Seiritsu International Education

We have the new international room!!! It is called the SGC (Seiritsu Global Center)! There are a lot of books to read and there also have a self-study space for you to study. The teachers are working in the teachers' area in the room, if you have any questions about English and studying abroad,you can ask them at once. We all like this room very much. The English Club will also held in this room from September. By the way, I was elected to be the president of English Club! I will try my best !

The most exciting school activity is the School Trip! I went to Hokkaido for my school trip. We went there for a week and visited Hakodate, Otaru, Sapporo and Furano. We enjoyed the food such as seafood don, milk ice cream and ramen.

We also enjoyed the activities and the beautiful scenery there. I tried many new things that I have never experienced before. My favorite was rafting and the baseball game.

We experienced rafting in a river called Sorachi River. Rafting is a sport that goes down rows of torrents by combining power with friends on a large rubber boat. Before we rowed into the river, the teacher taught us how to row the boat. I was scared at first but it became so interesting! We enjoyed it very much! Every time we went through a challenge point, we raised our paddles altogether and cheered. We had so much fun!

The other great activity was watching the baseball game. It was the first time for me to watch a baseball game and also the first time for me to be in a dome. I was so happy and excited. At first I was worried because I only know little about the rules, but there was no need for worry. All we needed was to watch the screen and say the words to support the team and the players in a loud voice with the people around us. We clapped our hands and shouted with the fans. There were also bands playing music. Our team hit two home runs and all the people went crazy! It was such a precious experience and I had so much fun!!!!!

writer: staff  date: 8:30 AM | Life at Seiritsu

Last week, I've visited the one of Japan's most popular tourist sites. It's the temple and shrine known as Toshogu in Nikko, a small city north of Tokyo. It took two hours to go there by train.I felt a sort of spirituallity at Toshogu and the area around it. I learned a lot. I saw the three monkeys doing the "See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil* post. and I learned more about them (🙈🙉🙊) and I gained a deeper understand as well.

writer: staff  date: 12:17 PM | Life at Seiritsu

Once again, thanks to the GoGo Nihon group, we were lucky to have a group of students from all over the world visit our school this afternoon. Nine students from seven different countries (Italy, Spain, France, Belgium, Estonia, Mexico and the USA) came and visited us and took part in an Aikido class.

The foreign students seemed to enjoy the lesson and so did our students in the aikido club. Getting our Japanese students to come out of their shells and interact with our foreign guests is a major goal of our department.

In fact, when a few shy girls hesitated to explain a technique to our guests (because they could not say it in English) our new coordinator, JC, pointed out to them that the oldest person in the room (one of the Aikido masters) was speaking no English but communicating with everybody very well, they took a step out and tried.

It is always nice to drive home the fact that words and grammar are only a small part of communication.

We look forward to having another group from GoGo Nihon again.

writer: staff  date: 6:24 PM | Life at Seiritsu

In this excursion, we went to a city with gorgeous historical sites - Nikko.

The railway from Tokyo to Nikko was pretty far. It took almost two and a half hours to get there.
When we arrived at Nikko, most of us were very hungry. I bought a manju with my friend, it’s a sweet bun with delicious bean filling inside. This helped us to charge our energy.

We went to a great Japanese temple, that is also a shrine, which is called Toshogu. It is a place to commemorate Shogun Ieyasu Tokugawa and Shogun Toyotomi. I learned a lot of Japanese history knowledge from my teachers and from this place. Also I got a fortune for myself. It’s kind of like a lottery where you learn about your future luck. My fortune said I would have a little luck, which I think is okay for me.

writer: staff  date: 9:47 AM | Life at Seiritsu

For a bunch of students and our International teachers, today was a chance to escape the city heat. Only half of the students could make it but that still meant we had 10 students with us on this trip. Because we are all spread out over the city, we had two different meet up points in the morning.

So as I said, we had been hoping to beat the heat but that is not so easily done... it was still 28°C with about 80% humidity. Ah well. It was still really nice to be up in the mountains with all the trees and some slightly cooler breezes. And, luckily, we didn’t get the rain that’s happening all over Japan.

After the 2 1/2 hour train trip to the mountains, we took a local bus up to the temple area. Because it was a weekday, it was mostly tourists and lots and lots of elementary students in the area.

With only a few hours available to us, we stuck to the main shrine called Toshogu.
Toshogu is a special place, it is a mixed shrine and temple. We had reviewed the differences in Ueno on our last excursion but could now see both in one spot. No wonder many people get confused..

There is an idea that it was like an amusement park at the time and so lots of special elements are incorporated into the design and layout of the shrine. There are the imaginary elephants, the monkeys, the dragons and peacocks and so on decorating the various structures.

A lot of planning goes into these places and often times they incorporate spiritual ideas and elements related to energy. We all stopped for a minute to enjoy the power spot.

This shrine gives us so much to talk about that it is hard to know what to cover and what not to cover. We had sent some information to the students for them to read so they would have a little bit of an idea before going. If we had more time I would have loved to have covered much of this information in class but this time it was not possible.

Once again we reinforced the idea to the Japanese students, who are going to go abroad and who have been abroad, that they really need to learn a lot about their own culture so they can tell people, who are interested in Japan, more about it in English. For the two students who came this time who are leaving this year, they could talk a lot with their classmates who had already done it.

This year‘s group of students really enjoyed the fortune telling spots at the shrine. Some of them really challenged themselves trying to explain it in English and Japanese. I wonder what they were hoping for?

writer: staff  date: 6:16 PM | Life at Seiritsu

Sports Day!!!

Red, Blue, Brown...the colors of flags flapping in the wind and sweaty bodies everywhere. As always our school organizes many events during every school year and one of them is the sports day (undokai in Japanese). There are many sort of games and amazing things to do in that day. I mean we can have a lot of fun and it's a kind of way to allow students to expose hidden talents to others. I guess I'm not the only one who likes challenging himself.

I really enjoy it every year!

writer: staff  date: 12:56 PM | Life at Seiritsu

“I’m hereeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!,” shouts the heat and humidity. “Oh no….,” I say while crying...

If you didn’t get the message, summer is here and it’s loud. As I type, I am in a puddle and some fish are happily swimming around me. How do I get out of this situation? How do I become a human again, instead of a puddle? Those are questions I Googled in hopes that someone has an escape route ready for me to take.

Here’s what I learned so far to avoid getting too hot and sweaty:

1) Wear silky shirts because you are fancy, and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. Go to Uniqlo and GU to buy them. They have great prices.

2) Sleep with a fan. Instead of using AC, which is expensive. It will help withthose sweaty nights.

3) Be like you’re a cactus. You are losing water from your body every minute of the day without realizing it. Drinking water can help you balance body temperature, get beautiful skin, is also good for a healthy stomach.


How are you surviving the summer?

writer: staff  date: 9:16 AM | Life at Seiritsu

This summer will be my last summer in Japan for a long time. I will be moving back to Canada in August. There are a lot of things I want to go before I leave Japan. For instance, I want to wear a yukata and go to a festival. There, I want to eat food from food stalls like okonomiyaki and fresh taiyaki. I also want to try kakigori! I’ve never tried it before. This summer, I also want to go see fireworks. Before I see Japan, I want to try nagashi-somen. Trying to catch the noodles looks very fun. How about you? Do you have a goal for the summer?

See you next month for my last post!

writer: staff  date: 12:43 PM | Life at Seiritsu

It is that time again... speaking test time. For many students in many schools, it is a stressful period. For Seiritsu junior high kids, it is a little stressful but mostly it is a fun challenge that they like to get a good score on. And most of them get pretty good scores. Our students are speaking more and more and their scores show it.

Considering our 3rd graders of junior high are doing parts of the pre-2nd of the Eiken test, it is definitely going to help them going in to high school and beyond.

Otsukaresama desu!

writer: staff  date: 8:15 AM | Life at Seiritsu

One of our new International students has had to leave us mid-way through the year. His family was moving back to Korea and he needed to go with them.

We all wish Jihoo the best and hope he gets a chance to come back and visit us here at Seiritsu someday.

Keep in touch!

writer: staff  date: 8:15 AM | Life at Seiritsu

This morning we had a nice little letter come in the mail. Inside the envelope was a certificate from the Minister of Internal Affairs and Communications recognizing the hard work put in by one of our JETs. Being part of the first group of private school JETs, she has worked hard over the last three years to help get the program running smoothly.

Our principal wanted to give her the paper directly.

Thank you very much for everything you’ve done over the past three years!

writer: staff  date: 8:15 AM | Life at Seiritsu