skit rehearsal at the Summer Language Course

skit rehearsal - 1
Originally uploaded by Jason In Japan.

Me and about 18 other ALTs from Shimane studied Japanese for 10 days this past summer.

here is a pic of me and my partner, Taisha HS ALT Ang, rehearsing our final skit. I was playing a convenience store clerk and she was a customer looking for directions. I try to pick her up at the end of the conversation and we had a choose your own ending for the audience - does Ang agree to let me come along to the summer festival she is looking for or reject me? Maybe I've watched too many special edition DVDs... :)

The course was ok, but the teachers were volunteers and spoke little English, either by choice or by necessity - a choice I don't quite agree with given the level of the learners involved. While I agree it's helpful to struggle to ask questions in the language you're learning, at some point you need explanations in English, and these explanations were not provided. Still, I did learn some new things, and I enjoyed hanging out with my fellow ALTs from all over Shimane.

click on this pic for more from our learning adventure at the kenshukan in Matsue in late July and early August of this year.