Midnight Diary Entries: Weekday Round Up!

Tuesday

Wow. I have never had as much trouble with technology as I had Monday night. I was trying to figure out how to set up my new phone so I could get texts and e-mails properly. I am really afraid of using my phone improperly and racking up a huge bill. I think I understand how it works but I’m not 100%. I spent about 4 hours trying to get my phone to work, and it just wasn’t doing it. I tried everything I could think of: I asked a friend who has the same phone, I went online and tried to find a guide, I even looked at the packet of papers I was given by the phone company giving me step-by-step instructions on how to set up my phone; none of it helped. I had given up for the evening and was just going to travel to a cell phone the next day to ask for help. I watched a movie, a thriller from the 70’s, and was just about to go to bed when Yuki got on skype. She helped me make everything work with my phone! She walked me through it step by step and it all went off without a hitch. All the things she told me to do, I thought I had previously tried; so every time she suggested something I thought to myself, “I’ve already tried this and it didn’t work…” but I did what she said and for some reason it worked! Yippee!

Today went quickly. When I teach every period, I always have a quick day. Having things to do really helps to fill the time, right?

After lunch I went outside and watched the kids play. They played soccer and the boys and girls practiced throwing and catching baseballs and softballs, respectively. The girl’s pitcher practiced pitching and wow does she have an arm!

After school I went home and changed clothes, then went to Paul’s apartment to meet up with him to go our Japanese lesson. We had agreed to meet up early and ride over to the store to look at bike parts. After the store we were going to try to get some dinner, but we ran out of time, so we just went to class. After class we went to Ecos, a supermarket, and thenI went home. I had a nice big dinner and watched “Scott Pilgrim vs. the World”. It is a pretty awesome movie, and I didn’t even get to finish it. One of the girls in the film is really cute…Ellen Wong. She’s a rather new actress and she is quite pleasing to my eye (I really like her haircut).

I’ve been in Japan for about twelve weeks now. Wow.

Wednesday

I walked into school without a clue as to what I would be doing for my classes. I knew I had to teach “body parts” but I didn’t know what I would do for a lesson plan. My first class was taught by a teacher who I thought didn’t like me. She is the one who just sat there and didn’t help the last time I tried to teach her class. She was much more helpful this time and the class went really well. First I explained the body parts needed to sing “Head, shoulders, knees, and toes”, and then we sang it. After the song I drew some more body parts on the board and then I had the students come up and draw parts on a face. This was fun, but we were about to have some more fun. I had students come up and draw face parts while blindfolded. This was really fun, but I kept getting the same kids coming up, so luckily the teacher noticed this also, and she helped me pick some kids who weren’t raising their hands.

The next went class pretty well also. There were a couple of kids that cried and one kid got hurt, but other than that, things went smoothly. On girl cried for reasons unbeknownst to me. One boy cried because he got in trouble since he wasn’t listening to the teacher and he kept getting out of his seat. This same boy accidently butted heads with the boy behind him as they were laughing about the game we had just played. The other boy went to the nurse and came back with an ice-pack.

I got a surprise visit from Heart at third period. It was a coordinator that was not my own and he would be observing my class during third period and then again at the junior high for my sixth period.

During the recess I had a conversation with one of the other senseis entirely in Japanese! It was awesome! I couldn’t believe the amount I could understand! I didn’t understand everything she said but I could pick up important words and understand the gist of the conversation. Yatta!

Call the police. There has been a murder. Who was the culprit? It was me. Who was the victim? That observation.

I killed it.

The observation went really well, I thought. I played the same games and sang the same songs as I did in the previous classes. The guy from Heart was there, as well as the Kouchou-sensei and Kyoto-sensei. I think they were pleased with how much I controlled the situation. I knew it was their gripe before, with the way I didn’t speak enough during the class they had previously observed, but there were many factors involved with that poor performance. The class they had chosen to observe was the first of the day and I didn’t know exactly what I was to do because the lesson plans I receive ahead of time are never right. The first class of the day is usually the class I use to learn the lesson plan for the day, and then I take control for the remaining periods. This time I already knew what I wanted to do to fill the class time, so I was on fire. Might as well call the fire department also…

When I got to the middle school, I found out I didn’t have a sixth period. I never have a fifth period on Wednesdays, so now my day free! The Heart Corp. observer was called and informed about my lack of class, his visit was rescheduled. I was left a stack of papers to grade and they were a disaster. I don’t know what happened in the class but it seems like the lesson failed big time. Almost every one of the papers I was tasked with grading was just wrong. I didn’t grade them because I didn’t know the best course of action…

I ended up asking another teacher for help and she said to leave them on the teacher’s desk and talk to her about it on Friday. Okai!

At the end of my shift, I was invited to go to another party with the teachers. It’s going to be on Friday night and it’s $50! I don’t know if I can afford to pay that, but I don’t think I should miss this opportunity to bond with the staff. What to do?

Last night I watched a show right before I went to bed at 12:30ish. It was a discussion show where a guest or guests sit in the middle and 4 or 5 women on either side of the guest/s ask a bunch of questions. The guests were the Kanou sisters and the questions got a little raunchy. They asked questions about the sister’s breasts, which are famously large, and they asked the sisters about their sex-life. I learned on of the sisters has had a 5-some… Goodness me! There was a “surprise” event where an object was brought from backstage and the guests would be asked about it. Tonight’s object was one of the sister’s purses. They asked if they could look inside, and when given the go-ahead, they found about $5000 in cash in her purse. It looked fresh from the bank, still wraped in the little paper strip. Weird.

Thursday

The order of the classes got switched on me. I wonder why I can’t just teach what’s on the lesson plan.

The day went well regardless. I had fun teaching the sixth graders about other countries and their national monuments. The fifth graders were learning about “want” and we used restaurants and food cards as examples. The day always goes quickly until I get to the last part. After classes I still have an hour of doing nothing. I can write for this blog, but not for a whole hour. I think the Kouchou-sensei and the Kyoto-sensei are warming up to me. I played on the playground during lunch recess and Kyoto-sensei came up and started chatting with me and the kids I was hanging around with. He performed an acrobatic movement on the monkey bars and asked me try. I hurt my shin and almost cracked my head on the ground, but I recovered gracefully and the pain stopped eventually…

When I returned home I did some dishes, emptied the trash, got a new copy of Office 2007, and enjoyed a nice bowl of rice.

Lovin' life!