A brighter day of sunshine!

So this morning when i rolled out of bed i was greeted by a warm ray of sunshine. I small and gradual smile grew on my face which quickly disappeared when i realised it was 6am and i had to get up for work.

The truth be told, as much as I dont like getting up so early i do really like going into schools. Also i can sleep on the train...lol

This morning i found myself crouched down, japanese style  (as though i was squoting over a toilet), on the train nodding off to sleep with the occassional jerk of the train waking me. I sometimes feel guilty about being tired because to behonest, i dont really do much compared to the students.

You see i remember when i was in school and how we complained about the amount of homework we had to do but here in japan the children live for school...even if they dont want to.

Generally the school day begins around 8am which is when some students and most staff arrive with lessons beginning at about 9am. For some students though, especially sports or band, they maybe at school from about 6/7am. School usually finishes at around 4pm. Normally i would have taught about 4 periods (or less) out of 6, where as the kids have had 6 lessons. I will leave at 4pm (sometime 330pm for a train) but most kids will stay for school activities which can last until about 7pm before having to bike, walk or get the train home (occassionally a parent will collect them but this is rare). To make things worst for the children at the weekend they are normally back in school doing clubs etc. In the bigger cities a lot of students will go to cram schools as well, normally in there final year of JHS and HS they have to limit club time and study instead.

So when a child falls a sleep in my lesson i dont take it personally. In fact today this actually happened. The poor kid looked tired to begin with and was keeping up but the next thing i knew he was sound a sleep - i allowed him to sleep because he is normally alert, paying attention and a good student, so to me it was ok. Unfortunately for him my japanese teacher did not agree so slightly and did something i was shocked about. He actually applied pressure on the side of his head, pressing it against the desk until he woke up...im presumming it wasnt hard because the kid was ok...he was more shocked that the lesson was over as he had been a sleep for about 20mins...luckily he was not a snorer.

So if you are teaching here in Japan or planning to... just remember that some of your children may get one weeks worth of sleep that is equivalent to your one night of sleep.

On a side note...my manager spoke to me last night and hopefully i should have a car in a few weeks...they are looking into costs etc and should finalise things soon. Having a car will make things soo much easier

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• Japan
• TEFL
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• students