Grade School
Hey.
So, this morning I went to an elementary school to talk about general Japanese language to some...elementary schoolers. I think they were 2nd graders. It was their last day of official day of school, and their teacher had asked me to come in and talk about the Japanese language with them. The teacher's daughter did exchanges with our Japanese sister city, むつ市in青森県～Later she went as a JET and taught up in Mutsu :) So the teacher was pretty gung-ho about Japan. It's actually kinda nice to see a parent so supportive of her daughter; I wonder if she was always like that? Or if she grew into it? I'm kind of hoping my parents will. Ha.
Anyway, I was a little nervous, because I had never visited a class as a guest speaker before. Thankfully, it was pretty relaxed, and any time I had worried might not pass fast enough, we spent trying to quiet down the kids. They were a little rambunctious, haha. Especially the boys. I brought some 扇子and マンガ. I also snagged a Japanese fashions magazine to show-and-tell; 'course I flipped through it quickly to make sure there were no lingerie sections or anything.
Those kids were not good sharers. Still cute, though. After I said a little about who I was, they kids were allowed to ask questions. Most of what they asked was "HOW DO YOU SAY ______ IN JAPANESE?" Thankfully, I was able to answer all of their crazy vocab questions. One kid asked how you say "Truck," though. I told him that I knew how to say car. Then he went on to ask/say "Japanese people don't know a lot about cars, huh?"
Dude. Mitsubishi. Toyota. Honda.
At the time, I didn't point that out, but the teacher looked nervous. I just explained that in America, driving is our main mode of transportation, whereas in Japan metropolitan areas, trains are more convenient, but that in rural areas cars are used a lot. I didn't really go into much more detail than that, other than stating "It's not bad, just different."
So we went through questions, they sang a cute song that basically was like "Good afternoon, how are you, I'm fine thank you" in Japanese, and then I started to try to teach them introductions. Yeah, with boys not so much, the girls were right on board, though. Then I went to write some hiragana they were gonna learn.
Not long after we had gotten through "はじめまして” I realized these were second graders, and they were getting restless. So at that point after they were whining about not being able to do it, they were tired, can they have snacks now, I threw up my hands and said "HEY. Snack time! And I'll write your names in Japanese."
They concurred.
So I wrote their names in カタカナ, and the teacher and I handed out rice crackers and poured a little ramune for everyone.
Kids are OBSESSED with fairness. "He got more soda than me!" "She got two!" "I didn't get to see the magazine!" "She sat on my feeeeeeet! My feet were in her sitting area first!"
...But in all truth, I think I was like that as a kid, too. And I actually enjoyed myself. IT was a great learning experience. I had expected to do more teaching, but I guess I kind of planned on a lesson for middle schoolers rather than 7-year-olds xD;; Haha.
So! Until next time~
