<\/p>\n
By the time you see this, gentle readers, the third years will have graduated and the school year will be over. Unless you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re exclusively an ES ALT at which point, the sixth years will have graduated and the school year will be over; also have a drink on me, you must be exhausted.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m trying to figure out how I feel about the school year ending in March, even though I know that it doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t matter how I feel because it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not like anyone important cares. Still, I like airing my opinions, as you might have noticed.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
It seems to me strange to have the big school holiday not be immediately after the end of the academic year, although I can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t muster any sound pedagogical arguments against it. I just get the vague sense that something\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s wrong with it, like a chair that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s been made into a horcrux or Donald Trump\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s wig. It just doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t sit well.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
But bad vibes are not admissible in court and, if anything, the Japanese system might hold the advantage. After all, here the students won\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t spend all summer worrying about what their next school year will be like\u00e2\u20ac\u201c after all, they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll already be a third of the way finished with it. Fear of the unknown can be replaced with just a mild sense of dissatisfaction about having to return to what you already know.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
I remember that tremulous month of August, terrified of what lay ahead. Wondering if I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d keep up with my homework, if I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d ever make any friends at all or if this would finally be the year when I snapped and straight up bitch slapped Mr. Thomas. For seven weeks, these worries would circle in my head, tormenting me, and generally tainting any fun activities involving ice cream or beaches or whatnot. Japanese school children, instead, get a summer of certainty and just a mildly anxious Easter and Easter\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s always a bit naff anyway.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Another advantage would be not having to sit end of year Exams in the ovens that are classrooms in summer. And, of course, the vagaries of that season will no longer be able to distract the students from their crucial end of year cram.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Conversely, this does mean there is a big break in between a single syllabus\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 lessons and I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m sure it does make it difficult to keep the thread of a lesson or topic prevalent for an entire fortnight in the minds of both students and teachers (I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m imagining teachers stopping mid-sentence as the bell rings, packing up and going home silently, sitting throughout the holiday saying nothing and then resuming flawlessly when classes resume).<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
But then, if we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re honest with ourselves, that happens in English schools over the summer holidays too\u00e2\u20ac\u201c a lot of time is spent reviewing material from the last year and even just catching up to where classes were previously. The lessons which are interrupted may be technically of a different level, but one would hope that the transition in material between years would be smooth enough that they would dovetail somewhat. The only way to avoid that entirely would be to cancel summer holidays like that dude in the Recess <\/em>movie and I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t think any of us want a repeat of that. TJ and friends, you deserved better.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Despite this, it still makes me uneasy and I think it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s largely for reasons of symmetry, which I admit is tubthumpingly stupid. Symmetry can be aesthetically pleasing, yes, but you mustn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t let it rule your life or else, like Da Vinci and his mirror-writing, someone steals your idea for the helicopter. And, of course, the Japanese school year is still pretty symmetrical\u00e2\u20ac\u201c it starts and ends at the same point in the year, there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s just a chunk missing near the beginning. And, if I ever wanted to go for optimum symmetry as well as lovely thematic resonance regarding endings, beginnings and opportunities, I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d ascribe to the Antipodean way of doing things, whereby the academic year is split much like the Calendar. But then the big holiday would come when everything was cold and awful AND I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d have to admit that Australia did something better than England and I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t think I can live with that.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Rory Kelly<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" By the time you see this, gentle readers, the third years will have graduated and the school year will be over. Unless you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re exclusively an ES ALT at which point, the sixth years will have graduated and the school year will be over; also have a drink on me, you must be exhausted. …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":113,"featured_media":5613,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false},"categories":[442,48,417],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.hyogoajet.net\/hyogotimes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/RKellyDaVinciCoptor.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hyogoajet.net\/hyogotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5641"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hyogoajet.net\/hyogotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hyogoajet.net\/hyogotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hyogoajet.net\/hyogotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/113"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hyogoajet.net\/hyogotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5641"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.hyogoajet.net\/hyogotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5641\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hyogoajet.net\/hyogotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5613"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hyogoajet.net\/hyogotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5641"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hyogoajet.net\/hyogotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5641"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hyogoajet.net\/hyogotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5641"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}