japantrip1006

2006-10-18T01:50:00.000-05:00

Wednesday, October 18, 2006 3:45 p.m.

Konnichi wa!

It is 1:45 a.m. in Tulsa! I don't know how I'll ever adjust to the time change again. I may have to take a week off...just kidding!

We just had our last meeting and presentations and tonight we have a final reception. I leave for the airport at 9:00 a.m. tomorrow. It will be a loooong day of travel.

It has been a wonderful trip, more than I ever imagined it could be. Remember, teachers, this trip is offered to educators in all 50 states so if you are interested in applying, let me know and I'll give you the information. I'd do it again in a heartbeat!

I'll try and post some final photos after I get home, so check the blog again in a couple of days.

Sayonara!

2006-10-18T01:49:00.000-05:00

Painting of a monkey at the National Museum.

2006-10-18T01:48:00.000-05:00

Samurai armor at the National Museum

2006-10-18T01:46:00.000-05:00

The public bath. You put a wooden stool over by a faucet. Spray yourself, soap up and rinse. Then soak in the tub.

2006-10-18T01:44:00.000-05:00

Breakfast at the ryokan.

2006-10-18T01:40:00.000-05:00

The whole Joyo group at the ryokan in Uji.

2006-10-18T01:38:00.000-05:00

The ancient-style kiln in Uji.

2006-10-18T01:37:00.000-05:00

The river in Uji.

2006-10-18T01:35:00.000-05:00

I’m drinking green tea at the shrine. We were taught the correct way to turn the tea bowl and wipe it. You never drink the tea from the front of the bowl. You humble yourself and turn the bowl two times to the left before you take a sip. Then you wipe your lip mark off the bowl.

2006-10-18T01:34:00.000-05:00

This Buddha was in the cemetery at the shrine.

2006-10-18T01:33:00.000-05:00

This shrine was built for the man who brought sweet potatoes to this part of Japan. Our hero.

2006-10-18T01:32:00.000-05:00

One of the teachers asked for a flag. The city officials had to search for a few days, but found some in a city warehouse, and our guide, Moko gave us each one.

2006-10-18T01:30:00.000-05:00

This is a street in the oldest part of Kyoto. It is very narrow and lined with tearooms and restaurants.

2006-10-18T01:28:00.000-05:00

This is the slipper sanitizer in my host father’s dentist office. You push a button and clean slippers pop out the bottom. You wear these while you’re in the office. When you leave, you put the slippers in the top and they drop down and are sanitized for the next person.

2006-10-18T01:24:00.000-05:00

Tables are hung with very thick “skirts” in the winter. A heater is placed under the table and then your feet and legs are tucked under the skirt and kept warm in the winter. This is a very common practice and my host family told me they use a table skirt. This picture was taken in department store and lots of these skirts were on display.

2006-10-18T01:23:00.000-05:00

The Hippo Family Club meeting. The meeting room was very big and covered with tatami mats. The “windows” were rice paper in wood frames

2006-10-18T01:22:00.000-05:00

Bamboo grows everywhere here. The roots spread everywhere and I was told they survive earthquakes very well.

2006-10-18T01:20:00.000-05:00

My bedroom at my host family. The futon was laid out on the floor, and the “sheets” were sort of like terry towels, and then a big comforter covered the whole thing. It was actually very comfortable and I slept really well.

2006-10-18T01:06:00.000-05:00

Tuesday, October 17, 2006 10:00 p.m.

I’m back in Tokyo, but I’ll try to catch up on the last couple of days.

Monday morning we met with a group of parents in Joyo and discussed some education issues. There is a big concern here over the decline in population. Every school we visited had many empty classrooms. The parents said a major concern is that the majority of the population is aging and the young people will not be able to care for the older people.

We discovered that the public schools here are not free. Parents pay from $70.00 to $110.00 a month for elementary and junior high school. Senior high school is not mandatory so parents pay much more, around $1000.00 a month. They also pay for the required uniforms and any extra activities. The parents guessed that about 20% of families get state assistance. And many students go to “cram” schools, juku, on weekends and evenings to learn more and get ready for the very difficult exams the students take. High exam scores are required for students to get into good high schools and universities, and these schools also cost a lot.

The parents seemed satisfied with the large class sizes and want their students to become productive members of society.
We discovered that parents and teachers on the other side of the world have many of the same concerns as we do here in America.

Monday afternoon we had a brief tour of Joyo and visited some temples. We were served green tea and sweet potato cakes at one shrine. It was beautiful.

Late in the afternoon we went to a ryokan, a traditional Japanese hotel. The floors were covered with tatami mats and we ate very traditional food. We were also served sake and beer with our dinner, and we slept on futons. Green tea is grown in this part of Japan so we have had green tea to drink, greet tea cookies, shampoo, soap, candy, you name it.

The ryokan was in Uji, an ancient town up in the mountains. Before dinner, a group of us went for a long walk up the mountain to a pottery school. We watched some people make pottery and then the owner took us up a hill behind the studio to see a very old fashioned kiln made of pressed mud and straw. It is heated with wood and it takes days to fire it up to make the pottery. It was huge and fascinating. This way of making pottery is probably 1000 years old, so it was wonderful to see the kiln. And, of course, I bought a few things.

The ryokan was right on the river so we slept with the windows open and listened to the river all night long. It was great, but in the morning most of us wished we could have Cheerios and milk instead of fish, rice, unrecognizable vegetables and … green tea.

We took the bullet train back to Tokyo and a few of us went to the National Museum of Japan. I saw beautiful kimono, paintings on rice paper and silk, and samurai armor and swords. Wow!! After seeing these things only in books, this was an amazing sight. And, of course, I did a little shopping.

And I admit we found an Italian restaurant and had pizza for dinner.

Tomorrow morning, each group makes a presentation of their prefecture visit. I am introducing our presentation. Then in the evening we have a final reception, and I leave for home early Thursday morning. I hope to post another message before I come home, but I may not have time.

What an amazing trip this has been!

Sayonara!

2006-10-15T10:27:00.000-05:00

This is my host family, the Murakami's.
Standing in back are Motoki and Tomotaka. They are both university students studying to be dentists.
In front are Kazutaka, a dentist, Masako a house wife, and Noriko, a senior in high school.
Noriko lived in England last year with a family and went to school there. Her English was perfect (with a British accent).

2006-10-15T10:05:00.000-05:00

Saturday October 14, 2006 8:30 p.m.

It is Saturday evening. I’m at my host family’s house in Joyo city. I’ll try and catch up with the last few days.
I spent yesterday at an elementary school. It was a very busy place. Almost every class had 35 – 40 students, even the 1st grade, and 1st grade was the only class with an aide. There was no small goup instruction, anywhere, two special education groups, with 5 or 6 kids. There was no pull-out for reading or any other special classes.

The entire education system is controlled by the central government in Japan (with an emphasis on the word “control”). Every class in every grade level was doing exactly the same thing at the same time, all day, so, for example, when you walked down the hall and passed 3 third grade rooms, every teacher was doing exactly the same thing.

We also saw no disciplining of students except in the most gentle way. Things like running in the hallway (there was a lot of that), general rough-housing, and talking while the teacher was giving a lesson, were almost completely tolerated and ignored. When we met with a few teachers and administrators after school, we asked about that. They said that it is expected that the parents are teaching the children what behaviors are acceptable in society, so the school does almost no disciplining. However, later when I talked to the 17year old daughter in my host family, she said teachers are always yelling at the kids to be quiet and settle down. So I’m not quite sure what really goes on. We definitely saw and heard many contradictions during our school visits. But even with the large class sizes, lack of individual attention and noisy atmosphere, when the teacher gave a specific direction, every student responded.

I was very impressed with the positive attitude of the teachers and the happy atmosphere of the school. There was lots of energy and the kids were enthusiastic and very friendly. They were very eager to answer questions, tell us what was going on and correct our mistakes. Of course, they spoke almost no English and we spoke no Japanese, but we still communicated very well. It was a great day.

(The teachers in my group have had many lively discussions about the huge differences we see in the school structure, behavior, lessons, etc. I would love to discuss these differences with teachers at home to hear more opinions. Other topics for discussion that have come out of this trip - intrinsic vs. extrinsic rewards, instilling self-motivation, boys’ behavior, the purpose of testing – to rank students or as a diagnostic tool for individual needs and strengths assessment.)

Classes I observed – Reading, home technology, music, calligraphy, science, computer, math. Art, PE. I ate lunch with the 1st grade. They made lots of origami and gave it to me as gifts.

It was a long day, but I found a bit more energy to go into Kyoto for a few hours.

This morning my host family picked me up at 10 a.m. We visited at their house for a while, then walked to the grocery, toured the back garden, had udon noodles for lunch. I took a quick nap because I was so exhausted, and then we went to the Hippo Family Club meeting. 20 people from toddlers to middle age adults gather in a community meeting room in Uji (right next to Joyo) to practice learning about other languages and cultures. My family has been a part of the group for over 10 years. We went around the circle and introduced ourselves in English, for my benefit, and then for 2 hours we listened to tapes of songs, which we danced to, and conversations in Japanese, Spanish, English, German and Russian. The organization is in Japan and Korea, and they sponsor study abroad and other cross-cultural activities. It was amazing. I’ll have to look them up in the Internet and see what I can find out.

We had Japanese curried chicken for dinner with salad and fresh fruit, a soccer game on TV, a Japanese-style shower, and early bed for me. My bedroom was an 8 tatami mat room with a futon in the middle of the floor and one low table. The”curtains” are sliding wood-frame doors with rice paper. Beautiful.
Oyasumi nasai.

It’s now Sunday morning. I slept over 11 hours! I hope to take lots of photos of the house this morning because so many things are so different.

After returning to our hotel, a group of us went into Kyoto for a few hours. Lots of walking and talking and eventually a Spanish restaurant where I gat a cheese pizza! It tasted really, really good after all the Japanese food.

It’s now after midnight and I need to get some sleep.

I don’t know when I’ll have a chance to post again because of our travels, but I will as soon as I can.

Oyasumi nasai.

2006-10-15T09:59:00.000-05:00

The kids were very happy to pose for pictures and they always give the peace sign.

2006-10-15T09:57:00.000-05:00

The map of the world has Japan at the center, just like our maps have the U.S. at the center.

2006-10-15T09:53:00.000-05:00

The schedule is posted on the board daily. (I think.)

2006-10-15T09:46:00.000-05:00

The boys all take judo as part of the PE program. The girls will also start taking judo classes soon.