#jet programme 2015

So I haven’t updated in a while and I’ll probably forget some things.

The main point is, I’ve had some ups and downs in the past few weeks, as you do.

I got to go to an eikaiwa for adults in my town, which was great. All of the people were super sweet. One man asked how many boyfriends I had, so I took a leaf from Pacchan’s book and told him I had one for every day of the week.

I’ve also been continually going to dance practice for a local performance that is coming up soon. It’s about the founding of our town and I’m excited to be in it! I am but a lowly village person, but I ‘m glad because it took me a while to learn the dance. Plus it’s all old ladies who give me candies and cute little kindergarteners who are participating because their grandma’s are in it. They finally warmed up to me during last practice and played with me. They were the police and I was a robber who was locked up for stealing money, as I only had 100 yen in my wallet. It was so cute.

This past working week I had some pretty great classes. My 6th grade class loved alphabet karuta and I plan to upgrade it later with phonics instead of saying the letters. I was also productive and made 4 sets of alphabet cards for the karuta. Later, I also made four sets each of upper and lowercase letters so that we can play memory and other game with them.

I also had some 3rd grade students remember their shapes lesson T^T They saw me in the corridor and yelled “STAR” while making a star shape, just like I told them to. It was awesome.

Then I had a 2nd grade class and for the first time ever made children cry. And I mean, children, because not one but two kids cried in my class. I think the pressure from having to do their own self-intro was too much. It was pretty surprising, because every single class I’ve had for the past month and a half at every level, even kindergarten, has been fine with it. I never planned to have the kids speak one by one, but had so many teachers ask me to let the kids introduce themselves to me that I just ended up incorporating it into my self-intro lesson.

I think it was also to do with the fact that their regular teacher wasn’t there that day as he/she was chaperoning a field trip. However, I think I handled the situation pretty well by not freaking out, and consoling the kids while I had the other children continue introducing themselves.

Next was teaching emotions so I definitely skipped sad, and then ended the lesson by giving everyone a sticker for their hard work. Then I made sure I apologised to the two kids, using their names, and asking if they were alright, which they were.

So, my first week of classes went well, which seems to be the general consensus when I scroll through the “jet programme” tag and see posts by other new JETS.

Good job everyone!

As for me, it was more ups than downs, and I can’t really complain. Seriously who gets a perfect week right off the bat?

I had the wonderful privilege of having a 1st grade class during my first week of teaching and oh. my. goodness.

SO CUTE. OH MY GOODNESS SO CUTE. AND LITTLE. AND CUTE.

I’m super looking forward to tomorrow because I have another 1st grade class, as well as 2nd and 3rd grade too. All those lil munchkins are going to have so much fun with the shapes lesson I have prepared.

Alas, I deviate.

Having got my self-introduction down pat, most of my classes went by in a breeze. 5th grade and up is the only time when you’re unsure if the kids will be excited when you say you have a game.

The one class that kind of flopped was the first class I actually taught. By that I mean actually taught, and not just repetition of my self-introduction. I had one 6th grade class back-to-back for two periods. Go figure.

It was a lesson on directions and half the class seemed to find it too easy, and the others too hard (or they’re just normally super quiet). Thankfully, I’ve learnt a bit from my mistakes. I also had three 6th grade classes today at a school where the 5th and 6th grade teachers do plan lessons, so I can just grab what they did and apply them to my other classes :P Also to end on a random note, I need to make sure to bring a good bento on a certain day of the week, because that elementary school doesn’t do school lunch. You know what that means? Everyone has a kickass bento made by their mom.

You know what that means? I don’t.

Technically I’ve already started teaching, as I had two days at the JHS with the other ALT in my town.

As it was basically just my self-intro I don’t know how much I really count it as my first day of class. Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely loved it. The other ALT has been a complete godsend and has helped me out so so much. She’s super nice and the absolute best.

I believe that having two ALTs in a class is somewhat unheard of in the JET Programme. Our JTEs said they’d never experienced that before, and one in particular told us how much she and the students enjoyed it. She wished it could be like that all the time. I’m going to make sure to give my BoE super positive feedback about scheduling us like that, because it was so helpful to see the other ALT teach with the JTEs.

I got to get a proper idea of what I was supposed to do in classes, what pace and volume I should be speaking at, and learn what level of English students were actually at. By the time we got through the first day with 4 classes, the other ALT and I had gotten the lesson plan down pat. I was thrown off the next day first thing, by a very quiet 3rd year class. A JTE had told me that I could challenge them more since they were 3rd years, but because they were so quiet it flopped quite a bit.

If the other ALT hadn’t been there, and if the JTE hadn’t been so helpful, I don’t know what I would have done. Thankfully, the class after that was more lively and better at English so the lesson plan went well with them.

I also learnt how to get around awkward questions like, “Do you like men!?”

I was taken aback by the awkwardness of saying “yes” or “maybe”, which is what my normal answer was for the “Do you have a boyfriend?” question. Thankfully, the other ALT swooped in and saved the day with a hilarious “OH...men as in noodles? Do you like, ramen, udon, or soba better?” The kids laughed, and the JTE thought it was a great save.

I’m going to need to learn how to think faster on my feet.

Back to the first day of classes though, tomorrow is the beginning of my stint in elementary school. I’m quite nervous as half of the classes I’ll be T1 and I have little to no teaching experience. The other ALT has been really helpful, but she won’t be with me from now on so I’ll have to get through this on my own (sort of). I’m looking forward to it, and hope that since they’re little kids that there won’t be as many awkward silences. I hope they have fun!

I believe my first class is one where I’ll be T2 with a great teacher who tries to actually plan lessons. The other ALT said to just take what we do in that class and apply it to others, in order to eventually perfect it and make it my own.

So. I’ve actually been in Fukushima for about a month now, but I figured I might as well start this sooner than later. I’m a new ALT in Fukushima this year with the JET Programme. I look forward to talking to you all about my experiences here and creating some great conversations about anything and everything relevant to the blog. For a brief introduction to myself: - I am a straight-out-of-university grad

- I am Malaysian-Chinese, but am an American citizen who grew up in HK and went to British international schools. It’s a bit all over the place.

- I majored in socio-cultural anthropology, and took Japanese for 5 semesters/2.5 years at university

- I am a new ALT in Fukushima, teaching at one JHS, four ES, and six kindergartens/preschools (I know)