Contact Us

SEARCH

Site Map

2016 J-LEAP REPORTJANUARY, 2017: BREEZE ISSUE #111
A FREE MONTHLY E-NEWSLETTER FOR FRIENDS OF JAPAN & TEACHERS OF
JAPANESE

2016 J-LEAP REPORTBY MIKI INOKUCHIShaler Area High School
Pittsburgh, PA
Konnichiwa! I’m Miki Inokuchi and I am a Japanese language
assistant teacher at Shaler Area High school in Pittsburgh,
Pennsylvania. I have been teaching with my Lead Teacher(LT), Balsomico-sensei for about 4 months. I am learning
through teaching and enjoying my life in America so far. I’mvery surprised at how quickly time flies, and that makes me
feel like I really have to treasure every single day.
In this report, I will write about four topics including myschool, co-teaching, follow up training, and my life inPittsburgh.

SHALER AREA HIGH SCHOOL
Shaler Area High School is a public high school in western Pennsylvania just north ofPittsburgh. What comes to your mind when you hear of Pittsburgh? I think many people will
imagine an urban city. However, you can see endless forests and wild animals such as rabbits,
squirrels and deer around my high school. It is very nice to live here, surrounded by nature,and not so far from downtown.
There are approximately 1,700 students and they can select foreign language classes fromFrench, Latin, Spanish and Japanese. We have 5 levels and 6 classes each day. The number ofstudents who take Japanese classes is as follows;
Level 1: 11 students (most students skip this level because they already took a year of Japanesein middle school), Level 2: 28 students (2 classes), Level 3: 26 students, Level 4: 12 students,Privacy - Terms

AP (Level 5 is Advanced Placement Class): 6 students.
So the total number of student is 83. My students are absolutely amazing. They are respectful,and they seem to have a passion for studying Japanese. Everyone participates in class and I’m
glad when my students ask me about Japan after class, which motivates me to work harder.

CO-TEACHING
When I started teaching at my high school, I was surprised because we rarely use textbooks inclass, and class activities are always very practical. I remember the class was based on
textbooks most of the time when I had studied English in Japan. We are always trying to makelesson plans that have authentic materials so that students can learn Japanese culture. Forinstance, we wore Yukata, made rice balls, and made plans for a Japan trip in class. Also,Balsomico-sensei and I are trying to teach using Japanese as much as possible. We have aJapanese and English “button” in class. When the button is on Japanese, students can only
speak Japanese, which is very effective because students try to speak Japanese so hard. I
have many roles in the Japanese classroom, but some of the main roles include teaching
hiragana/katakana/kanji, checking student written and oral assignments, teachingpronunciation, demonstrating conversation, and generally supporting students. In addition, I
have individual conversation test with students at the end of each unit. Through the past 4months, I realized that it is hard making lesson plans for 5 different levels. I appreciate that
Balsomico-sensei and I do our work together as co-teachers, from planning lessons, toteaching and assessing.
I also attend Japanese National Honor
Society’s (JNHS) activities. Students who studyJapanese can belong to the group. Afterschool, students cook Japanese food, watch
Japanese movies, and paint Kanji on theclassroom wall, among other things. Forexample, we cooked Nikujaga (potato andmeat) and Japanese pumpkin soup afterschool. The article about our cooking class
was put in a local newspaper, and I’m very
proud of it. For homecoming (Shaler has alarge event like the culture festivals at
Japanese high schools). At the event, we sold sushi, rice-balls, and takoyaki (but we usedcheese instead of octopus). I’m very glad when I see my students enjoying Japanese culture
and I hope our activities will help increase the number of students who want to learn Japaneseat my high school.

FOLLOW UP TRAINING
In November, J-LEAP Year 6 Assistant teachers had follow up training in Boston. We could
share our successes and challenges and discuss about them together. It was very meaningful
for me to improve myself as an AT. After the training, I attended the ACTFL (American Council
Privacy - Terms

on the Teaching of Foreign Languages) annual conference. I never imagined that I could attend
the biggest conference for language teachers in the US. I learned various teaching methods
through sessions from brilliant teachers. I’m trying to put what I learned from this training andconference into practice in class. I appreciate so much that J-LEAP provides such a wonderful
opportunity to ATs.

MY LIFE IN PITTSBURGH
Since I had never been to a foreign country by myself andlived there, I was nervous at first, but thanks to my LT andmy host family, I could settle down in my new life inPittsburgh. They always support me in many situations. I
really can’t thank them enough. I am enjoying a lot of newthings in Pittsburgh so far. One of my best memories so far isa trip to Washington D.C. with my host family. Before I
started working at school, my host family took me there. Iwas thinking the whole time that I would like to go there, soI was very glad I could. Also, I’m enjoying American holidays
with my host family such as Halloween, Thanksgiving, andChristmas. I like how people decorate their houses for theseholidays. It is very fabulous! Moreover, I’m enjoying sharing
Japanese culture with my host family. For example, wecooked Japanese food, watched Japanese movies andmade origami. My host sister is 9 years old and she is very
interested in Japan. She always helps me cook Japanese food and she keeps asking me ‘How
do you say ~ in Japanese?’ and she asked Santa Claus for a kendama (Japanese traditional toy)
and Totoro (a character from a Japanese movie), which makes me very happy. I’m supposed toshare Japanese culture and language, and also to learn about American culture and bring itback to Japan. During my two years here, I hope to be able to share Japanese culture andlanguage with people in this area as much as I can. I would like to go to classes at local
libraries, the elementary and middle school in Shaler Area School district to teach about Japan.
I hope more people in this area will come to like Japan and will be interested in visiting Japan.
Lastly, I appreciate that I was given the opportunity to teach Japanese in Pittsburgh. Thank you
so much to all of people who are involved with J-LEAP including the Japan Foundation and theLaurasian Institute for giving me such a great opportunity. I would also like to say thank you toBalsomico-sensei, and my host family for supporting me every day, and my wonderful students,
year 6 ATs, and my friends here.
Arigatougozaimasu!

Breeze #122

Privacy - Terms

Breeze #121

Breeze #120

Breeze #119

Breeze #118

Breeze #117

Breeze #116

Breeze #115

Breeze #114

Breeze #113

Breeze #112

Breeze #111

Japanese Langauge Education Update 38

2016 J-LEAP Report: Kei Yamaguchi

2016 J-LEAP Report: Miki Inokuchi

Headquarters

New York Office

ボランティア募集

Center for Global PartnershipJapan Related Links

Volunteer

Job Openings (Updated)

Privacy - Terms

5700 Wilshire blvd, Suite 100Los Angeles, CA 90036
P. 323.761.7510

Annual Report© 2019 The Japan Foundation, Los Angeles
Web Design.

Privacy - Terms