Teaching in a foreign, foreign land

I was invited to participate in a team-teaching seminar at Yachiyo Senior High School. If you have never heard me mention this school before, that is because it is not one of my schools, but that of a fellow ALT. However this ALT currently has visitors from The States, and I was invited to fill his position for this day.

I had to teach at my normal Thursday school in the morning (Koga 2nd) and then I got to leave early for my business trip. Because of my paranoia about getting lost while I am driving here, I gave myself plenty of time to get to Yachiyo. Turns out the drive is only about 40 minutes from Koga, but I gave myself and hour and a half...haha. I always rather be early than apologizing for being late.

When I arrived I was greeted warmly by the Principal (an ex-English teacher) and we had a delightful conversation. We discussed his past travels around the world and his love of golf. He told me about his nephew who works for Bearing Point here in Japan, but studied for his MBA in Ireland. As has become the norm when I meet new Japanese people, he asked about my politics and thoughts about the recent election. The secretary served us green tea and a small cookie.

When my teaching partner, Bob, arrived we launched into the lesson plan and some preparation. Bob is an American and has been living in Japan for about 20 years now. He is a professor at a prestigious teacher's college here in Ibaraki. He created the plan for the class and was just filling me in on the details of my role. Since neither Bob nor myself were familiar with the students at Yachiyo, we had no clue what their level or even their interest in English would be. The Japanese teachers who actually knew the students only said that their level was very low.

The first activity Bob planned was for us to play a board game in which the students would have to roll a die, move their pieces and when they landed on a space, they had to ask a question of someone to seek information. We split the 31 students class into 11 groups to make for faster game play. On the board there were questions they could ask each other, questions for the principal, Bob and myself. It was a lot of fun for me, because as they were playing, a student would shout my name from across the room to get my attention to ask me a question. They were all so eager to play and ask the questions; I was very impressed by them. After this game was over, we asked the students to write sentences about the facts they learned about one another during the game. They had to write these sentences from memory and had to write as many as they could to get a prize (homemade chocolate chip cookies!). Again, even with the more difficult task, the students excelled and jumped at the chance to try!

It was a really fun class and I would consider it to have been an extremely successful exhibition. After the class was finished the 7 English teachers in the school, Bob and myself had a debriefing session. Bob discussed his different techniques for teaching and practicing grammar with the students. I even got to discuss a newspaper activity I did at Koga 1st. It was neat that my opinions and lesson ideas were being considered by seasoned teachers. I was also happy to relay my successful experience with a lesson that I was trepidacious about doing with the students in the first place.

I am learning more and more that teaching is not the profession for me. But along the way I am having a lot of fun and really trying to connect with some of the students. I will figure out some way to work with kids in the future; probably through volunteer work. :)