Today was a visit to Yumiko‘s school in the Okayama countryside. I gave them the discount rate and the PTA paid my expenses so the plan was a kids “Motivation Training” show in the morning and then a Teachers Workshop in the afternoon. Here’s how good Yumiko’s kids are!
I often get emails from people asking how to teach mixed age groups, and today with all the school + parents and grandparents I think we had over 300 people aged from 5 to 85!
The school teachers had of course decided not to bother setting everything up even though they had a list of what was needed, but the event went ahead very well anyway.
It is exceptionally tough keeping such a diverse group occupied. But I tell you you don’t even need to teach Genki English, you could just play the animations for the kids and they start laughing out loud and singing along on their own!
Songs wise we did Disco Warm Up, Rock, Paper, Scissors and Superhero, plus the two rules of “I can do it! and “losing means try again” and by the end they were all amazingly loud and confident – even the parents!
Then in afternoon I had the teachers workshop and in contrast that was horrible beyond belief…. full details tomorrow!
Yumiko was that you with the kids? What an orderly group of kids being genki and having a great time!
My kids chose a superhero stance like superman standing tall, chest high with his hands on his hips. Great kids. Great song.
Amazeing! I wish i could have videod some of my kids doing this song last year – they all went crazy for it.
Richard, thank you again for coming all the way down to our school! It was a great experience for kids and parents (grandparents) to learn directly from you! I’ve received lots of “Thank you” messages from attendants. I will send them to you later together with the results of questionnaire.
It must have been a great experience for teachers too. I think you made them think about what they had never thought of.
@Carol: No, it’s not me. I was shooting this video. Yeah, I wonder why kids didn’t stand in the superhero posture. Maybe they were so busy to remember the song and sing in a loud voice in a short time?? They had less than 10 minutes to learn the song.
@Julian-k: I really wanted to see the video of your last year’s lesson. It must have been great! Actually I had kept this song for Richard and didn’t teach it by myself beforehand. Besides I wasn’t asked to come and teach kids, I had no chance to teach new songs anyway.
But I think kids did a good job. I was glad to see kids still remember how to learn new songs with challenging spirits. I think that’s the great point about Genki English.
Wow that’s looks so great. The children looked like they were having a great time. The superhero song is such a hit with all my students too. I cannot imagine having so many children in one space for a class, it looks wicked!!!