日本からの おきゃくさま Visitors from Japan

Without a doubt, the highlights of the year from a Japanese learning viewpoint have been the visits to our schools this year by Japanese students.

At MM we had a group of 30 students visit from Asahi Juku Elementary School in Okayama Japan. Take a look at the Asahi Juku school website for pictures of their visit. http://www.asahijuku.ac.jp/elem.html In the right-hand column on the first page of their website you will see a list with a small camera icon. At the moment, the 4th one down is labelled ５年生　オーストラリア研修旅行 and this is where you will find photos of their visit. Try clicking on any of the other camera icon links to see other activities that the Japanese students have been involved in at their school. For example, the one at the top of the list leads you to photos of their earthquake drill held on 3rd September.

The group of students hosted by SA families attend a few different schools in the Yokohama area. One of the schools is Nagano Elementary School. Here's their website. http://www.edu.city.yokohama.jp/sch/es/nagano/ Not as many photos to view here, but it is interesting to see a picture of the school building. Japan is a much smaller country (geographically) than Australia. School buildings in Japan are usually 3 or 4 stories high. Asahi Juku school is 5 stories high!! Playgrounds may be smaller than ours, but every school has a gymnasium with a stage area for concerts and two basketball courts. Assemblies are usually held in the gymnasium.



Typical Japanese primary school.

While we are looking at Japanese schools, this is the primary school my children used to go to when we lived in Japan....http://kamiko-e.saitama-city.ed.jp/index.html ....and this is the junior high school my daughter attended... http://sakuragi-j.saitama-city.ed.jp/

Did you host a student this year? Or have a student visit your class? Tell us about your experience by posting a comment on this blog. We would love to hear about what these visits meant to you.