Today we finished our first week of the new school year. Now we need the weekend to recover.

The first week back after a break is weird. It’s been several weeks since we were in front of a class and we are suddenly back on our feet. In my case, I move around the classroom a lot and my feet are sore from all the sudden walking (in new shoes, no less). We also spend a lot of energy planning and having meetings and, for some of us, getting the new people up to speed.

It’s also hard to get back in the groove in front of the students. Teaching after a break is not like falling off a bicycle (something like that). Each class is different and the plan that worked well with one class got disrupted by a little jerk in another and by the teacher having too many carbs for lunch in yet another. In once class some of the students get the jokes, in others they weren’t listening closely enough to realize the teacher was speaking.

It’s also hard to get into the teaching rhythm early in the year as there are a few national holidays coming up (starting next week, actually). Breaks get filled up with busy work and our legs are still trying to find the path from one room to the other. In my case I’m doing boring stuff like talking about rules while at the same time trying to give the impression that English is interesting and fun to people who mumble in Japanese about how they can’t understand my English.

As I mentioned yesterday, in first year high school classes (10th grade) we are also dealing with students who haven’t had time to recover from junior high school anything goes mode.

That said, it’s good to be back in front of students. It’s also good knowing one week is already past.