IrishOboe

Wow, I had no idea how far behind I was with updates! I continue to have too many wonderful experiences and not enough time to write about them. Currently I am at home because I took a half day off, even though it’s Saturday. I’m getting tired of working on Saturday, but I think I won’t have to again for a while. Some events deserve more description, so I’ll just try to summarize my life then write about details later before I forget!

At school things have been going quite well. Of course I always see problems with how I teach and what I’m doing, but I am fairly relaxed and have managed to be on top of my work. We started the Show and Tell introduction presentations and I’ve been quite happy. Again, the kids defy the system with the students in the lower classes often producing better work than those in the upper levels. Some of them are a bit more responsible, too . . .

The third year kids are having a bit more trouble understanding how to plan getting from point A to point B. Some kids get it and are doing a great job, others clearly would rather have me tell them what to do. It’s stressing Naito sensei out a little, but I still think we should wait it out and see. I’ve discovered that they really don’t have any long-term self-guided projects in any sense of the word in high school here. The concept of outline, drafting, and re-writing seems to be a bit foreign. Well, all the better that they get a chance to see what it’s like to plan their own projects! I’m a bit upset that the books I ordered haven’t come so the girls who decided to read English books for their project couldn’t pick from the good ones I ordered but had to use less-than-ideal school books. Phooey!

I stayed after school a couple times this week to practice kyudo and chat with students. Monday even more ichinensei came to ICC (English club) and we decided what to do this year. It seems like we found a good plan. We’ll watch a movie the first week of each month (in English of course), the second time of the month we’ll have free time where students can work on what they want to and have me there are a resource, the third I’ll plan some games, and the forth we’ll have a special event TBD like cooking, having a party, etc. I was flattered that as plans were forming the kids in ICC before complained that they didn’t want it so structured and they liked what I did with them last year where they were free sit and talk and do various things with me. It’s good to know they enjoyed last year. Sometimes I wasn’t so sure!

After ICC I visited other clubs and ventured farther a field (haha) to the baseball and soccer fields. The baseball team was happy to have me visit and I talked with the new assistant coach in mixed Japanese/English. It’s always a pleasure to talk with kids outside of school. I just wish I wasn’t so shy still! I’m so much better than I was, but I still don’t reach out to everyone as much as I should. It’s easier to talk to the students who talk to me! However, when I do force myself to reach far out to the kids who look like they’re too cool for me, I almost always get a positive response. Gambaru! (I won’t give up!)

In the personal life I finally fell back into a lifestyle that got me sick again, though since I quickly responded with lots of sleep (those precious home hours are hard to give up!), I’m doing much better. I really helped that the ichinensei were gone Thursday and Friday for an orientation retreat so I only had my third year class on Friday. That gave me Thursday to clean up and plan and relax. It was certainly blessed timing.

Miwako has come over for Japanese lessons two more times (April 19 and 24) and they’ve been great. It’s great to chat with someone who’s willing to sit down and go slowly with me and correct me. In a conversation setting I don’t often get corrected, which is good because it’s the communication that matters, but at the same time it is good to learn and grow. I’ll have to think of something nice for her when I leave!

I guess that’s about it for this week. It was last week and the weekend that was full and crazy, so it’s bit a bit quieter this week. I had to catch up on a lot of things that got dropped because of last week. I think I’ve come to the conclusion that if I keep up the pace of all the things I want to do as well as I want to do them then I will forever be playing catch up because it is impossible to actually do them all! So now the trick is decided which things to give up. I wish I had more obvious time syncs in my life like TV and video games to cut. I’ve thought about the time it take to eat but that’s a catch 22 because if I spend less time making food I end up eating food that’s more expensive and less healthy. Not eating would work for a month but it’s not a permanent solution . . . Oh, radical thought! I could do less blabbering in my blog!