– A Beginners Guide to Classroom Management  So it’s been a few months now and everybody seems to have fallen into a nice routine and the mystery and excitement of your arrival have finally worn off. Both for you and your students. No longer do they stare at you in silent wonder but instead…
Who are you and where are from? What year are you on JET? Where do you teach and what level? Hello! My name is Shane Allen. Originally from Milwaukee, Wisconsin, I came to rural Kagoshima by way of the neon lit Las Vegas, Nevada. I am currently here on my second year teaching in…
Welcome to November! By now you’ve reflected on all you heard at the Skills Development Conference and might even have plans to put some of those key learnings into action. A big thanks to our fellow ALTs who organized the conference and a final round of applause for all those who presented. Moving forward,…
For the first book club of the new JET year, fourteen ALTs found themselves gathering at Tits Park fooled by the weather, wearing layers meant for the previous day’s chill. While waiting for everyone to arrive we made our introductions, some for the second and third time, and were also graced with the presence…
 The humidity of summer is finally disappearing, replaced by a slight chill in the air at times and announcing the arrival of what the Japanese call shokuyoku no aki（食欲ã®ç§‹ï¼‰. This roughly translates to “the season for eating,†an apt description for the renewed appetite that the cooler temperatures bring. Grilled with a light sprinkling…
This is a game board I made for a few my HS students. The aim of this game board is to make sentences with the verbs that the students land on. The players have to tell each other in which tense the sentence has to be. All you need is a dice and…
 Some say funk is dead, but honey, I beg to differ. Starting back in 2003 Mountain Mocha Kilimanjaro, a six man Japanese whirlwind of classic funk and ska, has been taking the world by storm. To give you the gist of their sound, you’ve got Naohito “Temjin†Yomoda on trumpet, Takeshi Kurihara with…
Inside the crowd was unique and varied. Larger men who wistfully looked up at the stage hoping to one day compete or perhaps remembering their own glory days, friends and middle-aged wives smartly dressed shouting words of encouragement to their partners on stage, and then the few photographers and writers scribbling notes on…
If you live in Kobe you recognize that there are many amenities the city provides that are harder to find in other parts of Hyogo. Simply put, we have a Costco! ALTs know just how lucky they are to be in such a great location, this is especially true for those who are avid…