The written document can be downloaded here, from the front page of fajapanese.ning.com
Friday, May 22, 2009
Last Week of Senior Exhibit-- written document.
All right. Finally done with my senior year, and as far as I am aware, my Senior Exhibit. I would say as far as I am concerned, but I am still willing and eager to help anyone and everyone learn Japanese who would like my help. That might not be happening at the moment, though.
Last week was pretty much the final week of the Senior Exhibit process... sad. But a lot happened. First, on the Tuesday of that week (busy as ever with the process and school) every senior set up for part of a Senior Exhibit Fair held for Fredericksburg Academy juniors and parents of juniors and seniors, as well as anyone else interested. I actually met two other people who were able to had lived in Japan and one parent was able to speak some Japanese which took me a while to answer. I believe she was rusty after several years, and I was rusty after a couple months of not using Japanese other than infrequently in the class. It took me a few moments to collect my thoughts and answer. I mostly answered questions and tried to get around to some friends' exhibit presentations. But I was more or less occupied at my table.
Towards the end of the week camewhat I thought was a rather difficult part of my exhibit, the Written Document. I had decided to create a guidebook giving some short information about basic Japanese. Honestly, I planned to make it more in depth than I did, but there was a good reason I had to stop. I thought that over 20 pages was a pretty decent length, more than a lot of people would want to read. And the thing is I really included a lot of basic grammar information that would be very useful and vocabulary that is useful as well.
I would like to talk about what it was like making the document. For the most part, it was very tedious!!!! I cannot stress how much more effort it takes to communicate complicated knowledge than to understand it-- at least from my end. How come when it's considered to be a vice to be selfish and talk only about oneself (and the easier thing to do) it's so much harder to communicate with teaching about one's own topic? I found it a lot easier to take the complicated information in. Enough complaining though. Anyone who reads it might even who knows Japanese (I don't think I made any mistakes but a Japanese person would know!) might at least find it impressive that I sat down and typed it in Japanese and English Romaji characters. It's no big deal if you do it all the time, but personally it was extremely tedious. To keep switching back and forth. (If you want to know what it is like, it's very easy to google how to enter east asian languages such as Japanese with your keyboard... and it might as well be an exhibit in itself.)
Really the most difficult part was having to explain everything carefully, accurately, and using the correct terminology. I couldn't make mistakes if this was the final part of my exhibit and I definitely couldn't afford to explain things poorly, or the document would just be useless.
Ulimately, it's designed to give people a small understaning of Japanese, and won't be helpful beyond the very basics (of course the "basics" in Japanese-- such as the order of sentences as well as the writing system are complex). Its main purpose was to give people an edge in learning and teach people how to study it themselves. By people... I mean whoever wants to read it. Maybe nobody, but I'll keep it with me and who knows, I might use it in the future or use it to explain something to someone else. I'll keep it with me for a little while. And I'm trying to figure out the best way to upload the file or the text; that should be here in juuuuuuust a moment.
And now that my senior exhibit (and my high school year) is over, I am tempted to just leave the post here and go about my day and whatnot, but I should really talk about the final impact of my senior exhibit.
Let me explain something. Many other seniors' exhibits may have been focused around service and helping others. I did choose to teach and my heart was in it, but at the same time this was not my original goal. My original goal was self-improvement; my plans to help others (that I have) are really part of a much more elaborate project not directly related to this, but I felt like I needed to learn Japanese to prove something to myself. No, I don't know Japanese. I'm not fluent, and I expect I won't be in the next year and a half (yes, maybe after that. I am planning on moving fast.) But I learned more than I really thought possible in January of 2008 when I started this. I did so much by working on my own and truly that has been the greatest reward. I feel like I have explained everything about the impact of what I have done already. My blogs have really told you the greater impact of what I have done. I have gotten a few students interested in Japanese, but mostly this has been about self-growth. This was important to me, and I tried to have what I called success. I succeeded in all the areas that were most important to me, and I did everything I could to keep my club up as well. I know that I can't be a perfect teacher or (先生) today as I am still very much and I mean very much a student (学生) (the second kanji in each of the two Japanese words in parentheses are the same because the words have similar meaning... just saying). Anyway just writing system of the Japanese language as you can kind of see is enormous! (over 5,000 kanji that are considered "vital" to the individual Japanese person. Sooooo excited to learn them...)
So hey! At least I am planning on going forth with studying Japanese. And I am not sure I would have done this if I did not study it now. I plan on making the Japanese language and perhaps foreign language and general an integrated part of my life. And for anyone who reads this and has any questions, feel free to ask. If my newest post isn't more than several months old by that time (it's probably going to happen) I'll definitely try to get back to you. And even so. I guess that's everything I have to say now about my Senior Exhibit. It's been a good experience. Time to get that guide up!
Last week was pretty much the final week of the Senior Exhibit process... sad. But a lot happened. First, on the Tuesday of that week (busy as ever with the process and school) every senior set up for part of a Senior Exhibit Fair held for Fredericksburg Academy juniors and parents of juniors and seniors, as well as anyone else interested. I actually met two other people who were able to had lived in Japan and one parent was able to speak some Japanese which took me a while to answer. I believe she was rusty after several years, and I was rusty after a couple months of not using Japanese other than infrequently in the class. It took me a few moments to collect my thoughts and answer. I mostly answered questions and tried to get around to some friends' exhibit presentations. But I was more or less occupied at my table.
Towards the end of the week camewhat I thought was a rather difficult part of my exhibit, the Written Document. I had decided to create a guidebook giving some short information about basic Japanese. Honestly, I planned to make it more in depth than I did, but there was a good reason I had to stop. I thought that over 20 pages was a pretty decent length, more than a lot of people would want to read. And the thing is I really included a lot of basic grammar information that would be very useful and vocabulary that is useful as well.
I would like to talk about what it was like making the document. For the most part, it was very tedious!!!! I cannot stress how much more effort it takes to communicate complicated knowledge than to understand it-- at least from my end. How come when it's considered to be a vice to be selfish and talk only about oneself (and the easier thing to do) it's so much harder to communicate with teaching about one's own topic? I found it a lot easier to take the complicated information in. Enough complaining though. Anyone who reads it might even who knows Japanese (I don't think I made any mistakes but a Japanese person would know!) might at least find it impressive that I sat down and typed it in Japanese and English Romaji characters. It's no big deal if you do it all the time, but personally it was extremely tedious. To keep switching back and forth. (If you want to know what it is like, it's very easy to google how to enter east asian languages such as Japanese with your keyboard... and it might as well be an exhibit in itself.)
Really the most difficult part was having to explain everything carefully, accurately, and using the correct terminology. I couldn't make mistakes if this was the final part of my exhibit and I definitely couldn't afford to explain things poorly, or the document would just be useless.
Ulimately, it's designed to give people a small understaning of Japanese, and won't be helpful beyond the very basics (of course the "basics" in Japanese-- such as the order of sentences as well as the writing system are complex). Its main purpose was to give people an edge in learning and teach people how to study it themselves. By people... I mean whoever wants to read it. Maybe nobody, but I'll keep it with me and who knows, I might use it in the future or use it to explain something to someone else. I'll keep it with me for a little while. And I'm trying to figure out the best way to upload the file or the text; that should be here in juuuuuuust a moment.
And now that my senior exhibit (and my high school year) is over, I am tempted to just leave the post here and go about my day and whatnot, but I should really talk about the final impact of my senior exhibit.
Let me explain something. Many other seniors' exhibits may have been focused around service and helping others. I did choose to teach and my heart was in it, but at the same time this was not my original goal. My original goal was self-improvement; my plans to help others (that I have) are really part of a much more elaborate project not directly related to this, but I felt like I needed to learn Japanese to prove something to myself. No, I don't know Japanese. I'm not fluent, and I expect I won't be in the next year and a half (yes, maybe after that. I am planning on moving fast.) But I learned more than I really thought possible in January of 2008 when I started this. I did so much by working on my own and truly that has been the greatest reward. I feel like I have explained everything about the impact of what I have done already. My blogs have really told you the greater impact of what I have done. I have gotten a few students interested in Japanese, but mostly this has been about self-growth. This was important to me, and I tried to have what I called success. I succeeded in all the areas that were most important to me, and I did everything I could to keep my club up as well. I know that I can't be a perfect teacher or (先生) today as I am still very much and I mean very much a student (学生) (the second kanji in each of the two Japanese words in parentheses are the same because the words have similar meaning... just saying). Anyway just writing system of the Japanese language as you can kind of see is enormous! (over 5,000 kanji that are considered "vital" to the individual Japanese person. Sooooo excited to learn them...)
So hey! At least I am planning on going forth with studying Japanese. And I am not sure I would have done this if I did not study it now. I plan on making the Japanese language and perhaps foreign language and general an integrated part of my life. And for anyone who reads this and has any questions, feel free to ask. If my newest post isn't more than several months old by that time (it's probably going to happen) I'll definitely try to get back to you. And even so. I guess that's everything I have to say now about my Senior Exhibit. It's been a good experience. Time to get that guide up!
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Senior Exhibit Presentations (Uploaded after written) (Practice and Final)
April 29, 2009
I finally gave my Senior Exhibit Presentation this week, and I think it went well. While there are many significant things about the presentation to talk about, such as the preparation, anticipation, and the presentation itself, what is most significant to me is the fact that it is actually completed and out of the way. As soon as it was over, I felt as an enormous weight had been lifted off my shoulders.
I first gave my practice rehearsal several days before Spring Break. I presented it to Mr. Eckerson, Ms. Blashford, and Ms. Garcia. To be perfectly honest, I hadn't practiced before, and I think that this presentation was what I was most nervous about. I hadn't presented it in any way before. I knew where I was going and was organized only in the construction of my powerpoint. First: What my topic was, why I chose it; Second: The Process, what I did for my learning activity, what I took from that; Third: The teaching (as well as what I feel went wrong and what could have been done to improve things). I actually got cut off in the middle of the third. I spent a long time talking about some of the pointless things, and this was my feedback from the teachers, merely as I recall:
1) I was kind of disorganized. Yes, this goes along with my manner of speech, but I could have re-worked it in a better way. At the same time, I hadn't prepared too much so I didn't think it would show up in the final and was pretty sure I could fix it.
2) What would have worked best was talking more about the teaching and my work with Japanese in the club/classroom. I had a lot to say about that, and didn't get the chance. I knew this had to be changed.
3) I should make things less dry and talk less about Japanese and try to get people more involved with what they can do. I had an activity, but it was a little bit complicated. I should make it easier to understand and clearly explain everything. (Ironically, I never managed to do this yet in the classroom.
4) I should probably show some auditory Japanese. That's something all people would like to hear so they could get a feel for the language. I didn't have anything in the presentation yet, and I knew from the advice I got that this would help.
5) My confidence, however, was great. And I spoke well. Thank goodness I didn't have to practice a thousand times to get that right. I just had to prepare a little bit better.
Ultimately, during spring break I made a few changes to my presentation outside of the powerpoint and I planned to change that before I actually presented. My presentation was three days after break. Unfortunately, one bad thing occurred. The day after my practice presentation, I had to wipe the hard drive of my computer and re-start with a new installation of windows. I had a lot of my data backed up (I thought my powerpoint, the bulk of my presentation, was included)
So... the day before my Senior Exhibit (luckily you would not have known if you were in the audience, I re-did my entire powerpoint. I actually re-ordered everything. This did ONE good thing for me and ONE good thing only. It forced me to re-organize from scratch, which was helpful. It caused way too much worrying though. Luckily, in just two hours, I was able to make a presentation I was completely satisified with. I was half-asleep, and put on a terribly formal-looking suit before I walked out the door and had to change into something more appropriate. I was now prepared, but was completely nervous anyway because of all the work I just had to do.
I set up for my presentation early though that day. Everything went well. My audience members, students and teachers, entered the room and I gave everyone a copy of a worksheet I had made just to show what some of learning Japanese is like. I passed around all of my books that I had used and notes I had taken at Japanese Language Academy which included my half-page-or-so essay in Japanese. I had all my learning materials with me and a computer now for the first time presenting without spyware projecting what I wanted projected on the screen. I added a trailer in Japanese from the (I think it is 2003) movie ピンポン (Ping Pong). That was entertaining I think. I had to keep the audience interested too. I don't think I made too many mistakes except for the fact that I wanted to show that earlier in the presentation. I also showed the website I worked on to help teach the class (fajapanese.ning.com) which never really got off the ground that well for many reasons I talked about in the previous blog. Although I had challenges I think my presentation was successful because I analyzed them completely and talked about what I would have done with more resources including time, and what I took from this experience. I didn't have too many questions I hope because I explained everything so well in the first place (I hope I hope!). All in all, it was kind of enjoyable to present everything now that I had done it too. It made me very happy. And Andrew was the only person to actually form sentences correctly via the teaching worksheet I made (go Andrew! He has proved his intelligence for sure-- which was really just following directions, I thought, but no one else could do it. So again, he gets my props here). That's all I have to say. That afternoon I took off my jacket and relaxed realizing that my presentation was done. It was a good day.
I finally gave my Senior Exhibit Presentation this week, and I think it went well. While there are many significant things about the presentation to talk about, such as the preparation, anticipation, and the presentation itself, what is most significant to me is the fact that it is actually completed and out of the way. As soon as it was over, I felt as an enormous weight had been lifted off my shoulders.
I first gave my practice rehearsal several days before Spring Break. I presented it to Mr. Eckerson, Ms. Blashford, and Ms. Garcia. To be perfectly honest, I hadn't practiced before, and I think that this presentation was what I was most nervous about. I hadn't presented it in any way before. I knew where I was going and was organized only in the construction of my powerpoint. First: What my topic was, why I chose it; Second: The Process, what I did for my learning activity, what I took from that; Third: The teaching (as well as what I feel went wrong and what could have been done to improve things). I actually got cut off in the middle of the third. I spent a long time talking about some of the pointless things, and this was my feedback from the teachers, merely as I recall:
1) I was kind of disorganized. Yes, this goes along with my manner of speech, but I could have re-worked it in a better way. At the same time, I hadn't prepared too much so I didn't think it would show up in the final and was pretty sure I could fix it.
2) What would have worked best was talking more about the teaching and my work with Japanese in the club/classroom. I had a lot to say about that, and didn't get the chance. I knew this had to be changed.
3) I should make things less dry and talk less about Japanese and try to get people more involved with what they can do. I had an activity, but it was a little bit complicated. I should make it easier to understand and clearly explain everything. (Ironically, I never managed to do this yet in the classroom.
4) I should probably show some auditory Japanese. That's something all people would like to hear so they could get a feel for the language. I didn't have anything in the presentation yet, and I knew from the advice I got that this would help.
5) My confidence, however, was great. And I spoke well. Thank goodness I didn't have to practice a thousand times to get that right. I just had to prepare a little bit better.
Ultimately, during spring break I made a few changes to my presentation outside of the powerpoint and I planned to change that before I actually presented. My presentation was three days after break. Unfortunately, one bad thing occurred. The day after my practice presentation, I had to wipe the hard drive of my computer and re-start with a new installation of windows. I had a lot of my data backed up (I thought my powerpoint, the bulk of my presentation, was included)
So... the day before my Senior Exhibit (luckily you would not have known if you were in the audience, I re-did my entire powerpoint. I actually re-ordered everything. This did ONE good thing for me and ONE good thing only. It forced me to re-organize from scratch, which was helpful. It caused way too much worrying though. Luckily, in just two hours, I was able to make a presentation I was completely satisified with. I was half-asleep, and put on a terribly formal-looking suit before I walked out the door and had to change into something more appropriate. I was now prepared, but was completely nervous anyway because of all the work I just had to do.
I set up for my presentation early though that day. Everything went well. My audience members, students and teachers, entered the room and I gave everyone a copy of a worksheet I had made just to show what some of learning Japanese is like. I passed around all of my books that I had used and notes I had taken at Japanese Language Academy which included my half-page-or-so essay in Japanese. I had all my learning materials with me and a computer now for the first time presenting without spyware projecting what I wanted projected on the screen. I added a trailer in Japanese from the (I think it is 2003) movie ピンポン (Ping Pong). That was entertaining I think. I had to keep the audience interested too. I don't think I made too many mistakes except for the fact that I wanted to show that earlier in the presentation. I also showed the website I worked on to help teach the class (fajapanese.ning.com) which never really got off the ground that well for many reasons I talked about in the previous blog. Although I had challenges I think my presentation was successful because I analyzed them completely and talked about what I would have done with more resources including time, and what I took from this experience. I didn't have too many questions I hope because I explained everything so well in the first place (I hope I hope!). All in all, it was kind of enjoyable to present everything now that I had done it too. It made me very happy. And Andrew was the only person to actually form sentences correctly via the teaching worksheet I made (go Andrew! He has proved his intelligence for sure-- which was really just following directions, I thought, but no one else could do it. So again, he gets my props here). That's all I have to say. That afternoon I took off my jacket and relaxed realizing that my presentation was done. It was a good day.
Friday, February 6, 2009
End of Summer, Finding an Application, and Teaching Japanese
I've been through a lot since I last wrote on this blog.
Over the summer after the Japanese Language Academy, I had more work to do for school than my project, so it was time to take a break for a little while. At least, it wasn't the same as directly working on language for four to five hours a day. I've learned a lot more about Japanese since I came back, and although it seemed like at the time I may not have learned a lot, it turns out if I see something familiar a lot of the time it comes right back to me because I have a memory to associate it with. Working in school at the same time as my Senior Project, I did not have the same amount of time to devote to studying Japanese as early in the summer. However, just trying to read or listen to something slightly new each week (and reviewing the things I may have forgotten) allowed me to continue making a difference.
Yet, back in school, I still wasn't sure what I was going to do for the main component of my application. That didn't mean I didn't have a lot of ideas. At first, I was merely planning to take a test: the Japanese Language Proficiency Test level four... but wasn't sure what to do beyond that. Well after getting caught up in school, I made what I considered to be a pretty grave mistake-- and actually missed the deadline for the test which ended up being some time in early September for the December exam! (It only takes place once a year) I have to say I was very surprised and felt foolish for not making sure I was on top of this in Spring. I never thought I would have to be and thought that I would actually be able to sign up for this in November, which was a mistake. I don't know what I was thinking.
I began thinking however. I was thinking about everything I had done and all the experiences I had. First, I learned how to teach myself. Second, I was taught by others. This was really entirely a direct self-teaching and learning experience. So, I began to shift my gears toward teaching, which is something I'd really like to know how to do. No, I am not literally thinking about seeking a degree in education- but I think it can help develop a lot of leadership and management skills which can carry over into all aspects of life.
How did I set up a way to teach people? What was I going to do exactly? And who was willing to spend their time learning what to many may be a completely random language with someone who isn't actually licensed to teach, nor is actually fluent in Japanese? There are a few.
I started looking for programs which teach Japanese in the area. I then remembered that I had chosen mine because it was basically the only one. So it didn't seem I'd be able to work or get help from any organization. Of course, this gave me some more freedom to do things entirely my own way. I thought about starting something myself. I wanted to see how big I could make it, and how successful it could be. I decided a good place to start was with people I know, so I looked at the school. I talked to people and fished for interest. I had already been fishing for ideas everywhere.
Eventually, I discussed the logistics of teaching people that I knew, and getting people to meet with me at regularly scheduled times. A problem with this however, was that all people I knew who would be interested in learning Japanese all have different times they are available, and when they are free. So I can understand why there aren't a lot of options for learning in our area. There is no base that is actually free to do it. I decided the only feasible thing to do was to start at school.
I had my first club meetings in November. Originally, I was planning to design my course over the December break, but getting started now (when club periods started) ended up being a good idea. I was able to feel what it was like to teach, and began to get a grasp on the challenges I would face. The first day I taught, I think I was somewhat of a nervous wreck, trying to explain things well and making several mistakes. After a while though, I became more comfortable with what I was doing.
I didn't have a plan, and kind of wandering around and teaching people different things randomly (which I thought were important to me when I was learning) was only so helpful. I haven't been able to teach people how to successfully write in hiragana or katakana, which is essential to learning Japanese entirely. Most people don't appear to be up to it at the moment, and I still want to get around that.
Over winter break, I created a website to help distribute information to people in the class: I posted information about hiragana, vocabulary, as well as several key aspects of grammar.
(url = http://fajapanese.ning.com/ )
I had hoped people would use the site, but as I posted a lot of things in hiragana (because I wanted members of the club to learn vital Japanese writing) there wasn't a lot of interest in actually using it. I know I hate when teachers at this school try to over-incorperate technology every day, and here I went almost doing the same thing.
At the start of this year, I helped teach a lot more using speech, vocabulary, and some of my own designed flash cards to teach colors, simple sentences using the verb to be, introduced the use of prepositions, and thus covered more grammar in the process. From here, it is possible to learn a lot more. But I am facing three overall challenges that have really gotten in my way (which ideally I should have been able to fix myself)
1) Lack of material: I don't want my peers to spend a ton of money on books, and so I haven't gotten textbooks for them to use. So what can I teach from? I don't want to violate any copyright laws, but I think there are some resources I can probably find in the vast world of the internet I could use to fix this problem. Because although a few members of the group can pronounce the words I have said, and use the grammar correctly, they have no means to study o_o. At least not without using the website I created, where I asked members of the club to leave comments. But this requires interest, which can perhaps be stimulated by a strong program that seems promising. Great! I can do that! But...
2) Lack of time. Teaching a class is time consuming. Because I am already not a pro at managing my time, and I am a student struggling to balance (with some success and some failure) four AP classes, I am trying to get my work done and stay sane at the same time. If I could just balance all of this effectively and figure things out, that might make things easier and I could fix the first problem. But... there is also issue number three:
3) Lack of meeting time. Yes, still a time issue. But even if I did not have time to literally make perfect lessons everyday back to back, if I just had 15 minutes a day (or even three times a week) that would be much better than these scattered 45 minute periods where I have two or three a month. It's almost impossible for people to retain information under this system and impossible to cover what I want to cover. And I still have not been convinced that this is impossible.
So those are my biggest issues. I have had some success, and I think I am very good at speaking when I have a good plan. But I really think I need to turn this on its head. This project of mine needs some more of my personal time. I need to stop continuing to teach Japanese to myself and start making it a lot easier for my peers in my club to learn. I understand no one is perfect, but why not shoot for the best? I am going to get together some real material this weekend. I realized after my last club meeting that most or my peers in the class do not know how to spell the words we have been using. If they are doing that well and are this confused, some notes would really help.
For my Senior Exhibit presentation:
5 mins: Why I chose my topic
The process:
Learning, 15 mins -Pictures, books, etc
Teaching: 15 mins: Talk about what it was like and strengths and weaknesses
-- Demonstrate teaching materials
Over the summer after the Japanese Language Academy, I had more work to do for school than my project, so it was time to take a break for a little while. At least, it wasn't the same as directly working on language for four to five hours a day. I've learned a lot more about Japanese since I came back, and although it seemed like at the time I may not have learned a lot, it turns out if I see something familiar a lot of the time it comes right back to me because I have a memory to associate it with. Working in school at the same time as my Senior Project, I did not have the same amount of time to devote to studying Japanese as early in the summer. However, just trying to read or listen to something slightly new each week (and reviewing the things I may have forgotten) allowed me to continue making a difference.
Yet, back in school, I still wasn't sure what I was going to do for the main component of my application. That didn't mean I didn't have a lot of ideas. At first, I was merely planning to take a test: the Japanese Language Proficiency Test level four... but wasn't sure what to do beyond that. Well after getting caught up in school, I made what I considered to be a pretty grave mistake-- and actually missed the deadline for the test which ended up being some time in early September for the December exam! (It only takes place once a year) I have to say I was very surprised and felt foolish for not making sure I was on top of this in Spring. I never thought I would have to be and thought that I would actually be able to sign up for this in November, which was a mistake. I don't know what I was thinking.
I began thinking however. I was thinking about everything I had done and all the experiences I had. First, I learned how to teach myself. Second, I was taught by others. This was really entirely a direct self-teaching and learning experience. So, I began to shift my gears toward teaching, which is something I'd really like to know how to do. No, I am not literally thinking about seeking a degree in education- but I think it can help develop a lot of leadership and management skills which can carry over into all aspects of life.
How did I set up a way to teach people? What was I going to do exactly? And who was willing to spend their time learning what to many may be a completely random language with someone who isn't actually licensed to teach, nor is actually fluent in Japanese? There are a few.
I started looking for programs which teach Japanese in the area. I then remembered that I had chosen mine because it was basically the only one. So it didn't seem I'd be able to work or get help from any organization. Of course, this gave me some more freedom to do things entirely my own way. I thought about starting something myself. I wanted to see how big I could make it, and how successful it could be. I decided a good place to start was with people I know, so I looked at the school. I talked to people and fished for interest. I had already been fishing for ideas everywhere.
Eventually, I discussed the logistics of teaching people that I knew, and getting people to meet with me at regularly scheduled times. A problem with this however, was that all people I knew who would be interested in learning Japanese all have different times they are available, and when they are free. So I can understand why there aren't a lot of options for learning in our area. There is no base that is actually free to do it. I decided the only feasible thing to do was to start at school.
I had my first club meetings in November. Originally, I was planning to design my course over the December break, but getting started now (when club periods started) ended up being a good idea. I was able to feel what it was like to teach, and began to get a grasp on the challenges I would face. The first day I taught, I think I was somewhat of a nervous wreck, trying to explain things well and making several mistakes. After a while though, I became more comfortable with what I was doing.
I didn't have a plan, and kind of wandering around and teaching people different things randomly (which I thought were important to me when I was learning) was only so helpful. I haven't been able to teach people how to successfully write in hiragana or katakana, which is essential to learning Japanese entirely. Most people don't appear to be up to it at the moment, and I still want to get around that.
Over winter break, I created a website to help distribute information to people in the class: I posted information about hiragana, vocabulary, as well as several key aspects of grammar.
(url = http://fajapanese.ning.com/ )
I had hoped people would use the site, but as I posted a lot of things in hiragana (because I wanted members of the club to learn vital Japanese writing) there wasn't a lot of interest in actually using it. I know I hate when teachers at this school try to over-incorperate technology every day, and here I went almost doing the same thing.
At the start of this year, I helped teach a lot more using speech, vocabulary, and some of my own designed flash cards to teach colors, simple sentences using the verb to be, introduced the use of prepositions, and thus covered more grammar in the process. From here, it is possible to learn a lot more. But I am facing three overall challenges that have really gotten in my way (which ideally I should have been able to fix myself)
1) Lack of material: I don't want my peers to spend a ton of money on books, and so I haven't gotten textbooks for them to use. So what can I teach from? I don't want to violate any copyright laws, but I think there are some resources I can probably find in the vast world of the internet I could use to fix this problem. Because although a few members of the group can pronounce the words I have said, and use the grammar correctly, they have no means to study o_o. At least not without using the website I created, where I asked members of the club to leave comments. But this requires interest, which can perhaps be stimulated by a strong program that seems promising. Great! I can do that! But...
2) Lack of time. Teaching a class is time consuming. Because I am already not a pro at managing my time, and I am a student struggling to balance (with some success and some failure) four AP classes, I am trying to get my work done and stay sane at the same time. If I could just balance all of this effectively and figure things out, that might make things easier and I could fix the first problem. But... there is also issue number three:
3) Lack of meeting time. Yes, still a time issue. But even if I did not have time to literally make perfect lessons everyday back to back, if I just had 15 minutes a day (or even three times a week) that would be much better than these scattered 45 minute periods where I have two or three a month. It's almost impossible for people to retain information under this system and impossible to cover what I want to cover. And I still have not been convinced that this is impossible.
So those are my biggest issues. I have had some success, and I think I am very good at speaking when I have a good plan. But I really think I need to turn this on its head. This project of mine needs some more of my personal time. I need to stop continuing to teach Japanese to myself and start making it a lot easier for my peers in my club to learn. I understand no one is perfect, but why not shoot for the best? I am going to get together some real material this weekend. I realized after my last club meeting that most or my peers in the class do not know how to spell the words we have been using. If they are doing that well and are this confused, some notes would really help.
For my Senior Exhibit presentation:
5 mins: Why I chose my topic
The process:
Learning, 15 mins -Pictures, books, etc
Teaching: 15 mins: Talk about what it was like and strengths and weaknesses
-- Demonstrate teaching materials
Sunday, November 9, 2008
Self-Study and Japanese Foreign Language Academy
Well, I have to admit it was hard first of all just figuring out what to do. So many ideas had been floating around in my head and while I knew I would be happy learning the Japanese language I never thought I'd actually be able to pull it off. Let me be honest. I know nothing-- out of the entire wealth of information that exists in Japanese, I can use but a small percentage. However, this doesn't mean I haven't been successful thus far. I think I'd be comfortable expressing myself in Japanese. And I have learned what it is like to learn when you pick something right out of the context and understand it. That doesn't leave you. In the sense that learning has become easier for me, I have thus far been very successful. Let me go back to where I really got this project rolling.
Back last January I enlisted the help of Ms. Benton, the recent seventh grade science teacher as my mentor for Senior Exhibit. This was possibly the best decision I've made even up until now in this process. I had been told that Ms. Benton knew Japanese and could speak it well. Seeing this as an opportunity I wouldn't have otherwise, I approached her, explained everything, and from the start Ms. Benton was more than helpful. We talked about Japanese a little bit (I had played with Rosetta Stone before and learned say, many words, and a few things about the language), and she let me know how to start learning. I had to learn Hiragana and Katakana, the two most basic uniquely Japanese alphabets used in the language. Ms. Benton hooked me up in some way with all the resources I would need to be successful. She recommended I order "Let's Learn Hiragana" and "Let's Learn katakana," two different alphabet guidebooks I have to say were more helpful than online resources by far. She had me order Tuttle Language Kanji cards, which are pretty useful for learning Kanji. She also attempted to get me a copy of a book she used to study at a Nagoya University in Japan, A Course in Modern Japanese, but none were available unfortunately.
This was actually a pretty big deal. Had I picked up just a different book, and one like that I would have learned about Japanese in a completely different way. Every resource you can use to learn Japanese teaches you all about the "polite" form, (not that anything else is impolite) which is not commonly used in speaking. The book from Nagoya would have taught me plain form, and I think given me a better idea of speach. Even now I'm not sure I have a grasp on the exact differences, but I know I'd be able to cope with it somehow were I familiar with the rest of the material. To my ear, plain form sounds a little bit more casual and cooler, more free than the structured and polite form. If you're reading this, you probably have no idea what I am saying unless you've actually studied Japanese.
Ms. Benton gave me a book called Nakama, which has been pretty helpful for looking up grammar and constructions. I learned most of my previous knowledge from a grammar book in Romaji (Roman Letters) which served as a major base for understanding. Looking back on it, this may have also been a better choice than my next one. But either way, I can't say what I did was bad. On a trip I took to UVA after I heard about their great Japanese program, I broused the bookstore and found textbooks used for the Japanese language. I was very happy. These were all nice books. Workbooks, furigana dictionaries, more things I like to have remembered, but nevertheless this was nice. I got concerned about prices, and taking a step back and looking at where I was standing in terms of study progress in the Japanese language (It had been maybe over a month since I got my first alphabet books and I just learned hiragana pretty well) I realized I did not need all these books. I overlooked the workbooks, dictionaries, higher level textbooks, and picked out Genki 1. It certainly looked nicer than my other textbook, was pretty to look at, had great lists of vocabulary, didn't get side-tracked by entire chapters on Kanji (but rather had the student just pick up on it through the book) and had some great dialogues and exersizes to read I felt Nakama didn't have.
By the way "Genki" and "Nakama" respectively mean "health/energeticness" and "friend". It's a close translation, but hard to explain. I think I have some level of understanding but can't say I know for sure.
I just stuck to Genki and maybe got through the first several chapters before the end of summer. I regularly spoke to Ms. Benton about my studies, how they were going, and how hard it was to get it done during school. I got to the point where it was easier for me to do it when I was supposed to be doing something else-- like when people asked questions on calculus homework I already understood or during lunch when I could have been socializing more. If I had to go somewhere-- on a bus or train, or take a ride in a car, I would bring my books with me. This is how I learned. I would look up little random things about Japanese online. I got software installed on my computer so I could both read and type with it. I'd pull up a word document full of Japanese notes between classes.
All this time, too, I was working toward the goal of attending the VA Governor's School Foreign Language Academies hosted at VCU to study Japanese. Ms. Nobles had given me information, possibly as far back as November of 2007 about the 3-week academy, and so I never forgot I attached a sticky note to my locker. That sticky note changed my life when I realized this would be a nice "learning activity" for the Senior Exhibit. I researched the Academies. It seemed to me in all the information I had read and picked out that the Japanese Language Academy (JLA) was designed for those who had never studied Japanese before, because Japanese was not typically offered in Virginia. Well, no it was not immersion like the many of the other academies (French, Spanish and German) and not based entirely around high levels of study like Latin Academy. It was, like the Russian, and Chinese Academies, made available to those who had never studied. Well, I got accepted, and in discussing the issue of my placement in the academy she volunteered to contact them as a teacher on my behalf. Well, apparently there were three different levels of study. I barely had a month left to go at this point. At least, I still figured, because I knew the basics, I'd be able to skip out of the complete introduction material.
I was wrong!!
Let me start out by saying that all of the students at JLA were interesting, and I wasn't really intimidated when I arrived at all. I was, actually a little but upset that I would be having no contact with the outside world for three weeks, as was stipulated in the rules-- this meant no computer technology (which I had loved using to study as well) no cell phones (what a great way to share quick information) and no phone calls otherwise. The whole point was really to be cut off so we could be involved with each other, but for me I don't see the point. There were some people who said they would be texting the entire time they were there however if they had the choice. So I understood.
Well we all had our little "get to know you" activities on the first day, which lasted for several hours. During this time, unbenownst to me, something had been going on. After all of these activities began to die down (which took a toll on you in Richmond in the middle of July) I heard them announce a few things about class placements. But what about me?!? I'd been studying. I wasn't even really considered. I spoke up and a one of the RA for our academy had me taken to the back for testing, after she asked if I was really ready for it. I went to the second floor of our dorm building, into one of the main gathering rooms it had on each floor. I was talking about what I had done to the RA Sensei (whom I would later come to know much better as "Nancy-Sensei of the nation of Canada) at about a mile a minute, nervous already about what I would be asked. This whole time I was thinking, I've never been tested. I have no idea what I know and don't know. What is this going to be like? and, I should have spent the past week learning the katakana alphabet instead of useless kanji! In the room there were two Japanese Sensei I had not met or seen since we had all arrived as well as one of the non-Japanese (gaijin, a wonderfully rude term) leaders of the group, whom I would come to know as Guthrie-Sensei. Already his infinite amount of knowledge began to bore into me. The very air was oppressive. It was silent. Like the silence before the storm. They were saying something. It was in Japanese. It was in English. Wait, what was that? I was asked how much I had studied Japanese. I still don't remember what language I was asked in. I realized it wasn't on my application. I used some awkward phrazing to say a little bit, and I think it came out as little-ly if that is possible. I then was asked a few questions and may have said, "wakarimasen" or "I don't know." At least I was giving them the language they wanted to hear. Then I was passed a sheet of paper. I heard the words, (I will write them in romaji) "yonde kudasai" or "Please read" Maybe it was "kore o yonde kudasai." "Please read this." Either way, Darn! There was some katakana. But no, these were words I had read before. Katakana is used to spell English words. I would be able to guess! Okay, one word, two, slowly... avoiding the gaze of the two Japanese Sensei who may have thought I should know more if I wanted to be tested. Then I came across a letter that looked like another one. A lot of them do. Hey, this doesn't make sense, I thought. I knew I had pronounced something incorrectly. The non-existant buzzer sounded and I was done for. I was told that I had obviously studied a little bit, but I needed to review the basics.
Guthrie-Sensei is someone I was able to get along with rather well. We actually had a share of disagreements, but I probably communicated with him more than any of the Sensei. He was in charge of teaching the "shokyuu" or beginner course. He did such an amazing job teaching I think those students advanced possibly beyond where I was after three weeks. Anyway, I was in his class for three whole days. I was bored, I answered every question, or at least knew the answer to it. I was trying to get moved out. I made a lot of friends in class, but it was kind of a drag. Guthrie-Sensei was probably thinking, Griffin if you go to the intermediate class you will DIE but he didn't say it like that. He was very forceful however, and I asked one day if, because I knew everything he was teaching one afternoon, I could move to the intermediate class. He was hesitant and spoke with the other Sensei. They had a "Sensei Summit" if you will. They agreed to let me try it out when I proved that I had knowledge of the afternoon activity.
Well, I heard that the students in chuukyuu, the next level, had had between one and three full years of Japanese apeice. Moreover, there were, if I am correct-- five other students in the class? I had just come from one of 20. Great. They were tight already. I hadn't gotten to know most of them. And, surprisingly enough, there was pressure. But at first, I just walked into a door and didn't talk much. I listened. I listened to what Sakamaki Sensei was saying. I wasn't sure, and I was able to get away with not talking for a little while. I am so happy at that momemt we were given a worksheet with some English grammar explanation. Great. I knew forms, I had rough ideas about how to conjugate (which means less in Japanese than other lanuages) several verbs, and I knew enough nouns to answer the questions. And, the only person who had just one year was sitting next to me. I still think our Sensei was happier teaching the other students more because they were farther ahead just because of the way she acted towards us when we didn't know something. I would try to do things on my own. We had to ask most of our questions in Japanese, and grammar explanations were in Japanese most of the time. I would have been fine learning the material in my native language and then applying it like in school. This was relatively murder. Flashback:"Griffin if you go to the intermediate class you will DIE." Yes, there was some truth to that. In the chuukyuu class I was succumbed to a lot of pressure from four of the students as well as the Sensei to basically, not hold the class back. I couldn't blame them. But it was a waste of time for me to learn in the shokyuu class. I knew about 80% of it, and I didn't come to JLA to learn two more chapters of what I could find in my Genki textbook I had brought with me. I'm going to talk about something besides the chuukyuu class now.
I need to tell what else we did to learn and discover Japanese. Every day at lunch, we spoke only in Japanese. I learned so much by sitting with the highest level of students when I could, and actually understood a lot of their conversation. I couldn't always figure out a way to intelligently converse, but when people would tell me things I would often use key phrases to convey my level of understanding that were simple. For instance, saying,"Aa, wakarimasu-- demo... sore de hanasu koto ga dekimasen yo" with a smile. "Ah. I understand, but I am unable to speak about that." Most of the people in the highest class were at least impressed that I had taught this to myself over a short amount of time, but where it might seem very impressive that I knew all this and learned it comparatively so fast, 45% of the students and of course all of the teachers, were way ahead of me and could converse well. So while I might actually earn respect from someone who hadn't studied Japanese, even if they fully understood exactly what I had and hadn't learned, it really didn't matter to many of the others because they could talk at times that I couldn't and I sounded like a pre-schooler walking around talking about pre-school things mostly-- only without the random outbursts in full pre-schooler fluency and joy.
One thing I really enjoyed was when the director (Sones-Sensei) was trying to explain to me which country Kankoku was. I knew it wasn't Japan, China, or a European country so I had a few ideas but wasn't able to communicate that. I was thinking Korea. And then the Sones-Sensei asked the question, "Rosuto (w)o mimasu ka?" I knew "Rosuto." "LOST," maybe one of the only shows on television where two character's Korean nationalities played a significant role on the show. "Jin to Sun wa Kankokujin desu ne?" Jin and Sun are Kankokujin (Koreans) then, aren't they? LOST is fantastic. I am glad that Sones-Sensei watches LOST.
The greatest thing I learned here by the way was not the language. We had immersion, we watched some great movies, a lot of silly Japanese youtube videos (yes, there are a l0t) literature class (we read translations), history, immersion activities (like Hello Kitty the board game-- and the illegal photocopy of the Hello Kitty board game with different peices). The best thing I learned was from our 20th century history of Japan lessons from Momiyama Sensei. He was a man who had seen so much-- very young when men in U.S. uniform took over his home-land, had seen the old Japan, the new, and the new America. He had learned English by working for the American soldiers at the end the 2nd world war. He had studied so much about Japanese-U.S. relations and had been involved with much of it after graduating from High School in America and working in the military. I kept all of my notes from his class. Many of them just silly little things about Japanese customs he thought we would enjoy. He was old, but he was seriously very wise. His stories told me something about the world, how America is perceived and why, he told me about human perception, why many of us think the way we do, how history can effect people, as well as the power of the most simple human actions. I answered a lot of questions as best I could and he was the type of person, that when he gave me any sort of praise, I immediately felt glad that I was looking at the world in a helpful way because I so trusted him to be right about all of the things that he had taught. You listened to the man and knew he had seen a lot, could tell he had thought about his ideas successfully, and could tell he was being sincere when he spoke. I think the words he shared with us will have an effect on me that will last my entire life. I know of the importance of empathy and understanding the situations of others. I will never forget.
At the end of JLA, after making all of our friends, after taking Sumi art lessons, after the interesting dance, after visiting Japanese Embassy representatives in D.C., after all of that, we had some work to do to prepare for the end. We had to demonstrate what we had learned. My teacher was very serious in her wanting me to do well. I felt like she was giving me too much obligation because I simply could have just dropped Japanese altogether after this if I wanted to. But I wasn't planning on it. I had to write an essay. I did alright. And I would say for the standards that I had for myself 6 months before, fantastic. I'll have to upload that later.
I really wish that the chuukyuu class had focused less on our projects. I felt the main focus of the class was to do projects with the information we were supposed to already know. Like one of the fellow students said in that class, "Well, yeah. This is all review for me." I just kind of dove head-on out of the plane and attempted to grapple with the concepts in mid-air while not actually LEARNING that much Japanese. My biggest surprise after moving into that level was that if a) I was actually able to survive in the class I would b) learn a lot more Japanese. I don't think this means that I failed in any way, and it certainly is interesting and has made me think about how I plan on teaching in the future. That's going to be covered in a different entry, but I learned some methods I think worked best and I plan to start using them more soon The next phase of my project is running at full steam, but I'm slowing it down to a crawl as much as possible and dissecting this carefully to make it work. There's a lot to do.
Anyway, I'll be sure to update this journal entry later with some more of my personal thoughts and experiences and I might add some examples of my work and talk more about how this effected me later as well. It definitely was a significant and major component of my Senior Exhibit process.
Back last January I enlisted the help of Ms. Benton, the recent seventh grade science teacher as my mentor for Senior Exhibit. This was possibly the best decision I've made even up until now in this process. I had been told that Ms. Benton knew Japanese and could speak it well. Seeing this as an opportunity I wouldn't have otherwise, I approached her, explained everything, and from the start Ms. Benton was more than helpful. We talked about Japanese a little bit (I had played with Rosetta Stone before and learned say, many words, and a few things about the language), and she let me know how to start learning. I had to learn Hiragana and Katakana, the two most basic uniquely Japanese alphabets used in the language. Ms. Benton hooked me up in some way with all the resources I would need to be successful. She recommended I order "Let's Learn Hiragana" and "Let's Learn katakana," two different alphabet guidebooks I have to say were more helpful than online resources by far. She had me order Tuttle Language Kanji cards, which are pretty useful for learning Kanji. She also attempted to get me a copy of a book she used to study at a Nagoya University in Japan, A Course in Modern Japanese, but none were available unfortunately.
This was actually a pretty big deal. Had I picked up just a different book, and one like that I would have learned about Japanese in a completely different way. Every resource you can use to learn Japanese teaches you all about the "polite" form, (not that anything else is impolite) which is not commonly used in speaking. The book from Nagoya would have taught me plain form, and I think given me a better idea of speach. Even now I'm not sure I have a grasp on the exact differences, but I know I'd be able to cope with it somehow were I familiar with the rest of the material. To my ear, plain form sounds a little bit more casual and cooler, more free than the structured and polite form. If you're reading this, you probably have no idea what I am saying unless you've actually studied Japanese.
Ms. Benton gave me a book called Nakama, which has been pretty helpful for looking up grammar and constructions. I learned most of my previous knowledge from a grammar book in Romaji (Roman Letters) which served as a major base for understanding. Looking back on it, this may have also been a better choice than my next one. But either way, I can't say what I did was bad. On a trip I took to UVA after I heard about their great Japanese program, I broused the bookstore and found textbooks used for the Japanese language. I was very happy. These were all nice books. Workbooks, furigana dictionaries, more things I like to have remembered, but nevertheless this was nice. I got concerned about prices, and taking a step back and looking at where I was standing in terms of study progress in the Japanese language (It had been maybe over a month since I got my first alphabet books and I just learned hiragana pretty well) I realized I did not need all these books. I overlooked the workbooks, dictionaries, higher level textbooks, and picked out Genki 1. It certainly looked nicer than my other textbook, was pretty to look at, had great lists of vocabulary, didn't get side-tracked by entire chapters on Kanji (but rather had the student just pick up on it through the book) and had some great dialogues and exersizes to read I felt Nakama didn't have.
By the way "Genki" and "Nakama" respectively mean "health/energeticness" and "friend". It's a close translation, but hard to explain. I think I have some level of understanding but can't say I know for sure.
I just stuck to Genki and maybe got through the first several chapters before the end of summer. I regularly spoke to Ms. Benton about my studies, how they were going, and how hard it was to get it done during school. I got to the point where it was easier for me to do it when I was supposed to be doing something else-- like when people asked questions on calculus homework I already understood or during lunch when I could have been socializing more. If I had to go somewhere-- on a bus or train, or take a ride in a car, I would bring my books with me. This is how I learned. I would look up little random things about Japanese online. I got software installed on my computer so I could both read and type with it. I'd pull up a word document full of Japanese notes between classes.
All this time, too, I was working toward the goal of attending the VA Governor's School Foreign Language Academies hosted at VCU to study Japanese. Ms. Nobles had given me information, possibly as far back as November of 2007 about the 3-week academy, and so I never forgot I attached a sticky note to my locker. That sticky note changed my life when I realized this would be a nice "learning activity" for the Senior Exhibit. I researched the Academies. It seemed to me in all the information I had read and picked out that the Japanese Language Academy (JLA) was designed for those who had never studied Japanese before, because Japanese was not typically offered in Virginia. Well, no it was not immersion like the many of the other academies (French, Spanish and German) and not based entirely around high levels of study like Latin Academy. It was, like the Russian, and Chinese Academies, made available to those who had never studied. Well, I got accepted, and in discussing the issue of my placement in the academy she volunteered to contact them as a teacher on my behalf. Well, apparently there were three different levels of study. I barely had a month left to go at this point. At least, I still figured, because I knew the basics, I'd be able to skip out of the complete introduction material.
I was wrong!!
Let me start out by saying that all of the students at JLA were interesting, and I wasn't really intimidated when I arrived at all. I was, actually a little but upset that I would be having no contact with the outside world for three weeks, as was stipulated in the rules-- this meant no computer technology (which I had loved using to study as well) no cell phones (what a great way to share quick information) and no phone calls otherwise. The whole point was really to be cut off so we could be involved with each other, but for me I don't see the point. There were some people who said they would be texting the entire time they were there however if they had the choice. So I understood.
Well we all had our little "get to know you" activities on the first day, which lasted for several hours. During this time, unbenownst to me, something had been going on. After all of these activities began to die down (which took a toll on you in Richmond in the middle of July) I heard them announce a few things about class placements. But what about me?!? I'd been studying. I wasn't even really considered. I spoke up and a one of the RA for our academy had me taken to the back for testing, after she asked if I was really ready for it. I went to the second floor of our dorm building, into one of the main gathering rooms it had on each floor. I was talking about what I had done to the RA Sensei (whom I would later come to know much better as "Nancy-Sensei of the nation of Canada) at about a mile a minute, nervous already about what I would be asked. This whole time I was thinking, I've never been tested. I have no idea what I know and don't know. What is this going to be like? and, I should have spent the past week learning the katakana alphabet instead of useless kanji! In the room there were two Japanese Sensei I had not met or seen since we had all arrived as well as one of the non-Japanese (gaijin, a wonderfully rude term) leaders of the group, whom I would come to know as Guthrie-Sensei. Already his infinite amount of knowledge began to bore into me. The very air was oppressive. It was silent. Like the silence before the storm. They were saying something. It was in Japanese. It was in English. Wait, what was that? I was asked how much I had studied Japanese. I still don't remember what language I was asked in. I realized it wasn't on my application. I used some awkward phrazing to say a little bit, and I think it came out as little-ly if that is possible. I then was asked a few questions and may have said, "wakarimasen" or "I don't know." At least I was giving them the language they wanted to hear. Then I was passed a sheet of paper. I heard the words, (I will write them in romaji) "yonde kudasai" or "Please read" Maybe it was "kore o yonde kudasai." "Please read this." Either way, Darn! There was some katakana. But no, these were words I had read before. Katakana is used to spell English words. I would be able to guess! Okay, one word, two, slowly... avoiding the gaze of the two Japanese Sensei who may have thought I should know more if I wanted to be tested. Then I came across a letter that looked like another one. A lot of them do. Hey, this doesn't make sense, I thought. I knew I had pronounced something incorrectly. The non-existant buzzer sounded and I was done for. I was told that I had obviously studied a little bit, but I needed to review the basics.
Guthrie-Sensei is someone I was able to get along with rather well. We actually had a share of disagreements, but I probably communicated with him more than any of the Sensei. He was in charge of teaching the "shokyuu" or beginner course. He did such an amazing job teaching I think those students advanced possibly beyond where I was after three weeks. Anyway, I was in his class for three whole days. I was bored, I answered every question, or at least knew the answer to it. I was trying to get moved out. I made a lot of friends in class, but it was kind of a drag. Guthrie-Sensei was probably thinking, Griffin if you go to the intermediate class you will DIE but he didn't say it like that. He was very forceful however, and I asked one day if, because I knew everything he was teaching one afternoon, I could move to the intermediate class. He was hesitant and spoke with the other Sensei. They had a "Sensei Summit" if you will. They agreed to let me try it out when I proved that I had knowledge of the afternoon activity.
Well, I heard that the students in chuukyuu, the next level, had had between one and three full years of Japanese apeice. Moreover, there were, if I am correct-- five other students in the class? I had just come from one of 20. Great. They were tight already. I hadn't gotten to know most of them. And, surprisingly enough, there was pressure. But at first, I just walked into a door and didn't talk much. I listened. I listened to what Sakamaki Sensei was saying. I wasn't sure, and I was able to get away with not talking for a little while. I am so happy at that momemt we were given a worksheet with some English grammar explanation. Great. I knew forms, I had rough ideas about how to conjugate (which means less in Japanese than other lanuages) several verbs, and I knew enough nouns to answer the questions. And, the only person who had just one year was sitting next to me. I still think our Sensei was happier teaching the other students more because they were farther ahead just because of the way she acted towards us when we didn't know something. I would try to do things on my own. We had to ask most of our questions in Japanese, and grammar explanations were in Japanese most of the time. I would have been fine learning the material in my native language and then applying it like in school. This was relatively murder. Flashback:"Griffin if you go to the intermediate class you will DIE." Yes, there was some truth to that. In the chuukyuu class I was succumbed to a lot of pressure from four of the students as well as the Sensei to basically, not hold the class back. I couldn't blame them. But it was a waste of time for me to learn in the shokyuu class. I knew about 80% of it, and I didn't come to JLA to learn two more chapters of what I could find in my Genki textbook I had brought with me. I'm going to talk about something besides the chuukyuu class now.
I need to tell what else we did to learn and discover Japanese. Every day at lunch, we spoke only in Japanese. I learned so much by sitting with the highest level of students when I could, and actually understood a lot of their conversation. I couldn't always figure out a way to intelligently converse, but when people would tell me things I would often use key phrases to convey my level of understanding that were simple. For instance, saying,"Aa, wakarimasu-- demo... sore de hanasu koto ga dekimasen yo" with a smile. "Ah. I understand, but I am unable to speak about that." Most of the people in the highest class were at least impressed that I had taught this to myself over a short amount of time, but where it might seem very impressive that I knew all this and learned it comparatively so fast, 45% of the students and of course all of the teachers, were way ahead of me and could converse well. So while I might actually earn respect from someone who hadn't studied Japanese, even if they fully understood exactly what I had and hadn't learned, it really didn't matter to many of the others because they could talk at times that I couldn't and I sounded like a pre-schooler walking around talking about pre-school things mostly-- only without the random outbursts in full pre-schooler fluency and joy.
One thing I really enjoyed was when the director (Sones-Sensei) was trying to explain to me which country Kankoku was. I knew it wasn't Japan, China, or a European country so I had a few ideas but wasn't able to communicate that. I was thinking Korea. And then the Sones-Sensei asked the question, "Rosuto (w)o mimasu ka?" I knew "Rosuto." "LOST," maybe one of the only shows on television where two character's Korean nationalities played a significant role on the show. "Jin to Sun wa Kankokujin desu ne?" Jin and Sun are Kankokujin (Koreans) then, aren't they? LOST is fantastic. I am glad that Sones-Sensei watches LOST.
The greatest thing I learned here by the way was not the language. We had immersion, we watched some great movies, a lot of silly Japanese youtube videos (yes, there are a l0t) literature class (we read translations), history, immersion activities (like Hello Kitty the board game-- and the illegal photocopy of the Hello Kitty board game with different peices). The best thing I learned was from our 20th century history of Japan lessons from Momiyama Sensei. He was a man who had seen so much-- very young when men in U.S. uniform took over his home-land, had seen the old Japan, the new, and the new America. He had learned English by working for the American soldiers at the end the 2nd world war. He had studied so much about Japanese-U.S. relations and had been involved with much of it after graduating from High School in America and working in the military. I kept all of my notes from his class. Many of them just silly little things about Japanese customs he thought we would enjoy. He was old, but he was seriously very wise. His stories told me something about the world, how America is perceived and why, he told me about human perception, why many of us think the way we do, how history can effect people, as well as the power of the most simple human actions. I answered a lot of questions as best I could and he was the type of person, that when he gave me any sort of praise, I immediately felt glad that I was looking at the world in a helpful way because I so trusted him to be right about all of the things that he had taught. You listened to the man and knew he had seen a lot, could tell he had thought about his ideas successfully, and could tell he was being sincere when he spoke. I think the words he shared with us will have an effect on me that will last my entire life. I know of the importance of empathy and understanding the situations of others. I will never forget.
At the end of JLA, after making all of our friends, after taking Sumi art lessons, after the interesting dance, after visiting Japanese Embassy representatives in D.C., after all of that, we had some work to do to prepare for the end. We had to demonstrate what we had learned. My teacher was very serious in her wanting me to do well. I felt like she was giving me too much obligation because I simply could have just dropped Japanese altogether after this if I wanted to. But I wasn't planning on it. I had to write an essay. I did alright. And I would say for the standards that I had for myself 6 months before, fantastic. I'll have to upload that later.
I really wish that the chuukyuu class had focused less on our projects. I felt the main focus of the class was to do projects with the information we were supposed to already know. Like one of the fellow students said in that class, "Well, yeah. This is all review for me." I just kind of dove head-on out of the plane and attempted to grapple with the concepts in mid-air while not actually LEARNING that much Japanese. My biggest surprise after moving into that level was that if a) I was actually able to survive in the class I would b) learn a lot more Japanese. I don't think this means that I failed in any way, and it certainly is interesting and has made me think about how I plan on teaching in the future. That's going to be covered in a different entry, but I learned some methods I think worked best and I plan to start using them more soon The next phase of my project is running at full steam, but I'm slowing it down to a crawl as much as possible and dissecting this carefully to make it work. There's a lot to do.
Anyway, I'll be sure to update this journal entry later with some more of my personal thoughts and experiences and I might add some examples of my work and talk more about how this effected me later as well. It definitely was a significant and major component of my Senior Exhibit process.
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