Tuesday

Only one more day left till I can go snowboarding yus! Woke up at 7:10am, had udon for breakfast, then drove to school. It was raining today – we haven’t had rain in a long time! Had periods 1 and 2 free so I continued cleaning up and sorting the English materials corner. Had a late period 3 class with 5-2 because graduation ceremony practice ran a bit overtime (poor kids!) so we had to play the 2 games I prepared in quite the rush. Managed to play both of them though, and (as expected) the kids loved the charades relay. Took the class photo at the end as well, and all the kids were crowding around asking to see the photo. 6-2 up next in period 4 (my last lesson together with my favourite class!) and we just finished off the picture book pages and had a super chill lesson. We had planned to play the jobs charades relay game, but the kids just got too into making the origami door and wanting to actually finish up their picture book pages nicely (unlike 6-1) so we just kept extending the time until the end of the lesson. Took the photo with them at the end too and when I looked back, every single photo had at least one person that blinked their eyes, or wasn’t looking at the camera…had to do some serious photoshopping haha.

The 6th graders were all really excited because it was a special mini buffet for them instead of the normal school lunch today! Basically they got the same menu as the rest of us (ramen, fried chicken, salad, soup) but larger amounts and also extra special menu items (shumai, meatballs, potato fries, jelly, and coffee milk instead of normal milk!). I find it super cute how the school does that for them. I also found out yesterday from the tea lady that only 4 people are on the school lunch team (excluding the nutritionist who’s normally too busy to help out with the cooking and only goes to taste test the food) which is just amazing! 4 people making food for 400! Anyway our lunch today was ramen, fried chicken, salad, and chocolate bread. Cleaning time was a breeze, although the kids were a bit hyper, they were obediently hyper and very manageable. Spent the free 5th and 6th periods writing some comments on 6-2’s finished picture book pages, and editing the 6th graders’ class photos cause I want to print them out for them as mini gifts! My JTE had written personal letters (well just a sentence for each kid but that’s still amazing!) for them so I wanted to give them something too. One of the kids was asking why my JTE’s letter wasn’t written in English haha (and he’s the kid who’s always complaining how he can’t read English!). Today was also the day in which the teachers were finding out whether they were remaining at this school, or being moved to another one. Sadly the lovely special-needs teacher whose desk is next to mine is being moved to another school. She was really surprised at it too since she had expected to stay at least another year. I feel quite sorry for the teachers who are moved to other schools, mainly because they get the notice so late so it’s like a lot of work hits them all of a sudden, having to pack and everything. Thankfully my JTE is not moving schools yay!!! But she said that her lesson hours will be changing, in that she’ll teach more of maths and only teach 6th grade English. So I’ll be teaching English with the 4th and 5th grade homeroom teachers from April! It’s definitely going to be interesting. If it was this current school year’s homeroom teachers it would be super great cause they all can speak a little bit of English (I think 5th grades teachers actually have the best English, but 4th grade teachers have always been very supportive and nice about English learning too). Looking forward to the new school year’s challenges! Got off work at 16:00 and went to the bank since it’s an early payday (public holiday tomorrow!), printed out the photos for the 6th graders at 7-11, and went to the drugstore to pick up some things.