Elementary Days
Thursday was the opening ceremony for sports day at the elementary school and also my first day of teaching there. The ceremony took place outside on their all dirt multi-purpose field. Apparently in Japan, they don’t believe in grass, even the baseball fields are all dirt. So the kids lined up according to grade and were forced to sing songs about sports day and the town. If the kids weren’t singing a teacher would be sure to shake the kids furiously and point their heads to the conductor. I love their group spirit here!
After they sang their songs a new track blasted over the PA. Then the lines began running towards the outside of the field accompanied with whistles and shouting. Then it hit me. Da Daa Daa Da… Da Daa Daaaaaaah. They were running to Rocky! Truly the best part of my day. I taught fifth and six grade and the kids were really awesome. They paid attention, seemed interested in me, and even participated. I don’t know at what point they become the lifeless junior high kids but it must be an agonizing process. I also learned that my phone is much more interesting than myself. I wanted to take some video of the kids and when they saw my phone I was attacked by half the class. They begged me to flip my phone so they could see the TV. I will post some video of the kiddos soon.
