Last Friday, as usual, I had an elementary visit. I was a little frustrated about this one because I had been asked to teach the students a lesson about school subjects for the fourth time. As in: the same students, the same topic, four visits in a row. But once I stopped banging my head against the wall, it turned out not to be that big of a deal to come up with some different activities using the same vocabulary and grammar point.
Anyhow, I hadn't realized it, but this would be my last visit to that school for the academic year. Graduation is in March and the new school year starts in April. I've been going to this elementary school quite a bit, nearly once a week for most of the winter, and it's one where I've always felt particularly welcome. The teachers greet me when they see me for the first time that day, even the ones that don't work with me, and Yoneda-sensei always talks to me in English. Yoneda-sensei very frequently praised me for my lessons, telling me how much fun they were. I don't get feedback all that often, so to hear so many positive comments made a real impression on me.
I was teaching three different lessons that day; one for class 5-A, another for class 5-B, and a third for class 6-A. 5-A, Yoneda-sensei's class, was the one repeating school subjects for the fourth time. We actually had a lot of fun; I used a game that Elizabeth taught me, and which the students seem to enjoy a lot. Yoneda-sensei had asked me to give him two or three minutes at the end of class, but he didn't specify what for. Of course, it wasn't any skin off my back, so I agreed.
It turned out that Yoneda-sensei had gotten all the students to write thank you notes, and the time he asked for at the end of class was for the students to present them to me. The notes were written partly in English but mostly in Japanese, and some of them had drawings on them as well. One of my favorites is an anime-style portrait of me with the label "Andlea teacher". It's very well drawn, especially for a fifth grade elementary student. And I have to admit I like it partly because the student drew me as being very cute.
But I think my favorite letter is the one from Yoneda-sensei himself. He wrote:
"To Andrea
Your class is warm-hearted. So the children like English, your class. And, me, too. I want to study again in next year in Nishi Elementary School. We had a lot of wonderful memories because of you."
Reading that letter almost made me want to cry. At most elementary schools, you don't really get to talk to the teachers. You work with them maybe once or twice in a semester, and chances are there's no time to meet with them before class to talk about what you are going to do. Most teachers will try to help you a little, at least by maintaining some control over the classroom, but there isn't a whole lot of communication going on. Neither the teachers nor the students get to know you, and you don't get to know them either. But since I had visited this school repeatedly and since they were so welcoming, I felt like I actually had a relationship with the school. And the thank you letters made me feel like I had left some sort of impression on them. I'm really hoping I get to keep going to this school in the next academic year, but it's entirely possible that I'll be rotated to a new set of schools. But if I do get to go back, I'll go there knowing that they actually want me to be there. Which is more than most of us get, as ALTs.
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