I love my job, but unfortunately it's still really tiring right now ^^;;
I was more tired than I expected yesterday, and ended up doing not much of anything later that day. So, I’ll admit, I was a bit worried for my full day today. Was it warranted? In a way, yes, in a way no. Did I manage to teach all my classes today? Yes. Would I have liked to have taught them better? Also yes.
I started the day with a fourth year elementary school class. Now the schools have merged, the classes are a lot bigger, with about 30 students each. At this elementary school I usually teach the two fourth year and two third year classes with occasionally first and second years as well, while the other Japanese ALT teaches the fifth and sixth years. These third and fourth years are absolute delights to teach, I love them to bits and they’re super engaged, try hard and seem to enjoy it, so they’re pretty easy to teach.
For the first period, the teacher did most of the work. I was still in the hospital last year, so I had missed that lesson and we played some simple games to practice the words they had learned then so they could hear “my correct pronunciation.” Not my words, but alright. We also started on directions, turn left, turn right and go straight, and overall it was a very easy class to teach. They had remembered most of the vocabulary despite it being pretty difficult, so that was great.
Second period, I had my first third year class. Because I hadn’t been there last week, they had not had any English since before the winter vacation. We played some bingo using the alphabet instead of numbers (they love getting stickers for every bingo) and started a new chapter “What’s this?” It’s a very quiz-focussed unit and the silhouette quiz was super easy for them. The “three hint quizzes'' of the book were easy enough as well, so then I made them make their own three hint quizzes. This was really easy for some and much more of a struggle for others. Usually the problem was in a) deciding the answer of the quiz b) deciding which hints were okay. This class more so than my other classes want to have the “right answer” so things like this where they can use their imagination to decide on things themselves are really hard for them.
They all managed to create one or more quizzes though, and I had them ask them to each other in groups, and in the end asked for volunteers to ask them in front of everyone. We only had time for one, but a lot of people wanted to do their quiz so we decided we’d have some more people do that next week. I’m so proud of them for wanting to talk English in front of the whole class. (I do give them stickers for it, though they only find that out after someone has volunteered xD) I don’t like forcing people to speak in front of everyone, since I hated that as a child, so it’s nice to see so many volunteers.
Honestly speaking, second period was a bit hard on me, especially near the end, but since there was a break after, I was fine. I rested and was ready for my second third year class. We did a similar thing as during the second period, and they were a bit quicker at deciding and making quizzes. The homeroom teacher wasn’t there, but that is often the case during English so I wasn’t surprised. He’s a new teacher, and he was there the first month and then occasionally, but rarely. He’s usually watching other classes or something? He does often come to apologize that he won’t be there during break though. And honestly, his class focuses a lot better without him there.
My last class was my second fourth year class, and their teacher wasn’t there either. Which meant I had no idea what they had done last week, but I had the students fill me in. They said they had done a lot, maybe a bit too much, because they didn’t remember as much as usual. I started with some review bingo of things we had done a while back, then checked the vocabulary, and spent most of the time practising that by playing Simon Says for the directions and several games for the vocabulary. I also had them try and give direction to their neighbour, but that was still a bit difficult, so we need to work on that some more next week.
This hour was the most difficult for me, not because of the students, because they’re the absolute sweetest, but because the pain that (of course) got increasingly worse meant I struggled a lot with thinking of Japanese words. I don’t think the students noticed, so that’s good.
School lunch was pretty good, I helped with portioning, but when we had started eating we found out there wasn’t enough. We had made one portion less than we should have. I panicked thinking maybe because I’d been ill they hadn’t ordered mine and I had eaten someone else’s food, but thankfully that wasn’t the case. I rested a bit after lunch instead of driving home, and I talked a lot with some of the other teachers which was a lot of fun.
After I got back from school I worked a bit at the office, and I probably won’t be doing much for the rest of the day. Still not back to full health, but hopefully getting there soon? Maybe? Of course it’s gonna take a while, since I didn’t rest as much as I should have, but then again, I barely have any day’s off left, and I do still have doctor’s appointments I have to get to.
I started the day with a fourth year elementary school class. Now the schools have merged, the classes are a lot bigger, with about 30 students each. At this elementary school I usually teach the two fourth year and two third year classes with occasionally first and second years as well, while the other Japanese ALT teaches the fifth and sixth years. These third and fourth years are absolute delights to teach, I love them to bits and they’re super engaged, try hard and seem to enjoy it, so they’re pretty easy to teach.
For the first period, the teacher did most of the work. I was still in the hospital last year, so I had missed that lesson and we played some simple games to practice the words they had learned then so they could hear “my correct pronunciation.” Not my words, but alright. We also started on directions, turn left, turn right and go straight, and overall it was a very easy class to teach. They had remembered most of the vocabulary despite it being pretty difficult, so that was great.
Second period, I had my first third year class. Because I hadn’t been there last week, they had not had any English since before the winter vacation. We played some bingo using the alphabet instead of numbers (they love getting stickers for every bingo) and started a new chapter “What’s this?” It’s a very quiz-focussed unit and the silhouette quiz was super easy for them. The “three hint quizzes'' of the book were easy enough as well, so then I made them make their own three hint quizzes. This was really easy for some and much more of a struggle for others. Usually the problem was in a) deciding the answer of the quiz b) deciding which hints were okay. This class more so than my other classes want to have the “right answer” so things like this where they can use their imagination to decide on things themselves are really hard for them.
They all managed to create one or more quizzes though, and I had them ask them to each other in groups, and in the end asked for volunteers to ask them in front of everyone. We only had time for one, but a lot of people wanted to do their quiz so we decided we’d have some more people do that next week. I’m so proud of them for wanting to talk English in front of the whole class. (I do give them stickers for it, though they only find that out after someone has volunteered xD) I don’t like forcing people to speak in front of everyone, since I hated that as a child, so it’s nice to see so many volunteers.
Honestly speaking, second period was a bit hard on me, especially near the end, but since there was a break after, I was fine. I rested and was ready for my second third year class. We did a similar thing as during the second period, and they were a bit quicker at deciding and making quizzes. The homeroom teacher wasn’t there, but that is often the case during English so I wasn’t surprised. He’s a new teacher, and he was there the first month and then occasionally, but rarely. He’s usually watching other classes or something? He does often come to apologize that he won’t be there during break though. And honestly, his class focuses a lot better without him there.
My last class was my second fourth year class, and their teacher wasn’t there either. Which meant I had no idea what they had done last week, but I had the students fill me in. They said they had done a lot, maybe a bit too much, because they didn’t remember as much as usual. I started with some review bingo of things we had done a while back, then checked the vocabulary, and spent most of the time practising that by playing Simon Says for the directions and several games for the vocabulary. I also had them try and give direction to their neighbour, but that was still a bit difficult, so we need to work on that some more next week.
This hour was the most difficult for me, not because of the students, because they’re the absolute sweetest, but because the pain that (of course) got increasingly worse meant I struggled a lot with thinking of Japanese words. I don’t think the students noticed, so that’s good.
School lunch was pretty good, I helped with portioning, but when we had started eating we found out there wasn’t enough. We had made one portion less than we should have. I panicked thinking maybe because I’d been ill they hadn’t ordered mine and I had eaten someone else’s food, but thankfully that wasn’t the case. I rested a bit after lunch instead of driving home, and I talked a lot with some of the other teachers which was a lot of fun.
After I got back from school I worked a bit at the office, and I probably won’t be doing much for the rest of the day. Still not back to full health, but hopefully getting there soon? Maybe? Of course it’s gonna take a while, since I didn’t rest as much as I should have, but then again, I barely have any day’s off left, and I do still have doctor’s appointments I have to get to.