#elementary alt

Animal Crossing/Spring English Board

So Animal Crossing: New Horizons came out around this time last year. Everyone was super excited about it, and every ALT I knew was doing Animal Crossing English Boards or decorations. I wanted in on the hype, so I made my little Animal Crossing board that I thought was super cute and the kids would love….and then the schools closed and absolutely no one saw it. It’s now a year later and there…

I’ve  been with this set of 6th graders for 2 years, and I’m really going to miss them. That didn’t stop me from being incredibly proud to see them graduate. We don’t have uniforms in elementary school, but the kids wear their new middle school uniforms when they graduate. Their parents buy the uniforms to last a couple years, so they’re always a bit big. Watching these kids enter the ceremony while shuffling around in uniform jackets that hang over their fingertips and pants that are bunched up a bit around the ankles if just so….😭😭😭

  They have one final meeting in their classroom, then all the students and teachers line the hallways for 送る会(sending off). The graduates walk through the hallways of the school and we cheer and clap for them. This is the last time they’ll walk in this school as students.

Now that the ceremony is over and pictures have been taken, everyone will go home. The teachers will all gather in the staffroom and eat a special celebratory bento and eat the snacks and cakes that the PTA gave us. And of course, talk about the kids who are leaving and remember them. Then we move on to get ready for the new incoming 1st graders. And so it goes on.

Goodbye, my little friends. Be good in junior high school.

Graduation Board – Space Theme

Well, it’s that time again. The babies are leaving the nest. It gets harder every year, because I’ve been with that group of kids longer. I’ve taught this group of kiddos since they were in 4th grade. Those little twerps have grown so much *sobs* Okay, time to hold back all my sniffles (until the actual graduation ceremony). Last year, I had the idea to write all the graduate’s names on some…

Summer English Board – Version 2

We’re back from summer break! But of course it’s still hot as hell and we’re all kind of sluggishly dragging ourselves around. Huzzah.

This English board has a lot of elements from last year’s summer board, with a couple new sections.

The first section is from last year – what various characters like doing in the summer. It’s fairly simple, and is mainly intended as a cute vocabulary…

First up, because of the release of Animal Crossing New Horizons and my continued frustration that I don’t own it, I made an Animal Crossing hanami scene.

We can’t hanami, but we sure can still stick cherry blossoms on every available surface! After some digging around, I’ve discovered that the Animal Crossing font is called Fink Heavy and you can download it for free off some font databases.

Next, I have a polling section where students can use stickers to say what they did over their very, very long spring break. I came up with six general options, which I’m sure means that I’ll have kids coming up to me and pointing out that they did things other than what’s on the board.

Finally, I have a small “welcome back to school” sign on the opposing wall.

I have no idea when the students will be back/if it will still be spring/if all this work was pointless. But honestly, it’s not like I didn’t have 40 hours a week in which to do something besides spin around in my office chair.

As the late, great Terry Pratchett said “There is a curse. They say: may you live in interesting times.” I never thought that interesting times would be a curse, but I could certainly go for things to be a bit more boring right about now.

But! I still think it’s super cute and I’m very happy with it. I made my elementary school the Earth, and the local middle school the moon. Then, I used an alphabet stamp set from Daiso to stamp the 6th graders’ names on rockets. Yes, I really do have only 10 students graduating. This is a very tiny school. But now they’re blasting off to the big middle school!

The rest of the board is fairly simple – just an explanation of the difference in schools and grades in the USA and Japan, and our silly graduation caps. The word of the month was “graduate,” because I was too lazy to come up with anything more interesting.

And that’s it! It’s a simpler board than I usually put up, but I like it quite a bit. Now here’s to hoping I don’t actually have to do a month of desk-warming (Thanks, Abe) and also that I don’t catch Madam Corona and die. Of course, the coronavirus would first have to make it up my mountain. In a prefecture where there haven’t been any cases reported. And infect me. A person who is not 100 years old, a.k.a. corona’s main target. So I think I’m gonna be fine.

The Interview Corner hasn’t changed from last month because it’s the 2nd grade teacher’s turn this month and she’s insanely busy. Or she’s just avoiding me. Either way, I’ll get her up there eventually.

I re-used the pictures of Valentine’s displays in American stores that my friends and family sent me last year. The kids were really interested in those before so I figured it’d be a hit again.

I also reused my signs comparing Valentine’s Day in the USA and in Japan. And of course, I had to put up my adorable Hello Kitty sign.

Ok, on to the new stuff. I’m still trying to get the kids to interact with the boards more, so I put up a sticker poll about favorite Valentine’s treats. Who will win between cake, chocolate, and candy? (I’m pretty sure it’s going to be chocolate. Like. Very sure.)

Next, I caved and followed the popular trend for ALTs making Valentine’s Day boards – writing “I love you” in languages around the world. I put the name of the language and the country’s flag on a flap, and underneath is the I love you. I’m very proud of the designs on these. I think they’re super cute.

Finally, I made the Word of the Month match the theme. Badda bing badda boom there we are.

Some of the elements are recycled from last year’s winter board – like these characters saying what they like about winter, and the winter vocab cards. Although I had saved last year’s materials, I ended up remaking them all again anyway. In the year of making English Boards and looking back at my old materials, I’ve discovered that I’ve gotten much better at making things and my old things are kinda ugly. So my pack-rat tendencies and my box of saved materials to reuse may not do me as much good as I thought they would. Sigh.

My JTE has been pushing me to include more things about cultures around the world on my boards. So this next section involves absolutely no English, but whatever. My prefecture is very well known for its onsens. I decided to introduce the kids to other hot spring/bathing cultures around the world by asking “I wonder if there are onsen in other countries.” Actually here Gunma-chan is doing the asking for me. Very helpful. I chose to use hot tubs in America, sauna in Finland, the famous Blue Lagoon in Iceland, and Middle Eastern Hammam to discuss. Each paragraph has a brief explanation or some fun facts about that kind of bath.

The next section is about the next Japanese holiday coming up – Setsubun. I translated the famous phrase for the holiday; oni wa soto, fuku wa uchi (鬼は外、福は内) into English, and added some items that are part of the festival. I also made this super cute demon face which I’m very proud of. He’s adorable.

Finally, I have the word of the month. This word of the month was inspired by me sliding across the parking lot and sidewalks all the time. Only two-ish more months of winter to go….