The Appropriately Named Week 2

I really should have come up with a more interesting title, I realise, but when you’re onto a good thing keep on gooding it is, I think, the expression. Either way, week 2 has come to an end and not without the same lingering concerns as last week. I still find myself reacting negatively towards the new teacher, particularly in the 2–Interior class where his attempts at control have reverted largely to screaming at students. I actually find this more distracting than whatever it is the students are doing. Talk in that class, although sometimes loud, is rarely at such a level that it makes it impossible to teach. Maeda-sensei’s pronouncements to the students that they are, quote, noisy (I am translating literally here from the Japanese) are delivered at such a volume that I am forced to wait until either he tires himself out or the students get bored and fall silent. In either event it seems to waste more time than the alternative.

I understand his point. He is concerned, and probably with good reason, that if the students feel that they can do whatever they want then they will continue to do whatever they want. It seems to me, however, that the appropriate course of action to take in this situation would be detention. Consistently telling students they are being noisy does little to change their behaviour. Few are interested in learning English so the loss of this opportunity is hardly seen as punishment. In fact, from what I saw in the class we did have all it seems to do is engender feelings of anger towards Maeda-sensei from the good students who are now annoyed they missed their lesson. For the students who persist in being rude surely the deprivation of time when they could be eating lunch or attending club activities would be a stronger motivating factor to better behaviour. Frankly, with 2–Interior I don’t really mind. Generally, I have fun in that class and if students want to have a conversation during that it’s all right by me. Of course this puts me in the difficult position of being the Good Cop to Maeda-sensei’s Bad Cop; a role I don’t really want to play.

While we’re on the topic of things that Maeda-sensei does that annoy me the second would have to be his decision that since I come up with the lessons and largely deliver them to the students his responsibilities are limited largely to patrolling the classroom. I’ll be the first to admit that I am not exactly the best team player. I’m sure we could be doing more activities cooperatively. Indeed, I am happy to do so if the other teachers want to plan them out. But if I’m planning the lessons for every class then I’ll be damned if I’m going to work out routines for each of the teachers (they’d be unlikely to do the same tasks given their different temperaments, I think). As it stands at the moment I’m quite comfortable with how Kokubu-sensei and Kussunoki-sensei approach the lessons which seems to be as my on stage assistant, translating where necessary and seemingly enjoying the class as much as the students. Maeda-sensei on the other hand leaves it all pretty much up to me. This frustrates me because while I don’t mind doing the work in terms of planning and marking I am technically the assistant. While he might in effect play that position I’d like it to at least look like he’s engaged.

I’ve probably whined enough, though. Apart from that things went pretty well. The first years are definitely not as good overall as that 1–Architecture class were last week but there were some classes that weren’t too bad. I enjoyed teaching 1–Interior and one of the mechanical classes showed some spunk. 1–Material wasn’t as bad as I feared and in fact 3–Material, who last year were horrible, are much improved. I’m not sure if they’ve just mellowed with age or if the decrease in their numbers by three has trimmed them of their more notorious elements. Either way, given I only have to teach them every two weeks I don’t think I’m going to have any problems there.

Finally, I had dinner last night with a friend in Ishibashi. A good time was had by all and it was great not to have to travel more than about 15 minutes each way. This is how it’s supposed to be!