Assisted an ESL activity on a school trip in Nara

I visited Todaiji in Nara today with elementary school pupils. Several English language volunteers were asked to help them for their ESL activity to interview foreign tourists from all over the world.


Last Tuesday, I got a phone call from my friend who is an elementary school teacher. I met her in Canada in 2001. We were class mates in an ESL school. Our meeting was interesting. It was my first experience both to stay in local people's home in English speaking country, and also to attend an ESL school. We sat next to each other on my first day at the school. We both had a limited ability to speak English at that time. We were serious students so for the first few weeks, we just tried to communicate with each other just in English, not in our mother tongue, Japanese, so our conversation hadn't gone very deep.

As her leaving time was getting near, we gradually had a desire to know each other more and finally one day, when I had a gloomy day and needed someone to talk to in my language, we started to speak in Japanese. Then we knew that we had the same accent, a kind of Osaka dialect, after a few weeks from the first meeting, we knew we both were from Osaka!

After being back in Japan, we got in touch with each other, and she started to come to my house regularly to have music lessons with me. We became close friends before long.

Anyway, I got a phone call from her, and she asked me to help their ESL activity and I said Yes! The activity plan was: The 6th grade students were going to visit Todaiji in Nara and try to interview foreign tourists by themselves. When they need any help, for example, when they cannot understand what the tourists are saying, then we, the volunteers, are there to help them.

Last Wednesday, I went to the school to have a rehearsal with them. The 5th and 6th grade students in the school are going to have English class once a week regularly starting from this month or so. They have done English classes with a native speaking teacher coming from outside for several times. They are getting used to English but still have difficulty with it. So this is a very challenging activity for them. At first their voices were rather small but got louder and louder as they got used to it. I was so impressed with their efforts.


And it was the school trip day today! I was assigned to a group consisting of 5 boys. They asked a question about Japanese cartoons. They greeted the tourists, asking if they may ask a question, asking to take a picture together, saying thank-you, handing a thank-you card to the interviewees. Our group met four groups from Holland, England, Australia, and France. All of the interviewees were kind and patient, waiting for the students speaking slowly but accurately.... I think they had a great experience there. Thanks to all of the tourists we met there!




As I was being there with them, I remembered my first experience talking to foreigners..... when I was a kid, perhaps, I don't remember exactly when, but I do remember that I was so nervous about if my English could be understood or if I could understand what they were saying. So my voice must have been so small and my pronunciation was not so good. But I was sooooooo excited when I could communicate with foreigners for the first time then I thought I wanted to communicate with them deeper and deeper..... The first experience and the first impression led me to the study abroad experiences afterwards.

I hope they had a great time today with us and liked the communication with foreigners. I also hope some of them are going overseas in the future and become rainbow bridges between many many people in the world!!!