Today I had three classes of first year students, and I spent one class working with Miyake sensei, so it ended up being four morning classes in a row.
The first year classes were fun. Two of the classes had students that weren’t so shy and were pretty comfortable with me right off the bat. The last class had a pretty quiet class who were a little intimidated. Still, even that class had students that were talking to me at the end.
Two of my classes today were taught with Mori sensei, who seems to overprepare for everything. She worked hard on her self-introduction, and it went pretty well. She timed every single activity that we did and really tried to control the flow of the class. That’s usually something I do, and so I kind of wrestled control from her early on and didn’t give it up. In the beginning of the first class Mori sensei was telling the students in a stern voice, “This is English class. You… will… have… FUN.” I prefer the more natural approach, so I kind of steered it that direction. I was pleased to see that the activities that I had suggested went well.
Not to jump all over Mori sensei, but during her introduction she was listing all the countries that she had visited, because she likes to travel. She said, “I have ever been to France. I have ever been to Viet Nam. I have ever been to…” I think I physically flinched every time she misused the phrase, like somebody was whipping me. The worst part was that she has been to a lot of countries, so she was saying it over and over – really branding it into the kids’ English learning. I know better than to correct her in front of the students, so I had to wait and mention it to her between classes, and then it got straightened out. I hate to think what she is teaching in her other 15 English classes.
The other teacher, Nozaki sensei, was a pleasure to teach with. It turns out that she has been featured on television for her skills on the abacus. She showed a picture of one of her appearances on a variety show (on a segment called “The Super-Housewife Next Door”). It was cool to see her talk about the abacus and how much she loves using it. She reacted well to the flow of the class and at the end said she really enjoyed it.
After my classes finished I headed back to the staffroom, and passed by a few of the first year students that I had taught during first period. They all smiled and said hello to me, and I could tell that before long I’ll have a lot more students that are more confident using English.
I was free in the afternoon, and by the time I had lunch and rested up a bit it was already the sixth period. Time flies when you have a bunch of classes.
After school I went into Kobe to meet up with Kuniko and Antoine. On the way I walked through Akashi park to take pictures of cherry blossoms – it was still quite beautiful even though the weather was cloudy.
Antoine ended up having some trouble arriving on time – he had another engagement that he couldn’t escape right away. When he arrived we walked down the street to a Mexican restaurant that I had heard about for a little while but hadn’t tried yet.
It turned out to be quite good, and quite affordable. We ordered a Mexican salad, some appetizers, two burritos, and two tacos, and the whole thing was only around 5000 yen with drinks. The food was great – very tasty and very fresh.
Afterwards we walked along the Motomachi to Kobe station, and then wandered around Harborland until we found a dessert-type restaurant that was open. It was a cheesecake place, but we had no idea until our order arrived that they were being very literal when they said “cheesecake”. It was a small round white cake, with fondue-like cheese melted over the top. Nobody could decide if it was good or not – certainly one of the stranger things that I have eaten. This coupled with our waiter who was not completely masculine – turned out to be a weird night.
Kuniko and I got home exhausted, and we went right to bed. What a long day… I posted some pictures from today here.
