Before I begin, I must apologize about the long hiatus. I've spent the last couple of months getting used to my new job, which I'll talk about in a moment. The new job means I have less time on the computer, which means I've had to prioritize other things over this blog. From this point in time, I'm going to try to dedicate more time towards this blog, but we'll see what happens.
My new job is going well so far. I now work for the prefectural government board of education as a native-speaking English teacher (as differentiated from regular English teachers, who are all non-native-speaking Japanese). I teach at a school in the southern part of Osaka prefecture.
Before I started work there, my predecessor gave me a sort of "transition call" to explain about the school. He said the kids were downright terrible, and the teachers just go through the motions. That scared me a bit; it reminded me of my time at a similar school a few years ago. However, once I started working there and teaching classes, I began to think that my predecessor was wrong, or at least the school wasn't a good fit for him. It certainly seems to be a good fit for me so far.
How is it different from the school from a few years ago? First, I have my own classroom - a "language lab", they call it, complete with a computer system, projector, sound system and monitors for all the students. I don't have to go to the homerooms and wade through hair curlers or manga. Second, at this school the students actually call me by my own name! At the old school, they called me anything but my name. Third, while the teachers do have a hard time with some students, overall there isn't the depression and sullenness that was prevalent among the staff at the old school. The teachers at the new school are friendly, bright and generally happy.
The students themselves are quite friendly. When I see them on the train or in the hallways of the school, they greet me and usually chat a little bit - usually in Japanese, but sometimes in English. I can't say that about the old school; the only time the students talked to me was when they were making fun of me.
That said, the educational level of the school is quite low, and it will be a struggle to get them to learn any useful English for communication. But so far I'm off to a good start.
Showing posts with label teaching. Show all posts
Showing posts with label teaching. Show all posts
31 May 2009
10 May 2006
Back to School
For this new academic year, I wasn't expecting to teach at a public senior high school like I have the past 2 years. My boss wanted me to spend less time teaching and more time in the office attending to HR duties. However, it turned out that the company needed an ALT at a senior high school on short notice, so I'm back in the public school ALT saddle once again.
This school is different from the countryside school I taught at the last few years. This one's located in Osaka city. The students are different as well - very different. The kids say "Hello" or "Good morning" to me with no effort. I was lucky to get "Hello" or "Good morning" in Japanese at my old school.
I had to teach my first classes my second day at the school, which was kind of short notice. So I just used the self-introduction lesson that I had used for the first classes at my old high school. That lesson was too easy for these students. Luckily I had something prepared, but still... It's a new world now. Should be an interesting year.
This school is different from the countryside school I taught at the last few years. This one's located in Osaka city. The students are different as well - very different. The kids say "Hello" or "Good morning" to me with no effort. I was lucky to get "Hello" or "Good morning" in Japanese at my old school.
I had to teach my first classes my second day at the school, which was kind of short notice. So I just used the self-introduction lesson that I had used for the first classes at my old high school. That lesson was too easy for these students. Luckily I had something prepared, but still... It's a new world now. Should be an interesting year.
10 February 2006
Bobby!!!!
Okay, this is beginning to bother me quite a bit. To students at my high school, I am no longer known as Herman. I'm known as Bobby Ologun. Every time I go to school and teach, I get at least one "Oh - Bobby!!!" from a student, whether its in class or in the hallway. You know what - it's not even limited to my school any more. While I was walking home from the train station the other day, these three high school-age punks on a bicycle yelled "Bobby!!!" in my ear as they were riding by. (I still can't figure out how three high school boys fit on a bicycle - another one of the mysteries of Japan.)
For those of you who don't know, Bobby Ologun is a K-1 fighter from Nigeria turned Japan television celebrity. Fame-wise, he hit the big time in 2005 and was all over TV, so most Japanese know who he is. That was bad news for me, at least as far as my work at high school goes.
Now, usually this stuff doesn't bother me. I take insults better than most people. In middle school I was called Steve Urkel. My first year of college, old white ladies said I looked like Tiger Woods. Heck, even last year, when I started work at high school, the kids called me Kevin Lyttle. I took all that in stride. But for some reason, this whole Bobby Ologun thing has really got under my skin.
First of all, I look nothing like Bobby Ologun, besides the fact that we both have dark skin. I can see the comparisons with Tiger Woods. I can even see Urkel. But I don't see this at all.
But I can be lenient on that. Maybe the real reason is because I don't like the guy at all.
If you've seen the guy, the way he acts in public is an embarrassment to black people everywhere, whether African or African-American. He's a straight up goofball, who acts stupid all the time, speaking botched Japanese (my GF says it's obviously on purpose - apparently Ologun has pretty good Japanese skills). It's good entertainment for some Japanese, but can you imagine the stereotypes that are forming in the minds of a people that hardly interact with blacks? Goofball. Stupid. Can't speak Japanese.
Of course, I shouldn't get too hot under the collar about dissing by high school punks that'll be pumping my gas someday. Nobody other than these students have called me Bobby. So I'm not trying to say that Japan is racist toward blacks or anything like that (Little Black Samba situation aside). But I'd be lying if I said the whole Bobby thing hasn't bothered me at all.
For those of you who don't know, Bobby Ologun is a K-1 fighter from Nigeria turned Japan television celebrity. Fame-wise, he hit the big time in 2005 and was all over TV, so most Japanese know who he is. That was bad news for me, at least as far as my work at high school goes.
Now, usually this stuff doesn't bother me. I take insults better than most people. In middle school I was called Steve Urkel. My first year of college, old white ladies said I looked like Tiger Woods. Heck, even last year, when I started work at high school, the kids called me Kevin Lyttle. I took all that in stride. But for some reason, this whole Bobby Ologun thing has really got under my skin.
First of all, I look nothing like Bobby Ologun, besides the fact that we both have dark skin. I can see the comparisons with Tiger Woods. I can even see Urkel. But I don't see this at all.
But I can be lenient on that. Maybe the real reason is because I don't like the guy at all.
If you've seen the guy, the way he acts in public is an embarrassment to black people everywhere, whether African or African-American. He's a straight up goofball, who acts stupid all the time, speaking botched Japanese (my GF says it's obviously on purpose - apparently Ologun has pretty good Japanese skills). It's good entertainment for some Japanese, but can you imagine the stereotypes that are forming in the minds of a people that hardly interact with blacks? Goofball. Stupid. Can't speak Japanese.
Of course, I shouldn't get too hot under the collar about dissing by high school punks that'll be pumping my gas someday. Nobody other than these students have called me Bobby. So I'm not trying to say that Japan is racist toward blacks or anything like that (Little Black Samba situation aside). But I'd be lying if I said the whole Bobby thing hasn't bothered me at all.
08 November 2005
"Practice?!? We talkin' about practice!!!"
Not long after I wrote about how things were about to go bad at my high school, a good thing happened yesterday. After classes, I didn't have anything in particular to do, so I decided to lace up my sneaks and shoot some hoops in the gym. To my surprise, when I walked in, I saw a group of my favorite ichinensei already playing a pickup game of basketball (most of them were girls). Out of all of my ichinensei that actually complete each worksheet and pay attention to me in each class, probably 80% of them were present on the basketball court yesterday. Amazing.
There were 9 of them, so they were eager for a 10th player and they called me over. We played 1 1/2 hours of good, fun ball. They oooohed and aaaaahed my amazing dribbling, passing and defensive skills while laughing at my terrible shooting. The best part was that during the breaks, many of them were actually begging for some English conversation. That's the kind of stuff I've been dreaming about.
Of course, the question is, Why don't they do this in the classroom? These same students are also among the most quiet in my classes, but you wouldn't have known it from their on-court trash talking. Ah well... I'll just wait for more opportunities like this.
There were 9 of them, so they were eager for a 10th player and they called me over. We played 1 1/2 hours of good, fun ball. They oooohed and aaaaahed my amazing dribbling, passing and defensive skills while laughing at my terrible shooting. The best part was that during the breaks, many of them were actually begging for some English conversation. That's the kind of stuff I've been dreaming about.
Of course, the question is, Why don't they do this in the classroom? These same students are also among the most quiet in my classes, but you wouldn't have known it from their on-court trash talking. Ah well... I'll just wait for more opportunities like this.
04 November 2005
Student Strike
It's November, and you know what that means... time for things to start going downhill at the high school. Consider what happened this past Monday. In one of my classes, about 90% of the students (including all the girls) quit on me with 10 minutes to go. There I was, finishing a fun game and starting to explain the last writing exercise, when these students just came up and handed in their unfinished worksheet, went back to their desks and started talking to each other. The main teacher and I tried in vain to get them to get their worksheets and do the last part, but to no avail. They just ignored us. So the last 10 minutes of the class were taught to only 3 students. I've never heard of anything like that happening before.
I mean, these were not just the usual troublemakers I'm talking about here. As a matter of fact, this was usually a well-behaved class. So it's shocking that 90% just quit on me like that. It couldn't have been the lesson, either; I've used that lesson for 2 weeks in other classes, with relative success. I guess it's just time for things to go wrong. I knew the relatively great year I was having here couldn't last that long.
I mean, these were not just the usual troublemakers I'm talking about here. As a matter of fact, this was usually a well-behaved class. So it's shocking that 90% just quit on me like that. It couldn't have been the lesson, either; I've used that lesson for 2 weeks in other classes, with relative success. I guess it's just time for things to go wrong. I knew the relatively great year I was having here couldn't last that long.
19 October 2005
"I have to praise you like I should..."
It's well over halfway through my second year at my high school, and I must say that this year's ichinensei (freshmen) are much, much better than the ichinensei last year, in terms of both behavior and English ability (relatively speaking). It's actually been a pleasure to teach them this year (well, most of them).
Take, for example, my daily morning routine of walking from the train station to the school among with masses of students. Often, there are a few students who will greet me. Last year, it was always in Japanese: "ohayou gozaimasu, ohayou gozaimasu." This year, some students, usually ichinensei, actually greet me in English: "Good morning!" Some students go farther than that: "Good morning, how are you?"
Another example: Every ichinensei class, I start off by saying "Good morning" to the class. Last year, I could count on one hand the number of times a student actually said "Good morning" back to me. This year, in the great majority of my classes, there are a group of students that say "Good morning" back to me every time. In addition, some students make the effort to say "Goodbye" to me after class! That gives me goosebumps.
I know some of you are throwing your hands up, wondering what the big deal is. But unless you've been in that situation, you probably can't understand the joy that it brings. When your job is to try to get your students to be interested in English, and then some actually make the effort to use English with you, even if it's just "good morning"... man, that's cause for celebration. So, kudos to my ichinensei students for making this year a pretty good one.
Take, for example, my daily morning routine of walking from the train station to the school among with masses of students. Often, there are a few students who will greet me. Last year, it was always in Japanese: "ohayou gozaimasu, ohayou gozaimasu." This year, some students, usually ichinensei, actually greet me in English: "Good morning!" Some students go farther than that: "Good morning, how are you?"
Another example: Every ichinensei class, I start off by saying "Good morning" to the class. Last year, I could count on one hand the number of times a student actually said "Good morning" back to me. This year, in the great majority of my classes, there are a group of students that say "Good morning" back to me every time. In addition, some students make the effort to say "Goodbye" to me after class! That gives me goosebumps.
I know some of you are throwing your hands up, wondering what the big deal is. But unless you've been in that situation, you probably can't understand the joy that it brings. When your job is to try to get your students to be interested in English, and then some actually make the effort to use English with you, even if it's just "good morning"... man, that's cause for celebration. So, kudos to my ichinensei students for making this year a pretty good one.
30 September 2005
Chariots of Fire meets ER
Today was my high school's Sports Festival, when the students (hopefully) show their best school spirit and participate in many different athletic activities. I missed it last year because of a typhoon, so I was looking forward to seeing it this time around. Unfortunately, because of my stupidity, I ended up missing half the festivities.
The very first thing on the schedule was a 4 x 200-meter relay. There were 3 of them, divided by grade, and every time, there were 6 teams of students and a teachers' team. Originally, I wasn't scheduled to participate, but by the third round, some of the teachers were too tired to continue. One of them called me over to fill in. Excited, and without stretching, warming up or anything like that, I immediately went over to the baton exchange area, about 30 seconds before the baton was handed to me. At that point, we were in 2nd place. My goal was to not let us slip into last.
But then, as I started running, I kicked it into a gear that I didn't know I had. I couldn't believe how fast I was going! It was like running on air. I hadn't run that fast since my own high school days. Not only did I maintain our 2nd place position, I almost took over 1st from the kid in front of me. Unfortunately, the anchor, who was after me, couldn't capitalize, and we wound up finishing 2nd. As I made my way back to my chair on the sidelines, teachers and students alike were coming up to me, saying Hayai! (You're fast!) I was enjoying the attention and basking in the limelight.
About 10 minutes later, I was feeling kind of dizzy, so I took a walk away from the festivities to try to calm myself down. But I ended up having to lay on the ground, too weak to stand up. The vice-principal, who happened to be nearby, panicked and went for help. Next thing I know, I was in the nurses room and being told to take a nap until lunchtime. The consensus among the nurses and the P.E. teachers was that running that fast without doing the proper warmups put sudden stress on my heart, which caused me to almost faint. Oh well... I had my 200 meters of glory. Anyway, the moral of the story: do your stretches and warmups, kids.
The very first thing on the schedule was a 4 x 200-meter relay. There were 3 of them, divided by grade, and every time, there were 6 teams of students and a teachers' team. Originally, I wasn't scheduled to participate, but by the third round, some of the teachers were too tired to continue. One of them called me over to fill in. Excited, and without stretching, warming up or anything like that, I immediately went over to the baton exchange area, about 30 seconds before the baton was handed to me. At that point, we were in 2nd place. My goal was to not let us slip into last.
But then, as I started running, I kicked it into a gear that I didn't know I had. I couldn't believe how fast I was going! It was like running on air. I hadn't run that fast since my own high school days. Not only did I maintain our 2nd place position, I almost took over 1st from the kid in front of me. Unfortunately, the anchor, who was after me, couldn't capitalize, and we wound up finishing 2nd. As I made my way back to my chair on the sidelines, teachers and students alike were coming up to me, saying Hayai! (You're fast!) I was enjoying the attention and basking in the limelight.
About 10 minutes later, I was feeling kind of dizzy, so I took a walk away from the festivities to try to calm myself down. But I ended up having to lay on the ground, too weak to stand up. The vice-principal, who happened to be nearby, panicked and went for help. Next thing I know, I was in the nurses room and being told to take a nap until lunchtime. The consensus among the nurses and the P.E. teachers was that running that fast without doing the proper warmups put sudden stress on my heart, which caused me to almost faint. Oh well... I had my 200 meters of glory. Anyway, the moral of the story: do your stretches and warmups, kids.
12 September 2005
At least they didn't yell, "Bobby Orogon!"
Okay... I'm sitting in the English teachers' office at school during lunch last Friday. I'm having a conversation with one of the English teachers when all of a sudden, these two boys stick their heads in the door, search me out, yell "KATRINA!" and run away as fast as they can.
As these two knuckleheads make a run for it, I just had to sit back in my chair and laugh out loud. I mean, exactly what were these punks trying to accomplish? Were they trying to make me jump up in rage? Did they think I would break down and cry in front of them? Even now, trying to think of the reasoning behind such an idiotic thing like that makes me laugh even more. Needless to say, those two boys will be pumping gas at the local Eneos for the rest of their lives.
As these two knuckleheads make a run for it, I just had to sit back in my chair and laugh out loud. I mean, exactly what were these punks trying to accomplish? Were they trying to make me jump up in rage? Did they think I would break down and cry in front of them? Even now, trying to think of the reasoning behind such an idiotic thing like that makes me laugh even more. Needless to say, those two boys will be pumping gas at the local Eneos for the rest of their lives.
25 August 2005
They're letting you teach my son?
This picture is from an article in my high school's newsletter that describes my adventures with PTA members on July 1. In case you can't tell, that's me standing, and I'm not doing shadow puppets... I'm holding up a flash card. The text at the top reads eigo sawakai (English tea party). Using my limited Japanese translation skills (and a good dictionary), this is what the short article says:
This year, for the second straight year, we got together with Mr. Herman and had a tea party. We played an easy English word game, among other things. We had a great time!
Pfhhhhh.... You better had had a good time, with all the work I put in for you, you ungrateful people! Nah, just kidding - it was fun.
I gotta tell you though... teaching 15- and 17- year olds, that's one thing. That doesn't bother me at all. But conducting a fun English game for their parents - almost all of whom are twice my age, don't give a hoot about English, and are surely looking to see if their kids are getting their money's worth from me - that makes me very nervous. I'm surprised nobody noticed how much I was shaking. But hey... if they thought I had a good time, then I must have done a good job, huh?
30 May 2005
My First Racial Incident
I've lived most of my life in the Southern U.S., and most of my life in the South was spent in Alabama. As every American knows (or should know), Alabama is famous for its history of discrimination against minorities. However, in all my years there, I've never experienced any direct racism of any kind. Maybe I was lucky enough to be surrounded by people who didn't judge me by the color of my skin. My experiences in Alabama (hey, everywhere I've lived) were pretty good on that front.
So, when a female student called me the closest Japanese equivalent of the n-word in one of my classes during a recent short stint at a high school in northern Osaka, I have to admit that I was very shocked. I never actually heard her say the word; the class in question was pretty noisy. I would have never known that anything had happened if the regular teacher of that class hadn't called me later and told me. According to the teacher, the girl was trying to get my attention in class. She used the term because she thought it was a friendly gesture. After the class, the teacher and the principal of the high school confronted the girl and told her that such language was unappropriate. I was surprised and disappointed to hear all that.
What happened after that was very awkward for me. I had a meeting outside of school with the principal and teacher, who both apologized to me in person. Then, when I returned to the school, I had another meeting with the teacher (who apologized again) and the girl who said the word. She was a pretty young woman with a great smile - someone you don't expect to utter racial slurs. She looked embarassed and ashamed to have said what she did, and she gave an authentic apology. She went as far as to promise to study more about African-Americans and minority groups in general. I don't know if the teacher put her up to that or not, but the student certainly made a sincere effort to show that she was sorry. I told her that I forgave her, but what she said had hurt me very much, and I hoped that she would show more consideration in the future.
In the end, I suppose the whole incident did some good. The teacher and principal decided to use the incident to develop what they called a "civil rights education" program to teach not only the students, but the teachers on how to show the right respect towards other races. As for the girl, I've heard that not only is she really trying to learn more about other cultures, but her grades at school have risen dramatically (especially in English class). Me? Well, I don't hold any grudges about that. It wasn't something that was said out of hate; it was just ignorance. I'm sure she's not going to say that word again. Yeah, I was disappointed, but I've moved on. If anything, the incident helped make me stronger as well, because it caused me to reaffirm who I am and what I represent.
So, when a female student called me the closest Japanese equivalent of the n-word in one of my classes during a recent short stint at a high school in northern Osaka, I have to admit that I was very shocked. I never actually heard her say the word; the class in question was pretty noisy. I would have never known that anything had happened if the regular teacher of that class hadn't called me later and told me. According to the teacher, the girl was trying to get my attention in class. She used the term because she thought it was a friendly gesture. After the class, the teacher and the principal of the high school confronted the girl and told her that such language was unappropriate. I was surprised and disappointed to hear all that.
What happened after that was very awkward for me. I had a meeting outside of school with the principal and teacher, who both apologized to me in person. Then, when I returned to the school, I had another meeting with the teacher (who apologized again) and the girl who said the word. She was a pretty young woman with a great smile - someone you don't expect to utter racial slurs. She looked embarassed and ashamed to have said what she did, and she gave an authentic apology. She went as far as to promise to study more about African-Americans and minority groups in general. I don't know if the teacher put her up to that or not, but the student certainly made a sincere effort to show that she was sorry. I told her that I forgave her, but what she said had hurt me very much, and I hoped that she would show more consideration in the future.
In the end, I suppose the whole incident did some good. The teacher and principal decided to use the incident to develop what they called a "civil rights education" program to teach not only the students, but the teachers on how to show the right respect towards other races. As for the girl, I've heard that not only is she really trying to learn more about other cultures, but her grades at school have risen dramatically (especially in English class). Me? Well, I don't hold any grudges about that. It wasn't something that was said out of hate; it was just ignorance. I'm sure she's not going to say that word again. Yeah, I was disappointed, but I've moved on. If anything, the incident helped make me stronger as well, because it caused me to reaffirm who I am and what I represent.
21 January 2005
OK, so elementary school wasn't that bad...
Yesterday I finished my short assignment at that elementary school near Kobe that I told all of you about. Despite all my problems while I was there, it ended on a pretty good note, I must say.
All of the students (even the bad ones) were a little sad that I wouldn't be back. To my astonishment, they had come to enjoy the English games that I used in the lesson. Many students took time after the last lesson to tell me thank you very much. That meant a lot to me. One class even gave me a binder with thank-you letters in English from every student in the class. Here are some excerpts, and forgive me - I didn't correct their English:
All of the students (even the bad ones) were a little sad that I wouldn't be back. To my astonishment, they had come to enjoy the English games that I used in the lesson. Many students took time after the last lesson to tell me thank you very much. That meant a lot to me. One class even gave me a binder with thank-you letters in English from every student in the class. Here are some excerpts, and forgive me - I didn't correct their English:
-"I was very grateful to you for teaching English, although a short time."Amazing, huh? I guess my time there was kind of effective, even though I didn't think so most of the time. In hindsight, things weren't so bad, I suppose. I'd probably do it again.... maybe.
-"I couldn't speak English, but I could understand it little by little, studying with you. I want to study English very hard in junior high school."
-"I have been learning English but I could not study home work at all. But I can do it, thanks to Mr. Herman."
-"I like sports, especially basketball. You are very tall, I want to play basketball with you if I have a chance." (Herman's comments: I think to any 12-year-old, I'm pretty tall, don't you think? Still, very cool letter.)
25 November 2004
OWWW! In Japanese, ITA!
Well, well, well... several weeks ago, I was talking about how well things were going over at the elementary school near Kobe. Well, the honeymoon is over... for some classes, anyway.
* A few weeks ago, I did a sports lesson. I had a bunch of sports toys from my company that I used to help teach the target English. Well, at the end of a few of the classes, some of the boys decided to grab the materials and take off, and I had to go chasing them because I needed the materials for the next classes.
* Today, I was doing a class on food. We played a game where the kids had to use a toy fishing rod to pick up these picture cards and put them in a paper bowl. One boy had trouble with the fishing rod, and, in his frustration, he threw the thing against the blackboard, breaking part of it.
*Here's the worst part: recently my hair has been kind of long, and the kids love to touch my hair during and after class. I don't mind that; after all, these kids don't get many chances to touch a black person's hair. However, after the last class, a couple of boys went too far. They grabbed a few strands of my hair and PULLED THEM OUT! That really got me steamed. After that, they went to their friends saying, "Mite! Mite!" (That means "Look!" in Japanese). It's like they got a souvenir or something. I was really upset.
Notice that in all the problems above, they involved the boys. The girls are no problem; they're sweet and nice, but a little shy.
* A few weeks ago, I did a sports lesson. I had a bunch of sports toys from my company that I used to help teach the target English. Well, at the end of a few of the classes, some of the boys decided to grab the materials and take off, and I had to go chasing them because I needed the materials for the next classes.
* Today, I was doing a class on food. We played a game where the kids had to use a toy fishing rod to pick up these picture cards and put them in a paper bowl. One boy had trouble with the fishing rod, and, in his frustration, he threw the thing against the blackboard, breaking part of it.
*Here's the worst part: recently my hair has been kind of long, and the kids love to touch my hair during and after class. I don't mind that; after all, these kids don't get many chances to touch a black person's hair. However, after the last class, a couple of boys went too far. They grabbed a few strands of my hair and PULLED THEM OUT! That really got me steamed. After that, they went to their friends saying, "Mite! Mite!" (That means "Look!" in Japanese). It's like they got a souvenir or something. I was really upset.
Notice that in all the problems above, they involved the boys. The girls are no problem; they're sweet and nice, but a little shy.
15 October 2004
Elementary School
Yep, that's right... in addition to teaching at a high school 3 days a week, I'm also teaching at an elementary school near Kobe every 2 weeks or so. The first time was yesterday. It was a blast! The kids were excited to be learning English, so they were eager to see me and participate in the activities. It was more fun than high school! I was dead tired after work, though. 5 straight lessons with 10 and 11 year olds will do that to you. But it was enjoyable, a break from all those bad high school students.
10 September 2004
Below the Rim
Whenever I have some free time after a hard day's work teaching English at my high school, I decide to play hoops with the basketball team. Now, the basketball team is not even a team right now. They have only four players: 3 boys and a girl. The hoops teacher is all too happy to have another body there to make things more interesting.
Yesterday was just my second time to join the hoops team for some b-ball, and today we decided to have a little ball game. I and two of the boys were on one team, and the hoops coach, the third boy and the girl were on the other team. I'm proud to say that the game was very competitive, with the coach's team winning a close game, 10 to 9. The highlight of the game for me was when I posted up against the coach, spun around and made a layup. Apparently, the team doesn't learn much about posting up, so you should have seen the looks on the students' faces at that work of art. All of a sudden, rumors are going around the school that I'm a basketball star. One of the students called me Jordan. Hey... I'll take that. That's better than Kevyn Little.
Yesterday was just my second time to join the hoops team for some b-ball, and today we decided to have a little ball game. I and two of the boys were on one team, and the hoops coach, the third boy and the girl were on the other team. I'm proud to say that the game was very competitive, with the coach's team winning a close game, 10 to 9. The highlight of the game for me was when I posted up against the coach, spun around and made a layup. Apparently, the team doesn't learn much about posting up, so you should have seen the looks on the students' faces at that work of art. All of a sudden, rumors are going around the school that I'm a basketball star. One of the students called me Jordan. Hey... I'll take that. That's better than Kevyn Little.
31 August 2004
Back to School
This week I started teaching at the high school again, after a good summer break. By the way, summer break was nice. I didn't do much, but you know, those are sometimes the best kind of vacation. I needed to just relax.
The high school hadn't changed that much. The bad students still behaved in class, and the good students were still too shy to say anything in English in my class. One thing that I did notice was that a lot of the girls have started to call me Kevin Lyttle. I had no idea who Kevin Lyttle was until they started calling me that. (If you don't know, he's that soca singer with that song, "Turn Me On", which, surprisingly, is popular here in Japan.) Both my girlfriend and I think that I look absolutely nothing like Kevin Lyttle. But most of these students have never seen a black person in the flesh before, so any black guy looks like Kevin Lyttle to them.
Even so, it gets on my nerves, because (a) I don't look like him at all, (b) it's not just one girl that's doing it, it's a huge number of them calling me that, and (c) they do it every single day. You'd think they'd get tired of it.
Oh, and while the girls call me Kevin Lyttle every day, the boys are worse. I've been at that high school since May, telling everybody that I'm American. But even here, in August, the boys insist that I must be from Jamaica! I know why they do that: (a) I'm black, (b) their idea of an American is someone with blond hair and blue eyes, and (c) reggae music is popular with the boys at that high school. Still, it bothers me.
Enough ranting. By the way, I do like working at the high school, if you can't tell.
The high school hadn't changed that much. The bad students still behaved in class, and the good students were still too shy to say anything in English in my class. One thing that I did notice was that a lot of the girls have started to call me Kevin Lyttle. I had no idea who Kevin Lyttle was until they started calling me that. (If you don't know, he's that soca singer with that song, "Turn Me On", which, surprisingly, is popular here in Japan.) Both my girlfriend and I think that I look absolutely nothing like Kevin Lyttle. But most of these students have never seen a black person in the flesh before, so any black guy looks like Kevin Lyttle to them.
Even so, it gets on my nerves, because (a) I don't look like him at all, (b) it's not just one girl that's doing it, it's a huge number of them calling me that, and (c) they do it every single day. You'd think they'd get tired of it.
Oh, and while the girls call me Kevin Lyttle every day, the boys are worse. I've been at that high school since May, telling everybody that I'm American. But even here, in August, the boys insist that I must be from Jamaica! I know why they do that: (a) I'm black, (b) their idea of an American is someone with blond hair and blue eyes, and (c) reggae music is popular with the boys at that high school. Still, it bothers me.
Enough ranting. By the way, I do like working at the high school, if you can't tell.
02 July 2004
Is this a Japanese high school?
Well, several weeks into my high school job, I can say that I've been very very surprised. In the U.S.A., we always hear about how Japanese high school students study all the time, how good they are at math, science, etc. The people that tell us that have never been to the high school I'm working at. In their classes, some students sleep, email friends using their cell phones, curl their hair with curling irons, read comic books, listen to their Walkmans, put on makeup, play with their little sticker books - anything except pay attention to the teacher. And this goes on every day, in just about every class I have.
Part of the problem is that teachers don't discipline students for those kind of actions. You can be sure that if I listened to my Walkman in class, I would have been in detention or something. But the students at my school get away with it. I don't know why the teachers don't do anything about it, or can't. But obviously they're embarrassed about it. The teachers that I team-teach with always say, "Herman, we're very sorry. Don't think this is a typical Japanese high school. Don't believe these are average Japanese students." In other words, this school is a special case.
To be fair, my high school is about an hour and a half by train from Osaka, in the countryside. These students don't expect to be much when they are adults. Many of them have hard lives: poverty, family problems, peer pressure. They don't have the motivation to study hard. So that's probably why they behave that way.
Still, I'm surprised every day I go to school. It doesn't bother me that much. It just makes my experience more interesting.
Part of the problem is that teachers don't discipline students for those kind of actions. You can be sure that if I listened to my Walkman in class, I would have been in detention or something. But the students at my school get away with it. I don't know why the teachers don't do anything about it, or can't. But obviously they're embarrassed about it. The teachers that I team-teach with always say, "Herman, we're very sorry. Don't think this is a typical Japanese high school. Don't believe these are average Japanese students." In other words, this school is a special case.
To be fair, my high school is about an hour and a half by train from Osaka, in the countryside. These students don't expect to be much when they are adults. Many of them have hard lives: poverty, family problems, peer pressure. They don't have the motivation to study hard. So that's probably why they behave that way.
Still, I'm surprised every day I go to school. It doesn't bother me that much. It just makes my experience more interesting.
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