Nyuzen Eikaiwa Class

My sister was visiting, July 2005

X-mas Enkai at Sakura Sweets, December 2005

My parents were visiting, May 2006

X-mas Enkai at Chinese Restaurant, December 2006

My Farewell Enkai at Sakura Sweets, June 2007

Our last class together, July 3rd, 2007

Once a week for more than two years, I taught an Advanced English Conversation Class in Nyuzen. The class has been meeting for twenty years and they have had many different teachers from different countries. They aren't particularly interested in grammar or serious study, although many of them study at home on their own or listen to the English NHK morning radio lesson. But they like to talk and they want to talk! They love to share ideas, opinions, stories and information about Japan.

They write a zine every few months and last winter we started publishing their writing on the Nyuzen-machi English Blog. Please visit it and leave comments!

Some weeks I brought a detailed lesson plan using lots of different activities and conversation topics. Other weeks we would just talk and they would carry the conversation without any direction. I often used this class as a springboard to bounce ideas off of for issues that were raised in my TEFL studies or questions I had about Japan and Japanese culture. Every week I learned something new. I hope they did too!

I will miss our weekly conversations!