The bell rang for the fifth period. Ben looked around anxiously for the Japanese English language teacher whom he was team-teaching with for the class in that period. Still, nowhere in sight. Students came in shortly and told him that he's supposed to go for class right about now. Then, he realised... that he was supposed to teach ALONE with NO warning.
Well, the class went pretty well. Got to use Japanese half the time - in a bid to make my instructions for the activities comprehensible to the students - so, I had a chance to act like a REAL English language teacher in Japan. lol . Could see that the students had fun and ... that they probably learnt something from the class (on comparatives and superlatives!!) . But they weren't all that cheerful and positive at the beginning of the class... it's the invasion of the ijimes :(
"Ijime" means "bully" in Japanese. Some of you might know that Japan is pretty notorious for its "ijime culture" in schools. Some say that the situation is more serious in cities than in the country. I'm not sure if the problem is that much less serious elsewhere in the world.. but as this is the first time I'm actually made aware of "ijime" cases involving my own students, I was kinda taken aback.
As I was saying, the students weren't very positive at the begining of the class.. That was also something that I noticed in other classes; all in the eighth grade. I had quizzed the teacher about it, coz the last time I taught them in October, most of the classes were really outgoing and active. She told me that it's got to do with the sudden rise in "ijime" cases in the eighth grade. Apparently, this kinda damaged the dynamics in the classes..
In this particular class that I was teaching alone, something obviously happened before that period and the teacher I was supposed to teach with had to counsel the 2 main "bullies" during that period.. I suppose the rest of the class was also reprimanded because there appeared to be more than just 2 bullies in the class... that explains their less-than-positive attitude at the beginning of the class.
From what I gather, some of the students were ganging up against this student, whom I shall call Hanako here.
Hanako is an educationally subnormal girl. However, her case is not as serious as those who are placed in the special class. But her learning abilities cannot match those of her peers, who are perfectly intelligent kids with no learning disabilities like hers.
Despite that though, she has achieved more than some of the kids with normal intelligence but sucky attitude towards studying and learning. She can actually
read some words. Some, yes; many, no. But there are still many students here who cannot even read
at all. Compared to them, she's achieved much more in English not just in terms of reading, but also spelling and pronunciation. But the fact remains that she will always be seen as the weaker one; the one who drags the class down in terms of overall performance, not just in terms of academic results I am sure.. And this bothers me.. coz she's such a nice and dilligent girl who just wants to achieve what she can, given the limited abilities she's been given, and yet, she can't do that in peace.
We all have our fair share of burdens and problems, why do we sometimes purposely cause even more trouble for others, when they already have enough to handle and when it doesn't actually help us solve our own issues?
This incident made me reflect on myself a little. There's some tension at work now, someone is being ostracised (though she's totally oblivious to it, given her clueless character) and I'm sorry to say that I am probably one of those who don't like her much too. She's totally irritating and she causes lots of trouble and stress for others. I will probably have to dedicate ten entries to describe her obnoxious behaviour if I really want to. But this incident made me ponder over what I would have said to the bullies had I been the teacher, and I realised that some of those things were applicable to my situation with this person as well... She's full of flaws (the way some of us see it now), and just like Hanako, who is intellectually subnormal, causes problems and probably, loads of stress to other people. But we don't have to focus on the bad side of her character and let the dislike for her grow. Even for that Irritating One, I can find some good qualities about her (fortunately or unfortunately :S) Sometimes, we are more sympathetic to inborn flaws like Hanako's, but are much less so to personality flaws that we perceive as self-wrought. Perhaps, sometimes they really are... but that shouldn't change one's capacity to accommodate flaws of other people, because at the end of the day, it is really about showing compassion for someone who is "lesser" than you... in
some ways of course.
I hope that Hanako can find her niche in future. But I know that is hard. Even in Singapore, where special needs students like her can have the luxury of going to special schools that cater to their needs, I am not sure how many of these people get work that they find fulfillment in later in life. In Japan, special needs kids are usually placed in special classes in
normal schools. The teachers are not trained to teach them, and from what I see, they don't really learn much from those classes. It's like they are just there to complete the compulsory education the government has set for them. But in reality, they are just sitting in the classroom during lessons and walking around the campus during breaks... For the relatively more intelligent Hanako, she gets to learn more, but she has to put up with extra stress learning in an enviroment composed of kids with normal learning abilities; also, I believe she can learn much more than she does now, given more specialised attention and a more appropriate pace of learning. Unfortunately, in terms of special needs education, Japan is still very much behind most developed countries.
I hope that special needs kids everywhere can achieve their dreams. It is perhaps not so bad to be limited by the strength of learning abilities - in fact, we all are - but it hurts to be limited by the external environment, especially when something can obviously be done to improve the situations, and fates, of these kids.
(Right) That's the brother and we're at Umi Jigoku.. literally.. the Sea Hell. The Hell Ponds are known as such coz of the steam rising from them. Also, these ponds are so hot that anyone who enters them will certainly be scorched to death!
