Four stories, easily over 100 stores, nearly a mile long, and by the afternoon it was packed with families and what must be the usual Sunday hubbub. What I found out later (and had sort of already guessed) was that this mall was nearly brand new, which probably supplemented said hubbub quite significantly. This was another time I wished that I had brought my camera, so sorry there aren't any pictures. There was a huge guitar shop, a burger king that I glutted at after work, and some ridiculous Halloween decorum, most noticeably a giant jack-o-lantern-centered playground-area with nearly 50 kids hurricaning around in noisy chaos.
This brings us to today's topic, which is kids. It's in my contract and I was trained to teach 'em, but after 3 weeks of anxiously waiting, I had my first close encounter today. It started off innocently enough: After finding the school, I made friendly with the staff and found out it was completely dead yesterday. There was another English School within eyeshot that had the popular children's anime character Doraemon as its theme, so we were completely beaten. Oh, and if you don't know, Doraemon is like what Garfield was to us Americans in the late 80s, except he's been around forever and will never go away:
A time-traveling cat who is really a robot from the future, friend of weak and bullied children everywhere.So much to my chagrin, about 2 hours into my shift some parents came with their kid to sign up for lessons. The School Director asked me to come and greet the kid (I had been getting paid to sit on my ass for the most part up until this point) and I did so. She was a cute little 4 year old girl with glasses who already knew her ABCs, even though she kept mixing up N and W. I messed around with the styrafoam letters and managed to entertain the kid well enough. I even brought out a Dr. Suess book to which she just said "NO." But other than that she was really pleasant and afterward the staff (3 women) all told me how great I was with the kid and that they wanted someone like me at the school doing kid's classes.
I was feeling pretty good at that point. I mean, I am confident enough about being goofy and smiling and friendly and all that; What scares me is all the other dynamics that go into working with and teaching children: dealing with misbehavior, discipline. keeping them focused, getting them not to speak Japanese, not making them cry or letting them hurt themselves, etc. etc.. And from what I've heard from other teachers, the little girls are usually good and have a healthy desire to learn. The boys however like to throw things and bring about utter flotsam and jetsam.
This brings me to the next part of todays J-kid Adventure. About and hour after that, I saw a mother with two kids in a shopping cart and one little one right outside the school, with one of the staff talking to her. I waved a few times to the one daughter and eventually they were drawn in. What this turned into however was the three siblings (one a 3-4 year old boy, one 5-6 year old girl, one 7-8 year old girl) running around, picking up markers and drawing stuff - granted it was on the board and they would erase it after the fact which seemed downright strange to me. So, as the staff talked to the mom it was my duty to "entertain the kids." I thought it would be good practice and it was, even if this lady was basically just dumping her triple load of trouble while she had the chance.
So I led them into the kids room, and they immediately grabbed the hula hoops. After settling them down a hair I started doing some pseudo-lesson stuff, like having them recite the alphabet. After that it all fell apart into babysitting chaos. The oldest girl knew a lot but was still kinda hyper. She was asking me "Do you like apples? Do you like pink? Do you like chocolate?" etc. etc., and she was pretty good and all, but left the other two yelling "mite! mite!" (look at me! look at me!) and running around and stuff. A few times I got the girls speaking english, but the little guy was babbling Japanese no matter how many times I shrugged and pretended not to understand. It's weird, trying to pretend I don't understand what they say in Japanese. Not onlt that, it should be obvious when I'm answering a question in English that the kid asks in Japanese that I understand it... but I guess they aren't old enough to put 2 and 2 together.
Anyway, we "played" for what must have been near 45 minutes. I imagine that with actual lesson structure, set rules about not speaking Japanese, non-siblings and set age groups the kids lessons should be a little easier to handle, but only a little. I was really goofy and silly from the onset, and as an older teacher told me the other day that is "a common mistake amongst new teachers." You apparently have to be somewhat strict at first and lay the ground rules before you can all have fun, otherwise after a few lessons the kids will run amuck. I think I'm going to take this advice, hard as it will be for me to execute. My first kid lesson is this upcoming friday, 6-9 year olds. X_X
So after they finished wrecking shop and I decided I'd had enough, I got the kids to clean up somewhat, (ideally you are supposed to get them in the habit of picking everything up after class so you can actually take your 10 minute break) and led them back to Mom. The Boss-lady thanked me for "taking care of the kids," a.k.a. babysitting them. Again, I look forward to having rules, goals, some kind of structure, I think it could go pretty far. All we really do is introduce simple words and grammar and play games anyway, so I'm sure it'll be fine. Just waiting to see if I get little angels or hellraisers....
In other news, I played a guitar at the guitarshop after work. It felt awesome, and I miss it. I look forward to receiving my guitar in the mail some time next month. And IAN flies on his way back home in 2 weeks! w00t.
On a sidenote, I've been playing a lot of Strong Bad's Cool Game for Attractive People, Tales of Symponia and Final Fantasy 4. The inner dork in my is quite at peace, and it's amazing what I can do with my free time now that I don't have homework... Although I do try to still study Japanese everyday.
I might go out with some fellow teachers tomorrow to eat drink and be merry, might hibernate, I'm not sure yet. But as a reward for reading all of this, here is last night's dinner:
This deserves an MMNOMMNOMM I believe.
I was feeling pretty good at that point. I mean, I am confident enough about being goofy and smiling and friendly and all that; What scares me is all the other dynamics that go into working with and teaching children: dealing with misbehavior, discipline. keeping them focused, getting them not to speak Japanese, not making them cry or letting them hurt themselves, etc. etc.. And from what I've heard from other teachers, the little girls are usually good and have a healthy desire to learn. The boys however like to throw things and bring about utter flotsam and jetsam.
This brings me to the next part of todays J-kid Adventure. About and hour after that, I saw a mother with two kids in a shopping cart and one little one right outside the school, with one of the staff talking to her. I waved a few times to the one daughter and eventually they were drawn in. What this turned into however was the three siblings (one a 3-4 year old boy, one 5-6 year old girl, one 7-8 year old girl) running around, picking up markers and drawing stuff - granted it was on the board and they would erase it after the fact which seemed downright strange to me. So, as the staff talked to the mom it was my duty to "entertain the kids." I thought it would be good practice and it was, even if this lady was basically just dumping her triple load of trouble while she had the chance.
So I led them into the kids room, and they immediately grabbed the hula hoops. After settling them down a hair I started doing some pseudo-lesson stuff, like having them recite the alphabet. After that it all fell apart into babysitting chaos. The oldest girl knew a lot but was still kinda hyper. She was asking me "Do you like apples? Do you like pink? Do you like chocolate?" etc. etc., and she was pretty good and all, but left the other two yelling "mite! mite!" (look at me! look at me!) and running around and stuff. A few times I got the girls speaking english, but the little guy was babbling Japanese no matter how many times I shrugged and pretended not to understand. It's weird, trying to pretend I don't understand what they say in Japanese. Not onlt that, it should be obvious when I'm answering a question in English that the kid asks in Japanese that I understand it... but I guess they aren't old enough to put 2 and 2 together.
Anyway, we "played" for what must have been near 45 minutes. I imagine that with actual lesson structure, set rules about not speaking Japanese, non-siblings and set age groups the kids lessons should be a little easier to handle, but only a little. I was really goofy and silly from the onset, and as an older teacher told me the other day that is "a common mistake amongst new teachers." You apparently have to be somewhat strict at first and lay the ground rules before you can all have fun, otherwise after a few lessons the kids will run amuck. I think I'm going to take this advice, hard as it will be for me to execute. My first kid lesson is this upcoming friday, 6-9 year olds. X_X
So after they finished wrecking shop and I decided I'd had enough, I got the kids to clean up somewhat, (ideally you are supposed to get them in the habit of picking everything up after class so you can actually take your 10 minute break) and led them back to Mom. The Boss-lady thanked me for "taking care of the kids," a.k.a. babysitting them. Again, I look forward to having rules, goals, some kind of structure, I think it could go pretty far. All we really do is introduce simple words and grammar and play games anyway, so I'm sure it'll be fine. Just waiting to see if I get little angels or hellraisers....
In other news, I played a guitar at the guitarshop after work. It felt awesome, and I miss it. I look forward to receiving my guitar in the mail some time next month. And IAN flies on his way back home in 2 weeks! w00t.
On a sidenote, I've been playing a lot of Strong Bad's Cool Game for Attractive People, Tales of Symponia and Final Fantasy 4. The inner dork in my is quite at peace, and it's amazing what I can do with my free time now that I don't have homework... Although I do try to still study Japanese everyday.
I might go out with some fellow teachers tomorrow to eat drink and be merry, might hibernate, I'm not sure yet. But as a reward for reading all of this, here is last night's dinner:
This deserves an MMNOMMNOMM I believe."Do not resist, for it is your destiny. Have we not all simply become the Children of Technology?" - Carnivore
"I realize it's no one's fault
Ultimately I'm still a stranger
Even when I dream the same dream swarming in the light
I just feel uncomfortable
A love song that disappeared in the wind
A poster that wouldn't stick to the wall
I hold the present I failed to give in my arms
I'm still watching my advancing toes
I don't worry about the rain or the puddles
I'll soon be dry
Until the day that I stop
Like an adventurer, my foot
I'll keep following the roadless road
I stole the passport I yearned for
Through the opening of the door, but it's already useless
Even when I dream of defeating the city and laying down
I only give an empty laugh
A fandango that speeds the night
A rooster that wants to fly
I vow to reunite with the eskimo who awoke in the desert
I can still see my eternal rival
His escaping back, ten steps ahead of me
Looks a lot like me
Like a challenger who will never give up
I'll always be running, my foot
I click my heels
Wherever I am, I'm out of place
A lostman who talks to himself more and more
Even though I'm not invited, I memorize my words of refusal
I'm still watching my advancing toes
I don't worry about the rain or the puddles
I'll soon be dry
Until the day that I stop
Like an adventurer, my foot
I'll keep following the roadless road
I click my heels - let's go" - The Pillows (translated into English)
"I realize it's no one's fault
Ultimately I'm still a stranger
Even when I dream the same dream swarming in the light
I just feel uncomfortable
A love song that disappeared in the wind
A poster that wouldn't stick to the wall
I hold the present I failed to give in my arms
I'm still watching my advancing toes
I don't worry about the rain or the puddles
I'll soon be dry
Until the day that I stop
Like an adventurer, my foot
I'll keep following the roadless road
I stole the passport I yearned for
Through the opening of the door, but it's already useless
Even when I dream of defeating the city and laying down
I only give an empty laugh
A fandango that speeds the night
A rooster that wants to fly
I vow to reunite with the eskimo who awoke in the desert
I can still see my eternal rival
His escaping back, ten steps ahead of me
Looks a lot like me
Like a challenger who will never give up
I'll always be running, my foot
I click my heels
Wherever I am, I'm out of place
A lostman who talks to himself more and more
Even though I'm not invited, I memorize my words of refusal
I'm still watching my advancing toes
I don't worry about the rain or the puddles
I'll soon be dry
Until the day that I stop
Like an adventurer, my foot
I'll keep following the roadless road
I click my heels - let's go" - The Pillows (translated into English)
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