Final comment on my MA

The last 5 months have been the most nerve-wracking time of my life. But all my efforts and achings paid off: I got M.A degree with distinction (meaning honor I think). Oddly enough, my emotional roller coaster reached the top when I sent the dissertation to my university in the UK. So, when I got the result with an honorable award, I felt strangely calm. I felt the sense of achievement and self-indulging excitement only when I announced the result on Facebook and received numerous warm comments from my friends.

At the moment, I've been thinking what's next while my daughter is doing her best to get into the high school she would like to be for the next three years and my partner is doing his best to get a PhD. I'm not anxious about their results. I'm sure they will get what they deserve and they deserve what they wish to have. Perhaps this is what I've learned from MA course. I don't need to worry what I get because I deserve what I deserve anyway. Lots of luck with supports will follow when you can imagine what you need to do and do the best you can. So, here is the path of success of your goal:

1 Dream.
2 Imagine how you get the dream come true.
3 Do it!

DID will get you what you desire eventually. When my daughter was the first grader in a primary school, I had only the Japanese high school diploma. As my daughter is about to become 10th grader this spring, I have a master's degree in TESOL. It is quite an achievement for a lazy and dreamy mum like myself. I have been a dreamer ever since I was born. I can easily imagine something, but I never had steadfast determination to realize the dreams until I had this beautiful baby and the sense of responsibility.

The first challenge was to quit smoking when I conceived my daughter. I dreamed to have a healthy baby, imagined how I could quit smoking and did it. Her presence in my belly got the steadfast determination to achieve this goal. I was a heavy smoker (Three packs a day: a chain smoker) and it wasn't an easy job.

The second challenge was to get a driver's license within the minimum amount of time and cost when my daughter was 2. I dreamed places where I can go with my baby in a car, imagined how I could get the license within a few months and did it. Driving skill is, by the way, one of the most useful skills a mum can have since there are many more occasions than you can ever imagine when you need to get to a certain place (for instance, the hospital) as fast as possible desperately.

The third challenge came to my mind when she entered a primary school. While I was nagging her to do her best at school, I thought to myself,  "I should go back to school and do my best if I tell her to do so." It took me one year to get all the required documents and put myself together. I enrolled in a university to get my BA degree through corresponding course, as my daughter became a second grader. I dreamed to graduate the uni as she graduates her primary school, imagined how to get all the credits by then and did it.

Then the latest challenge came right after the third as my daughter entered a junior high. This time I was more interested in how far I could go on the academic ladder. I dreamed to be awarded MA in the UK, imagined how to work on it and did it. This time, my daughter didn't motivate me in a direct manner, yet her constant criticism and rebellious behavior brought my unyielding spirit. With lots of support from my friends and family, I was able to maintain my determination.

Now it's my daughter's turn to realize her goal and she's shown me how mature and wise she has become. Her spirit inspires me to set a new goal. I can't fully imagine how I pull it off yet. But when I do, you know I will do it :-)

A book of messages.

This morning, I saw my daughter struggling to go to school. I know the face with a little anxiety and less motivation. She had it when she had a tough time at the beginning of this year. I asked her if she was ok and she nodded in a way she wasn't. There is not much I can do to help her except to hope that she would be strong enough to go through one of the most complex period time of her life, especially in the age of 15 before the entrance exam to a high school. The air at school must be intense and everyone gets edgy. I can only imagine how insecure and nervous she feels now because of the uncertainty of the future ahead of her. It seemed impossible to face and deal with the tests you have to take in the school days. It is precious when it's over, but when you are in the middle of it, you want to escape from the stress from time to time. Perhaps she was in such a pessimistic state of mind this morning. I felt the heaviness in the air around her. After sending her off to school, I came to a cafe and talked with one of my dearest friends in Canada via Skype chat for a few hours about my worries and our future projects. I felt calmer and positive after having a nice chat with him. MCU. ( his nickname)

Then I decided to plan for the Halloween party with kids. While I was searching for a book to share for the occasion with kids on Amazon, I found two new books that Momo's favorite author, Naoko Maehashi, published. A book has been one of a means to communicate with her heart. I've been telling her an important message when I get it borrowing other's voice via words of a book. Since this author's words touch her heart the most effectively, I hope this book also talk to her well, reminding her how rebellious and unbeatable her soul is. Momo has learned so many lessons from books, especially Children's literature and the ability to connect with words in the deepest sense is one of her gifts. 

While I was struggling with my own matters, I might have missed the signs she sent to me for supports. My words from the mouth might not comfort her enough but I am sure the books will do the job. It is a gift for me to hear reviews of books she read. I look forward to sitting down at a cafe with her and listen to her interpretation of the books. 

Supermoon night

Supermoon to rise tonight.
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2013/06/23/world/supermoon-to-rise-on-sunday-night/#.Ucar_JiilhM

The moon reminds me of many stories. One of them is a scene from this movie, Evening. An exhausted mum with a serious emotional problem sang the moon song for her kids when everything looked so intimidatingly wrong. She quitted cooking and put her daughter on her laps and went:

I see the moon and the moon sees me
And the moon sees somebody I wanna see...

Being a mum gets overwhelmed from time to time because of all the emotional roller coaster she deal with on daily bases. On such an evening, stop everything and just looking up at the moon with her little girls or boys and singing away would bring a big smile back on her face. How many times would you look up at the night sky and gaze at the moon? How often would you talk about the moon and the memories that are inspired?

Tonight might be one of the suitable one for storytelling night with a supermoon.

Have a lovely evening, everyone!

On my day off

Yesterday was one of those days that I don't enjoy looking back because of the despair I felt at work. I hear some abusive words from kids. Where do those painful and abusive words come from? Don't they come from the mouth of us, grown-ups. It is the chain of harmful words. I hear teachers say, "Why don't you understand such an easy instruction?" "Are you an idiot?" "Shut up!" without any reasons explained to the kids. I completely understand classroom management in a large class is challenging and stressful especially when you need to deal with that all day long. And those 6th graders can be a pain in neck. But abusive words can't stop anything. In fact, they feed only negative and painful vocabulary to the dictionary of our kids. It is true that the world can be brutal and harsh and kids might need to deal with that but I keep thinking what if kids didn't know those harsh and abusive expressions but knew more and more encouraging, supportive and soft words like music to our ears. Words and moods are much more contagious or influential to us than we imagine. For instance, when I feel relaxed and fine, my words become more inviting and cheerful. when my words become more cheerful, Momo, my daughter acts better and nicer. When she is cheerful, more laughters happen among us. And the other way around is the same. I am not saying that we should ignore something unpleasant or abusive incidents in our lives because there are always some.  But by focusing on such events, you become bitter and gloomy and your words usually coincide your mood. Then the painful chain of abusive words take place.

In order to have kids listen to you, perhaps giving them a little time to calm down especially after exciting activities is a better idea than throwing bitter and abusive words at them like, "Shut up! Otherwise, you are out!" " Shut up! Get out of here! You don't know when to stop!" I had enough of those heartbreaking words at work. It really break my heart because those words kill all the pleasures kids had during the activities that they felt excited. It is like feeding kids cake and telling them how bad the eating cake is. It is such a wrong message. One of the teachers say, "Ok, we had fun, Now let's listen to another one. Ok?" He has much better classroom management. It makes sense to kids. And I don't have to stand like an idiot while my team-teacher is screaming at those poor kids. I heard one of the teachers shouted at a girl, "We don't need a person like you! Get out of here!" It was harsher than what the girl mumbled. I felt so awful because she said something childish ( but she is a child and that's what she is supposed to say.) like, "You had a hard luck."to one f her classmate in a pair work. Maybe the teacher meant to shout at me for doing something inappropriate. But in any cases, shouting at the girl in front of the class and killing all the joy all the students were sharing at the moment was inappropriate to me. Whatever the problems she has in her daily behavior, I can't imagine such abusive words can grow anything healthy. I think inspiring and nurturing words can only touch our soft part of the hearts and grow more of empowering words there. What this girl need to empathize how her classmate would feel if she calls him a had luck. Empathy is something kids need to learn in the course of their development. And it is our responsibility to make sure that they learn empathy.

Some days, it is so challenging to be careful with my words. I get tired and stressed out and my words become unkind. For those days, I should remember the face of every kid when the harsh words were poured onto her / him - the most confused, embarrassed and despising faces. After all, I can't change anything nor anyone but myself. I would love to have a circle of musical and inspiring words around me :-)

It's been a while...

I've been dealing with the way too many new things at work on top of preparing two presentations without having chilling & reflecting time on my own. For the first time in a while, I had a peaceful afternoon nap on my favorite sofa. I realize how tired my body and soul has been. I guess that's what happens when you suddenly start dealing with more than 100 different types of humans at work. Before this new work, I talked with only my family and some of kids at my own school. The average number of people I meet was about 5 to 6 a day. They are all familiar faces and I know what to expect. But from a few weeks ago, as my new work begun, suddenly I deal with 40 to 50 people a day and I don't know many of them. For the first time in my life, I realized why I  couldn't handle school life so well back in school days. It is just too much information to take in. At workshops and presentations, I meet new faces and share the time but I often feel like those occasions are for meeting kindred spirits and making new friends. After all, those participants who bother to join my workshop or presentations share the interests or at least have a bit of interest in what I say. So, it has been inspirational and empowering for me to do presentations. However, this job as an ALT is a whole different story. Many of participants (students) got little interests in what I say. In fact some of them including teachers show no interests in me, an ALT. For them, I am just an intruder of their fun school life. One day, she marched in from nowhere and started telling something they didn't care. To make the matter worse, she asks them what  she can do for them. What a nightmare for them! I feel sorry for their confusion but I hope they will eventually understand my intention is not bad at all. In fact, I genuinely would like to get to know them because we are there, sharing the time and space at the same time for some kind of funny and amazing coincidence. It might mean nothing if we ignore the fact that the chance to be in the same classroom at a certain time is very low almost like the level of miracle. I just can't help getting a bit too excited about that. It might be a good reason or some kind of universal mystery going right now. If so, I don't want to miss a thing. Having this crazy idea in my mind, I've been 100% open to whatever I feel at work. With all my senses I take everything going on around me and it's been exhausting. I feel so alive and appreciate the opportunities offered to me but still I haven't got used to such an intense circumstance.
On top of that, at Sunnyfield English, I have nearly 10 new students joined to our learning community last month. I'm so ecstatic but at the same time I feel a bit overwhelmed because of the flood of information I would like to take in. Unfortunately, the capacity of my heart is limitless but that of my head is quite limited. Considering the chaos in my mind, however, things have been rather smooth. In fact it has been unexpectedly good. I appreciate everyone's generosity and patience.

From next month, I will have a full schedule, 5 days a week at elementary schools, 3 days a week at  Sunnyfield English in the evening plus my own study and life. I know there are bunch of people who got much busier schedule but please imagine I am a total beginner for juggling. I can toss and catch only a ball at a time. But now I got 5 balls in my hands to juggle. I am a big believer of "Practice makes perfect" and would keep on trying to juggle well. But in a mean time, I need a group of cheer leaders.
Would you be one of them?

Connected

Ok. I did it! I totally surprised myself. The mission has completed. I did got up on the stage in front of the crowds on the March 1st. What a leap from a mum with a little girl, wishing to find a little cozy place to live at the edge of the society to a TEDx Tokyo Teacher's speaker. For some people who are lecturers, presenters and pro-speakers,  it might not such a big deal. But for someone who leads a small and simple life, such a big event was something extraordinary. I must thank my friend, Noriko, who planted this crazy idea into my little simple mind as she posted TEDx Tokyo Teacher's speaker's application on the FB. As I mentioned before, I didn't expect myself to put myself into such a frightening situation. By nature, I think I keep my heart and mind open to something new. But I am also super self-conscious and terrified to be criticized by others. Then why did I dare to get up on the stage?  I guess my crave for sharing and communicating with others got much bigger and stronger than any anxieties and insecurities I still have inside of me. Being accepted as who I am by my family and friends is another reason to be brave and try out things I have never imagined myself doing. This year has been just awesome as my connection with others got deeper and bigger. I feel less fearful and much more liberated. I certainly have developed much thicker skin as well.

I've started reading a book about storytelling called The Storytelling Animal. I suspect that is who we are and that is what I was born to be. We read stories to know about other lives and our own. We tell stories to feel connected with each other. Via my new challenge which is to share my findings in class with other ELTs, I've already met so many unique,wonderful and inspiring people and heard so many extraordinary stories. 

In order to stay little more objective, I imagine my life like a book to write. I am the author of it and all rights served. I am not sure what next page will be like and I don't need to know how it would end. All I know at this moment is my story is getting merrier and richer with much more connections with other open souls. 

On Cloudy Morning

As I got up in this morning, I saw the grey sky and a bit gloomy face on my daughter at the morning table. She has the sudden deafness on her right ear and has to take very yucky medicine. On top of that she won't be able to enjoy music at the moment in order to give a bit of break to her ears. Taking away music from her is like taking her soul out of her. No wonder why her smiles are away from her chubby cheeks. In such an unfavorable circumstance, she always hum but this time she won't even do so. She buried her face into a book as if she tried to escape from the reality.

Then I started to think to myself, "What's the damage to listen to a soothing melody in the morning? She is gonna listen to some lectures that teachers make today, anyway. Why not a song! Just a song to start her day." So, I started searching a good song for her on youtube and found another mellow  yet beautiful tune of our favorite singer, Jason Mraz. We love his thought-provoking message and his beautiful melody with a hint of melancholy. The tile was "When we die".  It can be the most inappropriate song for such a grey morning but it turned out to be the best one to listen because of the message, "Live like it is your last day".

We often take out lives for granted. We live as if we can live forever. We get bored. We get lazy. We neglect to communicate with our family and friends. We tend to be caught up in things that bother us so much instead of appreciating things that you have in your hands. We moan, cry and whinge way too much. But when we take each day as our last day, we act differently. Like my grandparents in their last days, we would appreciate things more. We adore every single moment we have and won't waste any of our time on moaning and whinging. Instead, we would focus on what we can enjoy every single second of our day. We would do something productive not destructive. Who would you like to spend the last day with? What would you like to do? How would you like to be remembered ? By whom?

On the last day, I would like to spend with my family and real friends joking and laughing as we share nice meal and would like to thank every one of them for taking me as the way I am. And I would like to be remembered as who I am: messy, clumsy, cheeky gal who loves this brutally complex yet beautiful world. Like one of my teachers from high school said I am still excessively happy, curious and brutally honest immature being.  Yeah and I know very little about things. Yet I know I am loved and I certainly love the people who dared to get involved in my absolutely chaotic life. And this fact always get me smile even in the tempest.

As we finished listening to the song, I spied a hint of sparkle in my daughter's eyes. I would like to think that she is humming or whistling the tune right now at school. And one day if not today, she would realized she is loved by so many people because of the way she is.

A Cheeky Story

Can you imagine yourself standing on a stage in front of 300 audience, presenting your own idea?
I honestly can't. I repeat I can NOT imagine that. But what if a little crazy idea pops up in your mind one night and acted on the idea without considering the consequences? I sometimes jump into troublesome adventure because those events make me feel so alive. All my senses got sharp and awaken by the shock. I love surprising people, especially myself. I do sometimes I can never imagine myself doing. This story is one of them.

At the beginning of this new year, one of my friends posted about an announcement that TED Tokyo teachers is seeking speakers and entertainers on FB. She challenged us to make action on this opportunity. That was right after I read a book, Dare Greatly about the real meaning of braveness. As a typical of me, I  dared to send an application form just to show how brave I could be. I thought to myself, "No way I got a chance to talk." But I was happy and proud that the fact that I filled the form and sent it to TED Tokyo.

I have been researching on code-switching and its functions in EFL classrooms for young learners, more specifically beginner students at my school. While reading numbers of research paper on code-switching of bilingual children, I came across one of catchy title, We only learn language once. The role of the mother tongue in FL classrooms:death of a dogma. (Butzkamamm, 2003) It tickled my anti-authority and rebellious mind. The paper  asserts how L1 can be one of the most effective resource for language learning and introduces Sandwich technique, founded by a german scholar, Dodson in 70's. It was such a cathy name that I wanted to dig a bit about this technique and by the end of reading his paper, I was hungry enough to taste it in my classrooms with my students.

I have been planning to have Story-based or narrative-based teaching for I am a big believer of story and its magic over mind and souls of young learners. I enjoyed lots of stories as a child and turned my daughter a big story fan. I believe those stories are the foundation of my beliefs and values. Since I collected so many picture books for myself and my daughter, I wanted to share with other kids and hope that they would learn English as they enjoy the stories. I've read a book called, The Storytelling guidebook and learned how to utilize those brilliant narratives for language learning. So, it didn't take me so long to integrate the sandwich technique into my story telling practice.

For the first time, I read a story a little bit higher than my students' English proficiency with brief Japanese translation, they were so engaged to the story that they went so quiet. They could answer all the comprehension questions after the storytelling at ease. I really liked the result and stretched the use of Japanese a bit more for pair work. I gave some pairs some tasks and asked them to work them out together. They immediately code-switched to Japanese but successfully achieved the tasks together.
I liked the spontaneous interactions among them and the support they give each other. They looked engaged and enjoying the challenges. They came up the answers for the tasks in L2 but the spontaneous interaction that occurred in the pair work was conducted in L1. But it didn't bother me after understanding the nature of code-switching and its benefits. Students felt liberated to participate the class more actively and I was amazed and amused by the interactions among students. The vibe in the classroom was positive and lively.

So, I started to hypothesize that by accepting more spontaneous usage of mother tongue in some activities would facilitate more positive learning environment and consequently have students more engaged and active learners in my classrooms.

This bilingual method was in my mind when I filled the application form and didn't have a second thought when I sent it to TED Tokyo. So, that blew me away when I got the invitation to their speaker's workshop. I humbly accepted the offer and went to their first workshop for public speech last Sunday and had one of the most exciting and though-provoking day in my life with amazingly interesting participants and two incredibly supportive, passionate and giving mentors.

I knew what I wanted to tell but as soon as I got on a stage, my mind went paralyzed with nervousness   and words didn't come out from my mouth. Nevertheless, all the participants were patient, supportive and gave me some feedback.

I am not sure yet if TED Tokyo would want me to get back on the stage and let me to get words out of my heart on March 1st. I am not sure if my little fragile heart can take the thrill.

Excuse me? Yes, I have a very fragile and sensitive heart PERIOD

But I would try to get ready for the day because it would worth trying to do something I never imagined myself doing. I am trying to surprise myself.

A personal reflection at the end of the first month of the year.

It has been a month since the new year started perhaps a good time to reflect what went through my mind so far. I've got a few projects in hand, the Action Research on L1 usage, potential HV presentation and TED Tokyo speaker's workshop on this Sunday. I applied to the presentation a few weeks ago and got e-mail from one of organizers of TED Tokyo yesterday. In the application form, I wrote my thoughts regarding English education in Japan particularly on L1 use as a bilingual language teacher. My presentation would uncover what has been going on in the language teaching industry and classroom at school via my personal observation. I assumed nobody would take what I think and try to bring a bit of change seriously because I am just a person in a crowd. Although I personally think everyone has something extraordinary to tell, I never believed people would be interested in my own story for I haven't done anything extraordinary. But I suspect the catchy title - Would you like some BLT Sandwich in a language learning? might have attracted their interest. In fact, what I have contributed to the world is a small private language school for young learners with a little idea.

After my own daughter's birth, I set up Sunnyfield English to facilitate a learning space for local children via learning English. I never wanted to expand the business or numbers of students. In fact, I wanted to keep it as small as 2 to 3 classes a day for 5 days a week with 30 to 40 young learners in order to maintain the homy atmosphere and close relationship with them. However, from last year, the numbers of students started to drop and now become the half of the number used to be. The reason is crystal clear that children grew up and left our house and I haven't found the new ones to look after.  When my daughter was much younger, teaching at Sunnyfield English was the only job I had and I used to take a pleasure in organizing some events and did a bit of advertisement via posting flyers from time to time. Since some of friends of my students kept on joining, the number of students stayed almost the same for about 10 years. I was able to support myself graduating from 4 year university while my daughter was in elementary school while making a nothing fancy but comfortable living by the tuitions I charged. I certainly appreciate all the children and their parents for their support and understanding of my practice. After completing my BA in English literature, I went on learning further and got myself on a Master's program last year. In spite of my passion in this field, my interest and attention has been paid to more personal and professional development as a facilitator but not as an owner of the school.  Nevertheless, the biggest motivation and inspirations to keep this place is those children's laughters and the twinkling eyes when they discover something. I feel so blessed and spirited when I am with children in last 5 or 6 years. I suspect I see the little tiny chubby baby I held 13 years ago in every one of children I meet. In other words, I became one of the mums who blindly and helplessly love her children. It can't be complete unconditional because of little expectations I hold towards them but "humanly" unconditional and compassionate love. There are not much I can do for those beautiful creatures by sharing only an hour a week but one thing I believe I might have a chance to do is to plant the love of reading into the heart of them.  Unfortunately I can't go and read a story a night by their beds like I used to do for Momo but fortunately all of my children have their own mums who can possibly enjoy the stories children bring back to their homes as they leave my classroom. I might be naive to think that a language instructor can bring a bit of change at home but this goal would remain as my life time goal. And if this can be realized more pleasurably with a help of L1, I say why not! In order to keep this wishy-washy dream, this year I promised myself to tell the society where I am and what I do more actively, meaning making flyers and posting them.
After all, If TED Tokyo are willing to listen to what I think, my little idea which is planting the love of reading in the heart of little ones while utilizing children's L1 via BLT Sandwich, might be worth spreading.

Snowy day in 2013 : The first post :-)

The first snow in Tokyo area. It fell quite heavily so that I stayed home and watched the legendary movie, The Load of the Rings. My partner is a big fan of the book and passionately told me about the author, the legendary Tolkien. According to him, this stories were written for the author's grandchildren. I can't imagine a better gift than an amazing original story with full of adventures and wisdom. It is one of classics that would be told and enjoyed from generation to generation. Like most of classics of children's literature, it has some anecdotal episodes that could answer one of unavoidable question of youthful minds: What is the point of my small being?

Having watched three hours of movie, suddenly I was struck with mixed sentiment of heartwarming and heartaching. The latter was for those children who study so hard to enter a school they (or their parents) wish to go without having time to enjoy such a fantastic story on such a cozy day. My daughter was one of them last year and I still remember the awful sentiment I had as I sent off the little fragile back to the test site. Fortunately, she passed the test and has started the completely new life last April.

Almost a year has passed and she has been into the brass band, playing trombone 7 days a week. In spite of the extremely busy schedule and daily challenges she faces as a teen, she has become cheekier, more cynical and critical, experiencing the sweet and bitter taste of a human life. Whether the school she goes to is the right one for her or not, she is in the system, trying to figure out the puzzles she finds daily. There are more than a few things I don't agree with the school policy, especially the way they force students to study all the time, focusing too much on the results, not the process, ignoring the spontaneous and autonomous intellectual curiosity that each children possesses. However, it is not my role to decide whether she should bear the complete teacher-centerd and dictator style of education or not. After numerous sleepless nights, hysterical screams and tongue-biting moments, I have become a little tougher and fairer mum. Now I, at least, try to let her hold the ownership of her life's path. And I hope I have shown her enough to know that when she falls and needs my hands again, I will be there for her.

I have no talent to come up with a story that can make a great classic for children's literature but I might be able to learn and practice the wisdom I have given from the great story.

"This task was appointed to you, Frodo of the Shire. If you do not find a way, no one will. "

I would like to share this quote from the story with my daughter and think about the meaning of the quote together as we walk along the bumpy and dusty road stretching ahead of us. Who knows! she might find such task and might become the one who "change the course of future." 

Happy 2013 to you all!

Something to think of during the break.

The young musicians, aged from 13 to 15 have dared to play a challenging tune on a big stage for a competition which 160  ensembles of junior high schools in Tokyo entered. It was held at one of the largest concert  hall in west Tokyo. In front of them, there were heaps of audience and some intimidating looking judges. Their pressure might have been enormous due to the expectation from peers from the school and the club. In spite of the daunting situation, they stood high in the center of the stage and played their music in harmony. Their outstanding efforts and devotion brought them the Gold prize and admirations from their peers, instructors and parents. Nobody forced them to do. It was merely their free will to enter the ensemble and the competition.

Had witnessed what kids can do when they put their heart into it, what Kohn asserts in this video make sense more. Part of his assertion can be a bit too extreme and too generalizing for I also know that some kids can find their places even in a traditional education system, memorizing facts and figures and flourish in their own way. And perhaps the real world is not that ideal place to live on with heaps of controversial issues and contradictions as we all know. Perhaps the patience and steadfast will can be emerged from rather bitter experiences in school days. One of the auto biological books of a legendary teacher from one of the elite school, Nada, says hard work and lots of devotion from an educator make differences at school. His way was rather unconventional in terms of contents to teach.  Yet in terms of amount of work and devotion required from students and teacher-centered style, his way is conventional. I am sure there are many other cases that traditional education work well and some of them might have found their places at school and become teachers. With passion and devotion, children might be able to absorb something from the class. But I think traditional teacher-centered way doesn't work to everyone, either.  So, it is only fair if schools come up with unique and alternative ways, depending on the learning style, social and cultural circumstance, mindset and other variables each student might have or may deal with. Because it is not impossible if all the educators and stakeholders put their heart into the reformation. Progressive education Kohn asserts might not make the ideal and perfect education but at least the ownership of learning would be given to the learners and there are more chances that they might feel more engaged and enjoyable in learning. What educators and stakeholders can do is to facilitate the comfortable and welcoming spaces for learners to flourish and also provide supports when needed. Then learners might be able to apply their own style to learn how to solve puzzles that they wonder in the real world. Finding some convincing answers for your puzzles can be time-consuming and requires hard work as well but at least you are actively involved in the quest and perhaps that is what excites us.

In much smaller scale, what I can do is to provide such a place for young learners of English. Just imagining the faces in flow get me excited!

A Christmas Story

There are heaps of traditional Christmas stories to share during Christmas holiday. You also find little dramas and stories everywhere and I found one to share today in the morning on the Christmas eve.  

As my forgetful daughter, Momo left for school for practicing and preparing the concert she is participating today,  I sat in the kitchen table with freshly made coffee, thinking what and how to cook the Christmas dinner  we are having tonight at home. Then the phone rang. My heart doesn't dance as I pick the phone in the morning because those calls at the time of the day are usually emergency calls. As I looked at my cell phone, my heart actually sank because it was from my daughter and I knew it would definitely an emergency one. 

"Mum!"

Oh no...I thought to myself. 

"Bring the costume to school. I forgot them all."

Of course...it is the concert day, isn't it? Why didn't I make sure that she had everything? 

"Mum! Are you listening? Bring the band uniform! ok?"

After taking a long sigh and deep inhale, I finally manage to say, "Ok.", thinking how I was gonna complete this mission without my car. 

As soon as I put my phone down, the well informed critics in my head started shouting at me, 

"You are spoon feeding Momo. She can't be responsible if you help her all the time. "

" You are overprotecting mum." 

"Do you know who would be called? Helicopter mum!"

" You are sending her a wrong message by doing what she asks to do. " 

" You are spoiling your daughter!"

"You will regret what you are about to do!"

Another big sigh, coming out of my heart.

I needed to sit down on the chair in the kitchen and started to reflect what Momo was going through. On the Christmas eve, she left home for school in the early morning, practicing for the concert she would give with other high schoolers of the city where her school is located. I imagined her little dried hands with heaps of small cuts from carrying the heavy musical instruments for her club mates. I imagined her little swallowed lips from practicing trombone for the concerts during this holiday. I imagined her smile on the stage when she successfully performed her part. I imagined her numerous sighs and mumbles when things get too challenging to deal with. I imagined her jolly whistles as she wipes her tears. Then I had to put myself together and find out how I could deliver the uniform on time using the public transportation. 

Then my phone rang again. It was from my mum, telling me to get the uniform ready to deliver. Apparently, she was also notified by Momo about the emergency. Most of you might go, 

"What a spoilt child she is!" 

"That is awful to ask such a thing to her grandma in the early Christmas eve morning." 

And I agree with you. She is a spoilt brat. But she is also considerate and sweet girl who often acts considering others happiness and tries to do her best. She didn't mean to forget things but her mind is not capable of retaining all the information she gets. She feels stressed out and annoyed by her forgetful mind as well. I know how awful she feels whenever she forgets to bring something because I've been there. I was exactly like her at her age but I had a less crazy schedule. I had plenty of time to check and support in case of "emergency". My mum laughed at my forgetfulness and never got angry with it. And even with her grand daughter, she shows the forgiveness and humor. Again this morning, she called us to give helping hand again. But while my little critics shouting to my ears, I almost refused her help, saying Momo needs to learn how to be responsible. Then Mum said, 

"She's got plenty of time to learn that.  But you don't do that today. It is Christmas eve and let her enjoy the spirit." 

Lately my mum aged so quickly and forget things. She also struggles with her forgetfulness and understand how irritating it can be.  It has been upsetting for me to see her in a mess for she was a super mum. Selfishly and childishly I expect her to stay the way she has been without considering her age. But I admit I haven't been considerate or supportive enough with her. In spite of my childishness, she gave us a help without any conditions. She just gives without any expectations. She shows us how to be compassionate and what the Christmas spirit is all about. 

Perhaps Momo won't realize how amazingly wonderful her grandma is till she has the same experience as I did today. I felt so small and awful but at the same time so lucky to have a great role model as a mum. I was a spoilt brat like Momo when I was her age and sometimes I still am if not worse. But I remember  how helpful the laughter of my mum when I did something stupid and realized how those laughters and humor made who I am today.  I am full of errors and faults but my mum loves who I am. Why can't I do the same to my daughter? 

It is so unfair if I don't accept who she is because I was forgiven and accepted as who I was. It is my turn to do so. My mum said to me when I had Momo, 

"Enjoy your motherhood! It would be full of discoveries. Enjoy it while you can!"

 What a gift I got on Christmas eve! It is the messy and crazy motherhood for a teenager that I can experience and learn from only once in the life time. As my mum says, I would let myself enjoy the thrilling ride with occasional emergency calls and lots of laughters. After all, those crazy and silly moments would make unforgettable memories.

Who is the best role model for my language learning?

I've spend a day at Joint JALT Tokyo conference and had a chance to think who my role model was when I started learning English. The theme of the conference was, "There is no best method." but the discussion during the first plenary speaker, Dr. Andy Curtis, ended up in "Who can be the best role model for the language learners?" while he got us walk through the history of English language education and its methodology. It was quite interesting shift from talking about the best Methodology to the best roll model. To me, it was engaging topic for I constantly wonder if I am good enough as a language instructor. I keep on asking myself, "How can you be the best roll model for your students when your English can not be "Perfect"?" I Would try to make it as good enough as possible as a communication tool, however, I can never see myself to build the same sense of ease and confidence when I produce sentences in English as I do in my 1st language. My heart resonate with the phrases such as Daring greatly and the gift of imperfection because of the fact that I can't see myself achieving the native-like proficiency in English. And if the best roll model means someone who show the perfect model, I am a failure.

However, when I look back to my learning experiences, I remember some persons who were adorably imperfect and beautifully messy in a very wholehearted way. They motivated me to be able to communicate with them in order to get to know them more. Even for the different areas such as parenting, my roll models are not perfect human-beings yet they dealt with me as real and sincere as possible and accept me as who I am.  So, for me "the best" means not "the perfect". The best means more like sincere or real.

So, just in time before Christmas I found one more wish to add to my wishing list. That is to be courageous enough to show up in the classroom as sincere and real as possible in spite of all the anxieties and fears I might feel.

I am thankful for the opportunity to attend such a thought-provoking conference.

Momo's Learning Journey: Where does she go?

As I have mentioned more than a few times, my daughter has been getting terrible scores on English tests at school due to spelling errors and other careless errors in writing. She must have thought that she could be a super cool A+ student in her English classes, considering the time she spent with me, reading and playing in English until the age of 12 when she started studying for the entrance exam. In spite of the fact, she ended up taking extra-class-for- dummies at school. The outcome? She started saying "I HATE English."

Those classes are designed for slow learners and they supposed to help students to improve their learning skills and she should be glad to have such opportunities. But considering the humiliation the slow learners might feel to be in the class when the whole school kids know the reason why they take the classes, I felt uncertain about the effect of the effort of teachers. In spite of my concern, those extra-class-for-dummies have become her favorite.  What teachers do is to give them some tasks/ handouts to work on individually while they look after other things in the teacher's room. At the beginning, the kids did as they were told to do but eventually came up with better strategies on their own while teachers are away from the classroom. They started helping each other. Momo says learning together work better in fun and quicker way. I am not sure if it was really the teacher's intention but it happened and she said teachers were happy as long as all the tasks were correctly done within a certain time.

From this semester, she is no longer the "regular" of the class for her spelling skills got better and ironically she misses the class. Her enthusiasm in the "special" class asserts that the effect of peer learning for the age group. With more scaffolding from teachers, their learning might be accelerated, I wonder. But the peer learning experience has very positive effect on her motivation and also on her English proficiency test score. She took one of them at her school last month. This one is regular national proficiency test that the school requires students to take. In spite of her much lower than average score on her school English tests, she got 10th highest score in her school. It was a sudden leap from 40 something to 80 marks.

Daily exposure to authentic interaction between my partner and myself at breakfast table in English must be one of the reasons for the phenomenal change. For my own sake, I would like to think that the memories associated with a sense of pleasure via reading picture books and playing learning activities with her classmates at Sunnyfield English (my own school) started paying off as well. I have no idea how to prove it but she often says, "I know this phrase from Dr. Seuss.","Ah, Mr. Putter says this." and uses some expressions from those picture books she read or songs she enjoyed. It seems like after a few months of English lessons at school, those memories have returned to her mind.

Perhaps I am just speculating for my own benefit but she does started remembering bits of phrases, vocabularies, stories and songs from past and uses the experiences and knowledge for her learning. If she would be able to use her memories to hypothesize the meanings of unknown words and phrases in her learning, my score as a mum might get higher, at least on my self-evaluation sheet. Process is more important than the outcome for sure. But the positive outcome do motivate us to keep on learning to learn.

Case study of M : Some radical change in the teenager.

Last night I witnessed two radical changes in my daughter.

1 She asked me to help her English homework for the first time in several months, saying upsettingly, "When I took the trombone from my club room, one of my club mate said to me that I shouldn't take it home. Because I would fail to get good scores in English test again if I enjoy practicing music. So, I've got to study hard, Mum! "
She said for the first time in her life she felt offended by the assumption of her friend. So, she needs to prove that her friend is not right. well, whatever the reason is, a motivation is a motivation!

2 After the dinner, she suddenly asked my partner if he would teach her how to play the guitar. She said, "Just because I have spare time." But she usually plays games for pleasure. As my partner praised how quick she learned some codes, she proudly said, "I have some talent for music." This is very interesting remark for she is not really confident in her potentials and capabilities. She often says, "I am not so smart. I can't remember things." and focus on negative features of herself. I wondered where this confident come from. I heard her mumbling, "I can' play trombone well." more than several times lately but last night she was different.
The interaction between my partner and daughter lasted about 30 min. and she thanked him for helping her. Then we studied English together about for an hour.

Something magical and miraculous happened last night. I am not sure if the magic continues or vanishes but it was definitely something to note.

Progress I noticed in her English ability:

• Better spelling strategies
• Maintained fairly good pronunciation
• Achieved more lexical knowledge
• Improved reading and writing skills
• Showed more perseverance for challenging tasks 

But no spontaneous production skill can be seem. Very interesting to see how these changes would lead her.

A good question to ask.

"How would you like to feel when you enter your classroom?"

This was the question asked in the presentation that Brian, one of my jolly and wonderful friends gave at ETJ Chubu Expo. When I met him as my partner's friend for the first time last year, I noticed he has got exceptionally calm and friendly way to talk and move. I also discovered that he was a talented musician. This time I found out that he is also an awesome trainer of NLP. Each participant in his presentation got a gift to take home with him/ her. Mine is a circle that I can always go back when I feel destructed. The C-C-C circle: Confident, connected and calm. This is the mental state I always wish to be not only in classroom but wherever I go, whatever the circumstance I am in, whoever I am with and whenever I am with others.
He introduced us one of the ways to be in the mental status anytime we wish. It would take time and lots of practice to acquire this technic but it would worth the effort I think.

It was also interesting to know that all the emotions, confident, connected and calm, are related to one occasion to me. That was the moment I held my daughter into my arms after the long painful labor for the first time. I never felt so confident that I could do my best for the little beautiful gift. I never felt so connected to any other beings. I never felt so calm as I saw her peaceful face. As I was guided to remember the time when I felt the each emotion, I went back to the exact moment, feeling my heart got expanded and warmed up so nicely. And I will surely remember the C-C-C circle to step in anytime I wish or need. I will practice this new way to be in the mental status I wish to be in class in order to enjoy and share my time and information with my children/ students from now on.

My understanding of presentation is to present something worth sharing and I have attended so many fantastic presentations and learned how to make my practice better a lot. But the circle I got from Brian's presentation with his lovely partner, Sarah was something more than that to me. It was something that can transform my perspective of my whole little world into something more hopeful and pleasant. From time to time, life can be overwhelming for a person like me who has grown up in a safe and comfy home with heaps of love without going though so many hardships. I have become a mum with a teenager but I still feel like a young buddha, naive and ignorant to the beautifully complex world with lights and shadows. In such daunting moments, I would go back to the C-C-C circle in oder to find the confident, connected and calm person in my heart.

Are you living your dream?

When I was a little girl, I had a cousin who was 6 months older than I was. We were brought up like twins and we were best friends. Every weekend, I visited my uncle's place, which was in Kamakura, to play with her. We loved make-believe, acting like I was a princess and she was my nanny. Somehow, she didn't mind her unfair role at all and we both enjoyed coming up all sort of adventures in our small la-la land. We also loved reading picture books together. I still believe this childhood fun playtime with my best friend enriched my imagination and nurture my love for narratives / stories. Consequently, I started dreaming to be a writer as soon as I entered my teenage era. I didn't practice writing or  anything productive for my dream, however, I imagined the peaceful, elegant and lovely life of writers and felt content with the possibility. Somehow I had no reality check such as would I make it as a writer? Would that be a good and realistic carrier ? Would I make living for writing something? I just simply believed that if I want to I could be anyone or anything. Thanks to my mum, a genuine dreamer for feeding all sorts of fairly tales into my little absorbing mind.

Eventually, I have realized making your own dream happen takes so much effort and perhaps a bit of luck as well. It doesn't just miraculously happen without any efforts. It takes time, patience and steadfast faith in yourself. On top of that, you need some amazing supports from others as well as appropriate characteristics for the carrier. The miracle might happen when all the elements work in harmony at the right time for you. It is not impossible at all but it ain't easy at all, either.

As a mum of a teenager and a teacher for young learners, I often come up with a situation when I need to answer some philosophical questions from them. One of them is what is the point of living dream for such a small chance. All the effort and time you have spent might not work and you might end up in a carrier that you don't exactly love for reasons that most of dads and mums have. And some of grown-ups say, "Stop dreaming. Be realistic! You can't live when you have no job!" I have no objection for the realistic remark at all, however, I say, "Who knows what the future brings us? Why do you confine yourself based on the reality of someone else?"

The truth is that things might not work but they might work as well at the same work. So, why not taking a chance and make sure what works and what don't. After all, we live only once, at least, as who we are now. Instead of fearing the consequences for pursuing my dream, I would like to invest all my energy on chasing it. That is, of course, if the circumstance allows you.  In this crazy world, ridiculously unfair events happen: some incredibly nice people got hard luck on their carriers and lives. There is no guarantee for success. There is no shortcut  for finding meaningfulness in your life, either.

Your dream doesn't have to be so big. It can be a small goal like, "I will make my child smile at least once today!" Happy smiles are contagious and you never knows where the smily positive vibe will get you. At the face of risks and consequences, we all feel small and scared but it is up to us that we take the chance or not. And every action we make has a potential for learning and growing.

So, like my mum, my answer to the question - What's the point of pursuing a dream? - is that
it will be worth chasing if you have one because you can always gain something. If it is not the goal, it is the process. Nobody can take the experiences and findings away from you. Besides, you are lucky enough to be capable of dreaming or having a goal at such a difficult time to dream.

I am here still chasing my dream and goals every single day with whatever I can and one of the drive forces is the childhood memories with the amazing friend, my cousin, my twin sister. Unfortunately, my cousin is no longer in my reach for some illogic logic of grown-ups who decided to stay away each other without any contacts at all. ( my uncle and aunt was divorced when we were 12.) I don't know what kind of life she is leading but I truly hope that my rich childhood, filled with laughters and plays because of her presence, has also nurtured her heart to be a dreamer even when she feels time is not on her side.

"Oh...that's a kid stuff..."

Many of my friends who teach English at schools might share the idea that generally Japanese students are passive in their learning. They might not complain whatever you do in class and just passively accept and get involved in activities reluctantly. This general notion captures the tendency of my students, aged 11 and above, however, as long as the young ones are concerned, they don't hesitate to tell me either explicitly or implicitly. Especially younger than 8, speak their mind so explicitly that the comments can sound even brutal. But the straightforwardness is what I really love about them and truly appreciate their feedback in spite of an instant rage or quite sharp heartache arise inside of myself as I receive such sharp criticism from children.

Of course there are some cases reflect just absolute selfish nature of some children and need to be informed that there are some occasions they might have to do things they don't really take pleasure so much. For example, not sharing color pencils with other kids that belong to the school, being an absolute sore loser in learning activities or being excessively violent/ wild physically or verbally to others in class. In fact, any abusive behavior with others shouldn't be allowed for any reasons. At the face of abusive behavior,  a teacher as a safe learning environment facilitator, must immediately act to stop such nonsense and counterproductive behavior. A follow-up individual interview also need to be done sometime after class to investigate the causes in order to prevent such unpleasant situations.

However, when children express their displeasure or deficiency in the contents of my classes in a relatively civilized manner, such as a comment, "Oh...that's a kid stuff..." or a big sigh. The voice / sign should be taken seriously and appreciated for their sincere feedback. Yes, it is tough to face your failures especially when you tried to do your best. And also it is human nature that we upset by a negative evaluation and language teachers are humans who are extra sensitive to words. I bet I frown or show a disappointment as I take their criticism but hopefully children would forgive my immaturity and give me credit for the effort to facilitate better learning contents and environment.  In fact, most of children I know are very forgiving and give me so many chances to modify things that don't work in class.

From this week, I will record the entire interaction with my students and see what the datas reveal. Whatever it would be, it would be a learning opportunity if I take it so, would it?

What makes the world wonderful?

Are you singin'? Dancin' to this beautiful tune? Can you related to this sentiment? How often do you think to yourself, "What a wonderful world!"

As I teach young learners for quite long time, I have come across with some who are chronically depressed about their lives, finding no meanings, no motivation, no pleasures at all. Their common phrases would be, "I can't do it. " "I don't know." "I am tired." "I am sleepy." "Sorry." They don't destruct other students by being noisy, nasty or naughty. They just sit on the corner of the classroom with emotionless faces. I can't feel any energy from them. They don't react any cheekiness from their teacher, either. They come and go without participating. Is this person familiar to you?

It has been tough to understand what in the world is going on in their minds because I have never been a child like them. I was physically weak but very very cheeky inside. I often imagined something really naughty to do or say in class and entertained other kids by telling the ideas during breaks. My classmates usually love my ideas and we all laughed together. Being funny was my way to connect with others. Otherwise I would be a loser and the best target for bullies for my chubby looks and sluggish way of speaking. Being funny and cheeky was my best protection in my childhood. So, sitting spiritlessly like a zombi in the classroom was never occurred to me. The bullies would have killed me spiritually if I did so.

Those zombified kids for some reasons are not slow learners or chubby like I was. In fact most of them are bright and good-looking to me. And perhaps they might be considered as "good" kids for they are quiet and most of the time do what I ask to do. I just can't feel the vigorous spirits that most kids possess which bother me so much and need to know the causes. In spite of my strong interest or concern towards those zombified ones, they won't usually open their mouths unless I managed to build a rapport with them somehow. It has been fifty-fifty whether I can build rapport or not. If parents allow me to let me be with them for a while, I have more chances to get to know them but if I have only a few months,
 I am useless.

In my long career, I met a few kids of this kind who courageously opened their hearts to me and talked about their issues. Those were very very emotional moments and I salute them for their courage to open up and share their vulnerability with someone like me who share only an hour a week with them. From what I heard from them, I got a hypothesis that they have enormously high expectation for their lives and so their parents are and they are extremely goal-oriented. They have tendency to ignore all the pleasure of learning which lies in the learning process. No matter what outcome is if the process is worth participating, you will try again even at the face of big failure or setback. The kind of perseverance or "faith" in your potential is needed for them. They are perfectionist and feel constantly disappointed with their skills and talent because of the sky high expectations. When this persons meet  other perfectionist in their family, things intensified and every learning opportunity become a test or a judgement of his/ her talent. Eventually they stop trying and go for safe way, which is not bad at all. I don't mean to criticize anyone's life style but if this perfectionism leads some kids chronically depressed or kills their natural curiosity, I can't sit around and let it go. I would like to do something with them because they are part of the wonderful world we live in. They can take part in as who they are in this strange world with full of unique creatures including humans. And the truth is I've never met anyone perfect so far. There might be some but I've never net them yet and according to my wise grandma, there is none.

This kind of zombified people due to the perfectionism is defined as "fixed mindset" and the other who have more faith in their potentiality is "growth mindset", according to Dweck. She asserts that such mindsets come from what authorities (parents and teachers) say to them in their childhood when they are still so vulnerable to their words.

This is my topic for my Methodology assignment. I would like to examine myself as a teacher/ mum so that I won't at least hurt any children. I am aware of my limitation. I am aware that there is little tiny bit of time I can share with my kids. But within the precious time, I hope I can help them to see their amazing potential and amazingly bright and positive future not in the mere opportunistic way or idealistic way. I would like them to see their potential in the more realistic way via eliciting their psychological strength, toughness and perseverance at the face of setbacks. I need to research more how I can possibly help them find all the quality they posses inside but I know I will if I don't give up.

It is quite funny that my grandpa gave me this beautiful name, Chiyuki. In chinese character, it means "Never give-up" I think my grandpa's only expectation for me was to be growth mindset and live this precious life in my own unique way. With his unconditional love and unjudgmental wish for my well-being, I become who I am in spite of more than few times of severe fights with fatal sicknesses.

Seligman asserts that there are 4 features to fulfill to flourish your life :
positive emotion
engagement at work
positive relationship
accomplishment / meaningful life

My hypothesis is that parents and teachers play key figures to cultivate the essential mindset for kids to realize well-being on their own in their adulthood.

Do you see the beauties and wonderful features of the world? Then we are on the same page :-)

Home

What is home? Where do you call home? Where do you feel at home? Is that the place you live now? Is that the place you are originally from? Is that the place you work at?

This weekend, I had an amazing experience at an occasion that could be so overwhelming and even traumatic. For my first solo presentation, (I had more than few experiences to do presentation with some other fantastic teachers) I had more than 50 audience unexpectedly. Considering the quality of the product, Happy Valley, it is understandable that it got so much attention but it was from late afternoon and I am nobody in EFL world so that I assumed it would be rather a small number of audience might come. I asked some of my mates come and join my first presentation to cerebrate the new start but never imagined anything like that (nearly 70 audience) happens. It was so surreal and phenomenal to me. I couldn't believe my own eyes and needed to walk away from the room with full of nice smily and friendly faces. Outside of the room, I thought to myself, "What am I doing here? What if everyone got so disappointed? How I am gonna apologize to the audience who came to the presentation to learn something?" Then the panicky feeling swallowed this small being. I wasn't ready to stand up and talk to the people in front of me. They might have left their kids at home for the presentation. They might have many other better things to do. It would be a waste for them if they get nothing from this presentation because of me. All the panicky thought went through my mind and my heart started pounding so badly that I didn't know how to breath. I had to turned my back to the audience to take a deep deep breath.
At the moment I turned my back and walked a few more steps away from the door of the room, there was a tall man with a big warm smile on his face. Very gentle and assuring smile. I walked up to him and said, "I am not sure what I am doing here." He said, "They are not audience. They are your students. 3 or 4 years old. All you need to do is to go and teach them like usual. "

His words worked like a magic. My panic subsided and suddenly something exciting emerged. And I thought to myself, "Wow! That sounds fun. with nearly 70 kids in class? What kind of cool occasion it can be? Cool and awesome!" Instantly I was ready to play and learn with the audience. So, i turned around and looked at the lovely and smily my friends, students and bunch of amazing supporters who have encouraged me to present what I believe from my 17 years of experience with amazing kids. I started to remember all the rosy-cheeked cute children I had. In my mind, they were smiling and cheering me to do the best I could. The last person I caught with my eyes was my partner, quietly standing at one corner of the room with the little shy smile on his face. Then I heard his words from the previous night, "You would be fantastic." I went irritatedly, "How do you know?" But he said, " I just know." Honestly at that point, it didn't sound so promising but at the moment I caught his eyes as I was introduced as a presenter for Happy Valley, his words also got me do the best I could.

After the first song Hello was introduced, I knew how lovely the audience was and was sure that I could count on them to learn something from the presentation slides even without me. Even though my mouth was somehow so dried that I seriously thought my lips would stuck on my front teeth and I would look ridiculously funny in the first five minutes, I felt rather excited than panicked. With  fantastic helps from the audience, once in a life time superb performance of my partner and his co-auther/ good mate and of course the great support from the Happy Valley team, the presentation went extremely better than I expected. I truly felt the power of collective kindness and positive vibe. I was no longer the presenter, I was a participant of a big happy learning event.

What I learned from this experience is that the presenter's role for this kind of educational event is to facilitate a space where all the fantastically enthusiastic teachers would meet others and collaborate their skills and talents to improve our practice.  A presenter is a participant of the event and her work is to set up the ground where all the audience can work together.

My partner and other fantastic presenters I have met  have showed me so that I was familiar with the concept but this time I really understand the role of presenter from my experience. It is the same as my ideal teacher. It is still easier said than done matter for this newbie. I guess all I can do is to do the best I can and learn from the other participants whether I am with my little learners or big learners.

If the definition of home is somewhere you feel secure and relaxed and a place you are from, my home is a classroom where I can collaborate with other participants to find something new and unexpected about the world we all share.

By talking, mingling and connecting with kindred spirits, a cafe, a restaurant, an apartment room, a corner of a town can be a classroom / our home like my favorite singer, Phillip Phillips sings,

"You are not alone cuz I 'm gonna make this place your home."