Ishiki Junior High School

Tuesday, October 23

Today we visited a public junior high school here in Kagoshima. From start to finish, it was an amazing day.

When we arrived we were greeted with much fanfare. The entire school was lined up outside and the band was playing. We immediately felt like honored guests. We listened to presentations by the school adminstration and then had a tour of the school. This school is a training school for university education students and also gives demonstrations to other area teachers throughout the year. It has 605 students and 44 staff members.

Computer lab: Math class:

English class:
Bulletin board: Before entering the bathrooms the students must step onto the blue (for boys) and pink (for girls) platforms, take off the slippers they are wearing in the school and put on the blue and pink slippers.

Science lab:

The hallway has small wooden tables with potted plants on them as a reminder of the tranquility in beauty. The library - yea!

The librarian is making a banner for the assembly the students are putting on for us.

When coming into the school the students take off their shoes, place them in these cubbies and put on slippers. Notice the umbrella racks - you see these everywhere. You can borrow an umbrella and leave it at the next umbrella rack.
The students were very excited to meet us. They were anxious to try out their English. Kids of all ages always give us the peace sign!

The students had prepared an all-school assembly for us and did skits, judo, karate and traditional Japanese archery, calligraphy and some origami! We sang the national anthems of both of our countries. It was all very, very nice.

Karate demonstraton: Judo demonstration:
Origami:

The students serve lunch to each other in their classroom:
The students and the teachers eat together in their classrooms.At 2:00 every afternoon all students spend 20 minutes cleaning the school. They sweep inside and outside the school, scrub sinks, bathrooms, wipe down the floors, empty the garbage, work in the greenhouse and other janitorial type of jobs. They seem to have a lot of fun doing it.

Then it was time to leave. Once again, they rolled out the red carpet for us. The entire school lined up and as we walked past them we shook hands, gave high fives, and peace signs and all the while the band was playing in the background with great vibrato. It had been an incredible day. I think we all left the school feeling like we had just made 600 new friends.