How To Get Japanese Kids To Say They're Sorry

Recently, I’ve been staying at school well past my clock out time of four in order to practice tennis with my first graders. Those of you who know me may be scratching your heads wondering why I’m putting in so much time to play sports and of all things why I chose tennis, a sport that I literally began playing only a few weeks ago. The short answer is because it’s fun and I like spending time with my kids. The long answer, and the insane amount of practice my kids do, is the subject of this entry.

In Japan, students are responsible for keeping their homerooms, and the school as a whole, clean. It’s part of the moral and societal aspect of the students' education, raising them to be upstanding Japanese citizens. Teachers take part in the cleaning, too, and I am no exception. However, as I have no homeroom to speak of, I try to spend equal amounts of time with all six classes at my junior high school. Cleaning time is a great opportunity to surprise my kids with some unrehearsed English speaking practice. I often announce myself as I come into the room, telling the students that I’m there to help and asking what job I can do. More often than not, I am met with blank stares. In fact, I’ve had some students literally collapse to the ground, muttering how they can’t speak English (in English mind you).

There are some exceptions though; students who will try and talk with me despite their lack of confidence. One such student is Tsukasa, who I first met as a second grader last year. In terms of conversational ability, I’d have to say Tsukasa is one of my strongest students. Not because she knows the most English or because her pronunciation is perfect, but because she doesn’t quit when something unexpected or difficult comes up. She tries gestures or drawings when she can’t explain some concept to me. It also helps that she genuinely loves English and actually enjoys learning and speaking it. Along with Shiori and Risa, my two soyokaze kids, Tsukasa was one of the first students whose name I committed to memory. She also happens to play tennis, so when I had free time during recess, I would go watch her practice.

Then something kind of strange happened. As I became more and more familiar with individual students and their abilities and interests, I started to realize that my really strong English students are all members of the tennis team. Okay, maybe that’s a bit of an exaggeration. After all, it goes without saying that none of my really good boys are on the all-girl tennis team. Still, if I had to pick out a group of my best students, a good number of them would be tennis players. I have a few theories as to why this may be, but suffice to say I began spending more and more time with those students, even staying after school a few times to watch them practice. Speaking with the tennis team third graders was easy and it was good practice for them. Furthermore, I knew I was interacting with some of the few students who may actually go on to seriously study English in high school.

Another rather fortuitous thing occurred while I was talking to my JTE about practicing with the tennis team. At this point, I had spent an afternoon training with the first graders and was considering going again. As it happens, my JTE was also a rather skilled tennis player during her junior high and high school days (the evidence for some correlation is really mounting here). She not only spoke with the tennis coach to see if I could practice with the first graders, but lent me her racket as well. And with that, I began playing tennis.

A brief aside, if I may, as to the insane nature of exercising with the tennis team. Every day after school, the first graders run ten times around the track at the school. They then do 20 pushups, 30 sit-ups, 30 squats, bear crawls (forward and backward), and several rounds of jumping over small hurdles. It’s also worth noting that, aside from the three-member music club, tennis is the least demanding school activity. Once they've finished all those exercises, they start actually practicing tennis. To date, I have yet to complete this exercise regiment in its entirety, usually having to stop and rest once we start the jumping. I feel bad, not only because I can’t keep up with my kids, but also because I feel like I might be letting them down by not finishing.

Good as the exercise is for me, it’s not the reason I keep going to practice. I just really enjoy interacting with my kids. There have been several really amusing moments during practice where I’ll hear two students discussing how to say something in English. I don’t think they’ve caught on to the fact that I can understand about half of what they say. They really do try and use English around me, which is adorable. They’ve helped count my exercises in English and keep saying they’re sorry when they make a mistake. For those who have never watched Japanese kids practice, they tend to say “gomen” a lot. My kids are no exception. Whatever the error, be it a misplaced serve or a ball lobbed a bit too high I’ll hear an “I’m sorry” every time.