I’m so glad that I remembered to tell this story – I saw this early this morning on the way to work and I remember thinking that I’d forget it for sure. Luckily for you, I didn’t.
I was walking to work near the Mikuriya shrine, and it was raining. Not a ton of rain, just a hard sprinkle really. As I turned a corner a lady was walking my direction with a tiny dog on a leash. The dog was wearing a whole raingear ensemble. First, he had a pink slicker that covered his whole body, including a little flap that went over his head. The lady must have been worried about his little paws, because she had wrapped each of his four legs with plastic grocery bags, and secured them with rubber bands. The dog walked past me making that plastic bag sound as he trotted along, and he even peered up at me from under the pink rainsuit. He didn’t seem embarrassed at all.
At school I had three classes, but before my classes began I got a chest X-ray along with all the other students and teachers. It was free, so what the heck. They had a bus that pulled up and we just lined up, walked in, and we got zapped.
I had my first two classes with the new students, and they were polar opposites. The first class was with Mr. Oshita, and if you take the “a” out of his name it pretty much describes his attitude about team teaching. I didn’t even know he was an English teacher until the end of my second term at my school. He did such a great job of hiding and avoiding me that I never knew. Well, now his time had come.
He walked in and he was so nervous. He was doing a nervous giggle, his hands shook, and he was stuttering, even in Japanese. Luckily, the class was perfect for him. The first class was full of students that were quiet, obedient, and basically sat quietly and watched me in amazement. The pressure was off Mr. Oshita, and that helped a lot. He started to calm down, and we did about 90% of the class in English, which is a new record. I think that number will start to slide over time, but it went really well. The class seemed really interested and I think they’ll be more energetic as they get to know us.
The next period was the exact opposite, and I was teaching with “tough as nails” Ms. Terano. She’s a really nice teacher with a great attitude but not a lot of confidence in her English. It’s quite good, but she’s just scared to try. She did a great introduction for our class, and then I did my introduction.
Sometimes the free format that I do can be helpful for students to relax. These guys were very relaxed. They were walking around the classroom, making lots of noise, and being really disruptive.
Except everyone was speaking English.
These kids were pretty good – not all the English made sense, and often it was strange mixes of popular band names and commands, but the last thing I’m going to do is yell at somebody to stop speaking English. It was great. Ms. Terano was kind of like a deer in the headlights, and I don’t think she knew whether to yell at everyone or congratulate them.
Finally I regained a little control by introducing another activity, and that seemed to get everyone focused. I introduced the idea of a bonus point system that we did last year, and they really liked that. I asked a couple of easy questions to get them used to the idea, and pretty soon people were scrambling to get my attention and speak English. It was great!
After class ended about eight girls came up to ask me questions, and proclaim their love for me. I just smiled and said “thanks”. Ms. Terano looked a little disturbed by their behavior but probably it was because it was the first time she has taught with me. One of the boys walked by Ms. Terano as he left and said “Very young beautiful teacher!” in English. That really flustered her.
After school my ESS members met up to eat snacks, play cards and hope for new students to drop in. Today we had a couple of girls show up, but they were pretty scared. They said that they have to join a club, and I think we were last on the list. We poured them some drinks, gave them some snacks, and put on “Pirates of the Caribbean” on the TV. We watched the first quarter or so.
The new students said they would consider the club and took off, so the rest of us talked for a while, and then we broke up the meeting and went home.
On the way home there was kind of a zen moment as I walked by the cherry trees by the temple. The blossoms are falling now, and the air was full of fluttering petals heading slowly to the ground. There was a little kid standing under the trees trying to catch the petals as they fell, and they slipped between his fingers as they fell all around him. I didn’t have my camera with me today, but I realized that it was one of those moments that isn’t quite the same on film. I was glad that I was there to see it.
