Post by yopparaisaru on Apr 8, 2008 9:41:07 GMT 8
So today is the first relatively real day of JHS, the students are all in their homerooms and are having everything explained to them. Notably even though there's absoultely nothing for me to do, I'm here anyway typing away on the forum and staring the front cover of my book. Anyhow a JTE came up to me and asked me if I could intrepret for him at a homeroom period 1st period. Apparantely there is a new student from pakistan here (1st year) who doesn't speak a word of japanese and he would like me to translate for her. "Does she speak english?" I ask, fairly reasonable question i think since I don't speak a word of arabic. Only to hear, oh yes, her english is better than mine. So my teacher who is almost good enough to be called pretty good, leads the way to the student in question who I assu,e I can have at least a basic conversation with.
I walk in the room, and pick her out right away, (not hard to do when everyone in the room looks the same ) And i start talking no holds bar, regular english at a normal speed (at least what has become normal for me-who knows how much slower normal has become in my year here...) only to be met with one of those half smiles of i have no idea what the sounds that are coming out of your mouth are supposed to mean. Lovely... once i realize nothing is going through which doesn't take long, i get the reply "You speak English? Where you from?" Well at least her willingness to speak and her grammar makes her better than the 3rd years at my school but still far from what i expected.
Anyhow she doesn't speak japanese, she can't read japanese, but she's definetly in a class where the teacher speaks only in japanese. She has an aide I guess to help her, but the aide's english is only so-so. To make matters worse she just moved to Japan 2 weeks ago. So now I can't help but feel awful for this girl because I can just see her fall through the cracks. Her english is good enough for her to understand the grmmar points in the english books (actually she prolly already knows all of them) but what about the other subjects. Math can be self explanatory in lower levels, but once they start geometry and trig and stuff like that how can she learn if the explanations are all in japanese. Not to mention the science and social studies classes. Do you guys have or had any experience with foreign non japanese/english speaking students? And do you have any advice on how to help said student if there's anything to do?
On a side note, I am envious that she doesn't have to eat school lunch and gets to bring her own. Especially on pork and beans day this friday, i shudder at pork and beans to begin with, i can't imagine what nightmare will come from japanese pork and beans...(well that had nothing to do with my topic...)
I walk in the room, and pick her out right away, (not hard to do when everyone in the room looks the same ) And i start talking no holds bar, regular english at a normal speed (at least what has become normal for me-who knows how much slower normal has become in my year here...) only to be met with one of those half smiles of i have no idea what the sounds that are coming out of your mouth are supposed to mean. Lovely... once i realize nothing is going through which doesn't take long, i get the reply "You speak English? Where you from?" Well at least her willingness to speak and her grammar makes her better than the 3rd years at my school but still far from what i expected.
Anyhow she doesn't speak japanese, she can't read japanese, but she's definetly in a class where the teacher speaks only in japanese. She has an aide I guess to help her, but the aide's english is only so-so. To make matters worse she just moved to Japan 2 weeks ago. So now I can't help but feel awful for this girl because I can just see her fall through the cracks. Her english is good enough for her to understand the grmmar points in the english books (actually she prolly already knows all of them) but what about the other subjects. Math can be self explanatory in lower levels, but once they start geometry and trig and stuff like that how can she learn if the explanations are all in japanese. Not to mention the science and social studies classes. Do you guys have or had any experience with foreign non japanese/english speaking students? And do you have any advice on how to help said student if there's anything to do?
On a side note, I am envious that she doesn't have to eat school lunch and gets to bring her own. Especially on pork and beans day this friday, i shudder at pork and beans to begin with, i can't imagine what nightmare will come from japanese pork and beans...(well that had nothing to do with my topic...)