Nearing the end of the school year

Time to talk about school again.

Term 2 finished at the end of December, just before Christmas Day for students but after for teachers. Remember that in a non-Christian dominant country, a Christian event is not a holiday, despite the materialisation and significant commercial opportunities it brings. So, kids still have to go to school on Christmas Day. Interestingly though, there is still something close to 4 million Christians in Japan who regularly attend church.

New Year's Day holds a lot more significance. If you would like me to elaborate, please let me know - I always love any feedback.

As you would have read, I caused quite a stir at the end of the last term, deservedly so nonetheless. The process I had to follow afterwards at my school for failed students didn't disappoint in terms of being different to my past experiences. Here, the parents of failed students are called in to the school for a year-level meeting that outlines their situation and expectations from here on out. And that is as follows:

i) 呼び出し　よびだし "yobidashi" meeting ii) 課題　かだい "kadai" (homework/assignments) iii) winter holiday homework iv) 再試験　さいしけん "saishiken" (repeat exam).

I was instructed that the kadai and saishiken can be exactly what I had done previously, but to make sure they definitely improved. So, that's what I did. I begrudgingly made three versions of the previous test and gave it as kadai. I made them complete one before the holidays and get it checked by me, and then gave the same one again after the holidays to highlight improvement, if any. Then, 10 days after the holidays, they sat the saishiken (repeat exam). Everyone, thankfully, improved. Some substantially, some minimally, but all were OKed. I then had to write a report on the process for each student that was handed to the Head of English, then the homeroom teacher, then the Head of Year, then the Head of Curriculum, then the Head Teacher, and finally the Headmaster. They still love paper here, and they love stamping things and passing it on to someone higher to stamp too. There's quite a beautiful array of red stamps on the header of each page by the end. So, my part was done.

BUT!!! The 高3年生's (= Year 12 in Aust.) most important exam was only 3 weeks away - the 卒業試験　そつぎょうしけん (sotsugyou shiken, "graduation exams"). I am in the middle of marking them right now.

For some students, they have to pull out a magical score in order to pass the year. I have been told that they must end with an average score above 30% for the entire year. For some of my students, as everyone here knows, that will be tough... astonishingly tough. So, the frantic, passionate plea from a wide range of teachers was to make the exam exceedingly easy.

I was given a copy of a previous year's paper and it was laughable. Seriously, I saw it as a full circle experience for the low-level academic students to finish where they had begun, with questions like "What is your name?" and "How old are you?". I knew I had to assuage many people's feelings and create something ächievable" but I could not bring myself to the level I saw in that paper. So, I made something. I had three lessons left with each class, so I made the exam in three parts and focused on one part per lesson. The three parts were:

1) listening (I knew an MCQ would at least give the very weak a chance

2) Q+A

3) mini-essays.

In each lesson I looked at strategies for completing these sections and my worksheet would be a variation of the real exam questions. Figuratively speaking, I have never held the students' hands so firmly in the lead up to an exam in my life, and I don't intend to do it again. I have always aspired to produce students that can not only recall parts of our content from the term, but have the flexible thinking required to apply their learning in a given situation.

Back to marking...