Ingenuity

I planned a lesson for my classes yesterday that involved a board game and asking each other questions in English. Now, usually an important component of a board game is a device that determines how players progress down the game board. I think the most natural selections are either dice or spinners. My plan was to buy dice at the hyaku en shop (dollar store) and bring them to school. When I arrived at school yesterday morning, I was reviewing the plan with Endo-sensei and I realized that I had completely forgotten about dice! In her very Japanese way, Endo-sensei apologizes to me for me forgetting the dice. I tell her, no I am the one who is very sorry it is my fault that I forgot dice. In response she says, "Thank you for saying that!" I tell her that I will walk across the street and purchase dice during second period before our third period class. She looks hesitant but says okay.

Now, I feel like a dope and I start trying to rack my brain thinking of ways to solve this problem without going across the street. It hits me, and I run over to the one internet computer this school has and bogart it for about 30 seconds as I do a Google images search for "make-your-own dice." The first image that pops up is perfect, so I click on the image, do a copy and then paste it into a word document. I resize the image to make it just a tad bigger and then I copy and paste six images to a page - I wanted to play the game with 10 groups, so I needed a lot of dice. I print my page, make a second copy and grab some different color highlighters, and some small paper fasteners that have a bit of weight to them. Back at my desk I sit there contemplating for a moment. I have no scissors nor glue and most of the teachers are not in the room for me to ask. So I just wait for the first person I see and ask to borrow their scissors and glue. I start my little arts and crafts project. I color the dice with highlighters, cut out the pattern. The adorable little adjunct science teacher that sits next to me, sees what I am doing and offers to help me!! He cuts out all my dice and then has to rush to class. I continue working on my little project; folding on every line, applying glue where necessary and dropping a fastener inside of each die before sealing it completely. I knew that little paper die were going to be too light to work well, so I thought that something inside would give them a little weight; it totally worked! Another teacher sees what I am doing and again offers to help me! We made twelve dice in less than an hour and they all worked!

Endo-sensei saw what I had done and asked the teacher helping me, "Was that your idea?" And the teacher said, "No, it was all Annelyse." I was pretty happy about being able to trouble shoot so quickly and really thankful for the help and supplies that the other teachers gave me! And just to show that students are wholly unaware of what their teachers go through for them...

...Once I got to class and the students started playing the game, one of the students completely destroyed one of my dice and then refused to play the game and left his team without a means to play either. Brat!