Author Archives: DELively

They Who Will Not Obey Will Repeat or be Stunned

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For a few minutes today, I kind of wished I had a stun gun to use on a student.

Every year, the school where I work puts on a couple speech contests. Junior high students get the assignment before the Summer break and high school get it before Winter break. Almost no one actually writes it during the holidays but at least the first year junior high students (7th grade) take it somewhat seriously.

The problems begin in second year (8th grade). By then, students already know, within reason, who is going to win the speech contest. They also know they can’t fail for doing badly on the speech. (Well, they can, sort of, but not until they try to go to high school.) Therefore the incentive to do a good job is somewhere just above zero percent for most students, especially if they are in a lower level class.

To get the speeches turned in we implement detentions and get the homeroom teachers involved. Then the problem becomes getting the students to put some energy into their speeches.

Unfortunately, today, in almost every class, we all had some kind of problem. Oddly, the problems tended to occur in the “higher” level classes.

In my case, a third of the students showed up without the “show” part of their “show and tell” speech. This means they have to do the speech twice. Other students feigned surprise that they had to memorize the speech. (Two days of practice and constant reminders to memorize it apparently didn’t register. For the record, I have a teenage kid, so I kind of understand that.)

Instead of listening, some students were talking and making lots of noise. One student was especially loud and I was trying to figure out if I needed to be closer for the stun gun probes to be effective. He dragged a second student into it.

When the second student almost started a fight with a third student, I ended up having to enact a rule I usually don’t have to use in higher level classes: IYANYAN (If You Are Noisy, You Are Next). This rule applies even if you’ve already finished your speech. (The record is three times.) I called up the second student and made him do his speech again. Then I made the first loud student do his speech.

Things were a bit quieter after that, but I think a stun gun would have been faster and more impressive.

The Long Road to Form Groups Against the Groups

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I once spent 20 minutes of a 50 minute class trying to get Japanese students into groups. This only happened because I refused to accept the groups they already had.

My plan, simple as it seemed, involved putting the students into one of four groups. To do that, I implemented a simple system of assigning numbers: You’re 1; You’re 2; You’re 3; You’re 4; etc. I encouraged the students not to forget their numbers. After everyone had a number, I pointed to various corners of the room and said “Ones here; Twos here; threes here; fours here.” and stood back with my arms crossed a sense of smugness.

Twenty minutes later I had no fours; three ones, four threes, and everyone else was a two.

The Japanese teacher working with me translated into Japanese and after another five minutes we had something resembling groups but little time to do the activity.

My mistake was misunderstanding the importance of pre-made groups. Basically, all Japanese Junior high classrooms, especially in public school, are organized in alternating rows of boys and girls. With various magic words, the teacher can quickly organize the room into pairs (Anál nathrach); groups of three (orth’ bháis’s bethad) and groups of six (do chél dénmha). Something like that. (Bonus points if you are old enough to recognize the spell and know what movie it came from. Don’t tell your parents you watched it when they were asleep, though.)

I also misunderstood the managed teenaged politics involved with the groups. This month Maki doesn’t like Koji and will never be in a group with him but she does like Ami but Ami doesn’t like her but also won’t be in a group with Akiko. Next month all that will change and everyone will hate Ami.

When I used basic randomness to assign groups I was putting people in groups who refused to be together.

The best part is, because I didn’t use the activity, I already had the next class planned.

All Your Homework Are Belong to Me

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Today I let other students vote on the fate of one of their classmates. It didn’t go well for him.

The class I teach comes under various names depending on what grade I’m teaching but it all amounts to “English Conversation”. Basically the school where I work took regular English classes and split them into a grammar/government approved textbook part and a spoken English part.

Because my classes typically only meet once or twice a week, it’s common for my students to take them lightly and work on other homework.

This week there must be a test in Japanese because many of my students arrived in class with my textbook and a Japanese textbook. I gave a blanket warning reminding them of the rules and then let them get to work on the day’s project.

My rule regarding homework from other classes is quite simple: Strike One: I tell you to put it away and you lose a lot of points. Strike Two: You lose a lot more points, I take the homework and promise to give it back next week. There is no Strike Three. However, I also allow students who finish their work early to study other classes while everyone else finishes the project.

Today I seized a book within the first ten minutes of class. The student made up for it by eventually working and attempting to get bonus points for the project.

At the end of class I held up the seized textbook and put the students’ fate up to a vote. The question was “Should Mr. Lively be nice (for once)” Yes or No.

I took a vote and of the students who were actually listening to what I was saying, two, including the man whose fate was in question, voted Yes for be nice. Five voted for No for not nice.

This created a small crisis, though, when one student apparently realized I’d seized the book he’d lent to his friend. He complained he didn’t get to vote and/or had hanging chads and I held a second vote. The second time the Yes be nice vote won.

I gave him “his” book back and told him I wouldn’t be nice again.

Earnestly Important Follows the Disappointment

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One of the first things I did when I started teaching British literature in Albania was disappoint my students.

I think they had expected me to arrive with boxes of books that they hadn’t read before. (The boxes would eventually arrive, but it took some time.) Instead, I had to try to put a different spin on the “approved” texts that survived from the Communist era. (Lots of George Bernard Shaw.)

At one point I was invited to a radio interview program and encouraged to read a couple poems. I chose Emily Dickinson’s “Because I could not stop for Death” (I don’t remember why but I’m sure the reason seemed pithy and wise at the time) and William Butler Yeats’ “The Second Coming” because I felt it described the state Albania was in at the time as the old rules fell away and new rules came into existence: “Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold” and later “And what rough beast, its hour come round at last / Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?”

The broadcast was well received and I found myself making copies of the Yeats poem for several students.

Somehow, I managed to acquire some copies of Oscar Wilde’s “The Importance of Being Earnest” which I like to count as being the first blatantly non-political satirical play taught in Albania. (Can you prove it didn’t happen?)

I had to walk the students through some of the jokes, but was impressed at how many they got.

Then, the woman who ran the British Council library at the time (which was just down the hall from my classrooms) suggested I have my students perform a staged reading of excerpts from the play. I agreed and it grew to a reasonably well attended event.

The students rocked. They read with energy and had good timing on the jokes. One woman even managed to pull off Lady Bracknell’s “A hand-bag?” line with the proper amount of horror and contempt.

I didn’t yet realize that I wasn’t technically supposed to be helping out Britain–I didn’t yet realize the extent of the rivalry between TESOL and the British Council–but I heard about it soon after that. Then again, my entire Peace Corps experience was full of little political pitfalls such as that and I tended to walk right into them.

That night, however, was awesome.

A Library Unto Myself of Books Not My Own

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I once had a book company give me a lot of books. I then had to figure out how to give them away and keep them safe.

Back when I was in Albania, I sent a letter to Norton Publishing in the UK asking if I could get a couple sample copies of one or two of their anthologies. This was a tactic often used by university students to acquire books back when university textbooks only cost an arm and a leg.

I was surprised, then, when Some Big Shot at Norton (not his real name) offered to send me dozens of books if I could pay part of the shipping. Despite my bad relations with our country director Bitchy Punt, I somehow managed to convince her to pay the portion of the shipping (only the equivalent of fifty dollars or so) and the books arrived at my apartment.

I then had to figure out how to distribute them. I gave a stack of them to the library at the Foreign Language faculty in Tirana, and also presented a set of anthologies to the library director as a, well, incentive/kickback to keep the rest of the books safe and in the library and, more importantly sometimes in Albania, to actually let them out of storage. I was then able to send my students to the library to borrow the anthologies for use in class. I also had my students write letters to the Big Shot at Norton thanking him and his staff for their generosity. (Occasionally, I do learn a few things about working with other people.)

Unfortunately, I was also living in Elbasan and, after giving away another huge chunk of books to the excellent library there, I still had five boxes of books in my apartment. Now if I’d been smart (shutup) I would have immediately taken them to the black market and set up shop. However, since I’d already told my students I’d do book checks and fail anyone without a book if I saw any of the books in the black market, I figured it was a bad idea to go sell them.

In the end, because I left the Peace Corps under angry terms, I donated more books to the libraries and told my students they could keep the ones they had. The rest ended up at the Peace Corps office and I don’t know what happened to them.

A Small Burden of Duty with Pajamas

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Today I ended up being seen but ended up not doing very much except change clothes.

Today was the Capital Region Junior Karate Contest for my karate style. The competitors are as young as fourth grade elementary school and as old as high school seniors. Earlier this year I committed to attending and serving as a judge. In fact, I marked it on my calendar way back in April or May and have been reminded of it several times, including last week at practice.

I didn’t really feel like going, and almost called to cancel four different times this past week. With the girls away, I thought a couple days to just relax and be alone would be more interesting. However, given all the reminders I’d been given, I thought I’d better go. I packed up my dogi and caught a 7:15 train and went down to Tokyo. I decided, though, I would use the girls’ absence as my excuse to abscond as early as possible. To offset this, I arrived early and helped set up–which mostly involved moving and setting up chairs and tables.

Imagine my surprise then, when I discovered I wasn’t scheduled to judge any events.

I don’t fully understand why this happened. No one in our dojo was scheduled to be judge, including sensei. Despite this, I put on my dogi and sat down to watch.

Because this is the largest junior contest, there seems to be a certain amount of politics involved, especially for those of us with black dogis. Sensei once explained that once you’re an official sixth level black belt, karate becomes more like a job. (I’m still not official.) Also, unlike lower levels, it’s also possible to lose a degree and have to retest. This is mostly a big deal if you want to have an official dojo and train adults.

Being seen at the contest is therefore a big deal. Those who haven’t played the politics well can find their dojos unable to officially train adults. (This happened for a brief time to my old dojo in Itoigawa a few years ago when they didn’t play the game well enough.)

I played spectator for a while. The high school kids were especially good, even impressing my sensei.

At lunch time I changed clothes and ran away. I don’t know how politically savvy that was, but it was more fun than playing spectator whilst dressed in black pajamas.

The Guardians of Quietness and Random Denialy Things

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The girls are away welcoming Mother of She Who Must Be Obeyed back from the hospital, which means I’ve got until tomorrow to trash and clean the apartment.

it is hard to explain but there is a difference between having time to yourself during the day knowing someone will eventually come home and knowing that you’re completely on your own. Since I’m already feeling the grind from being back to work after summer, I decided to pretty much waste as much time as humanly possible today.

This time wasting involved going to see Guardians of The Galaxy which, given that there were only seven of us in the theater on a Saturday is unlikely to be extended a few extra days. It also didn’t bode well that I was the only one laughing. I enjoyed the movie a lot even when I was going “Golden net? Really’? Haven’t these space people heard of cruise missiles? You’ve got a green woman, a former Doctor Who companion, a humanoid plant and a talking raccoon but you don’t have Tomahawks or even a couple handy MOABs to drop? What do you people think this is? A movie?

I also had a chance to play with the new iPhones. I like the iPhone 6 as it’s about the same size as my current phone. The iPhone 6 Plus would work a lot better if Apple abandoned the big round button. I have large hands and had to do hand yoga to turn off an app. It’s also way to big to be used as a phone. You might as well get one of those old Gordon Gekko models. It at least would look retro, instead of “I’m sticking a plate on my face”.

Basically, I spent the day not working on a big writing project (novel number three) which has been roughly outlined and world built over the past couple weeks and only needs for me to put butt in chair and start typing. Even Kimberly is getting impatient waiting for me to start.

First, though, I’m serving as judge at another Junior Karate Tournament tomorrow. That will give me a heck of an excuse not to work on the book. Then the girls are coming back.

The Year of Living Bewilderdly

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It’s no exaggeration to say that I’d rather relive my high school years than be age 20 again.

The host of a podcast I like to listen to often asks his guests: “If you could go back in time and visit your 20 year old self, what would you tell yourself?” (He clearly doesn’t watch enough Doctor Who to know why that is a bad freaking idea.) In my case, I wouldn’t tell 20 year old me anything. I’d just watch him and make sure I’m not still doing any of the things he was doing.

During age 20 I went to England and, well, let’s just say, fell into obsession with the wrong kind of woman (She Who Must Not Be Named). That would have been bad enough except that she didn’t say “piss off” but rather seemed to enjoy the attention (in the same way a fisherman enjoys the attention the fish pays to the hook). The results were worthy of a novel, but first there was alcohol involved.

Age 20 was when my forehead “visited” a rock and the year when I did my heaviest drinking. (Please note, I was not yet technically of legal drinking age although, under a quirk of Kansas law, I had been when I was in high school.) It was also, fortunately, the year I learned to moderate my drinking.

What I remember most about age 20 was a strange malaise. I was neither a teenager nor was I fully an adult. It was all a very strange time. My grades dropped and I went on pretty impressive money wasting binges involving billiards and arcade games. (For the record, I’m the only person in existence who could ever waste a lot of money playing too much pool and never actually improve my skills. And you all thought I didn’t have any talent.)

As I’ve written about before, age 20 ended on a Tuesday with a police frisking. In an odd way, that frisking snapped me out of the malaise. I was still on the hook at strange times for increasingly strange encounters with She Who Must Not Be Named –she once tried to convince me to help her with “a small murder” but I knew it was the alcohol talking and, luckily, I’d already learned to moderate my own consumption–but I never had that sense of malaise and bewilderment again (well at least not until I fell into obsession again, and then that third time but those are a much longer post).

I do wonder, though, what 20 year old me would have done about the “small murder”.

Oddly Strangely Fun and Symbolic

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One of the things I like about Japan is it’s collection of odd museums and odd traditional ceremonies.

My favorite museum is the Tobacco and Salt Museum (currently closed pending a move). It’s owned by Japan Tobacco, which controls 66% of Japan’s tobacco market and is, by law, at least 33% owned by the Japanese government. It is a testament to, well, two things usually considered bad for you in excess, although at least one is essential to survival (hint: not tobacco). It has displays of how Japan produced salt and a few floors of occasionally interesting displays on tobacco and tobacco culture in Japan. It also used to have one of the best cheap coffee shops in Tokyo. I hope the move hasn’t ruined it.

To satisfy two other cravings, I recommend what I call the Eat Beef and Shout Competition, which involves consuming delicious dead animal flesh and then going behind a bush and shouting anything you want as loudly as you can. Participants have been known to express their love for someone else or their contempt for their boss. Prizes are given to the loudest shouts.

Niigata, where I used to live has everything for the newlywed couple. Every March Tochio hosts the Hodare Matsuri (link may not be safe for work) in which women can ride, well, some wood carried aloft by some men. Hodare means, more or less, “male naughty bit” and newlywed brides are encouraged to, well, ride the wood, so to speak. Traditionally, the most dangerous moments in the festival occur when an attractive foreign woman, um, rides the tremendous woody, and all the photographers nearby trample each other to get the best pics for next year’s brochure.

Whereas newlywed brides in Niigata get to enjoy a tremendous woody, newlywed grooms in Niigata are thrown off cliffs. Every January 15th in Matsunoyama Hot Spring, newlywed grooms are marched to the top of a snowy cliff, given some booze, tossed up and down and then hurled off a cliff as part of the Muko Nage. The festival ends with a pile of rice straw being burned and everyone rubbing ash all over everyone else’s faces.

The symbolism is obvious: You are now at the peak of life, but soon marriage will cause you to start drinking. You will now fall from the peak of life to the bottom of life where your wife waits for you. Soon you will watch your dreams go up in smoke and have it rubbed in your face. Good luck! Happy marriage! (Something like that.)

 

 

The Second Brings the Grind the Third Brings the Pain

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One of the things that happens where I work is that, after we come back from summer, we’re a bit rusty but refreshed. The first couple days your legs are sore from standing all day and you begin to seriously reconsider your footwear choices but by the end of the week you are back in the groove. The second week is when it all begins to fall apart.

The second week is when you begin to remember how boring the groove actually is and, well, so do the students. When you come back from summer they’ve 1) forgotten your name 2) forgotten your tricks and 3) forgotten your rules. A lot of energy is spent getting them back into the groove and once they get there they 1) remember your name 2) remember your tricks and 3) remember your weak spots.

Last week I spent a lot of energy getting 8th graders to complete their speech contest speeches. This involved giving them the opportunity to come in at lunch and let me check the script and then me dragging them to detention to write them whilst I paced around glaring and rolling my eyes at everything they did (basically I became a teenager for an hour or so).

This week, even though Monday was a national holiday, it’s already been a long week. The higher level students have begun to push pressure points. My “new” student (he was “somewhere in North America, eh?”–not a real place–last year) doesn’t yet know that I make a sport out of giving returnees low scores. (Just ask the guy who requested a meeting to discuss his 9 (81-90%) and why he didn’t get a 10 (91-100%).

Next week, the real problems will start when the first big projects come due. We’ll hear some interesting excuses: I was absent the day this was assigned and am therefore exempt. I don’t like giving speeches. I hate English! I hate you! (And that’s just from other teachers.)

Luckily, we’re entering Awesome, which means the weather will be getting cool and dry. In fact, it’s already beginning to cool down, which is awesome.