When I go into a classroom, especially one that’s not mine, the students are almost always expecting a show. I have a couple of classes with Mr. Hayashi where I just repeat a few lines for pronunciation practice and that’s it. Most of the time I’m running the show, and these kids expect entertainment.
Today I had three classes which I’ve dubbed “Anything Classes”. The teachers have me come in one day a week and I can do anything I want. I was about to say “anything I want within reason” but no such limitations have been placed upon me yet.
Some of the students see it as an opportunity to catch up on their other homework, some sit there captivated, hanging on every word, some fall asleep, and some watch me politely and wonder what the heck I’m saying.
Today Mr. Yamamoto had asked me to do a couple of things that I would consider pretty boring if I were a student there. One was dictation using the new vocabulary words that they have been memorizing. I made four sentences using the vocab and then read them off. The students dutifully tried to copy down what I said. Usually small problems with the difference between my accent and Mr. Yamamoto’s throw them off.
After that the class was all mine, so I had them read an original story that I wrote about learning how to drive and the fate of my first car. They liked the story – they couldn’t believe that you could be behind the wheel at sixteen years old. The age here is eighteen, but it’s prohibitively expensive to get a car and drive right away.
After that, I passed out a word search puzzle using their new vocabulary. As everyone was thinking about how boring this was going to be, I reached under the desk and pulled out a bag of mini-Oreos. That perks the students right up. I told them the rules and said the first one up to the front of the class with everything found would win the sugar.
The students really get into it – the class is almost humming with excitement. You can bet that no Japanese teacher has thrown down a prize during class – I know that it rarely happened to me in my high school days. For about eight minutes all the students are hunched over their papers trying to find all the words. One kid got a nosebleed but didn’t want to go to the nurse because he would miss out on the chance to win. One of my winners came up to the front of the class with shaking hands. This is high stakes stuff here. We’re talking about a bag of Oreos!
My other class was with Mr. Hayashi, and we were doing pronunciation practice. Mr. Hayashi decided to have some fun – he had me try to pronounce some Japanese words. The kids were laughing at my pronunciations – and I think it made them feel a little better. It’s easy to get discouraged, but when we were joking around trying to pronounce “Fukuoka” it was nice for them to see I was human, too.
I also spoke with Mr. Hayashi and got the low-down on Thursday. It’s the first day of mid-term examinations, and in the afternoon we are going to try to play a teacher’s softball game. After school, Mr. Hayashi invited me to a BBQ at his place. He’s going to have a veal tenderloin that he bought directly from his favorite restaurant in Kobe. We’re going to eat that with a cheap Chianti and tell stories in Japanese. It should be good practice for me.
I also managed to negotiate an abbreviated schedule on Friday, Monday and Tuesday. I will be working just a couple of hours each day and then I’ll be free to do whatever I want. Now I just have to think about what to do. None of my friends are on the same schedule, and Kuniko has to work, so whatever it is will have to be local, and solo. Hmmm… what would you do?
There was a big PTA meeting in the afternoon so I snuck out early, and came home to cook up some gyuudon. Mine never comes out like the cafeteria’s, but I’ve decided that it’s because the grade of beef that I use is probably much higher. I’ll just have to enjoy the homemade stuff.
