Improvement
Thankfully today went a lot better than yesterday. Am I still dizzy at times? Yes, of course. But was I able to teach and do my job like usual? Also yes. And it was a lot of fun. Today I went to my junior high school and taught all three second year classes. We did more and the most and man, did they struggle. The second year classes are the hardest to teach/ worst at English, so it’s always a bit of a struggle, but also a lot of fun.
I ran into several third years when I was about to leave, and they talked to me in (slightly broken) English, and that made me really happy as well. On the one hand people say an ALT that doesn’t speak Japanese is better because it forces the students to use English, on the other hand, I feel like a lot of my students 1) try and speak English because they already like me and have talked to me before (and most would be way too shy to just use English on someone they don’t know) and 2) they know that if their English doesn’t work out, they can still talk with me. If they end up not knowing how to say something they have the option of falling back on Japanese and asking me what to say, which helps a lot too.
One of the teachers ran after me to tell me “Thanks for your hard work” in English. He had wanted to say that when I left the teachers’ office, but he couldn’t think of the English and when he remembered especially ran after me to still say that. I thought that was really funny.
Yesterday I tried paper clay for the first time. It was super difficult to work with, but the resulting figures are super light, I didn’t expect that. (I was just looking for clay at the 100 yen shop, I had just heard about paper clay in some youtube videos, but knew nothing about it). And they even glow in the dark, though only if you leave them white.
It was hard to get a decent picture xD
And I tried some more embroidery, this time after reading about basic stitches (and learning you can halve your thread for more detail. Not there yet, but there’s definitely a lot of improvement from my first to my second try. Also being asked by your mum if you went to school today when you’re 27 is a weird feeling xD It did remind me I still had to post my blog, so that’s good ^^
I ran into several third years when I was about to leave, and they talked to me in (slightly broken) English, and that made me really happy as well. On the one hand people say an ALT that doesn’t speak Japanese is better because it forces the students to use English, on the other hand, I feel like a lot of my students 1) try and speak English because they already like me and have talked to me before (and most would be way too shy to just use English on someone they don’t know) and 2) they know that if their English doesn’t work out, they can still talk with me. If they end up not knowing how to say something they have the option of falling back on Japanese and asking me what to say, which helps a lot too.
One of the teachers ran after me to tell me “Thanks for your hard work” in English. He had wanted to say that when I left the teachers’ office, but he couldn’t think of the English and when he remembered especially ran after me to still say that. I thought that was really funny.
Yesterday I tried paper clay for the first time. It was super difficult to work with, but the resulting figures are super light, I didn’t expect that. (I was just looking for clay at the 100 yen shop, I had just heard about paper clay in some youtube videos, but knew nothing about it). And they even glow in the dark, though only if you leave them white.
It was hard to get a decent picture xD
And I tried some more embroidery, this time after reading about basic stitches (and learning you can halve your thread for more detail. Not there yet, but there’s definitely a lot of improvement from my first to my second try. Also being asked by your mum if you went to school today when you’re 27 is a weird feeling xD It did remind me I still had to post my blog, so that’s good ^^