Thursday

Woke up at 7:15am, had rice for breakfast, then drove to school. Today’s was Grade 4’s play presentation day! In first period we practiced with both 4-1 and 4-2. My JTE went to 4-1 and I looked after 4-2. It wasn’t too bad, but definitely not as polished and good as I think they could be. 4-1 is definitely much better. A few kids of certain groups in 4-2 are good, but a lot less kids in 4-2 have memorised their lines, and overall they’re just not as serious about it as 4-1. They’ll still do the play fine though, so I’m not worried about that, just a little wistful knowing they could do so much more. I explained the game we’d play after the presentations to them after practice (Mr Wolf, what time is it?) and they got really excited about that.

1-1 up next in period 2 and it was a high energy class the whole way through. First we warmed up by singing the Hello song, and then we read the picture book “No David” through a few times. First time they were just listening, second time I got them to say the “No” parts with me, and then third time I went through the meaning. They all understood the story though, since it’s simple and the pictures are clear. We then read it one last time together. Then I taught the Hokey Pokey song/dance to break things up, and they liked that a lot too. Then we watched Momotaro together (the same video thing that the 6th graders watched) so that they would have an idea of what the plays will be able tomorrow. It was funny cause they were all laughing hysterically at the foreign pronunciation of きびだんご and 鬼ヶ島 and wouldn't stop laughing even though the rest of the story didn’t have anything funny. We then finished off with a few rounds of Mr Wolf, what time is it, in prep for tomorrow.

1-2 in period 3 and they were pretty much the same as 1-1 but just a lot less hyper and much more quiet. One kid got a bit upset in the Mr. Wolf game because he’s quite competitive, and it was just cute seeing him holding onto the homeroom teacher’s sleeve. 1-3 in period 4 and they were super cute today. There’s at least 3 kids in this class that have siblings in 6th grade, so they were all like “YAY I can watch my brother’s play tomorrow!” and just super excited in general. Everyone had a lot of fun saying the NOs in the picture book. Lunch with 2-2 again and we had flat udon noodles (Gunma’s specialty), bread, and a mixture of Japanese vegetables. Spent the lunch break setting up the gym ready for the final presentation for 4th grade in period 5. A few kids from 4-1 were helping us set up, they’re just so pure about everything, and were very helpful and enthusiastic about setting up. The school had a bit of an emergency meeting because sand or other bits of dirt were found coming out of the school taps, so the kids couldn't drink from the taps anymore, or brush their teeth.

Play presentation time in period 5! It all went super well! 4-2 really buckled down and performed properly – I think they’re the type who plays around but when it gets to the real thing they’re serious – and 4-1 were great as usual. It was also super cute because the kids were really yelling out their lines since we were in the gym. After both classes presented their plays, we played Mr. Wolf, what time is it, for a few rounds before the bell rang and it was time to finish. They were so disappointed that we didn’t get to play the game more, and were begging “One more? One more?” even after the bell rang haha. My JTE and I spent the spare 6th period setting up for tomorrow’s 6th grade play presentations, and that kept us busy well until 16:15 (6th graders are having a rotation system for tomorrow so that’s why it took a while to organise everything) so I just got off work after that finished.