My First School Day

First off I want to say that I wish I had attended a Japanese High School. Today I was given a tour of the school and I certainly don’t remember robot construction being anywhere on our curriculum.

Kunisaki High School is the result of the merge between 3 different High Schools (kõtõgakkõ こうとがっこう) - an academic, agricultural and a technological. So the kids here can either do the typical school subjects or they can grow food and plants or build giant robots that will eventually take over the planet. Though if any of these had been an option at Hudson at least once a year someone would get bust trying to grow weed in the greenhouses. Not to mention there would have been endless corridor robot wars. In fact the robots that I witnessed in construction were for a robot fighting competition (I think) and were called Kintaro and Bear, after 2 characters from Japanese folk law. They were quite spectacular.

My education seems quite limited and lacking now and when the Armageddon comes I certainly won’t be able to rely on Matric maths for my survival. I will have to knit socks in exchange for food.

High School in Japan is optional but about 93% of students continue to study further so that they can get into Universities and Collages. My school has 3 grades of 6 classes with about 40 students in each, 1-1 – 3-6. Classes are numbered according to grade and course. Classes 4 and 5 are agricultural and the 6th classes are technological. The rest are academic. By the sounds of things I will be teaching all of them. This also means that the English abilities are better on the academic side.

School starts at 8, but the students are often here much earlier to partake in club activities (so anime does have its benefits). Classes finish at 4:15 and are then followed by more club activities. During the day the students are also required to help clean the school – something that could benefit South African Schools as we had it way too easy. Teachers are extremely dedicated to their jobs and will often stay as late as 9pm. So I not only have to adapt to a new system but a new mindset as well.