Days at Daiichi

When I found out I was going to be teaching a class of teenagers I was terrified. My own memories of high school started flashing before my eyes. A class of girls, talking over the teacher and using our phones to text, shop, and do anything but schoolwork, but as soon as I set foot in the school I realised that my high school experience was very different to that of the students in the class that I was teaching.

Although the separation of girls and boys was still very clear, here it was by choice rather than the fact that the boys went to a different school across the road. Instead of groups of desks around the room, they were in uniform single file lines. Rather than chatting happily to each other and yelling out answers, you could barely drag an answer out of them without picking on them one by one, and the biggest difference; everyone has to hand in their phones to their homeroom teacher at the start of the day - a rule that couldn’t even be broken for educational use on the final day of school.

I walked into the class for the first time in November absolutely terrified but soon realised that my preconceived idea of what was to come couldn’t be further from reality. School in Japan is incredibly different to what it was back home, but the class welcomed me with open arms, just as they would’ve at home; and for that, I am so grateful. Thank you and good luck with your final year of school everybody!