ALT in a Day's Work

It's summer again, which means no classes for me. Even though there aren't any obvious things I ought to be doing, somehow the days always get filled up! Let's take a look at one example of all the little things that make up a workday.

Much like our closing ceremony, but no chairs.

Spanish In the 15 minutes before the morning meeting today, I cracked open a Spanish study book to brush up on the 2nd language that shadowed my whole grade/high school life.

 Closing Ceremony Today's the last day of 1st semester, so of course we must have a 2 hour ceremony! They went through congratulating people name by name for sports and club accomplishments as a thousand students and teachers baked in the hot gym. One students passed out and had to be taken to the nurse's office. Instead of stopping the ceremony, they just talked a lot faster to end earlier.

Editing My supervisor is sending a letter to our Thai sister school. I used my special powers to correct spelling, grammar, and structure it to be more diplomatic.

Lunching I've only used half my "Social" budget for July so far, so I biked out to an Udon restaurant for lunch with Greg. Between bites of the chewy, cool, refreshing noodles, we talked over his summer trip to America... tomorrow!

Teaching The principal came by with some English questions. What's the difference between "How are you?" and "How are you doing?" (conclusion: not much!) and "You're welcome", "Not at all", and "No problem" (conclusion: formality of context, relations between speakers, and perceived inconvenience of the task).

Writing Writing this blog post, and catching up on entries in my daily diary. I'm so used to doing it now that it's not too hard to reconstruct a day based on To Do list scribbles.

Advising The photography teacher came by to ask for advice on an English subtitle for a basketball picture. We decided on "Planning the Victory".

Chatting Now that it's summer the other teachers are starting to relax again. Greg and I got to talk with one of our favorite English teachers about summer plans, Victoria's Secret, and the Japanese hatred of all things Chinese.

Recontracting I am officially recontracted until July 24th, 2014! I'm looking forward to another exciting year ahead. What surprises wait to be tread?*




*Sorry, this is a weird sentence. I just wanted it to rhyme.