I came to this town last year and from what I remember everything was immaculately organised and the teachers were great. Cut to a year later and we decided to do an advanced techniques workshop in the morning and a practical session in the afternoon. It should be tough, but they should be able to do it.

Or so I thought…

We did Wie heisst du? (to show how the materials work for a language you don’t know), curriculum design and When is your birthday? and that was basically it. It was just a fraction of the content of the other workshops this Summer. So I began asking and pretty soon found out why, it’s because these are the first teachers I’ve taught this year who don’t actually have to teach English. Those of you abroad are probably thinking “eh, how does that work?”. Well, they don’t have a proper curriculum and just leave it up to other teachers or volunteers to do a few lessons a year. They’re planning on introducing the new English Notebook next year for 5th and 6th graders, and then probably cutting English from 1st and 2nd graders. So make no wonder they were so slow, it’s like if someone said to you “here’s a workshop on how to teach advanced ballroom dancing” – unless you really loved it, you wouldn’t try too hard if it wasn’t going to be a part of your job.

The lackluster continued into the afternoon, where although they tried, there wasn’t the hungriness or passion of teachers who are told they have to teach. The Ehime teachers were so much better! The Education Ministry are always worried that they can’t make English compulsory because teachers can’t or won’t teach it. But from my experience, especially in places like Okayama or Fukuoka, it’s the act of forcing teachers to actually teach it that makes them able to do it. There certainly was none of the biting my hand off when suggestion new ideas that we’d seen earlier in the week. And sorry, none of the lessons were worth videoing for you!

So I guess it’s a shame, as they did put effort in attending and organising everything, but it’s definitely helped me see I’m right in charging for public school workshops from November, because without the compulsion to learn how to do it, the workshops really don’t have much meaning.

But now I’m dreading some of the upcoming workshops which are in just the same situations!

Today was rather draining, so instead of heading home I went straight on to Tokushima where I’ll take a rest tomorrow. I think I’ve missed the famous Awa Odori festival, but did see something strange in the woods!