The Phantom of the Opera - another letter to the Persian

To my friend to my only friend

I have been hungry and disired for love,　and now I found it at last. I don`t want anything anymore. Now I don`t regret anymore. 

I was born with scaring face. It`s not mother`s fault I know. But my mother scared me,never watched my face and never kissed me. Then she would like hate me gradually. 

I prefered and admired beautiful things,buildings,art, music and so on. I made my house in the deep underground of the Opera House secretly. And I remade some secret passages to be able to move freely. I could enjoy watching stageplays as a invisible man.

I have been satisfied this life till I found my Angel, Christine Daae. I was fascinated her voice like songs from heaven. I loved her passionately, then I wanted to marry her.

I tried to eliminate ones to interrupt my action without mercy. 

Some time she was going to leave the Opera House for love.

Desparately I took her away from stage and forced her to marry me, you knew that. She said “yes”,and she kissed me voluntarily. 

Then the world changed. I lost the reason to stay here, to live more. 

I will go somewhere never been in. 

Good-bye friend. I`m sorry and thank you for everything.

Eric

Posted for Misako

The Phantom of the Opera - what really happened

Erik was unhappy man. He has terrible ugry face. Even her mother never kissed him. She gave him his first mask when he was two years old. She turned her face away from him every time. 

But Christine put her arms around Erik's neck and she kissed him. That was his first kiss from a waman. That was why. He decided she would set free. and Erik wanted to die. He did not want to live any longer. He thought it makes her to be free.and to be happy. He killed himself. 

After that Raoul and Christine married and were happy. 

But they never came back to Paris. and never singing Margarita.

Posted for Yoko

The Phantom of the Opera - a letter to the Persian

To the Persian

I am leaving this letter for you, because once you were my friend. Now, of course, I have only enemies. People scream when they see my face. I am clever, it is true, but no woman can ever love me. And how can a man live without love?

When I was a child, I was very unhappy. My mother never kissed me. She didn't want to look at me because I was so ugly. And years later, when I was a man, I did many terrible things. I know that, and I am free now. But I did one sorry thing in my life. Christine is wonderful. She can marry the Vicomte and be happy.

But I can never forget her good voice, and I cannot live without her.

And so, goodbye.

Erik

Posted for Reiko

Independence Day - schoolgirl's experience in San Diego

I have not cruised for a long trip, but I have a good memory that I’ve seen fireworks from a ship.
It was fun, so let me write down the experience here.

I’ve been to a city, called Oceanside, near to San Diego, USA. My host family had a neighbor in good relation. My host family had four children, and the youngest girl was about 20 years old. The neighbor had two boys, and the oldest boy was the same age as her. They were friends from childhood, so it might also bond their parents.

The neighbor had a ship which is about 5 meter long in the port of San Diego.

There are fireworks to celebrate independence on 4th of July every year. The neighbor invited us to see the fireworks from their ship. It was my first time to join the celebration of independence date, so I was excited.

The view of port was amazing with white clean ships. I strongly felt it was beautiful because I was grown up in mountain side. On the ship, we had a couple of glasses of wine, and saw fireworks on the ship. Everything was new to me who was from mountain side in Japan. I enjoyed the atmosphere, and appreciated the neighbor that I could experience one of American customs.

I hope to see the fireworks from a ship again.

Posted for Yumi

An honest appraisal of a commuter's driving skills

I think I am bad driver.

Every weekday, I am usually ready to go to the office 13-15 min. before starting an operating time.

We had waked up earlier (ex, 15 min. earlier) in order to get ready to go to the office earlier. I left my house just 2-3 min. earlier because my preparation became slowly without realizing.

So, I gave up to waking up earlier.

To get back to talking about bad driver, due to late preparation, I need to hurry and usually increase speed and sometimes stop quickly.

That is, I have no time to stop for a car oncoming lane or a person who wants to cross the road without crosswalk and to stop at a point where a yellow light is flashed.

Near work, there are 2 schools, and many students are walking in my commuting line. One time, I almost got into an accident. I am always afraid that I may have a car accident some day.

In Matsumoto, it is difficult for us to live without car. In order to keep my car license and to be good driver, I am trying to shorten the time of my preparation.

Name withheld!

Mallorca mystery

After Hannah went back to England, she goes to university to be a biologist.  She spent the special holiday in Mallorca Island and cannot forget about the beautiful blue sea.  At the same time, she regretted that she could not do anything for dead seal which she saw at the beach.  She wanted to help it, but she did not know anything about animals living in sea.

She has another reason.

During she spent holiday with her friend Joe, she felt her job at bank is really boring.  She finds her job is just for her money not for anyone else.  On the other hand, Joe studies Spanish literature at university.  Hannah wanted to study on what she is interested in and it would be better if her study could help other people.  After she could be a biologist, she wanted to work together with Ramon.
He is working for Spanish coast guard and she thought she could help him for protect the beautiful blue sea.  Through the experience that Ramon and Hannah went into the cave, she thought two people could do a greater job than only one person.

Posted for Tomoko

Hiroshi's 'Strange' Holiday - after reading...

This is a story in the summer two years ago. I went drinking with my friends when I went to my home town. The place we drunk was far from my house in my home town. So I left for there by train. We enjoyed our reunion after a long time while drinking. So I forgot the time the latest train leaves.

After drinking, I decided to go home by taxi in the end since the latest train had left. However, I did not use taxi till my house to save the cost of a taxi ride. I decided to walk after getting down from taxi on the way. I walked along the railway. There are not anyone in the way to my house since it was the midnight. It was very dark and silent.

It was the night even the only dog did not bark.

However, I suddenly could hear the strange noise. That was the sound like someone hit the rail way at many times. I looked around, but there are not anyone. The noise continued for a few second. I shouted from fear. Then the noise stopped. When I tried to start walking as relieved, I found something surprised. There were some bunch of flowers by my foots. Those were offered for the dead men by traffic accident there. I could not breath in surprised at the moment. I start running in rush.

Posted for Hiroshi

Dodgy neighbours - suspicious Miyuki

Which of your neighbours could be a master criminal? 

I think the neighbour in next to right side could be a master criminal.

The family is really strange for me and I suppose there is secret in their house. I heard the father is normal office worker but he drives high class car such as Mercedes, Lexus. In addition, he often changes the luxury car. Their children went to high school in China. I think there is a secret to earn money.

The oldest boy has a child and they lived together with their parents. The child is small but I cannot hear any voice or crying from the house. I have never seen a child. Normally, I can hear any voice from house where is child. It is really strange for me.

I'm wondering if the house has thick wall with good quality.

As there are people can speak Chinese, they could contact with China and import or export some goods illegally. Just imagine..

So, I think they could be a master criminal.

Posted for Miyuki

Seven - book review

This book is about detectives who find a clue to the last deadly sin, Envy...I think the most exciting and most aggressive part is when the assistant shoots the murderer, Doe, in the head.

The story is about a crazy-minded man being jealous of happy people and kills seven of them, leaving Deadly Sins' names somewhere. The given sins' names are related to the case of the person who was murdered. There are seven different ways of killing the victims, but I'm not going to say how they die because if so, the stroy will be ruined.

I loved the idea of using the seven deadly sins' names. It was amazing & fresh. I also loved the way of killing people and the backgrounds of the victims. What I didn't like so much was that it was a little bit too bloody & I think the book is not suitable for kids.

I my opinion, this book was written for teens, and bloody scenes are required, so maybe you'll like it.

Posted for Shimei.

We painted the town red - Bon Bon in full Luna colour!

The Grande Depart

 Aching limbs, hoarse voices and stuck on smiles? Sure signs you've been dancing around the town again!

We circled our wagons as the traffic stopped on Eki Mae dori, just after 5pm on Saturday evening, and waited for our red wave to arrive. Busy process then getting name tags secured around children's wrists - we nearly lost a little girl a few years ago & I can't tell you how scary that was. Distributing fans which our students delighted in creating last week, and a bandana to top off the costume.

A Luna Dervish

Important to get dads, especially, in the mood with amber throat charming juice, and network a bit - one of Yamaga's star players came over to say hello, as did a couple of the Yamaga die-hards - good on you guys!

The music started bang on time and we were away, looking fresh and keen...away from the main festival that is, up the main drag into matsuri hinterland. Once again, no crowds, stalls, or mood. Who cares - over 70 of us this year so we entertained ourselves royally, and had a good practice so by the time we did turn in towards the main action, we were on a roll. As you can see from the slideshow here, everyone had a superb time - and almost everyone kept going from start to finish. Awesome stamina.



Proud of all our dancers; the festival is all about you, and you made this year very special. Of course thank yous to all parents and grandparents who looked after us along the way & especially Yukari for dealing with all the unglamorous preparations.

We totally conquered Matsumoto - again!

Find all the photos from Matsumoto Bon Bon 2015 right here

Planting acorns - Luna's Reading Tree

Current progress

Back in April, to coincide with the start of  a new academic year here in Japan, we endeavoured on yet another project: Luna's Reading Tree. As our students develop their reading skills, we wanted a reminder within the classroom of their progress as means of evaluation for both student and teacher. Conveniently, it also adds to the decor!

As part of our reading curriculum, the Oxford Story Tree series has been a staple to many of our young learners as their first steps to reading in English and beyond. Having only become acquainted with Kipper and the gang relatively recently, I've thoroughly enjoyed their grand, and at times bizarre, adventures alongside my students.

The first step

Part of the reason this series has been such a hit with Luna is the language progression, each story builds on the vocabulary from the previous titles to allow students to expand their vocabulary without getting heavily bogged down with too many new words. Each series also comes with an audio CD, to listen in class or at home, and a workbook focusing on the key words from the story. Both bring a great wealth of additional materials/content for children to internalize the language.

The entire series spans 7 levels, with each level represented by a different colour, while at Luna we use the first four levels: red blue, green and orange. We believe this provides enough of a platform for our students to begin discovering their own titles and genres to explore.

The secret room looking lonely

Luna's Reading Tree represents all 28 titles, in the forms of leaves, from the 4 series, differentiated by the different colours. Each time you complete the story along with the workbook, you add a customised acorn to the relevant "leaf" to show off your accomplishments. Our goal is to have a luscious tree budding with vibrant energy, although our initial plan may not come to complete fruition as the Oxford Story Tree series are no longer available to order in Japan.

Never fear though as we still have some tricks up our sleeves and an opportunity to discover other fascinating stories to spark our students' imaginations.

Rainy season heat

 A long rainy season has from early June has finally ended, but what is worse is the scorching sunny days after that. Most days this week were boiling, over 30 degrees Celsius . It is perfect weather for swimming in the pool in the P.E class. The heat is not so bad at night or during classes at school because we have fans to keep us fresh and cool.

 However, after school or at the weekend, I usually have badminton club, where we use shuttles which are very light and easily blown by the wind, so we close the doors and all the windows. This makes the gymnasium horribly hot and humid. I changed 4 T-shirts in about 4 hours and drank about 3.5 liters of water!

 I want to hang out at the beach with cute girls instead of playing badminton with big sweaty guys!

Posted by Takuro

After reading - A letter from an orang-outang

When I met you for the first time in Borneo,I thought you were so kind. You moved me from the small cage to the big one. So I was relieved for a while. Then I thought I would go home in jungle again.

But you "a sailor " were not totally good man.You put me in a small cage again and moved to a ship.I stayed for two months. That was a terrible journey. I felt seasickness everyday and I didn`t like the food you gave .In addition I hated the whip.

In Paris, the situation was almost same. I eally wanted to go home.

The trees in the jungle was my favorite place. In the Rue Morgue I saw the lightning-rod, I thought I could be on treetops.But it was different. I watched women. It was a badly stressful incident.

Fortunately I stay in the Zoo in Paris now. This is the quiet life for me. I hear you get lots of money instead of selling me. I never forgive you.

Posted for Hiroko

After reading - An unusual story involving an animal

Every Japanese knows Hachi,a akita dog. Hachi was born Akita prefecture in 1923. When he was 1year old, he came to Tokyo.

Mr.Eisaburo Ueno who was a professor of Tokyo University, Department of Agriculture by train. Mr.Ueno wanted to keep a Akita dog although he had had 2dogs.

Everyday when Mr.Ueno went to University, Hachi saw him to the door or to the Shibuya Station. And when Mr.Ueno came back home, Hachi went to Shibuya Station to meet him.

But, after a year, Mr.Ueno passed away by a stroke of apoplexy after a meeting of the University. Hachi didn't have anything for 3days after his death.

On the day of Mr.Ueno's funeral, Hachi went to Shibuya Station to meet Mr.Ueno.
Later, Mr.Ueno's relatives tried to keep Hachi, but it didn't work well.

After 2 years Mr.Kobayashi who was a gardener of Mr.Ueno's house kept Hacchi.He knew Hachi since Hachi was a baby. Mr. Kobayashi loved Hachi very much, but Hachi didn't stop to go to Shibuya Station to meet Mr. Ueno. On his way to the station, Hachi stopped at Mr.Ueno's house and looked inside of the house through the window.

One day Mr.Saito who was the president of Japanese dog preserve association knew about Hachi and wrote the news paper article about Hachi. Hachi became famous, people loved him.
10years later, after Mr.Ueno died, Hachi passed away.People atend his farewell ceremony and he was berried to the grave next to Mr.Ueno. Hachci's blonze statue was built at Shibuya station, and it is still there.

Posted for Yasumi

After reading Hamlet - a conversation between king and prince

Hamlet went to another world where he saw his father.

Hamlet: Father, at last I have killed bad Claudius for your revenge. I decided I had to kill him when your ghost spoke to me about your true death. That was too cruel.

Father: You did a great job, fulfilled my soul. It;s great, my dear son. But I'm sad you died and came to this world too young. I hoped you lived strongly with Ophelia for long time as Denmark's noble king.

Hamlet: I'm sad about Ophelia, her father Polonius and brother Laertes. I'm sorry forgive me.

Father: You were good, noble and gentle prince. You are loved by all people. But it's not enough to live as a king of Denmark for long time.

Hamlet: Yes I was. I should be more cruel for bad people. Next time we will again be in that world and be a most royal and complete king to Denmark.

Father: I hope so. We will live strongly without revenge or not to receive revenge from others. We have to live for long time. It's important.

Posted for Mine

Sensei, I don't have a story to tell...speaker's block & interrogative teaching

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Casually mentioned I was trying to teach "The Narrative Tenses" last Thursday evening, via Swarm,  and then had a bit of a 'mare doing so. Friend, inspiration and twitter vivant +Michael @mickstout promptly asked me about resources to do so. Oh hell, called out!

Back story = used to employ a DELTA-qualified teacher whose every second sentence was about teaching the narra'ive tenses (Geordie), how good he was at it (them?) and that we should all d'off caps & bend a knee to the genius before us. But seeing as we have never had that many students in the rarefied reaches of advanced storytelling...you do need a bit for YLE Movers but you can generally get by without having to display any grasp of the past perfect simple/past perfect continuous/etc...in fact if you even tried, I think the speaking examiner would shake your hand!

This particular class week was missing the storytellers, instead only the 'answers on the next page already filled in' students had turned up. Any story telling they do attempt is in L1. My 'pardon?' usually gets a 'No, no' + dismissive hand wave. Been there? Can never introduce something stealthily or creatively because my thunder eternally stolen "that's on p45"...

Nuts & bolts of had + past participle etc all diligently underlined. But grasping the actual concept? Timelines, arrows, arm waving...Jim sensei needed to hit reset and start again.

So not only scratching my head all week about how to rescue the befuddled students from last week's grammatical cul de sac, needed to actually impress a colleague as well - or at least try to reply.

My students share the same language, and are not natural story tellers nor inquisitors. Imagine the opposite of Irish or Italian, maybe? Any contribution usually delivered as a set piece, accepted universally & scarcely a comment or question there be afterwards.

As usual, simplest is best, and decided after rummaging my collection of supplementary materials that nothing was really going to present itself. I needed to detox the class from the dreaded G terminology & translation mindset, and in some parlance flip the classroom. Keep books in bags, concentrate on imaginative brain, banish pencils, avoid turn-taking & prevent dominant personalities railroading others. Time too for me to be quite a lot more intrusive than I usually am (inviting fluency and letting 'errors' go).

A board game with out story telling limits

Solution. A narrative.

Dived into the back of our games cupboard & found Never Ending Stories (sorry, that awful song will start in your brains too!) - for age 6+ it says on the box. Ideal. Very simple. Totally random. Players plop cards onto a board in turn, and develop a story as suggested by the images on them (characters, objects, locations) in the order they have been played. Past tenses great. But the 'forgotten' past?

Start at the end of the story and add cards to try to get to the beginning, back-filling detail as you go. This is where the teacher needs to be very involved asking for connections, suggesting links, checking/requiring details eg Were they married before? What happened? How did they meet? and letting the whole group contribute - player whose turn it is selects 'best help' and adds the bits up. Importantly, before the next turn, teacher as narrator recaps - helping everyone keep up with developments and providing a model. Embellishment with current events etc as they occur to you are great, as students then get to see the rationale for the tenses you are using, without focusing on the tenses you are using per se - at least if the story is interesting! I challenge anyone to recount the same (and ever expanding) story the same way twice without leaving bits out; students need to see this is the beauty of storytelling not the mental linear blockage some see it as. Grammatical flexibility gets you over the hurdle and you can 'keep going' without having to go all the way back to the beginning of the timeline and get things 'in order' Students love pointing out the teacher's mistakes....ask them if you left something out...and 'rescue' yourself with a post script.

How our story unfolded - narrative to come

So, for me, interrupt like mad at the creative brainstorming phase, establish chronology and link bits together grammatically - then let that part of the story be told however it comes out. Once a turn is 'done'; gently re-tell it to check you got it right (include 'corrections' here?), and help the other students with a second listening before connecting all the other previous parts.

So there has to be a digital way to do this, for classes with wifi & tech savvy learners.Voicethread would be one way to collate a final version, I think, and could be done outside of class/before the next class. Sock Puppet, minus the time limit, another idea. Fotobabble only gives you 90 seconds - but ideal per pic?

In class, with confident students I think a Pecha Kucha type approach might work. You could also trawl ELTpics or any theme in Flickr - or go random and use flickr as a screensaver (hands free, adjust time images shown to suit skills).

Another randomiser = give a student a slip of paper with a ridiculous scenario on it and have them bluster their way out of it - kind of Liar's Game. (eg "You were seen climbing out of a nightclub window at 8am this morning wearing a superman suit")  Of course allow questions from the floor. Big class, have 2 or 3 students sit at the front and have them tell a story. Only one is true, room votes at end of story & Q/A on which one. NB They can all be false, but the winner = most convincing liar?!

My favourite place - Kamikochi

Matsumoto is a city in Nagano prefecture, Japan. Because this city is surrounded by mountains, in winter it doesn't snow much like Nigata and in summer it isn't so hot.

The most popular place for tourism is Matsumoto Castle. The castle was built in the 16th century, and a samurai called Ogasawara was governing the whole country of Shinano (The old name of Nagano). It is a famous castle which never had a fight. And also it is called "karasu jyo". It means crow castle and this is because it is black. In Hyogo, there's a another castle called white heron castle and it is because it's white.

There are many other places to visit. Kaichi elementary school is a place where you can see combinations of the Japanese and the Western styles. Japan used to do national isolation for 200 years during the Edo period. When a man called Perry from the U.S. came to Japan, it ended. And many Western things came into Japan. This building is one of an example.

Taisho lake

My favorite place is Kamikochi. it's a scenic spot and it's being popular and popular. These days many people from cities comes to escape the summer. In Kamikochi, you can see lots of beautiful mountains of the Japanese Alps. If you climb to an altitude of about 1500 meters, you'll see a beautiful lake called Taisho lake.

Posted for Remi

E-mail to Elizabeth

Elizabeth,

I am writing this E-mail from Fotheringhay Castle.  You must be surprised to see my E-mail.  Tomorrow, I am going to die and meet my God.  You cannot imagine how I feel now, but my heart is peaceful and quiet.

Promise me.  Please take care of my son, James.  He becomes the King of Scotland tomorrow, but he is a young boy and doesn’t know how he should rule his country.  Please support him and never let him die by unnecessary fight.

Before God, I have to tell you the truth.  You may still believe I killed James’s father, but I didn’t.  I know nothing how Darnley died on that day.  I was not there when he died and don’t know who killed him.  I know I had a lot of enemies and someone wanted kill me, not Darnley.

You know, the King or Queen is always lonely.  I had a few good friends, but more than that there were a lot of enemies around me.  I could not believe the people from the bottom of my heart.

James will fall into the same situation with us.  I just hope he will find a good woman who will love him and support him all his life.

I did want to see my son, James before the end of my life.  Please pass my message to him, I really love him.

Yours sincerely,

Mary

Karen finds a huge computer

I lost control of my space ship and it goes faster and faster. It's broken but I'm excited. I come to a strange planet, land safely, and find my crew is safe.

Purple planet with local inhabitant!

The purple planet has small mountains and water, and I am wearing a spacesuit. It's cold - zero degrees!

I decide to explore alone because I do not like my crew. I find a tunnel and a ladder. I don't like tunnels because they are dark, but I go down the ladder because I met an alien. It's small and pink with three arms and two legs, and it can fly.

I find a huge computer. My computer is good, so I push a button. The computer explodes and I am very shocked. The tunnel collapses and I am trapped.

THE END.

Yu-chan`s final mission

Yu's cold green planet.

I lose control of my ship, and it goes faster and faster because of engine trouble. I don't feel good - I'm going to be sick.

I come to a strange planet, land safely, and find my crew is safe. It's big green planet. There are not any animals. I'm wearing a space suit. I'm cold. It's zero degrees outside.

I decide to explore alone - I am brave. I find a tunnel and a ladder. I like tunnels because they are dark, but I go up the ladder because I saw a flashlight. I'm excited.

I find a long corridor with four doors at the end. I want to open the gold door, but I go through the black door and enter a room with metal walls. A panel in the wall opens and I go through it. I find an elevator and want to go up, so I do, but the door closes behind me and I realise that I am trapped. I shout and shout, but nobody can hear me....

Mutiny on the Bounty– after reading

Pitcairn Island　- Use the internet and write about the people of this island now

Pitcairn Group of Islands consists of 5 islands including Pitcairn Island. They are the colony of England and located in the South Pacific Ocean. There are no other islands that the people live 300km around Pitcairn Island.


56 people live in Pitcairn Island. They are the children of marine who participated in Mutiny on the Bounty. They believe in Protestant Christianity. They do not drink any alcohols and not smoke. In addition, they do not eat pork and shrimp.


After 2004, England started to invest in infrastructure in the island. There is still neither a radio nor a TV broadcasting service, but the people can watch the overseas broadcasting for free through the satellite TV. In addition, the people can use internet through the satellite connection. On the other hand, they have neither gas nor running water. Although there are no water sources in the island, rain water is used for drinking water. 6.4km road is maintained. The people use bike or four-wheeled buggy for the transfer.

In 2005, the police office and school was founded. The police officers and teachers are sent from England. They are controlled according to the



same level of criteria as England.

Story maze - Yuto's space trip

I lose control of my space ship. I was flying in space to find a planet. It goes faster and faster because the aliens were pushing. I come to a strange planet, land safely and find my crew is safe. I decide to explore alone. I found a tunnel and a ladder. There are so many rocks in the tunnel. I decide to go up the ladder. I find a long corridor with four doors at the end. I go through the gold door and break the door and put the gold in my pocket.

Story steps dictated by the throw of a dice!

The corridor leads to a maze of one hundred corridors. There is a transporter machine at the entrance. I enter the machine then I came to a strange orange planet; I landed safely and my crew is safe too. I decide to explore around and find another tunnel. This time I go down the ladder and find a huge computer. A door opens when I push the button.

I found yet another long corridor, and at the end I go through the silver door this time. I am trapped.

Dream in Space - Nanako`s story

I am in my space ship going to the purple planet, when I lose control of it and it goes faster and faster. I feel scared because it`s fast.

Storyline from Nanako's story maze

I come to a strange planet. It is purple and small. I land safely and find my crew. Everyone is safe. We are wearing small space suits, and they are cool inside. We decided to explore in a group because it was scary.

We came to a hill. We go around it and find a deserted space station. We go inside it, but there is nobody there. It is a little dirty and smells like lemons. The computers are off. There is fruit on the table, but I don`t eat it because it is very yucky.

I find a comfortable bed and lie down on it. It is very smelly but I fall asleep. When I wake up, it was only a dream. I am back in my cabin in my space ship. We are still flying in space on the way to the space station on the purple planet.

We Can Do - taking Young Learners in Matsumoto

Proud, once again, to be able to provide Young Learners for our students in Matsumoto - as well as continue our open door policy and welcome children from Okaya & Yamanashi as well.

Space not an issue, as we rented the big room at the Fukushi Kinroshya Centre this year. Nobody told us the bell was going to ring at twelve noon, which made us all jump! That apart, everything went very smoothly indeed; well-organised Yukari, thank you. Everyone knew where to sit, which colour pencils to sharpen etc.

Are you ready to start?

This year we had takers for Starters & Movers, so some first timers looking very small on the big chairs and a wee bit nervous - not a bad thing; handling pressure once in a while is an important achievement.

Also some children moving up a level, and coping with a sizable jump in level. Needed to hand out a tissue or two...important we are all smiles at the end of the day, and the promise of an ice cream seems like a decent bribe!

Thrilling to know the children in our care today are measuring themselves against a global benchmark in tests that again let them display what they 'can do' and rewards them for having a go. We do not teach to pass the exams at all - we teach English, with strategies built in which enable learners to operate independently & confidently.

Newest YLE venue in Tokyo

Delighted today to announce that "Hello Kids" in Miyogadani (Tokyo) has become Luna's newest venue for Young Learners, and run their very first Starters session today...which takes me back to our own very first YLE session and the amazing feeling of pride I had when the likes of Sayaka, Wakana, Yumeka, Tatzi came bouncing out of their speaking tests in 1999 into mummys' arms...

Thank you Greg, Jeff, Hitomi et al at the school today for undertaking very new roles; it was obvious you all have a very close relationship with your students and care deeply about their performances. Thank you for digging in to your roles weeks ago & being on top of the job today.

At Luna we expect every venue, every session, to meet the MAXIMUM requirements of an Inspection; regardless of an inspector turning up or not. To that end we do not allow any new venue to offer YLE (or any other exam), through JP004, without them proving to us first that they can & will get the job done as per rules & regulations. It is vital all candidates are taking their examination in the exact same circumstances as another around the world, otherwise the whole process is invalid.

Delighted to report all the children seemed to enjoy themselves, so everyone looking forward to getting their certificates back soon!

Luna's anchor ladies - Naoko & Hiroko

Luna's anchor ladies - Yasumi & Olga

Health questionnaire - the results

Mmm, pie

I asked some questions about health to people through the Internet. People from under 20 to 80, 13 people answered it.

The most interesting question for me was: Question 4. In Japan, it is believed that blood types determine your characteristics. I agree with this. But 70% of the people disagreed with this. And I was surprised to hear so.

I was impressed that 77% eat breakfast everyday. I think in Japan, people who eat breakfast are decreasing which is not so good. In my opinion eating breakfast is the first thing to do after you wake up and it is one of the most important thing in your daily life.

I was curious why many people love meat than fish and vegetables. From this response I found out 54% love meat. And most of the people don't eat more than five kinds of vegetables a day. I think people who answered these questions should try to eat more vegetables and fruits.

First Aid - my first (painful) experience

When I was 7-years old, it was caught a finger in the heavy front door in my previous house.  The door of my previous house had a thickness of about 8 cm and was so heavy.  It had strong pain and my nail of injured finger was gradually turned purple and finally whole nail of injured finger turned to purplish black.

When 2-3 month passed after injured, I visited a small farm nearby my grandmother's house and gathered grass to give to goats, sheep, and houses etc. After I gathered grass a few times, I found that my injured nail was removed completely without any pain. I couldn't find removed nail in grass field.

Have you ever seen under the nail? I have memory that under the nail, there was winding muscle? construction like large/small bowel and it was not good to see for a while. At that time, I was given first aid.

I couldn't remember how long new nail took to grow. I am sorry that I didn't carefully saw my nail's growth at 7-years old and didn't take any picture. If I have iPhone at that time, I will take many photos and update my nail's growth to twitter.

Posted for Ritsuko

Paradise - my idyllic place

I traveled to Fiji three year ago. I stayed Fijian village and resort.

As per this reading book, Fijian people was really friendly. They said to me "Bula!" in the town. In country side in Fiji, there was no enough electricity. Also, I could not take a shower. There was some difference in Fiji compared with Japan. But I liked the place because people was really friendly and there was beautiful sea. I could swim in the beautiful sea and watched real "Nemo"! Also, I could see beautiful coral reefs.

Fijian beach near Nadi, Viti Levu

For resort area, the commodity price was expensive than local area. The water was twice price! But the hotel was luxury and relaxed. The staff's hospitality was great! They gave me smile a lot.
The food was delicious. Fijian food also was tasty. There were Indian people in Fiji, so I could eat spicy curry with naan.

I liked Fiji so I would like to live there because the time is spent slowly. I can enjoy swimming in the beautiful sea. Fijian people is kind. But I prefer to live urban side (Nadi is better). I want to take a shower everyday and need electricity!

Posted for Miyuki

After reading - My homestay life in London (Part 3)

Going for a stroll in the British coutnryside

Day 3.

Today I had a lot of walk around with Daniel. His family had a dog and he loved the dog named Patrash very much. It's his important role to take a walk with Patrash every afternoon. he is an important friend for Daniel.

He said he loved to watch the TV program about wildlife like Animal Hospital. It was the house of sick animals and unwanted or homeless animals.

Danial's parent brought Patrash to their home. He was was and was spending very happy days and lived with them. Daniel said he wanted to be an animal doctor in future.

I thought he was very gentle boy. We stopped walking after 30 minutes.

Posted for Mine

After reading - My homestay life in London (Part 2)

Day 2.

"You can do it if you B&Q it!"

It was Friday. When I got up, and opened the winder, I could see a lot of beautiful flowers. The house was very beautiful. I could sleep on a comfortable bed last night.

Mike and Jane made their house by themselves by DIY. Every weekend they went to DIY centres, and garden centres. They sold good wood and plants for the home. Mike and Jane were proud of their house and garden very much..

They brought me to the garden centres. There were a lot of beautiful flowers, they were very cheap. They bought some of them and brought back to their home. I helped them to plant those flowers.

Posted for Mine

After reading - My homestay life in London (Part 1)

Day one.

Not something I would want for dinner

London is the biggest city in UK. I stayed in a house there.

There were three people in the family. Mike father, 40 years old, Jane, mother, she was 35 years old, and their son Daniel, he was 10 years old. And I was a new member of their family.

They were all very friendly. Also they were my English teacher. Each of them spoke in nice English. But at first I couldn't understand their English well.

In the evening I ate bread and butter pudding for dinner. They liked that food very much. It was great and delicious. Jane phoned them to a local restaurant and they brought the food to their house.

Mike and Jane are working, and they can't cook large meals in the evenings. So take-away meals from fast food restaurants are very popular now, they said.

We talked a lot about British food in the past and now. After that I changed some presents from Japan.

I helped clear the table with them.

Posted for Mine

How's the Weather? Again?

One of my favourite songs with YLs, but after a while struggling to come up with new ways to present the song and do something interesting with it - apart from the obvious song & dance routine, which is still the best bit!

My badly drawn snowflakes (you try?!), leaves and clouds + my not so bad raindrops & suns, given to each child (group of 30+, don't try this on the fly!) at tables with crayons poised for action. Usually don't ask kindergarten kids to colour on already cut-out things (end up scrubbing a lot of tables) but a bit short for time with this activity.

Pres play and watch Jim-sensei make a dope of himself waving his arms about...OK...some joining in takes place as the Q & A parts are repeated three/four times. Press pause, and ask "How's the Weather?", accept any/all correct shout outs and point to the five pictures they've got. Which one? Whole class checks by holding up a picture, changing one or two to conform (we're in Japan!) - and then colour it. I did not say which colour (wanted this to be their work) but staggered they all went for a red 'sunny' sun! When done (new group so "Finished?" "Not yet" got a lot of practice) glue your sun onto a big sheet at the front of the class.

Repeat as above through the remaining four verses - I did nominate "rainbow" for 'snowy' - and presto, the classroom has a very colourful weather chart for daily use, and a chant embedded in it/30+ little heads.

In-Conference Professional Development - PANSIG

Back-pedalling a couple of weeks to tell you about a very exciting afternoon I enjoyed (though working very hard) in Kobe at the recent JALT PANSIG Conference held there.

It has often struck me how many of 'my' (Cambridge) Speaking Examiners attend the various workshops & conferences I sometimes manage to get to - without being surprised; they are operating in our natural recruiting zone and showing an interest in professional development. Ideally then, make it an extra-worthwhile weekend for everyone and have something tangible to take home.

So what did we do? Prior to the Conference, announced that there would be an opportunity for teachers to attend a full speaking examiner training workshop, with a discount if attending the Conference already - or a discount to attend the rest of the day at the Conference if signing up for the training. Good deal either way!

We received very positive interest and had the session fully booked in no time at all; online pre-training meant we could start at speed with everyone on the same page...my job really a matter of fine-tuning interpretations of instructions and delivery of materials. You would have thought that reading out a few questions from a script would be easy. Usually, it would be, and you do not have to be an experienced teacher to be able to do that. However, add in the pressure of two (sometimes) three nervous/expectant/shy/chatty/non-native speakers hanging on your every word, plus the need to give each a 'fair' turn, plus manage the timing of the tasks, plus pay attention to responses and body language, plus remember what to do next? Not so easy. And with Conference providing us with a roomful of dummy candidates to actually practice on in real time, a lot of pressure. Speaking Examiners have to rise to the challenge and appreciate the necessity of delivering a standard test each & every time. For me, this impacts on the test-takers perception of the test more than anything else they do on test day. They will not remember the questions, but they will remember how they felt in the speaking test.

Job satisfaction for me in examiner training comes with recruits managing to control the above calmly.

Which is at odds with the expectations of recruits, who want to know 'what the scores are' from the start! When we do eventually get to the assessment phase, recruits get excited to see the actual criteria, and then there's a good deal of head scratching as few have assessed with benchmarked criteria before - and very few with 'Can Do' in mind. Invariably recruits begin by noticing 'mistakes', 'errors', and 'can't do', and picking on accents they are not familiar with etc. It takes 'a few goes' looking at different samples of speaking for the group to come around - and it needs to be the group, in the same scoring ballpark, for the lesson to have sunk in. And this is where teachers can stretch their experienced legs and share/discuss/argue/negotiate around interpretation of the criteria v what they saw/heard - and explain all of that couched (only) in the terms written down in front of them. Bye bye 'funny accent' and 'can't do the present perfect simple' etc!

And then the satisfaction of 'nailing' scores when final marks are collected, and the reassurance that there is a lot more support hereon in for all our successful new SEs - in this case 14 people catching the train home glowing with a very real sense of achievement from their weekend to reflect on & put into practice. Well done the PANSIG Cadre!



Need to thanks a couple of people for pushing this unique initiative through - an idea I have had in mind for a couple of years, but needed implementers like Jon Dujmovich and Mark Brierley. Overall, I should thank the PANSIG organisers for seeing the win-win, Tim Pritchard for his 'can do' attitude, and the volunteers who were thrust into practice speaking tests. This event would not have happened without the support of Cambridge English Language Assessment in Japan, specifically Tomoe Aoyama.

Photo album from a very old party!

Karaoke Queens!

I'd like to share - a bit late , sorry! - photos from my birthday party last weekend. It was a 60's theme party, which some people even tried to adhere to. It was great to see so many of of our younger learners enjoy the early start, and show the oldies how 'own' the karaoke microphone!

I really appreciate the special effort Yukari made with help from Naomi & Chiyo, and want to thank everyone for all the lovely presents (even the ones without alcohol content!). Thanks everyone for coming - pretty obvious we had a good time, I think.

Check out the album, by all means download your favourites, like & share!

https://www.flickr.com/gp/saint_george/S9LE11

Better than karaoke - What do you have?

Everybody Up is a popular series here at Luna and after watching the following clip you can understand why. The songs are wonderful and allow for us to add our own actions to get our students interacting with each other. The following video is from my new Monday class and there's no lack of enthusiasm! Leave a comment of your favourite song from the Everybody Up series.

The Piano Man - after reading, choose another Tim Vicary book

"The Everest Story" of  Mr. TimVicary looks very interesting for me.

Some Japanese tried to climb up to the top of the Everest before. The climbing was broadcasted to the world including Japan. There are also a lot of climbers in Nagano as there are lots of high mountains in Japan. Actually, I had climbed up to the middle of the mountain in Nagano when I was 14 years old. That was my first climbing of a full-scale mountain in my life.

I got used to seeing the people of the climbing mountains since my childhood and liked to see their stories to reach to their final goal after the harshness of nature, various difficulties and enjoyable beautiful scenery. It is difficult to climb the Everest by myself, but I think I could imagine and enjoy when I read the book. And I also would like to learn how difficult to get the top of the mountain and how to find the way to climb to there.

The Empress Michiko

The current Empress Michiko (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Queens- Write about a powerful woman in our country’s history.

Empress Michiko (皇后美智子 Kōgō Michiko), born Michiko Shōda (正田 美智子 Shōda Michiko) on 20 October 1934, is the Empress consort of Japan as the wife of Emperor Akihito, the current Emperor of Japan reigning from 7 January 1989.

Michiko Shōda was born in Tokyo, the eldest daughter of Hidesaburō Shōda, president and later honorary chairman of Nisshin Flour Milling Company. Raised in Tokyo and in a cultivated family, she received both traditional and "Western", learning to speak English and to play piano and being initiated into the arts such as painting, cooking and Kōdō. She is the niece of several academics, including Kenjirō Shōda, a mathematician who was the president of the University of Osaka from 1954 until 1960.


She attended Futaba Elementary School in Tokyo, but was obliged to leave in her fourth grade because of the American bombings during World War II. She was then successively educated in the prefectures of Kanagawa, Gunma and Nagano in the town of Karuizawa, where Shōda had a second resort home.

After attending college, she admitted to have also been named in her childhood as "Temple-chan", because her curly hair and reddish colors were unusual for a Japanese girl and it made her look like the American child actress Shirley Temple. Although she came from a Catholic family and was educated in Christian private schools, she is not baptized.

She graduated summa cum laude from the Faculty of Literature at the University of the Sacred Heart, Tokyo with a Bachelor of Arts degree in English Literature in 1957. She also took courses at Harvard and Oxford.

Since she came from a particularly wealthy family, her parents were very selective about her suitors. Biographers of the famous writer Yukio Mishima had considered marrying Michiko Shōda, and that he was introduced to her for that purpose sometime in the 1950s.

In August 1957, she met then-Crown Prince Akihito on a tennis court at Karuizawa near Nagano. The Imperial Household Council formally approved the engagement of the Crown Prince to Michiko Shōda on 27 November 1958. At that time, the media presented their encounter as a real "fairy tale", or the "romance of the tennis court". The engagement Ceremony took place on 14 January 1959.

Michiko married Crown Prince Akihito and became the crown princess of Japan until the death of Emperor Hirohito. She was the first commoner to marry into the Japanese Imperial Family. She has three children with her husband. Her elder son, Naruhito, is the current heir to the Chrysanthemum throne. As crown princess and later as empress, she has become the most visible and widely travelled imperial consort in Japanese history.

The Mutiny on the Bounty - Pitcairn Islands

The Pitcairn Islands are a group of four volcanic islands in the southern Pacific Ocean. That is the British Overseas Territory in the Pacific. It consists of the four islands – Pitcairn, Henderson, Ducie, and Oeno. They are spread over several hundred miles of ocean and the total land area is about 47 square kilometers (18 sq mi). Only Pitcairn, the second largest island is inhabited.

There are no inhabited islands 300km around. Why do people live in this solitary island far off in the ocean? The Bounty mutineers who are famous in the several movies serve as a trigger. The people in this island are the descendant of the sailors who took part in the mutiny of the Bounty.

Their religion is Christianity. All islanders are protestant of Seventh-day Adventist. Basically they don’t drink nor smoke. The alcohol and cigarette are sold in the government store which is only one convenience store and the Christian’s café which is only one café in the island but is thinly distributed.

There is a rule for the food, they don’t eat pork nor shrimp. This is because they are dedicated to their passion in the practicing Christianity. After the mutineer lived in the island, some of drunken islanders killed each other. The Adams who was the last person in the accident sought help from the Bible and the islanders have practiced hardly and don’t eat pork nor drink in the end.

Why I hate science - after reading C.H.O.I.R. Boy

I hate science.. Because everything is difficult for me!! I have an aptitude for humanities course not science course.

I don't like see mathematical formula at all, so I have never felt that science class was fun or interesting. I didn't remember the science words although I tried to study hard. So, my test score was terrible.. I liked to empiric test but I could not find interesting poing for the other stuff.

Also, science teacher class was difficult and it is hard to understand what he said. I'm not sure but I liked science more if the class was fun.

Posted for Miyuki

Guest Blog: Tom & Damo's adventures (Part 3)

Customs finally catch up with Tom

Lastly we headed to Matsumoto, close to the Japanese Alps. Although not a big city like Tokyo or Osaka, it holds many things to do and is situated in a great location. Even in May you can see the snow capped mountains in the distance. I really enjoyed the visit to the castle and even got a photo with a Samurai. With admission to the castle you can also visit the nearby museum for free. Although information written in English was limited inside the museum it still held some interesting artefacts from both the castle and Japanese history.

Majestic as ever

 On my final day me and Damo headed out up into the hills. After getting a little lost and taking a detour, we made our way to Utsukushigahara Open Air Museum. It holds a bizarre collection of art, with what seems like hundreds of unique and crazy sculptures. Some pieces I thought were incredible, thought provoking and of interest, whereas others were just plain weird and I had no idea what they were. The weather wasn't great, but on a nicer day, the viewpoint at the museum would provide a great view of the whole region and definitely worth the hour and half drive from Matsumoto. After this it was time for me to head back home from my visit and leave Damo to get back on with his English teaching.

One of the more bizarre works at Utsukushigahara

After 3 flights, 22 hours of flying and a very tired Tom, I made it home back to the UK. I really enjoyed my time in Japan and will definitely make sure I come back in the future!!

Time for goodbyes and the end of our adventures