7 - Aoyama, and the curios of foreign education systems

One of my schools sits, some might say inconveniently, at the top of a bloody great hill. As I collapse in as elegant a fashion as possible into my chair each morning, my more sober side thanks this brief assault on my cardio-vascular system as a welcome form of exercise. My drunk and belligerent side however emits a series of exaggerated "ffffweurgh"s as I contemplate leaving the house half an hour earlier in future to convert the near-vertical dash into a gentle amble. "Good morning!" beams the teacher next to me. "Flerp," comes my burbled response. So begins the school day.
















Tumbleweed just out of shot.

Aoyama Junior High stands in the hills above my village and was the first school I visited when I arrived in the country. As such I've formed a certain affection for it, much as a duckling would for its first sign of life. The school feeds me better than a duck would though, and it has a rather neat ice cube making machine.


There are around 500 students here and it can be a pretty fun place to teach at. I say "can" because I have an embarrassingly light workload most of the time. For now, though, let's busy ourselves with the nitty-gritty...

There are three grades at the school, ages running from 12-15. The grades then split four ways, much like a proper-sized Kit-Kat, forming four classes of around 35 kids each. There are three English teachers, one for each grade, with whom I share an amusingly varied relationship. There used to be four, the extra lady being a gift of a colleague and pretty much the kindest person I've ever worked with. A linchpin, if you will, around which the rest of school life revolved. We planned our lessons together, constantly revising and refining them between repeat performances (a plan would get unleashed upon all 4 classes in the grade y'see) and she was the person I went to with all of my questions about life in general. Due to the peculiarities of the Japanese education system we don't really get to teach together now. More on that in a bit...

















The other three are a lovely bunch, although I'll usually only have a couple of classes a week with them. Teacher A has taught at the school for an age and as such is usually late to class and wings most of his lesson plans. He knows his stuff and I enjoy breaking up the slightly stuffy atmosphere with grand hand gestures, ludicrous regional accents and games that usually involve Spider-man.

Teacher B and I had great classes together but he's just had his workload doubled and tends to cancel most of his lessons with me now. My classes are, for his students and him, a break from the textbook and a chance to practice their what English they know with games usually involving Spider-man. As with most English teachers in Japan, he's under massive pressure to whistle through the book and get the kids through the exams. He's also a little unsure as to what to do with his new English teaching resources - namely, me.

Teacher C is a very sweet lass the same age as me. I end up having to teach her classes for her on the few occasions I'm called for. Occasionally I prod her from the corner to translate one of my bizarre regional accents and accompanying hand gestures. She's a smart cookie and soon picks up how my garbled explanation of the lesson plan is actually supposed to work. First class is a shambles; by the fourth we've got them eating out of the palm of our hands.

Now, onto the oddities of the Japanese education system. The academic year runs from April to March. Come March, the whole school undergoes a huge reshuffle in staff. Of the 20-odd teaching at Aoyama, almost half were made to leave for another school. They were lined up in front of the students during assembly and presented with flowers whilst both parties gushed industrial buckets full of tears.

















This is standard practice at every school in the country, although why exactly I can only guess at. There are only three grades of students, so you might assume that the kids and the teachers will probably spend much the same time in the same place. In addition, the teachers are moved on to other local schools, so that would help standardise teaching practices and try to get everyone marching to the same drum. Some older teachers seem to stay at a school for longer, so perhaps they've been accepted as part of the furniture. It's an odd system that seems to prove totally disruptive each year, but considering Japanese customs come March it might make a bit of sense.

March is cherry blossom season and everyone goes mad for the brief week that the trees sport their fetching new coats. At the same time all businesses, not just schools, go through an annual reshuffle and prepare for a new year. University students graduate and prepare for their first job (and possibly only one if they pick a big company), school kids move up a year, or from one school to another, and people contemplate life's fleeting pleasures as the blossom flutters loose the minute it forms.

As roughly as I can find a way to express it, there lies one of Japan's defining characteristics - nigh on impossible to articulate fully but just about able to be hinted at. The country's physical environment is reflected in the culture, or vice versa, and everyone appears to act along the the lines of a time honoured tradition. People shift up, others are left behind, and Japan continues moving forward seemingly as one, but inwardly watching their own paths as individuals.