Today Kuniko and I went back to work after a relatively relaxing weekend. The students today were a lot more quiet and obedient, mainly because Nozaki sensei wrote a message on the whiteboard in Japanese telling them that if they spoke a lot of Japanese they wouldn’t get a snack at the end of the day. I didn’t explicitly point out the sign until some kids started acting up, and then that brought them back to earth. The real test will be on Friday with the hyperactive girl class.
So the classes today were a lot of fun, and I’m starting to settle into a groove and a pace that I’m comfortable with. Nozaki sensei has left it all up to me as far as what I teach, how close I stick to the textbook, and even if I use the textbook at all. The textbook is pretty high level for the students. The teacher’s manual says hilarious stuff like “have the students make groups and discuss what they did during Golden Week, what they wanted to do but couldn’t, and why they couldn’t do it.”
Yeah, right. Some of my students can’t even say “Saturday”.
However, with the flexibility I have I can adjust the lesson a little bit to suit the level of the students. The third class today was with some of my favorite students. Mana, the child genius, arrived early, so we sat and had a very smooth conversation in English about what she did during Golden Week. She politely answered my question and then politely asked about my Golden Week. Child genius, I tell you!
During their lesson we introduced a new word, “tacos”. I tried to explain them, but it is a tough concept to get. Instead I produced a bottle of Tapatio to smell. They were really excited that there was something unusual in the classroom. I passed it around and everyone smelled it. Everyone agreed that it smelled “dangerous”. I was surprised at the end of the class when they asked if they could put some of the sauce on their Umaibo snacks. I said sure, and I delivered one microscopic drop on each Umaibo stick. Ryu was saying “no problem, no problem” and then he flung himself to the floor crying out in exaggerated pain. The other students started complaining of the heat and visibly sweating. I thought it was turning out as a bad idea, but the students begged for more, and Ryu and Shota wanted to have some kind of competition about who could handle the most hot sauce. I cut off the experiment there, but the students asked me to bring it next week – they loved it.
I have noticed that Japan has been flirting with spicier foods over the past year or two, and maybe I am sort of doing some grassroots work myself to try to get more spicy foods on the market. Nowadays it’s not unusual to see Habanero and Jalapeno on the labels of snack foods in Japan, even though they aren’t nearly the spice level that I was used to in America. Good progress, though!
The last class of the night was for junior high school students. They are a quiet class and have a lot of work to do before they loosen up. It’s nothing that three beers each and a lot of gyoza wouldn’t solve, but that’s out of the question so instead I have to let the slow march of time relax them.
There were a lot of times where I felt like a comic bombing in Vegas – lots of students looking at me blankly hoping that I won’t ask them directly. Finally after plenty of uncomfortable silence I had to start calling on people. They answer in the quietest voices possible. The material is pretty tough, too. I think I may wander away from the textbook a little more in the future and play more games with them until they relax more. It was downright spooky how quiet they were tonight.
Kuniko and I arrived at the train station at the same time, and we walked home together. Interesting how before we would go to work together, now we’re coming home together. I had a huge headache so Kuniko cooked up some ã•ã‚„ãˆã‚“ã©ã†ã®åµã¨ã˜ (sayaendou no tamago toji) which was a great way to use up the snap peas that we had gotten from Kuniko’s family. I crashed out early because of my headache – I hope it’s gone by tomorrow.
