Thursday, June 25, 1998

After the ryukan, we returned to the Hotel for a meeting with some of the PTO mothers from Oimatsu Elementary School. The meeting was very formal at first, and I admit, I was not very interested.

We traded pleasantries and then began with the questions. I learned that many mothers are involved in the PTO, but few fathers. There is an initiative to get more fathers involved, but it is slow going. One of the big projects of the PTO is traffic safety. Since many students walk to school, the PTO is very involved in traffic safety. This PTO paints the lines and cross-walk reminders every few years.

The only parent involvement in the classroom seems to be as chaperone for field trips. Parents also go to students recitals and the like, but rarely visit the classroom.

Because the Japanese have recently stopped having school on every Saturday, the parents are getting more time to see the kids. The mothers thought that this was a good thing.

I heard a few really good ideas that Japanese elementary teachers do. I am not sure if I will be able to do them, but here they are:

1. Send Good News cards home to the parents. this way the parent does not only get bad news.

2. The teacher keeps a running notebook with the student. The student uses the notebook to record assignments. Periodically, the teacher will write a note to the parent and expect that the student will bring it home and have the parent read it. The parent has the option of writing a reply.

3. Class newsletters. I write an article for my school's newsletter and I know that some parents love them. Other parents do not read the newsletter.

Well, that was all I got out of the PTO meeting. I was glad that it was over. We gave the five mothers a few small gifts before the meeting ended. Although the PTO joined us for lunch, we sat separately. I sat with Stephen, Ami, and Hallie. We talked about relationships.

After lunch we boarded the bus for a visit to Okayama University's Education Department.

I get the feeling that the education department has trouble maintaining its funding. It could be the whole university. Maybe they just put their money into things other than cleaning and painting. The place was dingy at best. After the obligatory formal introduction, we took a tour of several classes in the education department. Apparently, the school of education teaches by showing teachers exactly how to teach each subject. In the art teachers' class that we saw, the students were practicing painting. In the music teacher's class, the students put on a small concert for us of the songs that they were learning.

The music really began to play during the Q&A session after the tour. We started with some of the typical like, "What are your impressions of our school/Japan?" We handled these well. The trouble began when we started asking questions. We had two types of trouble with this group. Either we were asking very complex hard to translate questions or we were shocked at the answers. Stephen was the first to encounter difficulty. He asked about the teacher training curriculum. He wanted to know if, because Japan follows a national curriculum, the teacher training could be highly specific. Something got lost in the translation because the answers about everything except what Stephen wanted to know.

Our next trouble spot came when someone asked how many weeks of student teaching each pre-service teacher had to complete. The answer was four weeks. Now, like every other American teacher was surprised by how little student teaching was required. I said nothing. It seems to work in Japan. One of our members reacted thusly:

To the translator:

"Well, you let him know that I had to complete eleven weeks of student teaching." She was shocked, but she continued, "I can't believe that you only require four weeks. Are you trying to change that?"

The translator did a remarkable job keeping things even, but no one could mistake the look on her face or the tone of her voice. The University faculty did their best to explain that four weeks was all that they felt was needed. After each professor explained something, our shocked member muttered something about four weeks or eleven weeks. She could not get over it. I, and several others, were embarrassed. I wish I could have just told her to let it go and move on.

Well, we finally did move on. We left the university and made an unscheduled stop. It seems that Messieurs Kamayama and Beppu, of Kurashiki city hall, had something of a surprise for us. They took us to the house and workshop of Shinzo Kodani. This man was a master glass blower. His shack-like workshop was dark and dominated by the giant kiln in the center. Along the high window sills and on shelves were examples of his work. I could see dozens of different vases, pitchers, and bowls. Each piece was either a different color or shape. each one was unmistakably hand made, but extremely well crafted.

The glass blower was amazing. He was also quite a show man. He told us more than once that he was not an artist, but an artisan. This man talented whatever he wanted to be called. He make his craft look easy. Right in front of us, he proceeded to create several beautiful pieces. He told us that 35 years ago, when he started, there was no handmade glass in Japan. He had to figure it out himself to recreate an ancient art form. (By the 1960s the Japanese only made glass in large factories).

He told us that for fifteen years he worked and made it up as he went. Then, in about 1980, Tokyo hosted an international arts festival. the glass blower went to the festival and to his great surprise, met other glass blowers from around the world. In the typical Japanese humility, he tells that he finally learned some tricks and was able to take his art to the next level. My guess is that he taught the Europeans and American glass blowers a thing or two. He said that he is still in contact with glass blowers around the world. My mother thinks that she saw him in a PBS special about Japanese living legends.

Well, while I was visiting with this living legend, he told us about the Christmas bulb that he used to sell to the United States. While he was telling us about this he created two of them. Because they are so thin, they do not need to cool slowly. Someone asked if he knew why it did not break like a larger piece would (without going into a cooler kiln to cool slowly). the glass blower's response was he didn't know, it just did. Good enough for me. I was extremely lucky to be standing in the front when he finished one of the glass globes. He let me take it home. The glass ball is remarkably strong; it survived the trip home.

Speaking of home, after the glass blower, we went back to the hotel and were free for the evening.

Quite a day. I started in the ryukan, met with PTO, saw the University, met a glass blower, and finally relaxed in the evening.

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