Just a short story...

When I am not at work, I am working. Being the borderline workaholic that I am, I engage my free time in a valiant attempt to improve Japanese English abilities and line my pocket with a few more yen. On Monday and Tuesday nights, I teach a junior high school student who was fortunate enough to enjoy three weeks in Switzerland this summer participating in a summer camp.

With just three weeks of exposure to English, his ability and cofidence in the language increased dramatically. He is no longer afraid of making mistakes and actively attempts to expand his vocabulary and attempt new grammatical constructions. It is certainly refreshing for me since the majority of students are reserved and shy when I attempt to engage them in English conversation and are stumped sometimes by the most rudimentary of questions.

Unfortunately, this newfound confidence has created some friction amongst his classmates at school. Last night he recounted the story of fighting three boys who were upset over his English ability. According to my student, he is answering too many questions and speaking too much in class. Whether or not there are other factors involved, I cannot be sure but it is common for students who attempt to demonstrate their abilities to be shunned and ostracized by their classmates. Thus, most students will not volunteer an answer since it draws unwarranted attention to themselves. This perpetuates the teacher directed learning that dominates the classroom. The teacher stands at the front while the rest of the students "absorb" the information while staring "intently" at their notebook. Unfortunately, more often than not, absorb is really deflect and intently is more likely to be blankly.

Learning a language is a perfect subject for actively engaging the students. Unfortunately, it is often a struggle to involve the students in an interactive manner. In fact, a Japanese English teacher that I teach with recently lamented that he wished he taught at university since he could just lecture and not worry about class participation.

However, learning a language also requires that the students are not afraid to take risks and make mistakes. This can be very difficult in the Japanese classroom environment. Often the analogy is made to the nail that sticks up being hammered down. However, rather than the external force of the hammer, the classmates themselves pull the student back into the woodwork of conformity.

I can only hope that my student strives to improve his English while not adversely affecting his relationship with his peers. It is a delicate balance and Japanese schools are unfortunately littered with students who have been unable to conform sufficiently.