We were working on relative pronouns and the students were suppose to guess the movie after I read the hint. Sometimes the hints were too obvious like “It’s about a man who has super powers and flies through the sky saving people. What a super guy!” Because of this, the students have developed a knack of grabbing keywords and answering.
Ana: It’s about a girl who has a fantastic dream in which she and her dog, Toto, have many experiences. How fantastic!
R-kun: FANTASTIC FOUR!
Nothing like some good ole domestic conflict to spice up an English lesson. I found this particular dialogue from an intermediate-level English textbook for ESL students.
Gold. I can see Oscar potential. I may even re-enact this one for YouTube.
Or Delinquents are Cute When Young.
I was outside and a class of little grade 4 Japanese kids were puttering around their plastic cube potting plants. K-kun looked at me and beckoned me over, “Ana-sensei! Ana-sensei!”
Ana: “Yes?”
K-kun: (motions over his plant) “Negi!”
Ana: “Negi?”
K-kun then pulls a round onion bulb out of the planter and holds it up by the green long stems. He thinks for a while.
K-kun: “Onion!” (He beams proudly.)
Ana: “Oh! Onion!”
K-kun looks over and spots his friend. He then starts swinging the onion by the stems like a viking swinging a mace. He yells, runs and then hits his friend squarely on his head by the fat onion bulb — Braveheart-style.
K-kun: “ONIOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOON!!!“
Whenever I say a pun in either English or Japanese, I am usually met with rolled eyes and a head shake. However, whenever Japanese children make an English pun they just eat it up and repeat it ad nauseum.
Today, the kiddies and I were playing Fruits Basket. One of the words they are allowed to shout out is “Everybody”.
One boy thought it sounded like ebi-body and he would laugh with his friends about his joke, wiggle in his seat, and gloat how he cleverly realized that “every” sounds like ebi which means “shrimp” in Japanese.
Then one other friend of this same boy realized that “body” could easily sound like “party”.
During the game, a boy came to the center of the ring, grinned hugely before he started dancing side to side like seaweed and shouted, “EBI PARTY!”
Groups of boys rushed out of their chairs, scrambling to find a new seat to sit on while they wiggled their bodies like partying shrimp.
It is said that girls grow up faster than boys and the Japanese girls of the class rolled their eyes and shook their heads as they found a new seat to sit on and waited for the next command.
“EBI PARTY!”
Or Telephone Gone Awry.
Shortly after finding out the death of Osama bin Laden, I decided to share this to the staff starting with the vice-principal.
“Who died?”
“Osama bin Laden.”
“When? Now?”
“May be 30 minutes ago.”
Then I hear later from other teachers,
“Laden died.”
“Who told you?”
“Ana-sensei. About 10 minutes ago.”
About 2 classes later, I returned to the staff room after teaching English, greeted by the tea lady who looked relieved.
“Oh thank goodness! I heard you or someone had died. And something about 3 minute ramen.” (Note: ramen: Chinese noodle soup.)
Or The One Uppance episode.
Stickers are a big deal in my elementary English lessons. Big stickers and small stickers carry different values with the big sticker being the most prestigious to earn. Two boys volunteered themselves to answer questions near the end of the class. Usually, this boldness to speak in front of their peers earns them a small sticker, but correctly answering the question in perfect English warrants a big sticker.
This became the manliest battle of words … ever.
I asked J-kun, “What do you eat for breakfast?” to which he replied, “I eat rice and miso soup for breakfast.” That’s fine and expected since the whole class practiced answering the question with the sentence pattern, “I eat A and B for breakfast.”
I asked G-kun, “What do you eat for breakfast?” Before answering, he looked over at J-kun and smirked. “I eat bread and fruit …” — a dramatic pause — “and sausage for breakfast.”
Gasps of surprise from the class. G-kun broke the sentence pattern! Whispers of excitement. Not to be outdone, J-kun looked at me. “Ask me! Ana-sensei, ask me. One more time, please.”
“Er, what do you eat for breakfast?”
“I eat rice and miso soup and fried egg for breakfast!”
A quick rebuttal from G-kun. “I eat bread and fruit and sausage and … PIZZA for breakfast!!”
“I eat rice and miso soup and fried egg and sausage!”
“I eat bread and fruit and sausage and pizza and salad –!!”
” … and spaghetti and hamburger and parfait …”
“and hot dog and yogurt and cereal …”
“I drink tea …”
” and milk … and coffee … and green tea …”
“I drink orange juice and apple juice and lemon juice …”
They both received big stickers.
Or … the one where Ana learns that she is NOT a VIP.
Italics denote speech in Japanese.
It was thirty minutes before home time; I was left alone in the staff room to do whatever pleases me. While some cute bear in a grade three Japanese book about kanji attempted to teach me the on readings and kun readings for the kanji “cold”, a teacher and a student rushed in exclaiming, “Wow. This is empty. Nobody is in here.”
I raised my hand. “Um, I am here.”
“Oh, it’s Ana-sensei!” said the student.
The teacher smiled apologetically. “Oh, I’m sorry. I meant to say that no one important is in the staff room.”
She repeated herself slowly and in English, “Not. Important.”
Italics indicate Japanese.
“We need you to scare the children,” said my principal.
“Er, what do you mean?” I said, puzzled.
“It’s setsubun. You’ll be a perfect demon. You just have to wear this, ” he handed me a paper mask. “And dance around.” He dons on a mask, poses akimbo and then poses like a wrestler.
Then he started, what looked like, his interpretation of Riverdance. The vice-principal came by, “When they throw beans at you, try to eat the beans.”
My principal guaffed, “You don’t eat the beans! Ha ha!” The vice-principal looked at me, then at him and gave a knowing look.
“Ooooh, you must try to eat the beans,” my principal said to me, slowly and in English. “It’s tradition. It’s peanuts.”
“I heard you in Japanese!” I laughed.
My vice-principal crossed his arms and shook his head, slightly in disappointment. “She knows too much.”
***
Happy Setsubun Everyone! Fuku uchi, Oni soto! (lit. “Good luck in, Demons out!”)
One particular group in this particular class in the second year of junior high seemed to be in a heated debate about something. The worksheet on their desks were still blank. R-kun raised his hand, looked my way, and yelled out, “Ana-Sensei!” (Again, italics denote a conversation all in Japanese.)
Me: Yes?
R-kun: What does “You still have lots more to work on?” mean in Japanese?
Me: Hm. Simply put, “Mada mada desu yo” or something like that.
He turns around to face his group as they groan.
R-kun: I told you! I told you! See?!! I TOLD YOU!!
Me: Where did you learn that?
R-kun: Comic. I like, er, Tennis .. Prince? You said reading comics is good for learning.
Me: Oh, Tenisu no Ojisama? Ah, I see. That’s “Prince of Tennis”.
He turned back to his group as he posed like a familiar character from the aforementioned comic as he said to them, “Your English … You still have much more to work on.”
I really don’t know if I am a good influence on these kids or not.
The character being referred to is Ryoma Echizen from The Prince of Tennis. I had to research this and later realized it was also being parodied by my favorite anime, Gintama, as seen here:
Just before December for a Christmas-themed English class, I made a class of grade three students write letters to Santa using a letter template. In each letter and appropriate underlined space, they were able to write their names, their age, their gender, and a generic term for what they wanted for Christmas like “a toy”, “a video game”, “a card”, “a doll”, etc.
After that, I left room for them to write a small message to Santa in Japanese where they could write “Merry Christmas” or delve into details of the gift they want.
Thanks to the hard workers from Canada Post, each child received a letter back which prompted the children to question the existence of Santa Claus. (And to question whether or not he is Canadian.) Italics indicate Japanese.
S-kun: He is NOT real! All these letters are the same! Ana-Sensei wrote these. Ana-sensei, you write me this letter?
Ana: No. These are from Santa.
K-kun: See!! Ana-sensei can’t even write like this. She can’t do all the curly, swirly things. Ana-sensei, please write “Santa”. Please try!!
He points to the cursive writing, so I began to write “Santa” in cursive on the board. They laugh.
S-kun: It’s sooooo horrible! She can’t write like this. So, may be … it IS from Santa?
*****
R-kun: I didn’t get what I wanted for Christmas. I don’t think he’s real.
H-kun: He’s real! He read my letter! I got a Beyblade!! I got what I wanted!
R-kun: You got a Beyblade … from Santa??
H-kun: Actually, I got money from Santa who said it was for a Beyblade. Mom says that Santa does not know which I wanted, so Santa gave me money instead.
R-kun: How does your mom know that? She talks to Santa? That’s impossible!
H-kun: My mom has done a home-stay exchange before. She went to the States. She can speak English with Santa.
Later , I saw R-kun in the halls.
R-kun: Write okane please? I want to make sure Santa understands my letter next year.
*****
S-chan: Is Santa from Canada?
Ana: No. He’s from the North Pole. (I draw a quick globe on the board with an arrow pointing at the very top.) He’s from here. On your envelope, it says North Pole. See, North Pole!
S-chan: Oh. He wears red and white. Canada is red and white. Santa is very nice. Canada-jin is very nice. Are you sure he is not from Canada?