Back to normal!

I survived the adjustment week, and the summer intensive courses. Now it is back to normal teaching and I can’t wait. That was the longest adjustment week I’d had in a long time. Saturday just dragged on and on, I had one chants lesson and two FTLs and there was absolutely nothing to do at the school at all. 

Not long until the summer break, not that I’m counting!

Adjustment Week

How’s your adjustment going? Mine’s been pretty good so far. I have finished writing all my summer greetings cards at one school. I wrote exactly the same message to everyone but I was totally surprised about how long it took. At least the schools are organized this year. In the past, the staff handed them to me just as I was leaving. I was not impressed!

The Summer Intensive Courses are going pretty well too. The chants was fun, but making the lesson last for 50 minutes was a bit of a challenge. Petite Chants was interesting, especially when one parent decided that they were going to sit outside and watch! It makes you wonder what the customers are told at times. 

The best thing though is the free time. Yesterday I only had three FTLs all day! It is a nice break from all the kids classes that I usually teach.

Marine Day

Summer is here at last! It’s a long weekend for me, cause I usually work on Mondays. This is one of the best thing about ECC, everyone has public holidays off. A few teachers I know are heading down to Suma Beach, but it way too hot for me. I think I’ll stay at home. It was 36 degrees in Osaka city yesterday, and they are forecasting 35 today!

Photocopying

What’s with the new signs on all the photocopiers? I understand that we should be worried about the amount of paper we use. But apparently that is not it. ECC is worried about the amount of toner that we use. So now I have to write down every copy that I make and give an explanation of what it is for. The kew workbooks are a typical example, it says quite clearly on the cover “photocopy the page you want to use!”. I don’t think I have every seen anyone doing their private copying at work. It is a pain for the full-time teachers, but at least we are paid for this. Japanese part-time are typically only paid for the time that they are teaching a lesson. So now they have even more service overtime making copies for their class, and recording this information all in their own time.

Payday at last!

Have you ever been caught short when payday falls on a bank holiday? I always remember way to late when the 12th falls on a Saturday. I had a whole 1000 yen to spend over the weekend. You guessed it, no partying for me. I can’t remember the last time I spent the whole weekend at home relaxing. Maybe this is  why ECC pays on the next business when payday falls on a bank holiday. 

I’ve heard that many Japanese companies pay earlier when pay day falls on a bank holiday. Though I must admit that the company that I worked for back home also paid after the bank holiday- but on the other hand being paid weekly and monthly is totally different.

Summer Intensive Courses

How many SIC classes have you got this year? Until I saw the urgent Senka posting I totally forgot that the staff asked me to teach Petite kids and Chants SIC classes again this year. The staff have even changed my shift, not that I’m complaining. Instead of my regular 345 to 935 shift I am starting at 10! Sounds good to me, but I just hope that the Petite Kids materials are better this time round. Mixing mini-kids and AL students together is just asking for trouble from the start. “Kids who can talk” plus “kids who can not talk” = parents wondering what is going on.

All I can say is “Let’s have fun at ECC!”

Big changes in Umeda- coming soon!

Has everyone heard the good news? ECC Umeda School the biggest school in the nation is moving to the Hankyu Grand Building. No longer will we have to battle the elements to reach the school. No longer will you have to raise your voice to talk over the teacher in the next room. And we can only hope that the air conditioning works and there is some kind of effective cooling system in each room. Goodbye sweat boxes!

ECC Speak!

The big question on the recent CS survey was “Did the teacher ask if you had previewed with speak?”. I’m curious just how many teachers out there do ask this question. It would be great if education published the results to all the questions on a district basis. Are teachers in the kanto district more diligent than the teachers in the kinki district?

Out of the all the students I teach every week I can only think of one student that regularly uses it, and his level has really improved. Then there is the student I have been teaching for years, I asked how often do you preview or review with ECC Speak. “I haven’t even installed it yet!”

Cool Biz!?

Have you ever heard of Cool biz? I hadn’t until yesterday, I was teaching a lesson and a student starting talking about environmental issues. I mentioned that ECC has some “save the earth” campaign. Then the student asked me why am I wearing a tie. Quite a simple answer:- it’s company policy to wear ties in all adult lessons. They then asked if ECC had Cool biz? 

What is Cool biz?

It is some kind of government campaign introduced by the former prime minister Koizumi. Government offices and business set air-con temperatures at no lower than 28 degrees, and staff dress more casually.

I guess we can only dream about the eikaiwa industry introducing Cool Biz! A friend working at AEON AMITY told me that they even wear their suit jackets in kids’ lessons during the summer!