Hello 6A!! Here is my travel journal so far! ^^

 I have been in Tokyo for one week now, and I really like the school I'm at. Tokyo greater metropolitan area has a combined population of over 30 million people. In approximate numbers, that's about the same number of people that live in all of Canada! Inside Tokyo, there are several large cities that have their own names and areas. I live in a city called Saitama, which is in the northwestern portion of the greater Tokyo area. It's not a dense as downtown Tokyo, and it feels to me a little more like a suburb than a super busy city. The first picture is one I took from the classroom where I teach. Because I'm outside the downtown area with skyscrapers and tall apartment buildings, i can get a great view of this mountain. It's the most famous mountain in Japan, and it's actually a volcano.

Student artwork on perspective drawing

The school I volunteer at is very similar to schools in Canada. Each classroom has a group of students who are about the same age, and are all in the same grade. Every morning, the teacher in my class, Mr. D, puts the day's schedule on the whiteboard just like Mr. Hansen, telling the students the order of the classes, including recess breaks and Phys. Ed. Just like in Canada, I think that these two times are the most popular events each day! hahahhahah My class is a grade six class, so they are studying topics that are the same or similar to what 6A has been studying in Calgary. In math, we're working on geometric shapes and in language arts, students are reading individually, in groups and with buddies from another lower grade. Mr. D is also reading a book aloud to the class everyday. I was surprised to see that it was a book some of you were reading, "The Hatchet" by Gary Paulsen!

The job wheel!

And just like the students of Hawkwood, the students here at my school really care about their school environment. This last picture is a 'job wheel' that the class made to ensure that their school environment is taken care of. Each day, certain students are resposible for different tasks in the school. Because they are the oldest students in the school, they get many responsibilities that are unique to grade six. For example (it's difficult to read the writing in this picture), some students are responsible for organizing and cleaning up  the sports equipment everyday. Another job, the blue wedge, assigns certain students to turning off all the electronics at the end of the day, so no elecricity is wasted overnight at the school. Because students in Japan eat their lunch together at school - and it's cooked by the school - there is even a wedge for who gets to help serve the food everyday at noon! It's really amazing to see everyone working together to almost run the school by themselves. It reminded me of the leadership groups at Hawkwood, and I told my partner teacher here in Saitama all about the different groups that you have. He was surprised to hear about the differences, like the fact that they don't have patrollers at this school, but they do have lunchtime helpers.

That's all for now 6A! I'll write some more soon, once I get to travel into the big city and take pictures of what I get up to. Hopefully, this blog helps you understand a little more about what I'm doing here, and gets you excited to travel overseas one day!

またね