Year 2 Post 1

Hi Guys! Sorry I haven't posted in awhile, although I'm not really sure if anyone takes notice other than my mom and dad. (Thanks Dad for letting me know you miss seeing my blog updates, you've actually inspired me to write this small update)..

Just for the sake of having a picture in this post
Image Courtesy of Google

This post is just a small update on how year 2 has been so far. You can expect (or hope) to get posts of more substance later that will detail what I have been up to. So far Year 2 has been frustrating and confusing, but also really rewarding.
A lot of frustrations come from the fact that there is a second ALT this year who is at the moment splitting all of my schools with me. So we are alternating taking turns visiting all of the 16 elementary and junior high schools on Oshima. Getting used to having another ALT around the office has been an adjustment to say the least. But the truly frustrating part is that we both have very different teaching styles and also just plain personal characteristics, which sometimes clash (i.e. I like to take my time when planning and making decisions because I believe it allows me to assess and evaluate my ideas/thoughts from a variety of angels whereas my new co-worker loves to make impetuous decisions. With her everything must be planned for immediately and she has no patience to compromise).Thankfully, I think we are finally beginning to find a happy medium, we`ll see. It will certainly make life around the office much more bearable.

A lot of my close friends and family know that I went home to Hawaii for just over a week at the end of August. There isn't a whole lot to say about it because I was only there for such a short time. But it was really great to see my family, my Houdini (bunny), and congratulate my best friend in person for her recent engagement!!!
During that short week at home I was able to appreciate all the stupid things I used to take for granted. Which mostly entailed food (easy access to foods that I love to eat, and realizing how much easier it is to be a vegetarian with a varied diet when you can stop by a whole foods on the regular). Seriously, Whole Foods (and other natural food shops) is probably one of the things that I miss the most (on a regular basis) about living in America.

Upon returning to Japan I felt so ready for this year to be over. I couldn't wait to get back home to enjoy the beach, people speaking English, seeing my best friend get married, and of course American grocery stores!!!! I would look at the calender and count down how many months it would be until I would be going home again and feel excited to see that one month was gone from my long wait. Now though, I have been looking at the calender and think the exact opposite. Whenever I am at my schools my students are so excited to see me and I think to myself that I only have 9 more months with them. In the beginning of October I went to one of my schools sports days and I realized that this might be the last sports day I get to attend (and only half of a sports day at that, since I had to teach english lessons at a different school earlier the same day), thinking about this would have brought me to tears if I wasn't surrounded by all of the students and staff.
And I find myself more and more frequently wondering, "would it really be so bad for me to stay just one more year?", right now I'm not really sure. I have a lot to think about until February.

All of these slight frustrations aside my life has been going pretty smoothly. All of my classes have been going really smoothly. I'm visiting my schools a lot more frequently this year (which would account for the fewer blog posts. Less office days:less blog posts) and I have been able to implement a lot of my own ideas into my elementary classes which has kept things exciting for me. The most recent success was the Halloween lessons I did for my schools, which at one school included carving pumpkins! Also, thanks to the help of workers at the Board of Education I was able to spearhead the 1st annual trick-or treating event on Oshima. Only a handful of my elementary students actually participated, but I'm hoping if the tradition continues next year it will become even more popular!

Now I need to get back to studying a bit for my GRE (taking it on Nov. 17th!!! wish me luck). You can expect my next blog post to be sometime after then.
For now I have a lot to think about.

Keri