another universal teaching truth

You can't make people want to learn. I don't care if they're children, teenagers, adults - whatever. Age doesn't matter, nationality doesn't matter, NOTHING matters. If there is no motivation, you can't make 'em learn.

Lately, head office has been coming down on our shisha (region) because of high cancellation rates and low renewal rates. Last week, I spent an hour in a v-chat where the primary message seemed to be "students are quitting/not renewing, and it's ALL YOUR FAULT. Quit blaming the economy, quit blaming job transfers, quit making excuses. Let's face it - you need to be better!"

(Talk about encouraging a lack of motivation . . .)

Sure, it's possible for teachers to increase motivation. I'll accept that. If a person is a really great teacher - I mean, really stupendous, totally has the whole thing down - then maybe they can get their students so pumped up about it that they'll keep coming back even when they don't really want to.

I am not a great teacher. I believe that 90% of motivation comes from within. I can't generate it for them. I can enjoy myself and take my job seriously, but I can't force people to want to study English. Now, that doesn't mean that I don't do the best I can. I love my job, and I want to do it well. That helps some - my students see how enthusiastic I am about English, and they think it's kind of cute. It makes them feel like I'm here because I want to be here and not because I need the money (which is true, wholly and completely - the money doesn't mean jack to me, not really). I can encourage my students and guide them and help them and amuse and educate them in class. But if they don't WANT to learn, there's not a whole lot I can do about that. Granted, this is my philosophy because it's the way I operate, but on the whole, I've found it to be mostly true. If they don't HAVE to do it, people won't do it unless they want to.

(Unless they're like me and they'll only do things they want to do, PERIOD.)

I will note that though Moriya's renewal rate is not great (it's over 50%, which is good enough for me), our successful interview rate is around 90%, and we pulled in 7 new students last month. As far as numbers are concerned, I still have about 75 students and 30 classes. Maybe we're not doing phenomenal work, but we're making ends meet, and that's enough to make me happy.

"on the road again"

Leaving for my vacation tomorrow! Will spend two nights at a hostel near Mt. Hakone, followed by one night at a very nice and expensive hotel near Mt. Fuji. Then, on Sunday, I'm heading into Tokyo for the St. Patrick's Day Parade. So totally looking forward to this. Should have plenty of pictures when I get back.

Also, I will be moving. It hasn't been made fully official yet, but I am being transferred to the school in Moriya, in Ibaraki prefecture. I'm told that it's one of GEOS newer schools and that it's one of the company's fastest growing schools. My boss informed me that they need a teacher who is "strong and independent." This sounds like praise and recognition, doesn't it? I think it means that this may be a challenging position. And that may just mean that I'm a terrible cynic. Either way, challenges are okay with me. The majority of my students will be adults, and that's all I ask for.

Though I will be working in Moriya, I will be living in Matsudo, which is in Chiba prefecture and very close to Tokyo. One of my students also informed me that it's close to Disneyland, which she should know well enough because she is a frequent visitor to said theme park. That's fantastic (and that's sarcastic), but it's not like I'll be living IN Disneyland, so there. I will have to commute to work by train, so there's that to consider.

This news has been disappointing to my students, though. Even some of them who are cancelling were a little upset - as Naofumi-san pointed out, I could still hang out with my old students if I stayed in Gunma-ken. Rio-chan's mother even said I should come and visit them, and in all seriousness offered to have me as a guest. (Have I mentioned that I love my students? I love my students. They are awesome incarnate.) I'm not sure how many of my classes will transfer to Ito Yokado now, because some of them are already asking about transfering to other GEOS schools.

Which raises other concerns for me. I had an interview today, and despite the move and the changing of teachers, the prospective student decided to sign a contract. This gives my adult interviews a 100% success rate. I do not understand this. It always strikes me as odd when people seem to like me. I've never thought of myself as particularly personable. My greatest concern, however, is how these newer students (there are 3 of them whose contracts start this month) will fare at Ito Yokado. Renewals have not been encouraged, a sub teacher will be put in charge of the adult classes, and Hitomi-san has been told not to open any new classes. I find all this a little distressing, but there's nothing I can do about it, which just irritates me.

Finally, I would like to take this time to affirm my distaste for adverbs. The Sprint 8X lesson this week was all about adverbs, and it was painful. Even Naofumi-san thought it was a little disconcerting. The conversation caused me great emotional trauma from the overuse of its adverbs. I also took offense to the book's suggestion that writers use adverbs to help "describe their characters and their motivations." As a writer myself, I believe that using adverbs is akin to cheating and should not be encouraged. Adverbs should be used only when necessary and not whenever the writer doesn't know how to express herself in detail.

Take, for example, the adverb "clumsily." You can write, "The ballerina danced clumsily." Okay, fine. That'll get the job done. But, suppose you write, "The ballerina tripped over her feet and staggered forward, bumping into male lead and knocking them both off balance." No, it's not perfect, but you get more detail and a better visual idea of what's happening. Creative writing is about forging a mental image of a scene, and that requires details. Adverbs only offer outlines, vague shadows of what is happening.

Yes, I've edited a few things over the years. I've written some crap over the years too. I also read fan-fiction for a while before I decided to give it up for the sake of my sanity. If not used with great care, adverbs can ruin your prose.

In closing, Tom Swifties should be outlawed. That is all.

for more information on the abomination that is a Tom Swifty: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Swifties
(adverbs and puns combined! the horror . . .)

"vacation, all I ever wanted"

The next three posts after this will be about food, I promise. For now, life in general continues to be entertaining enough.

I made a show of thinking things over this past weekend (though, in reality, my mind was already made up), and then on Tuesday, I emailed the CDM trainer and told him that I was grateful for the information he gave me, but ultimately, I was not interested in a CDM contract. I cc'd it to my GEOS trainer as well.

The next day, I received a very polite and very icy reply from the CDM trainer, thanking me for being straightforward about my desires and informing me that he was looking for someone who would actually enjoy the job. It almost sounded like he was turning me down, like I had applied for the job. Benni-sensei read it too, and she said, "Why's he sound mad?" I explained that he'd lost a whole month in job recruitment because someone had mistakenly told him I wanted the job. Now he's under even more pressure. I can understand that he's a little unhappy with the situation. Benni-sensei didn't quite get it, but that's okay. I don't mind people being mad at me.

Then my trainer called and said that he'd met with the CDM trainer, who had basically flat-out refused to work with me. This did not upset me either, because the feeling was mutual. My trainer also sounded a bit irritated with me, especially when he asked me what my Plan B was.

My reply: "Uh, continue working as an adult teacher. Do I have a choice?" I had to explain that I wasn't refusing to go to the Ito Yokado school - I was just refusing to become a CDM teacher. My main complaint this past month was that I was being taken away from my students even when I was going to be present at the school.

Allow me to note that I really do feel like my students are being done a disservice by GEOS. First, the company planned to send them a sub teacher, which suggests to me a short-term situation. Second, we are not supposed to do any contract renewals, despite a couple of students asking to do them. Third, my trainer keeps dismissing their concerns about Ito Yokado as "silly - they'll get over it." The past two weeks, our students have become more vocal about their concerns because we've basically been told not to tell them anything. And then my trainer says, "Just don't say anything that will get them mad at the school." Yeah, that's not really necessary, because by saying nothing, they are getting mad at the company. I have tried to be honest with my students without making GEOS seem like some big bad dragon that has it out for them. Doing that would not make the situation better. But I'm not going to lie to them either. What I haven't done is come out and tell them what I really think, which is that GEOS doesn't care if they go to Ito Yokado or not. And Hitomi-san is 99% convinced that the CDM school would prefer for the adult students to just disappear altogether. She was told to encourage them to cancel their contracts.

My point here is that I'm concerned about my students, and I'm frustrated with GEOS because they aren't doing much to alleviate my concerns.

Then my trainer tells me that he still has to talk to customer service to get an idea of how many adult students are actually going to Ito Yokado. And if only a small number of them are going, then they will have to move me to another school.

"Okay," I said, because that had been the way it was described to me a month ago.

"Well, GEOS will not pay for your moving costs."

"That's alright, I understand."

"Of course, that's not certain. There's no telling if we have a school to send you to. You'll probably have to stay at Ito Yokado for a couple of months."

"I understand that too. It's no problem."

Actually, the idea of leaving Isesaki is not a pleasant one, but I'll do it if I have to. At this point, having lost a good number of my favorite students, I don't feel bad about the idea. And the more I learn about the problems at Ito Yokado, the less certain I feel about working there.

So, here we stand, sure about one thing only: the CDM NET trainer wants nothing doing with me and will not work with me. I consider that a good thing, especially if that means they won't try to recruit me again in the future. I'm sorry that there was this misunderstanding between us, but if he'd spoken to me at the beginning of February (rather than going through third parties, most of whom were Japanese), I would have told him then that I wasn't interested. I'm still not sure where the miscommunication came from, because I never told anybody that I wanted to be a CDM teacher. I didn't even agree to take it into consideration. The first time my trainer spoke to me about it, I told him how I felt. So, I'm sorry the CDM trainer wasted his time believing that I was the solution to his problem. But that doesn't mean I'm going to give in and do what they all wanted me to do. That's just not the way I am.

In other news, I decided to take a vacation, as a number of people have suggested to me. In two weeks, I am going to spend four days in the Mt. Hakone/Mt. Fuji area. I'm staying at a hostel near Mt. Hakone for two nights, then moving to a very posh-looking French-style hotel near Mt. Fuji for one night. I am very much looking forward to this. But, no, I do not plan on climbing Mt. Fuji. That should be saved for a future summer. After much training, I should think.

I am hoping that March turns out to be a nicer month to me than February has (shouldn't be too difficult, considering that February is the cruelest of all months). In addition to the trip to Hakone/Fuji, a group of our students wants to take Benni-sensei and me to Kawagoe, and I'm excited about that, mainly because of how awesome said students are. They're a very amusing group of ladies. And tomorrow night, I'm going to Maebashi for a takoyaki/gyoza party. Ah, see, things are looking better already!

why my students are the awesome

I love my students, I really do. They're all generally nice people, and they work hard and do their best. And they are sincere about things. It's unfortunate (but understandable) that so many of them are cancelling their classes because of the school situation. Some of them have gone to visit Ito Yokado and have come back disappointed. No surprise, because the Ito Yokado school is a joke. In a cruel twist of fate, the punchline is my own misery.

Wait, this is a post about how much I like my students. Right.

First, I don't deserve their praise and loyalty - a number of them are transferring to the Ito Yokado school because I'm going there too. (no word yet on what I'll actually be teaching, but it damn well better be the adult classes . . . that's another rant, and I'm trying to be positive here) Suffice to say that they apparently like the way I teach. Go figure.

Second, they bring me things that they think I'll like. I am terribly unworthy of their gifts and so am very grateful whenever they think of me. That feeling is completely indescribable.

I love wagashi (Japanese sweets), especially daifuku, which most of my students find endearing. The above feast of wagashi was brought to me by a couple who take a private lesson. The yellow blocks are made of a sweet potato paste (delightfully yummy, not too sweet), while the white (plain mochi) and green (mugwort mochi) daifuku are filled with anko. The pink balls are wrapped in oak leaves and are traditional treats for Children's Day in May (though Hitomi-san tells me it's also for Girls' Day in March). It's an interesting combination of flavor - and yes, the oak leaves are completely edible and really make the overall experience worthwhile.

Another of my students likes to make sweet things every once in a while - she's brought cookies and caramels before. On Tuesday, she brought little tarts for everyone. A chocolate-almond tart and a lemon cream tart with fruit. Both of them were absolutely delicious.

And practically all of our students enjoyed the peanut butter balls, which I neglected to take a picture of. Oh, well.

In other news, February continues to suck major chicken balls. And only about 10% of that suckage has to do with the weather.

a failure to communicate

If only I could say it was a language issue, but honestly, I think it's more of a listening issue.

The lady in charge of the Codomo school at Ito Yokado (henceforth known as That Woman) has spent the past two weeks telling us simple folk at GEOS Isesaki what's doing. She does this in such a way that Hitomi-san will drop whatever she's doing and work on whatever it is That Woman wants her to do, despite the fact That Woman is not her boss and, indeed, has no right to tell any of us what to do. She's been making all sorts of decisions and insuinating to Hitomi-san that they are all official.

Note: That Woman has yet to speak directly to me, but she feels she has free reign to decide what to do with me.

Further, That Woman has also yet to have any sort of communication with my trainers, meaning that none of them have approved any of the decisions she's made. These include my schedule and the addition of another GEOS teacher to come to Ito Yokado two days a week to teach. Apparently, she's unconcerned that this other teacher is transferring to another school entirely and isn't available to come to Ito Yokado at all.

I spoke to one of my trainers last Friday, and he assured me that nothing That Woman has decided is official or even likely to happen. Any firm decisions made about me will come from GEOS, not from GEOS Codomo, and thus I should generally ignore anything That Woman says. Which I will gladly do.

So, as far as what the hell I'm doing in the near future is concerned, I know as little about it now as I did two weeks ago. But I do know I should generally ignore That Woman and wait to hear from my trainers before panicking about anything. Also, I am not in danger of becoming a Codomo-only teacher, which is perhaps my greatest fear, the mere thought of which makes me break into a cold sweat. The idea of teaching 30 classes of nothing but children is straight out of a nightmare for me.

The other problem is my co-workers. Don't get me wrong: I adore my co-workers, and they've shown a loyalty to me that I don't think I really deserve. But they're human, so they can be madly infuriating sometimes. One of my male students observed that giving advice to Japanese women is futile because, though they will listen and acknowledge the advice, they will ultimately reject it and continue to bemoan the situation, even if it's a good and reliable solution. I must, sadly, agree with him.

Hitomi-san is the more practical of my co-workers, recognizing the possibility of a bad situation when she sees one and not doing too much moaning about it. She tends to panic though, as she did on Thursday, when she called my trainer 10 times and emailed him thrice. I appreciate her concern, but I suggested that perhaps she was overdoing it a bit.

Benni-sensei, on the other hand, maintains a sentimental outlook on everything and becomes a confused, uncomprehending child whenever faced with something she doesn't like. When my trainer came to visit me last week, she spent half an hour trying to convince him not to close the school, like it was his decision in the first place. Once she gets an idea into her head, she clings to it, no matter how impractical it may be. She's the oldest of us, has more worldly experience, but it seems like sometimes we have to look out for her. She's forgetful, consistently late, terribly laidback, and a major pushover when it comes to kids. I get the feeling she spent too much time in California.

Anyway, my situation remains unchanged. For now, I'm definitely going to Ito Yokado, and the intent is for me to teach all of my old classes. That is, if my students don't all quit when they see how ridiculously small and inconvienent the Ito Yokado school is. However, I've had many of my students tell me (or Benni-sensei) how pleased they are that I will be teaching there, and that many of them want to continue their classes only if I'm their teacher. That's enough to put a bit of a thaw around the cold cockles of my heart. I'm unworthy of such loyalty.

GEOS Isesaki is SOL

GEOS seems to have made its own New Year's resolutions, which appears mainly to be that they will save as much money as possible. They're accomplishing this by closing down quite a few of their schools, and - in a turn of events that is not surprising to me in any way - Isesaki is one of the unlucky ones.

Technically, my school isn't fully closing - it's being merged with the local GEOS Codomo (kids') school, and head office wants us to encourage our students to move over to is. The Codomo school isn't very far away, and since their only other choices are Takasaki (1 hour away by car) or Ota (two hours away by car), head office is hoping that the majority of the students will simply opt for the new location.

Sounds good on paper, right? Merge two schools at the better location, making it more successful, and keep everyone happy in the process. Right, except that ideas that look good on paper rarely work properly in the real world. There are two major flaws in the logic.

1. The Codomo school is TINY. Yes, it's located in the Ito Yokado mall, but it's TINY. It occupies a little corner and is basically constructed of partition boards. There's a very small lobby, a miniscule office, and two average classrooms. The school already has about 70 kid students, and given that I have 40 students, nobody's convinced that schedules can be made to fit the classroom limitations. They could probably add some of the kids to my classes, but my classes are more expensive and aren't set up quite the same.

2. In the official letter to the students, it's stated that I will quite possibly not be the teacher at the "new" school. I can't read the letter because it's in Japanese, but Benni-sensei says it pretty much guarantees that they'll have a new native teacher. This is only partly true. If enough of my students agree to move their classes to the new location, then I'll be kept on as the native teacher. If too many of them decide to quit or go to different schools, then I too will be sent to a different school. Which means I'm facing the possibility of moving.

On principle, I don't mind moving. It's a hassle and will cause me problems, but the actual idea of moving isn't aggravating to me. The problem is that I don't want to move. I'm quite happy where I am - I like Isesaki, I like my students, I like my co-workers, and I don't want to have to get adjusted to a new place and a new school. The matter would be completely different if I was ready to move on, but I'm not. I'm very comfortable here, and I'm not ready to move on yet. In other worse, I like moving but not being told I have to move. Of course, I don't like being told what to do in general, so I'm unhappy anyway.

Right now, I don't know for certain what will happen to me. I'm hoping that the majority of my students decide to move to the Ito Yokado school, thereby allowing me to continue teaching them, which would make everybody happy (as Hitomi-san reports it, everyone's more worried about changing teachers than changing location, which I take as a compliment). But we can't tell them that I might be able to stay in Isesaki, which might encourage them to just cancel classes altogether.

I should know for certain what's happening to me by the middle of February, once we know what our students want to do. Our last day of classes will be March 31st, so at least I've got two more months to enjoy myself here. Although I don't like the idea of leaving Isesaki and getting settled in someplace new, I'm not completely against it. It's not like I have any choice in the matter. And Benni-sensei thinks I'd be placed somewhere else in Gunma or one of the neighboring prefectures, so maybe I won't be completely from everyone. After all, these are the people who are my first Japanese friends, and I really like some of them.

So, I'm still waiting to see what happens. For now, I'm just going to enjoy my time in Isesaki while I can. It's just another bend in the road that I'm approaching, and I won't know what happens until I get there.

Wednesdays are amusing.

Wednesdays are now officially my easy days. I had one class moved to Saturday, so now I only have a kids' class and my two-hour block with Naofumi. Easy-peasy.

The kids' class is a small Intermediate class, with two boys who are between 10-12. One of them is really quiet, and the other one is really bright, and they get along well together. They're nice boys, and I've gotten to the point where I can mess with their heads a bit.

For Christmas, my BFF Heather sent me a ginormous box of goodies, including an action figure-type thing of Obi-Wan Kenobi, my favorite Star Wars character. I have it sitting on my side table in my classroom, and the boys noticed it immediately when they came into the room. They were enthralled, and once I explained how I got it, I'm not sure what they found funnier: the fact that my friend gave it to me as a Christmas present, or the fact that I like Star Wars. In any case, they joked about it quite a bit before settling down for class.

One of today's vocabulary words was "bike," which was partially confusing to them because they identified the picture as a "bicycle." Sometimes the vocab in the GEOS books is a little weird (a track suit is considered a jersey? okay, that's a new one on me, but hey, I'm not paid to publish this stuff ). My quiet boy grinned and started humming and then quite clearly sang out, "Bicycle! Bicycle! Bicycle!" well enough for me to recognize it as a small snippet of the Queen song. Then they both started chanting it and grinning like maniacs.

I'm fairly astounded at how popular Queen sometimes seems here. I watched a program a couple weeks ago that was solely dedicated to the awesomeness of Queen. There was even a Japanese guy who did a fairly astounding impersonation of Freddie Mercury (the pronunciation was a little off, but he looked JUST LIKE him and the mannerisms were insanely accurate). Also, at the local Cainz Home, Queen is heard quite often over the radio system. I don't complain about this. However, I now have "Bicycle Race" stuck in my head.

Fast forward to my class with Naofumi, which started with a discussion on what we did during the holiday break. (Oddly enough, he participated in a bicycle marathon. Coincidence? Yeah, probably.) Also, he watched movies. We discussed "Dark Knight" a bit before I made him tell me the plot of "Million Dollar Baby," which I have not seen.

This was surprisingly difficult for him and not because of a language issue. He was genuinely concerned about offending me by talking about "sad" and "nasty" plot points. I'm not sure how paralysis from the neck-down is considered "nasty," but that's how he referred to it while describing the fight. He kept pausing and asking me if it was okay to continue. To be fair, I probably should have let it pass and spared him some discomfort, but really, he should have known better. After all, I had just told him how much I liked "Dark Knight," and I've mentioned before that I love westerns and war movies. Paraplegia, welfare fraud, and euthanasia aren't difficult topics for me, but that's not saying a lot. I'll generally discuss anything and everything without much embarrassment. Besides, I'm not sure anything can top the catheter and prostate exam discussion I had with one of Benni-sensei's students.

Still, I found it interesting. He has no problems discussing politics with me, but he felt uncomfortable bringing up sensitive plot points in a movie. He kept saying how sad it was. Which prompted me to say that I love movies with sad endings, and he looked at me like I was a little crazy.

I dunno, maybe I am. All I know is, after putting up with me for three months, he'd know better by now. Oh, well, just goes to show that nothing is as it seems. Life is full of little surprises.

In other news, during my second hour with Naofumi, my throat started to clench up and it became hard to swallow. And now, I feel the makings of a full-bore sore throat starting. Which tells me that I have a cold and will probably not be in the best of health tomorrow. It had to happen eventually. Personally, I'm surprised that I've managed to avoid illness thus far. And I was actually getting a little worried. After all, if I don't get sick, my immune system doesn't get the chance to strengthen itself. Not that I'm excited about getting a cold. It's just nice to put an end to the anticipation. It was only a matter of time.

I don't feel like total crap yet. If Murphy's Law is truly in effect, my worst day will be on Friday, when I need to be at 100% to deal with my three kids' classes in a row. Or on Saturday, when I deal with the 2yo twins for the first time. With any luck, I'll survive to spend Sunday in bed.

Intensive Week, Schmentisive Week

Intensive Week is designed to allow our Sprint students a chance to make up any lessons they've missed in the past four months. Rather than giving regular lessons, we're supposed to use lesson plans from our supplemental materials. This is less to educate students and more to sell them stuff. The Tatsujin series (focused on Listening and Vocabulary) don't come cheap, but this is a perfect opportunity to show them off and dazzle the students with them. Too bad I have a pretty weak sell - though one student did ask me lots of questions about them and wondered if I thought they would help her. Considering she was asking about the Listening series, I emphatically replied yes, because . . . yeah, that's a weak spot for her.

Anyway, I have decided that I don't like Intensive Week and that I will prepare my own lesson plans for it from now on. The lessons from Head Office aren't terrible, they're just . . . ridiculous. The supplemental materials are not meant to be stretched out to 45 minutes (the Tatsujin series even states on the box "15 minutes per day"), and the amount of info given could cover about 2 hours of teaching, especially if the students are a little lower level. The warm-up exercises themselves could take up half an hour if the students aren't sure what's going on. See, the thing about Intensive Week is that Benni-sensei's students can take my classes and vice versa. So, I had a couple of mixed classes in which I had some fairly low-level students trying to keep up with more advanced speakers.

Actually, that was a little amusing. Naofumi in a class with five of Benni-sensei's Sprint 4/5 ladies? Funny. He's a little on the shy side, and he was a little overwhelmed at first, but he ended up being quite helpful. And Benni-sensei says that the ladies enjoyed themselves, so it wasn't a complete disaster. In fact, two of those students will be moving up to a Spring 6 class with me in the spring, so I was glad to have a little intro to them. They were just impressed that I knew their names.

But, really, the lesson plans were kind of useless to me. Plus, it didn't help that one of the suggested books is not in our library (Benni-sensei thinks that one of the former managers "borrowed it"), so I had to rush to make one up. And then I didn't even need it because the student - one of Benni-sensei's - just wanted to talk the entire time. Motosu-san is a very nice elderly gentleman who is a retired farmer. I spent most of the 45 minutes listening to him talk about his recent stay in the hospital, and trust me, you probably don't want to know why he was there. Let's just say it was educational for both of us, and you never know when catheters will suddenly come up in conversation.

I will be very glad to go back to the Sprint schedule next week. I just consider myself lucky that I only had four Intensive lessons - Benni-sensei had eight, and I'm sure there are teachers out there who have more than that. It's somewhat ironic that most of the training in Vancouver was geared towards teaching Sprint classes when I have a relatively small number of them. The majority of my classes are Active.

Still, another GEOS experience under the belt. Things can get back to normal for a little while. Best of all, winter vacation is only a week away!

a busy busy . . . BUSY week

I've been meaning to post all week, but December proves to be just as crazy in Japan as it is in the States. I had a pile of Challenge Kids tests to grade, contracts to check up on, baking to do, Intensive Week lessons to plan, coloring to do, and general all-around work stuff. Maybe it's because of the end of the year, and everything is wanting to be done before the new year arrives. I've noticed that a lot of my students have also been way busier than usual.

Surprisingly, I have had relatively few homesick moments. There have been a few, mostly when I think about all the baking that's done around Christmas (how I miss peanut butter balls and red velvet cake!), but these moments are usually fleeting and pass quickly. Just thinking about the happy memories is enough for me, keeping them in mind and not letting go of them. I've also been doing some thinking about all that's happened this past year, and it's amazing what changes a person can go through. Most of it was for the better.

On the plus side, I had the most excellent Friday ever. It was crazy busy (as usual), but everyone was in a really awesome mood. The kids were great, and most of them were really happy with their Challenge Kids test scores (which is only right, because all of them did fantastically well, and there were even a couple perfect scores). Plans for the kids' party are going well, even if we are going to have about half the number of students we had last time. But all of my favorite students are coming, so yay! (Yes, I have kid students that I like to have around - did I mention I'm becoming a pod person?) I have a new student in one of my Sprint classes, and he fit in well with the other students and seemed to enjoy himself. And now I am home baking cookies for the kids' Christmas party and considering making persimmon bread for tomorrow's nabe party.

Life? It's totally good.

Oh, and to all of the awesome people who work with my Mom: thank you for the Christmas card! I love it! And I'm very happy that you're enjoying my little piece of the internet here! I'll try to keep up with eevrything that's going on here! Thank you!

In closing, here's something that one of my students brought for me from her trip to Tokyo Disney. (sorry about the formatting, but I'm in a hurry and fixing it would require me to go and figure out how to do it) It's for the New Year, and it was filled with green tea truffles! Yummy! I'm now using the tin at home to hold my jewelry, wallet, and keys, to keep them a little organized. So nice!

Christmas comes to GEOS Isesaki

The lobby - that little window looks into the office.

Another shot of the lobby, looking out onto the street.

Our library (ha ha).

Our Christmas tree. A little Charlie Brown-esque, isn't it? Well, it's what we could find in the back storage room, so it's what we've got.

My Christmas wall.

Decorations for Christmas have been put up and enjoyed by all. They're hardly spectacular, but they're ours and we're proud of them. I actually really like my wall, and it was nice to put on some Christmas music and decorate it. I don't have a tree this year, so that kind of made up for it. Every time the kids color a new Christmas picture, I put it up on the wall for everyone to see. I let the kids pick where they want it to go - they seem to like that.

Our Christmas party for the kids is this coming weekend, and Benni-sensei asked me to come up with a mini-lesson idea to give to the kids. Putting a historical-purist like me in charge of Christmas is not a stupendous idea. I get hung up on details. Like the origins of the holiday. And the symbolism of it. And why we do the things we do when it comes to decorating. I have to remind myself to keep things simple because Christmas is really a rather vague concept to the Japanese, especially if they've never been exposed to an American Christmas.

(Which is why we have a menorah mixed in with all of those other Christmas coloring pictures, because it was easier to leave it in than to try to explain to Hitomi-san what Hanukkah is and why it's different from Christmas. I have nothing against Hanukkah, in fact I think it's disrespectful to it to lump it in with Christmas when it is most decidedly NOT Christmas. I'd like to include it, but I have only limited knowledge of it, and nobody's all that interested anyway.)

The problem is not avoiding talking about religion. You can talk about Christmas all you want without really touching upon the Christian aspect of it, which is what I plan on doing. These kids aren't Christian, and they don't care and aren't interested, and I'm not here to convert them. Nor am I trying to belittle the holiday, because I like it, and I have my own interpretations of it. My main goal is to be fair all around and make sure that the kids enjoy themselves and aren't overwhelmed with information.

So, my focus is on Santa Claus - he's a figure they all recognize and like, so that's a good start. I'm thinking I will create a template for them to write letters to him, and then next week, I will give them each a little something in their stockings (which I'm having them work on this week). Benni-sensei also wants me to do something having to do with Christmas trees, and I'm working on that. Maybe I'll make a big paper tree for the lobby and have them make ornaments. Or maybe I'll have them make their own individual trees. I like the big tree idea, but the problem is making the tree. Makes me wish I had some sort of artistic talent.

the dog and pony continue to perform well

So, in the end, my evaluation was along the lines of, "um . . . so, I don't really have any advice to give you because, really, you're doing everything right."

Sweet.

Benni-sensei apparently had no concept of an "observation," because she generally acted like the guy was there to nitpick the school to death. Whenever he was around, she found an excuse to not be in the same room. And she kept asking my why I needed someone to come and watch me. I think she was more bothered by it than I was, because I was just "whatever." It had to be done. On the plus side, she and Hitomi-san could NOT stop talking about my complete and utter awesomeness. Seriously, it was almost embarrassing. But nice to hear. I really like my co-workers - they're not always the most reliable people, but they mean well. We get along, and that's important.

All in all, a pretty good day, made even better by the knowledge that I won't have any kids' classes the week of the 21st. After the Christmas lesson, I say goodbye to the kids until January.

Not that I have a major problem with any of my kids . . . okay, not the older ones. But, I swear, one day, I'm going to take my little five-year old terrors and plant them in separate corners with their noses to the wall for the entire class. Just ONCE, I'd really appreciate it if they didn't act like they were just released from the bowels of hell. I am little more than a babysitter in this class, and I've pretty much adopted the same attitude with them as I did with my ninth-graders: if you sit down and don't gad about the room, I'll be happy. These boys have no concept of keeping their foul, vile, germ-ridden hands to themselves. I have to hide my whiteboard markers, and lately I've been locking my door with the hook latch because one of the little darlings went in and started drawing on the board with a highlighter. Brat. I can't wait until he gets into school and gets some manners pounded into him. I like him better when he's just woken up from a nap and he's practically comatose. He doesn't do any work, but at least he's not shrieking at the top of his lungs.

Alright, speaking of children, here's my mini-rant about my kids' classes. First, what the hell is up with organizing them by age? I have an 8y/o girl who is at a higher level than a 12y/o boy, but she's in the low class and he's in the high class? Okay . . . figure that one out.

Second, the book for the 3-5 y/o class is a piece of crap. It's organized oddly, the dialogue is funky and generally not easy for the students, and its teacher's guide is mostly useless. The book assumes that you have a full class and therefore need to spend a lot of time making sure that each child knows what hopscotch is. It also seems to be under the misapprehension of believing that toddlers have a long-enough attention span to be interested in listening to some creepy voices on a cd. My boys don't have that capability. And they're not stupid, so they get the idea of the lesson pretty quick. And if I'm getting bored of making them run around in circles to get to the corner with the correct picture, then they are too. Wait, I take that back, I never get tired of watching them run around in circles and collapse in an exhausted heap on the floor. It keeps them quiet for a few fleeting seconds.

The older kids' books are actually not so bad. The phonics are straightforward and advance at a good pace. The conversation is mostly natural, and the vocabulary is stuff that they like and should know. Honestly, I like my kids (and thus did sara-sensei become a pod person). They're usually pretty good sports about things, and they do try really hard. They all do really well with phonics and listening, but speaking is very weak for them. The only thing I can figure is that the previous teacher didn't have them doing a lot of comprehension work - just listening and repeating. I only have 2-3 kids who can respond to questions with full sentences, when about 8 of them should be able to do that. They know the words, but they don't know how to use the language. So, that's becoming a big focus for me - getting them to create simple sentences such as "I like" or "I don't like." Because they can answer if I ask "do you like?" and that means they can use the full sentence. Something to work on in the future.

But yeah, I kids' classes are mostly fun. They're lively, alert, and willing. Who knew it was possible that kids could be so cool?

Of course, none of them are teenagers yet, and that could be a whole different kettle of fish in the coming year.

cross-cultural teaching truths

It's probably not a good thing that, in so many cultures, teachers are always given a hard time. Dealing with kids - no matter what age - is not easy, even if you enjoy it. Japanese teachers work very long, very hard hours - just like American teachers! They probably don't get paid very well either.

I actually have a few students who teach English, which is why they are taking lessons from me, to improve their skills. They're terrible at keeping up with homework because, of course, they have plenty of work to do at home already. I usually don't assign much homework unless individuals request it, and my teachers are often the ones that look at me with pleading "please, don't ask me to do this!" eyes because they feel bad if they don't do the work.

Last week started off with a national "labor" holiday, which gave schools two days off to make a three-day school week. On Saturday, one of my teachers came in for her class, and I asked her how her week had been. "Hard!" she replied. "The long weekend was nice, but at work, it was a short week and very hard!"

When I was teaching in the States, I had a love/hate relationship with short weeks. On one hand, it was wonderful not to have to go to work. On the other hand, they were always the roughest weeks ever. It feels like the kids take all that energy and punkishness and save it to spend during the days that they ARE in school, thus doubling the amount of trouble they get into. I usually felt like I needed another three-day weekend just to make up for the four-day school week.

So, I replied, "Yeah, I always hated short weeks too."

And thus, we had a nice little chat about teaching in the public school system. At least she enjoys it more than I did. But she's a pretty awesome lady - about my age and one of my higher-level students. She never seems to mind when I start off on one of my tangents about where English comes from (our current unit is about learning new languages and how language is developed), and she's very good at trying to figure out definitions by analyzing a word's parts. She's one of those students that makes class more fun than just work.

Also on the subject of teaching and related duties, I was considering that this is my seventh week in Japan and thinking, "hmm, I'm surprised I haven't been contacted by anyone to set up an observation or a check-in or something." And thus, I am proved psychic, because today I got a phone call from our region office informing me that I will be observed tomorrow. "Just wanted to let you know so you aren't surprised when I show up!" he said. Uh, yeah, could I request more than 24 hours notice next time? Yeesh.

Not that I consider this a problem, because while Friday is my busiest day, it's also my least varied. I have three kids' classes and three Sprint 7 classes, and he'll only get to observe half of them because he'll have to leave early to catch his train. It's Kids Challenge week, which means that the kids will be taking their tests and not getting an actual lesson. (and that's a posting all in itself, because boy, do these guys take their tests seriously) So, I can't think that there will be much to observe. My first Sprint class is a one-person class, and she's a real sweetheart and very quick to learn. All I have to do is remember to follow the Sprint outline that was hammered into us at training.

Gee, that sounds familiar. It's the dog and pony show all over again. Not that I expected anything else, because this is teaching, after all, and teaching is all about showing off the dog and pony. Here's hoping that I know how to make it look good. At least this time I won't be worrying about keeping the kids in line . . . that was also three-quarters of the battle to begin with.

Non-Japanese Food Journal: guacamole

Yeah, this year's Thanksgiving went mostly unmarked by me, other than exchanging greetings and well-wishes with a lot of people. The one special thing I did was make guacamole.

Okay, before everyone starts thinking that this is a little weird, I'll admit that it is. Most people don't think guacamole is a Thanksgiving food, and I doubt it'll ever be considered such, it's not like I'm trying to start a trend here. But it amused me to make it, and it was something I wanted to do. It just so happened that I decided to do it on Thanksgiving.

For the record, I don't like Thanksgiving. Oh, the sentiment's alright, but it's totally at the wrong time of the year. In the northern hemisphere, who is doing their harvesting at the end of November? Here in my little region of Japan, it seems that the only things that are really in season right now are persimmons and apples. Of course, turkey is pretty rare, and most people wouldn't eat mashed potatoes, but that's not my point. All I'm saying is that it's a ridiculous time of year to have a harvest festival. The Canadians are way more logical about it - their Thanksgiving is in the beginning of October and thus makes sense.

And I'm not going to get into the whole "Indians and pilgrims" thing, because, man, what a line all that is. I'll believe that happened when I believe that Benni-sensei will actually clean her room (seriously, she's going to get trapped in there one day if that stack of books and papers on her desk keeps multiplying). But, yeah, color me cynical on that one.

A couple of weeks ago, Benni-sensei and I went to the grocery store for something, and we were hanging around in the produce section when she grabbed me and yanked me toward a pile of avocadoes. Benni lived in California for a long time, and she loves Mexican food, and she stared at those avocadoes like they were ambrosia. Then she asked me if I liked guacamole, to which I of course replied that I love guacamole and also enjoyed making it. She laughed and said, "Hey, maybe you can make some for me some time!"

I said maybe I would, and we went on our merry way. Later that same day, we were talking to Naofumi, and he mentioned that he'd spent some of his childhood in California, and Benni immediately asked him if he liked guacamole, and he said he thought he remembered liking it. This led to a mostly-Japanese conversation about living in California, which Naofumi looked kind of embarrassed about because he insisted he was too young to remember most of it. I snuck away and went home because it was late.

When it comes to saying that I'll make food, I usually end up making it. Maybe it takes me a little while to get around to it, but I do get around to it. I love to cook; I think it's relaxing. And I miss it terribly. I'm almost convinced that I miss my oven more than I miss my family! (sorry, family!) And this week, I got it into my head that I should make guacamole.

Let me say that avocadoes in Japan are really small and really expensive. Indeed, this is probably the most expensive guacamole I've ever made, but that's probably because I had to buy some ingredients that I would normally have stocked - like cayenne pepper, jalapeno tabasco sauce, and cream cheese. Dairy products are kind of frightening when it comes to price, but I expected that. It took me FOREVER to find Tostito chips and they were insanely expensive, but totally worth it. I think most people were more impressed that I'd even found a bag of them than they were with the guacamole.

But, it was all worth it. I ended up using sour cream as a base (I found the tiniest container of it, a major victory as far as I'm concerned because Naofumi seemed pretty convinced that I would be unable to find it) because it was more like cream cheese than the cream cheese was. It had the right consistency and a better flavor. But it turned very nicely, and everyone who tried it exclaimed, "Oishii!" which seems roughly equivalent to "holy crap, this is really good!"

Benni-sensei was especially pleased because she was having a bit of a crappy day due to scheduling problems with her vacation. She was going to Thailand, but there are some major protesting issues going on right now and the airports are closed to traffic. So, she's currently on her way to Taipei, which she was not all that thrilled about but she felt obliged to go because her travelling companions wanted to go. Also, on the plus side, Naofumi had showed up to (finally) renew his contract, so it was nice to offer him some guacamole as a thank you, even though he'd been debating about this for three weeks now.

Ultimately, I enjoyed my Thanksgiving, even though it was a pretty typical day for me. The only thing I really miss about Thanksgiving is the cooking and especially the baking. I don't think I'm going to survive the Christmas holiday without doing some kind of baking, so this weekend, I'll probably end up heading over to Cainz Home and buying a new toaster oven. I already have one in the apartment, but I hate it, and I couldn't bake with it anyway because I can't regulate the temperature. It'll probably be an expensive purchase, but I have the money to spare, and it will definitely be worth it. I'll just have to figure out where to put it . . .

Anyway, Turkey Day is come and gone, and I hope it was a pleasant day for all!

my new favorite holiday

I love my Headways class with my horticulturist student. It's always amusing. Naofumi is probably my most advanced student. He spent 7 years as a child growing up in California, and his reading and conversation are excellent. He takes classes mainly to practice English and keep it honed and because his job encourages it. Headways is the most advanced class GEOS offers, and it's pretty intense. The book was published at Oxford, so it's painfully British at times, to the point where I've had to look stuff up because I had no idea what they were saying. But, he's a smart guy, so we've had some pretty interesting conversations regarding the text.

Monday was a Japanese holiday: Culture Day. I asked Naofumi what it was for, and he explained that people were supposed to go out and get cultivated, by going to a museum or a concert or something (yay for Sarah and Nick! I just went to the ￥100 store). He added that most Japanese people just take the opportunity to be lazy and do nothing. He seemed to be of the opinion that those kinds of holidays (Culture Day, Sports Day, etc.) were kind of useless, except for the fact that it's a three-day weekend for a lot of people.

"Sounds like some holidays we have in the States," I replied.

"Yeah." A pause. "Like what?"

"Like Columbus Day, for one. He discovered Hispaniola, not the North American continent."

Naofumi kind of chortled at this. "Wasn't the continent discovered by some other guy from Scandinavia or some place like that?"

"Yeah, Lief Ericsson."

"Hmm. So why don't you have Lief Ericsson Day?"

See? I love this class.

Speaking of holidays, I find it amusing that head office sent out an email encouraging NETs to tell their students about Guy Fawkes Day in an effort to convince them to travel abroad and "experience holidays unlike their own." For some reason, when I think of foreign holidays that I want to observe, Guy Fawkes Day isn't the first one that comes to mind. Just hope no one uses V For Vendetta as their reference point.

Sara-sensei is a teacher.

I know it's fun to hear about all the food I've been consuming, but I do other things too, like teach. That's my job after all, and I've had a couple people ask me to talk a little bit more about it. What, Sara-sensei takes posting requests? Sort of. I have a list of things I want to post about, but since my apartment is still not exactly in the greatest shape, I'm putting that off a little longer.

So . . . about being a Native English Teacher in Japan. It's fun. It's hard work, but it's fun too. I don't know if I think that because I've only been at it about two weeks now, but I love the English language, and being a big, gigantic nerd is a real boon with this job. I thoroughly encourage my students to ask me questions about obscure grammar/spelling rules because it sends me off on a quest to find the answer. I like puzzles. I told one of my private lesson students that, and she laughed and said I was in the right job then.

I have a total of 21 classes, which I divide into four types: Sprint, Active, Kids, and Private (which actually go back to being one of the first three classes, but they pay more, so they get their own category.) My favorite classes are Active classes with 2+ students because you can get more conversation going, and I'm there pretty much as a mediator and helpful grammar checker.

Sprint classes are firmly structured and focus on learning a grammar point (such as the proper way to word a sentence when giving a compliment), followed by a period of using that grammar point in conversation. I wasn't so keen on these at first, but they're growing on me. I still follow the structure, but I've found that if I get a little creative, students respond better. I only have two lower-level Sprint classes, and one of them is with a guy from Peru, and I understand his natural speaking pattern a little better than I do with my Japanese students. He puts a Spanish twist on a lot of his words, and since I can recognize that, we have a common meeting ground. He's actually really good with conversation, he's more concerned about learning the proper grammar. It takes me 30-45 minutes to write a Sprint lesson plan, depending on what else I'm doing (I usually watch a movie or listen to music while I work, it actually goes faster that way because the noise helps me focus). I'm lucky because my school has a whole library of lesson suggestions for Sprint classes, and a lot of the props are already prepared. Usually, I just have to decide what I want to use and then make copies and keep everything organzied. For a couple, I've had to make my own props (cutting out magazine pictures, for example, to match with adjectives), but that doesn't take too long either.

Active classes are way more flexible, and that seems to be a little scary with Japanese students sometimes because they have to offer more original responses. Getting opinions out of them is like pulling teeth, but I like these classes because when the students do start talking, they usually have good things to say. All of my students are pretty intelligent (they're learning a foreign language, so they'd pretty much have to be), and they run the gamut from bored housewives to teenagers to office workers to scientists (seriously, one of my students is a horticulturist who crossbreeds onions). So, they've all got really good opinions and can back them up well, once they get going. The hard part is getting them to talk. They'll sit and think about their answers for a few minutes, and it's less getting the English right and more figuring out exactly what their opinions are. Active classes are really easy to plan, especially because the books come with Teacher Guides and there are plenty of activities in the books to fill class time. I can do an Active lesson plan in about 15 minutes, with a little extra time for making copies if I need them. One book was published in England, so I've had to look up a couple of phrases/words here and there to figure out exactly what they're saying, but otherwise, it's my favorite. The last class I did with this book (with my horticulturist student) studied a Shakespeare sonnet, and I had a blast. The student was completely intimidated, but he did an awesome job and ended up feeling pretty proud of himself. Easily the best class of the week.

Kids classes are the hardest to prepare, I think, because I have to make sure that I have enough activities to keep them busy all the time. I have six kids classes (not including a private lesson with a four-year old, but she's so well-behaved and on the ball that I have no problem with her), and they're arranged according to age. This is a somewhat bad idea, I think, because some of the classes are terribly mismatched. I have one class with 2 10-year olds who are on very different levels. Fortunately, the higher level student is a girl and she's pretty well behaved if I have to slow things down to help the boy. In a class with four 12-year olds, though, the one girl is a little slower (no less intelligent, just slower with her replies), and the rest of them get a little impatient with her. I consider myself lucky the boys are actually nice boys; they may make a snide comment or two, but they listen to me and do as I say if I keep on top of them. The only class I really am not overly fond of is the one with two 5-year old boys because they haven't quite figured out who's in charge here. I'm starting to wonder in Japanese kids don't get any discipline until they get into school, because these two can be outright brats sometimes, and one of them has a younger brother who's even worse. On a good day, they're okay; on a bad one, the only thing I can do is keep them focused on doing something to distract them from wandering around the room and causing trouble.

Kids classes also have Teacher Guides, which I use profusely for writing lesson plans because there's a lot more going on here than just grammar. They're learning phonics, writing, listening, speaking - a whole bevy of things. It's pretty intense, but at least it keeps them busy. Fortunately, I only have to write three lesson plans because I have two classes of each type. It takes me about 45 minutes to do one of them, mainly because I'm having to stop and find games to play, or make lots of copies, or listen to the cds to figure out what work they're going to have to do. For the younger kids, I also have to learn songs and the hand gestures that go along with them. My private lesson girl stopped me once and showed me the "right" way of doing one song, so at least she's being patient with me too.

And then there are the private lessons, which are usually a conglomeration of the above. I have a couple who come together, and they don't like the book (which is too advanced for them and was probably pushed upon them by the old manager), so their class is mostly just conversation. I use the book as a jumping off point to ask them questions, and then we just go where we please. It's quite pleasant. Last week, we had a long discussion about the relocation of American Indians and the Japanese government's treatment of the native Ainu in Hokkaido. Another private lesson is with a woman who wants to learn business English so she can work for her husband's company. So, again, that's a lot of conversation, using a book to help her learn new phrases and how to use them correctly. And then I have one woman who has Sprint classes with Benni-sensei (the JET) but wants private lessons with a NET so she can practice conversation with a native speaker.

So, it's a variety of classes, and if I take a couple hours a day, I can get all my lesson-planning done in a good amount of time. And they're fun because it's a subject I know pretty well and love quite a bit. The only classes I generally feel a little nervous about are the kids classes, mainly because I'm never sure if I have enough prepared for them (so much so that I generally over-prepare for them, which makes me feel better), but they go by so quick that I usually don't have time to worry about it.

And there you have it. It helps being such an English geek, because even simple grammar rules (such as the proper usage of simple present tense) make me happy. And the students have noted that I seem to enjoy it, so that probably helps. Maybe the novelty will wear off in a while, but for now, I'm loving every minute.