Friday, April 5, 2013

The Start of a New School Year

April is the start of a new school year in Japan. It feels a little odd after experiencing August or September as the start of the school year in the US all of my life, but that’s how it is here.

At the university, this week is something like an orientation, with regular classes starting next week.  Ted has a weekend camp-in or retreat with all of the Outdoor Life students and professors. Outdoor Life is a small, close knit department with the older students helping and looking out for the younger students, who in turn do the same when they get to be the older students. This weekend event is spent doing team building and getting acquainted activities.

In addition to my part time university English job, I have another part time job at an English School.  I’m teaching two children’s classes one afternoon a week starting this past week.  The three hours went very quickly and it was really fun. I’ll probably be telling you more about this as time goes on.

There were two new people in my Japanese class this week, one from China and one from Bangladesh, and the teachers have traded levels. I can imagine teaching beginning Japanese is pretty trying and they have to change out from time to time.

Ted was interviewed by a reporter for the local newspaper last week and they just printed his picture and the story.  I think you need to know 2000 kanji to read the newspaper, so I’ll probably never be able to read this.

1 comment:

Margaret said...

I do hope all continues to go well with your teaching classes.
Thanks for posting the article about Ted. I think in snow such as you have there I would rather be indoors with my stitching than out in the cold!!