No, I Don't Know What I'm Doing

Today, I met with one of my JTEs to plan the lesson for a 9th grade class that I teach once or twice per month. First, she explained the rules of today's warm-up activity, with which I was familiar. With the students all standing, the JTE and I take turns asking questions, gradually increasing the difficulty with each question. The student who answers correctly sits down and then chooses either tate or yoko, very loosely translated to column and row, respectively. With tate, those standing in front of or behind the student have to sit down. Yoko causes the people to the left and right to sit. The object of the game is to narrow the field down to one or two people, who are then forced to watch Japanese television answer a question.

After discussing the rules, we came across a slight stumbling block. Here's what happened, more or less:

Me: Is there a list from which we pick the questions?
JTE: No, just ask appropriate questions.
Me: Ok, so what have they learned so far? What's an appropriate question?
JTE: Well, they're third years, so anything that they learned in the first or second year is fair game.
Me: What did they learn in the first or second year?
JTE: The same thing that all first and second year students learn.
Me: What do first and second year students learn?
JTE: [blank stare]
…
Me: Let me clarify. Before working here, I worked at a school with only one junior high student who never came to class. I almost never got to teach him.
JTE: Wait, so you're telling me that you have no previous experience teaching junior high?
Me: Pretty much, yeah.
JTE: [blank stare]
[scene]

This type of interaction is not good for my self–esteem. I swear I'm not a moron.

When we come to Japan, we ALTs get no help, no training, no lesson manuals and no teaching materials. The people who "manage" us go to great lengths to avoid having to deal with us, to the point that their "actions" are surrounded by "scare quotes".

On one hand, it's easy to see where they're coming from--and even sympathize. Most of them don't speak or understand English outside of a smattering of phrases that they most likely learned when they, as kids, were forced to take English classes. Assuming--usually correctly--that we ALTs speak no Japanese, they just want to avoid socially awkward situations in which they are obligated help us, yet have no way of truly communicating. So, rather than helping us have some idea of what's expected of us, they leave us to figure it out alone.

On the other hand, it's their job.

For someone who was thrown into the fray without any explanations or directions, I feel like I do a pretty good job. The kids generally get excited to have me there, and I've figured out ways to make learning enjoyable. I see the kids once or twice a month, have no idea what they've learned up to that point, and have no idea what kids their age are supposed to learn. It'll take some experience reading the textbooks and teaching lessons before I automatically know which questions are appropriate for each grade.

Before class, the teacher gave me a second year textbook so that I could study the grammar patterns. I went through the textbook and familiarized myself with everything, making a list of example questions along the way. Then class started, and the teacher decided to skip the tate-yoko game. Of course.

But it's okay, because in that class I got to chuckle when the kids and teacher all pronounced earthquake as arsequake.