The Beginning of the Rain
...written on 2001-06-06, @ 2:39 a.m.
Tales of Kim's Life in Japan
Tue June 5, 2001
Hoowe! Japan's rainy season began in the middle of this afternoon while I was at work. Dang. I had ridden my bike in and knew that I would have to leave it parked under the bike shed for the next three weeks.
Yep, it's going to rain every day for three weeks, I've been told. I don't mind if it'll keep the mosquitos and gnats down for a while. I know "they'll be back", but the rain may prove to be some relief in that aspect.
I had my regular Tuesday night class today. These four classes are the only kids I see every week. I have two elementary classes, one class of 8th graders and one class of freshman highschoolers.
I spoil my eighth graders. I love them to pieces. There are four boys in the class and three of them are from the same branch (Sobutsu). More about them later.
The one class that always has me in fear is my first one with the fourth graders. One of the dear little youngsters likes to play tricks on me and pulled off a good one tonight, I must say. However, later he crossed the line and I rebuked him for it quite soundly. Fred was in the room and I was afraid I had made a mistake, but after class Fred told me that he thought it was the right thing to do.
I watched "Dennis the Menace" carefully as we went through the various games and activities and saw that he was his most mischievous when he was called on to recognize the alphabet. He doesn't know it. I mean, he can say it, but he can't read it. I told Hide this so he can work on it with him.
My fifth graders are three little angels. They are rather shy, but catch on fast and are cooperative. Note to self: next week review: "an eraser", "a woman", and "a policeman".
It is so nice to see their vocabulary growing! Today after we practiced the review words (about 40), I spread the flashcards around the room and told them it was the store, "Yanagen". They giggled at the thought. They then cooed with curiosity when I handed them green envelopes filled with play American money.
I asked them to browse the store, pick out some things that they liked and come to me to pay for them. When they brought their items to me, I had them roll the die and whatever came up (1-6) was what they paid for it. Kanae brought up her things. I asked her what the first one was. "It's a train.", she giggled, no doubt at the feasibility of finding a train for purchase in a department store. "It's a TRAIN?" I laughed. "How much is it?" I added. Kanae rolled the die and up came a "one". "Only ONE dollar!?" I exclaimed. Kanae smiled as I gave her change and then wasn't too put out when she ended up paying six dollars for her hat. Hey, a brand new train and hat for only $7? She was smokin'!
I wondered if adding the money (and thus math) into the exercise would be too much, but their reaction and glee to the extra stimulus was rewarding to see. It worked and I even had one of the girls take over for me at the register!
"Ok, who's first?" I said to my eighth graders after greeting them. They all shifted in their seats, looked at each other, and then all stuck out their fists for four rounds of "janken" or "rock, paper, scissors" to decide who would be the first one up for "Show and Tell."
I remember Fridays in my elementary school English class with Miss Patton when we had "Show and Tell" and I thought it would be a good exercise for my students as well. In the beginning, before they got used to it, they would forget to bring something and grab the closest thing in their school bags, but now that it has become our opening ritual, I have seen many thoughtful offerings presented to the group. I usually ask them questions about their things, but today I got them to take the lead and ask their own.
After Show and Tell, I sat down with them and told them I wanted them to speak English. Anything would do, I just wanted to listen. Silence. Then titters. Silence again. Silence. Silence. Silence.
I was comfortable with the silence, but thought I might prod them a little bit and silently spread out on the table, a deck of cards I had in my hands. On these cards were pictures of verbs, adjectives, nouns and the conjunction "and". I said nothing, I just spread them out. The boys curiously touched and looked at the cards and at me, and while I heard a few grunts of recognition, no sentences were being formed.
I still said nothing. More grunts, more looks, they put a couple of cards in their hands and finally one of the boys (one of the ones who doesn't verbalize much) turned to me and said in a pleading voice, "Hinto". I smiled and took up some cards and showed them what they could do.
Boy, did that get them started, and the oddest thing was, that the one boy who is the most vocal in class was the least vocal in this exercise, while the two who rarely say anything without prodding, were creating silly sentences right and left! It was great! They didn't even want to stop when I told them to.
After that little sentence structure manipulation, we went on to play with some magnetic poetry. I gave them each a different "Backpack Poet" (Wild Things, Hugs and Kisses, Friends Forever, and Rant and Rave) and told them to use the words in there to make a sentence. Though their structure wasn't perfect, they were staying within the confines of a formal sentence and using phrases that I have seen in their text books. My most advanced student was stumbling in this one because he couldn't find any present perfect tiles! I hope to get them flying creatively in this exercise on down the line, but I was very pleased with how they were doing, especially after Hide's somewhat discouraging comment the other day when I showed him the kits.
I want to give my students the opportunity to explore English in many ways, speaking, listening, reading and writing, so at the end of class, I gave them a half a page of part of a bio on Leo DiCaprio. I told them to try and read it without a dictionary first, and then read it again with a dictionary to help them out and make a note of the words they had questions about. I could see a couple of worried looks (usually happens when they see a big chunk of written English), but when I read the first paragraph, I saw all of their heads nodding and heard them translating to each other what it said. I know this reading is a better fit for the high schoolers and I did give it to them also, but I think my eighth graders can do it bit by bit. I am still on the lookout for something tailor made for them and believe that this will do in the meantime. Next week will be the testing ground.
I've also asked my eighth graders to write me emails, but this has met with little success. I am wondering how they would feel about doing either a group diary or an individual one. I know this would be challenging for them. I think I'll broach the subject next week.
My tenth graders have advanced English skills and I did pretty much the same thing with them as I did with the eighth graders, except they could do it with more ease. They also liked the silly sentences ("sad pigs sing and cuddly dragons bounce") and the magnetic poetry. I am anxious to see how they do with the reading, and get their thoughts on the diary idea.
It is 2:15 a.m.and the rain is still a pattering. Ah, great background music for sleep.
Oyasumi nasai,
Kim