So today was going pretty well, until my worst nightmare came true.
My teaching schedule at Takasago Minami is pretty complex. Every week I teach the first year students, but each class of 40 is split into two classes of 20. That means that we alternate weeks. The second years I teach in classes of 40, but they only come every other week. There are many times that they cancel classes, and so I need to keep track of the class that was cancelled, and then be ready to move my lesson to the next time we meet. With so many things going on, and with several holidays and school events going on, it gets a bit tricky.
Mr. Hayashi had to go this afternoon to help with a judo event, so he asked me to teach his class alone. Again, this is supposed to be against the rules, but things seem a bit lax around my school. According to my notes, these students had already sat through my first introductory lesson, so I printed out worksheets and notes for lesson two, and then went up to teach the lesson.
The first indication of trouble was when I tried to collect the homework from the last lesson. I got a totally blank stare from the students. I’m used to blank stares, I actually get them a lot here in Japan. As you’ve no doubt guessed by now, it turns out that this was the first time that I was teaching this class. Now I was standing in front of some expectant students with the wrong lesson plan, no handouts for my introduction, no Japanese teacher of English, and 45 minutes to kill. Ouch.
I ended up going through my introduction very quickly, and then jumping into my second lesson. It actually worked out pretty well. The students were a rowdy bunch, especially since there was no teacher to talk them down in Japanese. One of the students was intent on arm wrestling with me, and it was a pretty hectic scene for a while. The only good news was that there were none of my teachers there to see the train wreck.
Tomorrow I’m going to put together a spreadsheet to organize my classes and lessons. I don’t want to get burned again.
