no wonder the festival lasts two days!

http://public.fotki.com/supergenki/august-2008--aloha-/culture-festival/

New Gadgets!

I have toyed with the idea of buying a word tank for a few months so when an ALT decided to sell his fairly new one; I jumped at the chance. I have a feeling I will be spending a lot of time “playing” with it before I get the hang of it as all the instructions are in Japanese!



Still it looks pretty!

A Special Happy Birthday!

With Lots of Love xxx

Amakusa Roadtrip

What a fun day – I can’t believe I didn’t take my camera : (

Today we went kayaking with Carrie, David and their friend Shunsuke. It was the first time I had been since a year 7 school trip and so I wasn’t sure how well it would go. It turned out we would be sea kayaking in Amukusa and it was a great day.

David fell out of his canoe just after we’d set off but luckily he as the only one. I really enjoyed it and hope to go back as long as I don’t have to do any of the rolling overboard stuff. I can’t even jump in a pool without holding my nose.

After all that excitement we drove around Amakusa, finally settling for a curry lunch (best curry I have ever had) before heading to the beach for a swim and shell hunting. Carrie and I were having a secret competition for the best shells and I think I won!



Can’t wait to go again but winter is coming so we’ll have to wait for spring!

Warakimasen!

At last my students know how difficult it is to answer questions about your own language. For my 3-7 class today the students were given the task of teaching me Japanese in English. They were being marked on how well they made themselves understood and how well they could answer the questions I asked them.

Everyone could explain their given points easily enough but when I asked why things were said a certain way you saw the panic on their faces.

For example they taught me that in Japanese the verb to cook is ryouyi wo suru.
I asked how to say “I cooked curry” in Japanese.
My student answered “curry wo tsukurimashita” lit. “I made curry”
I asked her why they don’t say “curry wo ryouri wo surimashita”
The panic started!

They all agreed it was harder than they thought to explain their language but they had a lot of fun doing it!

Another Movie Review

It seems the last few weeks have been about catching up on recent movies. Tonight Dawn and I went out for dinner and then noticed that the cinema was showing special previews of Wanted. Needless to say we ended up watching it.

I know the movie is being criticized for glamorizing gun use and I would have to admit that the movie posters don’t do much to help their case. However the movie itself was entertaining (even if the train scene was unbelievable) and the final shoot out – very cool!

ARGH!!!!!

I am not having a good week. Sometimes people have no idea that the things they absent mindedly say can have a devastating effect on the people they say them too.

A Must See

The SATC movie is so good. When Aska asked me to go see it, I wasn’t expecting too much but I cried 3 times during the movie and the clothes are unreal. I loved the story and the ending was true to SATC style.

My favourite character in the movie was Charlotte “I curse the day you were born!” ha ha! Seriously if you’ve ever been in love, been hurt, or had a friend who’s been in love or been hurt, this film will bring back all those feelings.

Alternatively if you’re just in it to see the clothes – you will love the Vogue photo shoot scene.

Love it or Hate it?

Classes are going well this week. The chapter in the text book is about different food from around the world. As part of the “internationalization” aspect of my job, I decided to introduce the kids to Marmite! A few of the kids actually like it but most of them can’t believe we would eat something so horrible. I actually think a few of them, who didn’t listen and insisted on trying a large blob of it, will be scarred for life.

We have also been singing “My Heart Will Go On” as a warm up during classes and it is a lot more popular than I thought it would be. Everyone knows the song and most people enjoy trying to sing it. I even got a few boys to volunteer to be Jack and we had a Kate and Leo moment in front of the class as the song ended – a great laugh was had by all!

First Day Back

I’m not sure why they bother using the expression “summer holiday” in Japan.

After one day back at school, I quickly realized that the students and teachers haven’t really had a holiday at all. Most of them had to come to school everyday for classes and the only time they had off was a three-day break because of the Japanese festival of Obon.

Hopes of returning to refreshed and eager students were quashed as most of them were falling asleep in the opening ceremony – oh well!

One great piece of news from the summer is that my school’s Taiko Team (Japanese drumming) is officially the number one team in Japan. After winning the Kumamoto championships they went to Tokyo to compete during the summer and returned victorious. After practicing every day for 4 hours I know they deserve it!

Unfortunately all the other clips I have of them are too big to upload and I only have this one!