Getting Back to Business

After the excitement of last weekend, I found myself getting behind in my research and my job.  Fortunately for me, I have caught up with my job's tasks this morning, so I have been able to relax a little bit.  Yesterday, I exhausted myself by waking up at 6am to score 11 final drafts of essays before lunch.  After lunch, I taught until 4:15 and then I prepared the next day's activities until 7pm when my brain could no longer function.  That was 13 hours of work!  Although lunch could be considered not work, it sort of is because we are urged to socialize with the students.  Already being exhausted by lunchtime, forcing a friendly conversation feels like work.

This morning I got enough sleep and paced myself well in and outside the class.  I think one affective factor to my exhaustion is feeling sympathy for my exhausted students.  We're hitting the midpoint of the summer program soon, and I can virtually see the workload on their shoulders.  I feel that my improved mood now contrasts with my students' moods, but it's not rubbing off on them.  In fact, they may have envied my cheerful attitude today.

By Friday, I should cleared enough time to get cracking on catching up on my research.  I'm currently reading through the least relevant part of a very relevant book, but I need to finish the book and read at least 2 other articles to get caught up.  I would also like to start interviewing some of my colleagues for practice.  I'd say that I haven't had this "can do" spirit for about a week, so it's good to feel motivated and I hope it lasts through the weekend.

In other news, thunderstorms have been rolling through Urasa last night and this afternoon.  A powerful storm last night cut the power from our campus for a few minutes.  The power returned at exactly 9pm when I make my daily Skype call to Jenevieve and Autumn.  Autumn seemed like she wanted to spend more time with me than usual, and that made me miss her even more.

For lunch today, the cafeteria surprised us all by serving bibimbap, a Korean dish.  Because the portions were big, I got my fill.  However, it induced my appetite and I've been hungrier than I have ever been since I arrived.  I got back to my dorm and finished off a package of cookies.  Before then, the bibimbap inspired conversations about Korea at the lunch table.  I had many enjoyable conversations about Korea, Korean food, and Seoul.  And then I felt very nostalgic about Korea.  I often had felt nostalgic about Japan when I was in Korea, but this was the first time that I felt that I preferred to be in Korea.  This feeling surprised me, however I am enjoying my time here.

Strangely, I had two separate conversations where religion became the topic.  Both were raised by students.  One conversation was about Shinto, Buddhism, animism, and atheism.  Another was about Mormons as one student is an ex-Mormon.

For me, today was a very satisfactory day.  A great complement to the very exhausting day yesterday.  I felt that I had accomplished an equal amount of work in both days.  Here's to the days ahead!

Below is a view from my office hallway looking towards the east side of campus.  The mountain in the background is Hakkai-san, which sounds like "Hawkeye" san.

First Class

I just got back from teaching my first ESL class since I left the ESL Institute at the University of Wisconsin at La Crosse.  For a first day, it went well and very fast.  If I had paced the classes as I had intended, both would have gone over by 10 minutes.  I guess I should explain my classes first.

I teach the same students in the same room for two classes under the umbrella name of Text Skills.  Except for the first two days, the first class (essay writing) starts at 1:30pm and ends at 2:45pm, and the second class (reading, vocabulary, and grammar) starts at 3:00pm and ends at 4:15pm.  Perhaps these classes feel rushed because I'm used to 60 or 90 minute classes as opposed to 75 minutes.

For the first 2 weeks, I'll have 11 students in my classes and then I'll have 12 throughout the rest of the 6-week program.  Of the 12, I have 6 Japanese men, 2 Thai women, 1 Chinese woman, 1 Cambodian woman, 1 Bengali man, and 1 Uzbek man.  For the most part, the students seemed to be getting along quite well.  The biggest challenge for me seems to be understanding the accents I'm not used to hearing.  From my teaching experience, my first impression is most similar to my UWL classes, especially the essay writing classes.

These students differ from most of my UWL students in that they are older and thus more mature.  Most of my mature students at UWL were the MBA students, and many students here are business or economics students as well.  Their level of understanding the EAP (English for Academic Purposes) classroom culture is considerably higher than my UWL students, and most of them are able to follow my sense of humor.  I've kept my humor quite light as this is a very serious program.

I feel as if I have established a good rapport with about half the class, which is quite good for the first day.  It usually takes the first week or two to get to that level.  I have already noticed a student or two that I may have to work on for better rapport.  For now, I just assume they are serious and concentrating students.  To give you a hint of who they are, they are from a culture I'm not familiar teaching in.

My classroom is one of the nicer classrooms that I have taught in.  It has more than enough room for 12 students and me.  It's equipped with a computer and an overhead project, but neither are built into the room.  For now, there seems to be plenty of writing utensils for both chalkboard and whiteboard.  I won't be using them too much myself as I'm continuing the University of Iowa College of Education's paperless program.  All my handouts are online for the students to access.  And I made my lesson plans accessible to the students once the class is completed, so they can refer to them as notes.

The worst thing about the classroom is the temperature.  You can feel a slight cool breeze from the air conditioning, but it's not enough to halt a sweat.  Because of the nuclear reactor crisis at Fukushima, the whole country is conserving its energy, so this is how IUJ helps in the effort.  Although I was mildly sweating in the class, once I stepped out into the hall, it turned into a medium sweat.  The pores completely flushed when I stepped outside.  I haven't been in this type of environment since Korea, but Korea's only this bad for a few weeks.  It's like this for months in Japan.