July 14, 2006 – Teamwork (the bad kind)
Posted by Barniferous in Life in Japan on April 8, 2017
Last night I went to karaoke for the first time in a long time. I’m not what anyone would consider a good singer, but I make up for this with volume and enthusiasm. I usually leave with a raspy voice.
Enthusiastic karaoke decided to team up with a cold that is making its way through the teacher’s room. By the end of my shift I had lost most of my voice. Not all teamwork is good!
July 13, 2006 – Fun was had by all
Posted by Barniferous in Friends and coworkers, Karaoke on April 8, 2017
After my short vacation in June I have been pretty reclusive, trying to save money by staying home after work as much as possible.
Tonight I went to karaoke after work for the first time in a long time. Fun was had by all and I stayed out too late (as usual).
Memorable students – The Slapper
Posted by Barniferous in Teaching English on April 3, 2017
One of the first things that is taught to new conversational English teachers is that Japanese students generally don’t like to make mistakes. This can be a challenge in a conversational English classroom, where identifying mistakes can help everybody learn. The teachers job was to create a fun, safe environment in the classroom so that students would speak as much as possible without fear of judgement if they tripped over their words.
Most students eventually became more comfortable speaking English, mistakes and all. There was one very memorable student who took his mistakes very personally. By all accounts he was a normal, pleasant person. However, when speaking English he would be very slow and deliberate, cautiously trying to craft perfect sentences. This was not unusual, but what happened if he made a mistake was: upon realizing his mistake he would slap himself right in the face! The bigger the mistake, the harder the slap. A particularly bad lesson would leave him with red cheeks. He came to be known as “The Slapper” by teachers in the area.
Seeing The Slapper in action for the first time was a shock for both teachers and other students. It was something that became less shocking over time, but it was still jarring to see an adult slapping themselves when they made a mistake. Teachers would do their best to discourage his unique form of negative reinforcement, and I was even part of a group class where the other students asked him nicely to stop hitting himself. I was impressed with the students both for taking an interest in their classmate and for asking him to stop in English; “please don’t slap yourself” was not a phrase that usually came up in NOVA lessons!
The staff got involved at one point, politely asking him to stop hitting himself because it was scaring the other students and the teachers. I think the message got through. Over time he got better at not hitting himself in the classroom, but he was never able to fully kick the habit.
Hitting yourself when you make a mistake is better than hitting anyone else, but it’s still not a recommended technique for learning English.
July 2006 – Busted (not me)
Posted by Barniferous in Teaching English on March 29, 2017
“No interacting with students outside of the classroom” is one of the cornerstones of NOVA employee policy. The idea is to prevent teachers from stealing students from the school for cheaper private lessons, and to reduce the risk of any unpleasant interactions that could cause the students to stop buying lessons.
** Please remember, when I say “students”, I am referring to conversation school students who are typically adults.
In Kawasaki I was aware that some teachers were seeing students outside of the classroom, but when I arrived in eastern Shizuoka I was surprised by how often it happened. Pretty much everyone other than supervisors had been to an “unofficial” farewell party with students in attendance. In addition, several of the teachers are or were dating students, and my friend Koalako shared an apartment with two teachers in Numazu.
Hanging out with students was an open secret in the area, with the understanding that everyone should keep it quiet and not let the supervisors or Japanese branch staff know. For the amount of times that teachers and students interacted outside of the classroom, it’s actually surprising how few people got caught. The good luck streak was broken in mid 2006 when teachers got caught red handed.
The two male teachers had invited two female Japanese students out for a drink, and for some reason decided to go to an izakaya near Fuji school that was popular with the Japanese branch staff. They were seated near the entrance, when coincidentally the branch staff came in for an after work drink as well. My understanding is that the teachers were called to a tense meeting with the area manager shortly after to remind them of NOVA’s policies.
I can understand NOVA’s point of view about the policy: they are a business and they need to protect their future profits. However, I think there is a lot of benefit from teachers and students interacting outside of the confines of the classroom. The best way to practice conversational English is to have a real conversation. Interacting outside of the classroom in a natural setting is also a great way to improve intercultural understanding. Other than good times at karaoke, I got a lot more out of my time in Japan by spending time with Japanese people instead of just teachers.
If you are teaching in Japan and decide to ignore company policy by hanging out with students, please be sensible, behave properly, and don’t ruin it for everyone else. Also, choose the venue carefully: you don’t want branch staff to crash the party!
July 1, 2006 – Canada Day already!?
Posted by Barniferous in Life in Japan on March 15, 2017
It can’t seriously be July already!?!? The first half of this year absolutely flew by.
We need some more Canadians in the Numazu area so I can celebrate Canada Day.
Memorable students: The Thesaurus (showdown)
Posted by Barniferous in Teaching English on March 12, 2017
This is the second in a three part series about one of the most infamous English students in the eastern Shizuoka area; The Thesaurus, who had a more impressive English vocabulary than some of the teachers I worked with. On one fateful evening I ended up in a vocabulary showdown with The Thesaurus in front of a room full of students. I barely came out with a victory.
The Voice room usually has open conversation or some English activities designed to keep everyone involved. The room was full of students from all skill levels, and the infamous Thesaurus. The previous teacher had been teaching some common English idioms to the students (a common topic), so I decided to turn this into a game.
I wrote one of the idioms across the whiteboard, and told the students that using the only the letters on the board, they had to make as many words as they could within a certain time limit. Words had to be at least 3 letters long, and I would award one point per letter. I divided the students up into teams, leaving The Thesaurus on his own, and started the timer. The game worked surprisingly well; students at lower levels came up with lots of small words, while The Thesaurus worked on pulling out the largest words he knew. Any words that students didn’t know got explained to the room.
I repeated this a few more times with continued success. As the time was running out, somehow the room came up with the idea that I should challenge The Thesaurus. I felt like I was playing for the pride of the teachers, honestly worried about being beaten by a man who read the dictionary for fun. The stakes were high and the pressure was on.
We took turns identifying words that we could build. With only minutes left, The Thesaurus managed to find an obscure 11 letter word that could be assembled from the letters available. I was on the spot – flashbacks of endless games of Scrabble against my mother played in my head, defeat after defeat coming into my mind. Here I was, a native English speaker, about to lose a word game of my own creation against the most infamous student in that has ever walked into a NOVA classroom in the Shizuoka area. It would be a blow to the teachers, and to Canadian English as a whole. The students were on the edge of their seats waiting for me to pull out a language miracle.
As I was beginning to lose hope, I saw my savior: the glorious letter “S”. I added it to the end of The Thesaurus’s word, pluralizing it to create a 12 letter word, one more than his 11 letter word. The students oohed and aahed as I wrote down my final word, barely claiming victory from the jaws of an embarrassing defeat as the class drew to a close.
I don’t know if this game was as memorable for anyone else in the room, but I won’t soon forget my epic vocabulary showdown with The Thesaurus.
Memorable students: The Thesaurus (intro)
Posted by Barniferous in Teaching English on March 11, 2017
This is the first in a three part series about one of the most infamous English students in the eastern Shizuoka area; The Thesaurus. He was a middle aged salaryman who believed that to master English, he needed to learn and use only the longest and most complicated words available in any situation. This approach made him challenging in lessons, and nearly impossible in the Voice room where students of all skill levels could attend.
As someone who has taught English while learning a second language, I learned that while a large vocabulary is useful, it is not critical to communication. “Where is the toilet” can be just as effective as “excuse me kind sir, my bladder is full and I am looking for an appropriate receptacle to expel urine. Could you please direct me to the nearest washroom facility post haste?”. If you can imagine the second sentence being spoken in a monotone voice, you would have a good idea of what talking to The Thesaurus was like.
The Voice room was The Thesaurus’s favourite place to hang out. He would come for several periods, making the room difficult or impossible for the lower level students. There are even some students who would check to see if The Thesaurus was in the Voice room before they entered. If he was there, they would take a lesson or go to a nearby school’s Voice room. The Thesaurus had the ability to adjust his speaking to students of all skill levels, he just wasn’t interested in doing so.
I had two tactics for working with The Thesaurus in the Voice room: the first was to stealthily break up the students into two conversations, one for The Thesaurus and anyone else who wanted to test their dictionary recall, and one for everyone else. This wasn’t ideal, but at least everyone could participate. My second tactic was to have one open conversation, and write down the most difficult words that The Thesaurus used on the whiteboard so the other students could look them up. This could work as long as we stayed with topics that were interesting to most, and not more obscure topics like the system of government in Turkey (yes, this was really something he tried to talk about).
To make matters worse, The Thesaurus was the only student I knew who had an Arch Enemy: another middle aged salary man who was generally well liked by other students and teachers. The Arch Enemy HATED The Thesaurus, and wasn’t shy in expressing this to anyone who would listen. The Arch Enemy would make a point of sitting right next to The Thesaurus to make him uncomfortable. When The Thesaurus started showing off his extensive lexicon, Arch Enemy would interrupt and tell him that nobody wanted to hear what he had to say. There is even a rumour of The Arch Enemy throwing his newspaper at The Thesaurus once. The Arch Enemy was intimidating at best, and bullying at worst, but only to The Thesaurus.
This kind of outright hostility was very unusual in Japanese society, and even more unusual in a classroom setting. It was uncomfortable for all involved, and everyone would feel a bit better when one of the two of them would leave the Voice room.
Overall, I don’t think that The Thesaurus was a bad person, he was just a challenging student. If someone wants to pay money for English lessons and has a goal in mind, it’s their right to be there. The problem was that he rarely considered the goals of the other students in the room, which helped make him one of the most difficult lessons that a teacher in the area could experience.
To put a positive spin on things: teaching The Thesaurus was a great way to build classroom management skills, learn some new words (even for teachers), and also a great excuse to go for a beer after work.
Memorable Students – Feeling good
Posted by Barniferous in Teaching English on February 27, 2017
As an English teacher, I always felt particularly proud of my efforts to try to help the weaker students in a class. I can understand how hard it is to learn a new language, and how frustrating it can be to see the people around you having an easy time of it. Conversational English teachers are given the bare minimum of training, so they aren’t always equipped to help struggling students. I tried to see weaker students as a challenge, and loved seeing the results when we were able to make a breakthrough.
I was teaching a level 6 student in Kawasaki NOVA who was struggling in many of his lessons. One evening I was lucky enough to have him in a man to man lesson: unlike a group lesson, we were able to work at his pace and I was able to give him all of the focus and feedback. He ended up having a fantastic lesson. By the time the final bell rang, he was smiling and confident. We both felt like we had achieved something.
As I was leaving the classroom, the happy student said to me “Thank you Mr. Andrew! When I speak English, I feel myself good”.
Different people have different ways to celebrate a good English lesson, but I’m pretty sure he wasn’t actually intending to feel himself.
Part of me thought I should correct him on the awkward phrasing, but I didn’t want to bring down his good mood so I let it go and left him smiling all the way out of the branch.
Drinking in Japan 
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