2017年5月28日日曜日

Cultural Exchange with Poland

May 26, 2017

We introduced Japan and Maibara high school.
The students in Poland introduced Poland and their school to us.
We talked about immigrants.

Poland borders Germany and Belarus. They think that the city they live in is not interesting because there are not anything interesting.

We were surprised that they did not know brass band and wandervogel.
They look adult. Their English is very good and easy to hear.
So we must practice speaking English more.



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(Teacher's Comment)
Thanks Lukas Gierek for managing this call. I feel so happy to see you again via Skype even after E2.
Those Polish students study at Microsoft Showcase School. In the session, we exchanged our views on accepting immigrants in addition to some cultural exchange. Since my students have exchanged letters with Polish students in another school, they must have felt close to you.

Dziękuję Ci!

Cultural Exchange with Lebanon

May 24th, 2017
Today we talked with students in Lebanon on Skype.
The students were 15 years old.

<Question>
Do you border the Meditteranean Sea? - Yes
Are you in Africa? - No
Does your national flag have red? - Yes
ARE YOU IN LEBANON? - YES!!

Lebanese currency

Traditional food in Lebanon

Lebanese flag: the red part represents blood, white represents snow in the mountain and the tree in the middle shows the cedar tree.


They showed me their traditional dance cheerfully.
They taught us how to write our names in Arabic. We wrote their name in Hiragana.



They knew Japanese things well. We learned about Lebanese culture.

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(Teacher's Comment)
Like Israel, Lebanon is not familiar with people in Japan.
Hoever, we were impressed that Lebanese students knew about our country very well.
This was our first Skype call with Lebanon. They prepared a lot of questions to us. Here let me answer some of them again.

- How do you feel living in a place threatened by natural disasters?
  Honestly we do not feel anything specially - of course we do some evacuation trainings for earthquakes at school, you can spend usual daily life here. We know not only how tremendous the nature in Japan is, but how beautiful and how we are blessed with it.

- We suffer from a huge pollution problem. In spite of the fact your country is much bigger, how do you manage to keep it clean?
  In our country, it is a kind of social rule to deal with the trash / garbage we made by ourselves. For example, if you go somewhere with something to drink in a plastic bottles, we usually bring the empty bottles home. We regard it rude to leave/throw the trash away outside. Also, Japanese students clean their classroom after school every day. This is to grow the spirit to cherish the environment given to them.

- Do you always sit on the floor when eating? Why do we see this more often in Japan?
  Honestly we do not sit on the floor when eating nowadays - more and more houses are westernized and less and less people eat on the floor. But in traditional ceremony we often do it. This is the tradition not only in Japan but among some East Asian countries.

I especially feel grateful to Yusser Chidiac, the Lebanese teacher I met in Toronto and who organized this call with me this time. Hope to connect with you guys again. :)

Mystery Skype with Israel

May 23rd, 2017
Today we talked with children in Israel via Skype.

<Questions>
Do you border the sea? - Yes
Are you in an island? - No
Do you border the Mediterranean Sea? - Yes
Are you in Europe? - No
Do you have red on your flag? - No
Are you in Africa? - No
ARE YOU IN ISRAEL? - YES!

<Game>
We were given quizes (played Kahoot) about Japan and Israel.
A Japanese student won the first place!



<About children>
They were 11 years old. They are in Holon (a city near Tel Aviv).
They knew PPAP, the Japanese YouTuber.
They do not read Japanese comics but have watched Anime.
They asked us many questions.

<Reflection>
Israeli children were very, very, very, very, very active!!
One of the children was dancing!!
If they had question for us, they raised their hands and held up their second finger.
They loved Japan!!

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(Teacher's Comment)

Honestly, the country name "Israel" is not familiar with students in Japan.
The only chance we hear its name is through media but mainly not positive news; something related to political issues or conflicts. Due to this, the negative image against the nation had been created, however, interacting with pupils in the nation for real broke it and got rid of prejudice inside their minds.
I feel really happy to find some students even started look for some information about the country after the skype call.

Thanks very much Gali, the Israeli teacher, for the fantastic moment and sending me this presentation about the country.

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