A secret agent adventure waiting to happen
It’s the first “official” day of Spring Break at Naruo High School. This weekend, every full-time teacher was locked into the school library to mark the entrance exams, which is now finished, even though the results don’t need to submitted for a week. The night before, kyoto-sensei and the art teacher literally spent the night in the staffroom guarding the entrance exams from any 12-year-olds who might break into the school to steal them!! After all this stress, most of the teachers are taking the day off today. Why they didn’t just wait until the normal work week to grade them is beyond me, because there is nothing to do in this office.There is lesson planning to do but typically that is saved for the last week before classes begin. It is quiet in here now.
Questions in the staff room from the ALT = big drama and suspense
Last week I tried to answer the question: “Who will be in my 3rd-year class?” This proved very difficult to learn. First I asked the teacher who would teach with me, and she had no idea what I was asking her. Then I asked the students’ current homeroom teacher, and he had no idea what I was asking him. The next teacher had to pull out a dictionary when I told him the class name: “Current English.” So, I changed tactics. I asked the previous year’s teacher how to say the class name in Japanese. ”ジジ英語。” I brought that word to next year’s teacher (who has told me she was going to teach it, by the way), and she told me to ask the homeroom teacher, he would definitely know. He didn’t know. He told me that the computer-science teacher (who doesn’t speak English but who I am friends with) would know. She reluctantly agreed that she knew, but was hesitant to tell me. I asked her for just a list, and she said she could, after today’s meeting. She forgot. No biggie.
In the meanwhile, I asked one of my students about this problem. They also seem to have difficulty with this concept but one of them told me she was going to be in the class. She named 7 other students who would be in the class. I was excited by the names. I was excited that someone knew the answer to my question.
Today, Monday, I said hello to the computer teacher and she remembered about the list. Great! However, there are only 5 students, some of them different from what the student told me, and some of the more exciting names were missing. I’m disappointed. Can I trust this list? In principle, I should hope so, but I wish the student had been right.
I don’t understand the operating principles of the world around me. Is it really so weird for an ALT to ask who will be in a class next year? Isn’t this already figured out? The students should have chosen this months ago and class begins 3 weeks. Why are teachers reluctant to tell me what’s going on? Am I not supposed to ask? Jesus Christ. If this isn’t such a simple question, I wish someone would explain to my why it’s not.
I make a point of actually asking the questions I ponder/complain about on my blog. I am going to ask a teacher about how class-scheduling works. The teachers will give me weird looks but I will ask anyway.