All My Children

Now that we've survived kids training we have to teach kids as part of our daily schedule. As the newly trained woman, I have been appointed the "chibis" (small children). I was told by the branch manager today that she prefers for women to teach the chibiko and kinder classes. Also, she recommended that I simplify my name for the little ones, so now the chibis call me 'Stephie'. My first chibiko group lesson was yesterday. There were 2 boys (age 3) that knew each other well and this created a little problem for me because they were a little too comfortable with each other. Even though the parents sit in the class with the student, in this case, they didn't do much to control their behavior. The boys were easily distracted and were constantly in competition over who could attract the most attention. They fought over who could say the words or find the pictures faster throughout the lesson. Even though they were a little out of control it didn't make me hate teaching the class, which is good since I'll have the same kids for the next 3 months. I did see how Japanese parents reprimand their kids; they smack them in the heads! This seemed to get their attention, at least for a few seconds.

Today I was supposed to have my first group 'kinder' lesson but another teacher took over, since there was a visitor coming in. The manager didn't think it was appropriate for me to have a visitor in my first kinder lesson. Visitor demos are done when a parent comes in who is interested in signing their child up in a "Nova Kids" class and want to experience an in-class demo to see how their child reacts to it. Since I was terrified of teaching kinder in the first place, I was glad that they made a managerial decision to take me out. I did end up teaching a kinder class later on in the day but it was a one-on-one with a 5 year old girl named Yuzuki. She was so cute and smart! I was glad that my first lesson was a one-on-one because it made it a lot easier for me to follow the lesson plan without having to worry about the behavioral and timing issues that come up with group classes. Yuzuki had already taken this lesson before so she knew all the vocabulary words such as "jump, clap fast, hop slowly, walk slowly, run fast". So, when I showed her the flashcards she wouldn't even let me finish saying the word; she said it and quickly acted out the action. I think she enjoyed it as much as I did.

I (Nick) also had my first two kids classes this weekend. Incidentally, rather than teaching the younger kids, I was paired up with Juniors and Seniors (I'm sure I'll get a kinder class sooner or later). First I had the Juniors class. . . and it was BIG. . . seven kids with the most diverse personalities you can imagine! The class was made up of two boys and five girls. Following the basic stereotype, the boys were very loud and full of energy (pushing, pulling and shadowing my every word). The girls, however, were mostly quiet, polite and very studious. The challenge here is finishing an entire lesson while successfully keeping everyone interested and participating. In the end, the class had fun and I'm pretty sure they learned something. . . not bad for a first attempt. Now, my second class was much different. I was supposed to be teaching two senior-level students, but only one student attended class today. Her name was Miyuki, and she was a great student. Since this was a one-on-one class, I was able to tailor the entire lesson specifically to her. We did some listen and repeat, played a number of games, and even acted out some of the vocabulary (fishing, swimming, & watching TV). All in all, she was a lot of fun to teach.

Also, we have received our first care package from Mary. It was filled with spices (which are sort of expensive here), Ovaltine and Nutella for me, postcards from FL for us to show the students and some cheese powder to put on pasta to make macaroni and cheese since we cannot find it here. She also sent powdered skim milk because the milk here tastes so different and we can't get used to it; plus it made my stomach hurt. However, we were finally able to find soy milk in the supermarket so I'm set with my soy milk & Ovaltine ....all I need to do is convert Nick into a soy milk drinker so that he can get his calcium too. I told Nick that since the milk here tastes kind of funny, soy milk might actually taste good to him. Thanks mom!