Your Japanese word of the week is...

"shukudai" 宿題 which means homework.  Having taken two weeks off for the practicum and now being in the home stretch before school ends, the homework load is piling up.  Particularly for this week, with 3 presentations and 3 other assignments due.

I'm not complaining though, really...  there certainly is a lot but I'm actually revelling in how technology has transformed how nice I can make my assignments look.  Everything from producing sample worksheets to presentations is now all done in the computer which in some ways takes the mystique out of doing things but also means the quality goes through the roof.

Gone are the days when presenting meant printing paragraphs on paper, attempting to cut them out with straight edges, and gluing them down on construction paper.

In fact, even PowerPoints are being out paced by newer, slicker, and more innovative presentation methods.

One that I learned about two weeks ago is Prezi.

Essentially a giant board, it offers a place to lay out presentations that progress in an organic fashion with views that zoom in or out, pan, and rotate as you move along.  The most amazing thing, however, is that it's incredibly easy to use.  It really is a triumph of design and while it isn't as powerful as PowerPoint or other types of presentation methods in terms of manipulation, it's a got style that very few, if any, other presentation methods can offer.

Check it out; I highly recommend it.

Your Japanese word of the week is...

"erabu" 選ぶ which means "to choose".  This week I won't talk much about school or whatnot mostly because school is just a mass of school work.  Instead, I'll talk about my other love...  cars.

Last weekend I was chatting with some friends and we were trying to decide what our perfect 5 car garage would be.  We could pick any car but they'd have to be able to do anything and everything we do in a year, from summer time jaunts to ski trips.

Naturally lists like these change all the time but this is what I've decided.....  for this week.

Lamborghini Gallardo Spyder

This, being a convertible, would be the perfect summer cruiser.  While not as pure of a driver's car as a Ferrari in its hardtop form, the convertible lends itself more to cruising.  It's also unbelievably pretty and sounds amazing.

I'd have one in graphite grey.  Although, this might have to go to make room for the F458 Spyder that's sure to come in a few years...

McLaren MP4-12C

Despite the rather uninteresting name, this is an incredibly significant car not in the least because of its rarity.  McLaren is one of the longest running Formula 1 constructors and, from 1992-1998, produced the McLaren F1 which was one of the most technologically advanced road cars of its time and is still heralded as one of the greatest.

Mercedes and McLaren teamed up to build the SLR a few years ago but that was more Mercedes than McLaren.

With the MP4-12C, McLaren are back with a car designed entirely in-house.  Lightweight carbon fibre, a 600bhp twin turbo V8, and a twin-clutch 7-spd gearbox.

And while Ferrari had just released its brilliant new F458, the McLaren just feels that tad bit more special.

I'd take mine in black.

Range Rover Sport

This one's simple- it goes off road.  It'd be perfect for ski trips or when it snows.  And the Sport has a supercharged V8, so it hustles as well.

Silver, since it's the easiest to clean.

Brabus E V12

This one's a bit neat.  Brabus is a tuning company that specializes in Mercedes' and, more often than not, can be found cramming ridiculously large engines into smaller, lighter models.

This one comes with Mercedes' twin turbo V12 found normally in their bigger sedans.  Then Brabus bump it up to 800bhp.

Being a big comfy sedan this would be perfect for driving friends around and with so much power it would be ideal cross-country road trips.  I'm not ashamed to admit I picked this purely because of the engine.

And since these cars are built to order, I'd be tempted to make it a station wagon just to haul that extra bit of stuff.

Black for the stealth look.

Porsche 911 GT3

The daily driver.  It's all about purity with this one and when the car drives like an extension of your body, it makes even the shortest trips exhilarating.

In white.

Your Japanese word of the week is...

"yoku kangaeru" よく考える .  Yoku is actually an adjective in the sense that placing it in front of the verb represents "thoroughly" or "well done".  Kangaeru is the verb "to think" so putting them together sort of means to "really think about" or, in my case, "reflection".

People who have been or are in the B. Ed program may take a moment to laugh and/or gag at the word reflection, which is tossed around all the time in the program but it's a much less trivial thing to do while on practicum.

The first week of my practicum went quite well mostly because there wasn't much to go wrong.  I spent the bulk of the time going to various classes and observing teachers to see how they taught their subject, managed their students and time, and set up their classroom atmosphere.

The second week, however, was different.  Although I only had to teach 4 full classes, the planning took a fair chunk of time because I don't have much experience running a 75-min class of 30 students.  This means I have to consider what I'm doing for every minute as well as gauging how long it would take them to do things.

The hardest thing though was I felt one of my lessons didn't go that well.  The students were great and the majority of them got the material towards the end (and the next day, in the review class, they all aced it which was great) but I wasn't very happy with how I did what I did.  I thought I had rushed through the intro to an activity and that caused a lot of confusion partway through the class whereas what I should've done was eased into it more slowly, trading quantity of work done by some students for quality of work done by all students.

To be honest, I was quite frustrated with myself but the day after, after much careful consideration (note word of the week), I adjusted my approach and it went much better.  And while it's easy now to say that having a bad class is a useful if not necessary part of the learning experience, it was much much harder to dig myself out of that rut while being stuck in it.  And in an evening no less.

Perhaps I was too critical of myself on the day of, but ultimately, it helped me reach the next step.

In the meantime, it's back at UBC until the long practicum.  Also, one of my fellow student teachers took some great pictures of some amazing costumes and artwork around the school so once I get those, I'll throw them up =)

Speaking of costumes, the Halloween Dance went without a hitch.  As for all the teens bumping and grinding, we the chaperones just turned a blind eye heh....

Your Japanese word of the week is...

"arienai" ありえない which, at its most technical, means "couldn't exist" but the way it's used is more like "unbelievable" or "unfathomable".

This week's post comes a bit late because I've been busy at a high school in Richmond doing my 2-week practicum (Oct 19-30).  And while not at the extreme end of unbelievability, it really is quite eye-opening just how much work it is to be a teacher.  It's not that I never knew, I just didn't think it was nearly this much.  The interesting thing is that most of the teachers I work with make it seem easy. 

I used to feel that classroom management would easily be the hardest thing I'd have to deal with but it turns out that lesson planning is the most critical, not in the least because a well planned lesson takes care of many of the classroom management issues that might come up.  And starting out as a teacher means planning many things from scratch as well as having to consider all the possibilities (what might students ask, how might students act/react, what would I need to prepare).

But as time goes on and the same lesson comes up again, the amount of planning drops and just some tweaking might work for the day.  Then there are things like being aware of time and just generally how to run a class which, once I get a feel for, I'm sure I'll be less concerned about.

This is, of course, not to say it's boring.  It's great fun interacting with the students and taking part in a Pro-D Day meeting with the science department.  Next week I'll be teaching 4 classes and chaperoning the Halloween Dance.  =P

As for the unbelievability, how's this-

A Windows 7 Whopper from Burger King in Japan.  7 patties for 777yen.  All served up on 13cm "American-sized buns"....  whatever that means heh....

Here's something not related to Japanese...

As you might have noticed, I've been getting into photography for the past 8 months and while I was in Hong Kong, I decided to try shooting an HDR image.

HDR (High Dynamic Range) is a method of taking the same picture multiple times, each at a different exposure.  In other words, some of them will turn out way too bright while others will turn out way too dark.  Normally cameras try to balance the light with the dark to get a decent image but when one area is too bright, the other parts show up too dark for the sake of balance.  This can be seen when taking a flash photo even in a decently lit restaurant; the people are really bright while the background may turn out darker than normal.

While the multiple shots are not that interesting on their own, each picture brings with it something special.  The overly bright one also manages to draw out the light in darker spots.  The overly dark one subdues all the bright lights so they don't overwhelm.  Combining them (along with a normal exposure where everything is more or less in balance) creates an image where the darkest of spots can still be seen without the brighter spots drowning out the rest of the photo.  Coupled with tone mapping, the result is an image with almost unbelievable detail.

I tried this back in Hong Kong with some pictures I took while going for a walk outside my hotel.  Unfortunately, I couldn't get the software to work properly on my computer and ended up with something that looked strange.  Luckily, on the eve before my practicum, I think I've figured it out...

All this stuff is still a work in progress, so feedback is welcome.

Also, I don't know why there's a huge dark spot in the crane photo...  it might just be how the software rendered the images...

And I've included the normal exposure versions of each picture so you can see the difference.  Note particularly how HDR is useful in shots with both bright and dark areas, so the final product shows both.

Enjoy!

Your Japanese word of the week is...

"hajimaru" 始まる which means to start.  And indeed it begins because next week, for two weeks (Oct 19-30), I'll be doing my short practicum.

The point of this practicum is mainly for observation but I will get a chance to teach.  It might not be a full 75min period (certainly not in the first week) and it'll probably be something my sponsor teacher has planned out, but it'll be a great experience and I'm quite looking forward to interacting wtih the students.

One thing I'm quite ready to admit, however, is that I'm not looking for a walk in the park.  Obviously I'm not asking to run a gauntlet for two weeks but if nothing ever happened during my practicum, I'd be less ready when I do find a real job in the "real" world.  I really do think that some element of a challenge is necessary to get the most out of it.

Case in point-

This was one of the very first pictures I took when I went to Japan in 2007.  It was the third day of what ended up being a two year journey and while it wasn't easy (especially the first few months), that's what makes it rewarding.  Had I went there and been frolicking in the daisy fields, laughing as I glided through the two years, I wouldn't treasure what I got out of it nearly as much.

Which brings me neatly to one of the things I've been learning about, particularly in my social justice class among many others.  In dealing with students, especially those who underachieve, lowering the bar is never the answer.  More often than not, the successful way of dealing with them is maintain the expectation that they meet the high standard.  The difference, however, comes from the support structure (they used the term scaffolding) set in place for the students.  Simply expecting them to reach the standard is a recipe for failure but outlining goals along the way and then helping them reach each ledge on their way to the top not only provides a system for them to succeed, but also allows them to retrain their self-esteem in that they can look back and see that they did indeed reach the top.  The real top.

I learned that in Japan.  I'm hoping to learn that here too.

So check back next week to see if I'm eaten alive or if I'm still alive =P

Your Japanese word of the week is...

"isogashii" 忙しい which means "busy". Dragging out the last syllable also puts emphasis on the word, just like you would in English ("I'm so busyyyyyy") =P......

Anyway, I really wish I could write about more than just how school and karate are going but, really, nothing else much happens aside from that. So, seeing as I can't help it, I might as well keep on =P...

Right now school's about a 70/30 balance between practical, "let's examine how to properly conduct a class" lessons and more theoretical, "let's discuss some of the issues in the classroom" lectures. The former includes stuff like giving mini-lessons in front of the class (which are video taped) and the latter involves quite a lot of discussion.

One of these discussion classes is a course on social justice and focusses on the topic of discrimination and oppressiveness and how, as teachers, we could or would deal with them, both internally with our own views and externally with our students.

As one might imagine, a class that focusses solely on topics like racism, sexuality, or class often result in some rather heated discussions. But last week we had a guest speaker from Out In Schools, a registered charity and a branch of the Out In Film society (which organizes the annual Vancouver Queer Film Festival) that attempts to educate students about the issues that surround homophobia and discrimination (and the wider theme of bullying, be it due to race, sex, class, etc.) through film.

It was a really interesting look at some of the resources available for victims of bullying as well as a great chance to see some eye openingly short films made by students. Some included a short made by some grade 5's about the still-common usage of the term "That's so gay" and another was about two students in a high school in a very conservative rural town in America who were the victims of bullying due to their sexual orientation.

It's particularly eye opening because not only are many of these issues not given enough exposure (I mean, sometimes you watch it and think "Seriously?? Do people still think like that??"), but that what we might deem as "modernized" or "globalized" thinking isn't nearly as inclusive as we imagine. Coupled with the fact that while many are perfectly happy to nod their head in agreement that certain social values need changing, few are truly comfortable discussing them at length.

Aboriginal issues suffer from the same, if not worse, stigma. The topic of residential schools came up and it's something that's extremely touchy to discuss. What's worse than the actual topic itself is how, in Canada, discussing Aboriginal issues has become such a conversational faux pas that the discussion never even gets off the ground. And how are we supposed to confront the topic if it's nearly impossible to comfortable bring it up in the first place??

So despite the required reading for the class, it's incredibly interesting to have that class foster a space where there is less fear of tackling the truly difficult issues. Of course, the trap is that many end up trying to think of ways to change the world when, in reality, we should be trying to think about these issues and how we interact with them. And, be it as teachers or citizens, move towards changing our daily spaces (work, home, etc.) to be conscious of how we're treating the people around us.

Lastly-
私の友達がブログに日本語の場合がほしかったと言ったけど、全部を翻訳できないかも。。。　=P　少なくとも日本語入ったね　haha