Mid term exams

My school is now in the midst of their mid-term exams. I have been quite fortunate in that I have only had 3 tests to set and a total of 50 papers to mark. However, the process of making and supervising exams at my current school is quite different to my previous experience in Australia.

Firstly, there are numerous small differences in the way classes and seating plans are arranged. I'll try and condense all of the information now, but if you have any questions, please leave it below in the comments.

Just as classes are arranged in alphabetical order of the surname in Australia, every class is arranged in the "a, i, u, e, o" hiragana syllable chart for surnames in Japan. See this page for a refresher on the hiragana chart and the order. Based on this, they are given their number in that order, which correlates to their desk, chair and little locker inside their home room. So, a student with the surname Arai would be one of the first, and a student with a surname Watanabe would be one of the last. Students at my school (junior and senior high) do not leave their home room unless they have P.E. or a specialty lesson (e.g. music or a science experiment). So, every time I enter their classroom it almost feels like I am entering their bedroom at home with clothes and bags everywhere, and reminders written or pasted on the boards. The other confronting impression upon entering is the classroom seating plan. It is exactly the same in every classroom - a traditional, perfect rows and columns arrangement with enough space in between each desk for a teacher to walk down. It helps for remembering their names, but there has obviously not been much experimentation with peer collaboration. A lot can be read into this, but now is not the time. The students are arranged from number one to whatever based on the first character of their family name, starting from the front of the furthest left column going backwards. That's important, because they are constantly associated with that number.

The high school students have all had a block period for the mid-term exams. All exams are in either 一・ニ・三時間目 (いち・に・さんじかんめ, ichi/ni/sanjikanme), which means in periods 1, 2 or 3, after which they are permitted to return home. This would be around 12:30pm or so. The high school students have exams in all subjects (except mine) from Tuesday to Friday, but the junior high students work on a slightly different schedule. They have mid-terms from Tues to Thursday, and they must hang around for regular classes after the morning exams. They definitely have a more demanding class schedule than the high school on first impressions.

The subject teacher is responsible for setting exams for all the classes they teach. One non-negotiable fact though is that the duration of exams is set to 45 minutes. After creating the test, the teacher must print all of the papers, fold them into a B5-like size, and then bundle them together with a rubber-band. The school actually has a pretty cool folding machine that takes care of that. I had never seen one before, so I stood there commenting on how awesome it was for about 5 minutes before actually using it. The teacher then wraps a school cover sheet around the bundle and fills in various boxes on it. This cover sheet is a template for all teachers to fill in the exact same way. I will explain this further in a moment. The completed bundle for each class is then placed into a big cardboard box with all the exam bundles from the school, which is then sorted by the teachers that have that specific role. At the start of each morning, the supervising teacher will go to the staff meeting room to collect the test papers for their supervision class.

Teachers are given a different schedule for the week of exams, which in most cases is lighter than their regular load. The most interesting difference to my previous school is that the subject teacher of the class will not supervise their own class. I guess that places a little more pressure on the teacher to ensure every aspect of the exam paper has been thoroughly checked for disguised errors. Secondly, the supervising teacher cannot start or stop the exam on their own terms (i.e. their own stopwatch or the time on the classroom clock). The start of the exam is when the school bell goes for the change of lesson. The finish time is when that bell rings for the end of the lesson. So, the supervising teacher has the responsibility to place the exam on the desk ready for the students before the bell rings. The students know very well that when that bell rings, they are going to dive into the exam paper and not look up. When the exam is over (the bell rings), the papers are collected in order from 1 to whatever (e.g. 1-40) so the teacher can mark and record the data more efficiently. I still haven't got my head around this one yet, but the students are allowed to take the exam paper home, except for the answer sheet that was handed in. Hmm... However, after the exams have been marked, they may also take the marked paper home and keep it (NB: not all subjects though).

The most interesting difference for me was actually the template cover sheet that teachers wrap the bundle of test papers in. Basically it is a simple table on half a B4 page. The top two rows of boxes are subject name, subject teacher (person who made it & who it should be returned to), date and period of the exam, and the year level and class. Below that is the number of students absent, their unique class number, their names, and then further down the name of the teacher scheduled to supervise that exam. There is a large space below for any comments directed to the supervising teacher to keep in mind or to read out to the class (difficult but not impossible for me, but they know that.. haha). There is a little mark of respect amongst the teachers that is uniquely Japanese though. In the box where it has the subject teacher's name, the template has the word 実施 (じっし, jisshi) typed after where the name would be written. The supervising teacher will cross that out and write above it 先生 (せんせい, sensei) as a sign of respect. At the same time, the supervising teacher will cross out the 先生 (せんせい, sensei) after their own name in the box at the bottom on the template, to express their humbleness.

In Japan, you never use さん (san) after your own name or those in your family, as it is a mark of respect. Similarly, teachers/doctors never refer to themselves as a 先生 (せんせい, sensei), as this is also a respectful term for their position. Whenever I am asked what my job is, I say I am a 教師 (きょうし, kyoushi), which is a more humble term. There are many examples of this in the Japanese language. The most common one I must recognise and use is when I talk about my wife. When other people ask me about her, they refer to her as 奥さん (おくさん, okusan). However, when I refer to her I say the humbler term 妻 (つま, tsuma). In a country that prides itself on their culture, this is an important thing to learn.

Finally, in the 三年生 (さんねんせい, san nensei, 3rd grade HS) classes, the home room teachers leave a message on the blackboard for them to ponder over all day. Afterall, no one will be using the blackboard for anything at all during the day. The message to the left was in one class that I teach. It reads:

Saigo made

Akiramezu

Zenryoku wo tsukuse!

Until the very end,

Never give up.

Use all the energy you have!