【Cross Cultural Exchange Report】 Children, parents, and teachers! Let's get excited together!
- EN-TRY運営
- 4月22日
- 読了時間: 5分
On November 13th, Chaileck Izumi Nursery School (Japan) and Learn Bright Early Learning Centre (Australia) held an online Live event! During the Live event, they introduced sushi, had a great time guessing an emu in a gesture game, and enjoyed playing Pikachu finger play games with the children from the Japanese school. We will introduce photos of the event along with an interview with Principal, Ms. Matsumoto!
Table of contents
■Initiatives leading up to exchange program
The children at Chaileck Izumi Nursery School were especially enthusiastic about the dance video about Australia. They seemed to have fun learning about a country they had never heard of before by moving their bodies in a fun way. In addition, when exchanging video letters with the other nursery, they were surprised to see friends in Australia making sushi.
Just as Japanese children learn about the countries they are interacting with, Australian children also learn about Japan, and when you see them experiencing a culture you are familiar with as something new, it somehow brings you closer. According to Ms. Matsumoto, there were many things about Australia, its culture, and animals that the children were learning for the first time, and they were interested in them. The same was true for the children at the Australia nursery! "What kind of country is Japan?" "What kind of food do they have?" They seemed to be looking forward to the live performance with excitement, wanting to ask the friends in Japan.
In addition, at the Chaileck Izumi Nursery School, they implemented various ideas, such as putting picture books about Australia where the children can see and preparing lunches with an Australian theme, and they were working on mechanisms to allow children to experience the world in their daily lives. One of these is creating an attractive environment that guardians can also enjoy.
You can see a lot of laminated photos on top of the group photo under the column title. Apparently, the hallway is decorated with photos related to Australia like this! They posted one photo related to Australia in the hallway every day, so that not only the guardians of the toddler class but also the guardians of the infant class could take an interest in them, and they became interested in the increasing number of photos every day.
By doing this before even informing them about the exchange, they created an environment where both the children and the guardians could become interested. Rugby, emus, Timtams (a famous Australian snack), etc. By adding one item at a time, the guardians became interested in the idea that those are Australian stuffs, right? They could be seen thinking and talking with the children about it. The teachers picked out the photos, ranging from famous ones to lesser known ones that piqued interest, and put the more easily recognizable ones, like the koala, at the end. It was a very exciting idea, wasn' it?!
■Scene of Live session
Finally, the big day has come. It seems that both the children and their parents have been looking forward to this day!
First, everyone waved flags and said hello to their friends on the other side of the screen!
They greeted each student one by one, and one of them even practiced her self-introduction in English, saying, "My name is..."!
By the way, friends in Australia were a little nervous about their first cross cultural exchange. Some of them were shy and hid even though they had the opportunity to stand in front of the microphone, but they all shared the same desire to talk!
When Magoo (our original character / facilitator) asked, "Who wants to answer the gesture quiz?" everyone raised their hands!
Even the teachers had a hard time thinking about the difficult animal gesture quiz from friends in Australia... but they remembered an animal from Australia and got the answer right! The answer was "emu"!
They answered the questions about sushi from friends in Australia by showing them the photos they had prepared! I'm sure when the Australian children see sushi, they will remember their friends in Japan!
They also enjoyed finger play games and question time, and at the end blew kisses to say goodbye.
The children at the Australian nursery seem to be thinking about giving gifts to their friends in Japan. It would be great to see them again!
■Teacher interview
We spoke with Ms. Matsumoto, principal of this nursery school.
Tell us your thoughts about the exchange.
・The children said they had a great time!! The school lunch that day was an Australian menu, which I think strengthened their interest in other countries. In the animal gesture quiz, a child who guessed emu was very happy, saying "I knew it was an emu!" and seemed happy to be able to say something he had learned beforehand. Also, just like Japanese children, Australian children are shy and can't speak out loud, and get nervous when it's time to speak, so we were able to feel the realism of the experience, including these aspects.
・The program was well received by the guardians, who were very interested in the program, and when they came to pick up their children, they would ask, "How was it?" One of the students introduced herself by saying, "My name is ●●." I think the child had practiced with their guardians, and I'm glad that this motivated them.
Please let us know if you have any suggestions for improvement or future
・At the beginning of the live sessions, the children were very interested, but after 30 minutes, they seemed to lose their concentration. The gesture games and finger-play songs were fun, but I also thought it would be nice if there was some content where the children could stand up from their chairs and express themselves freely.
・I would like to improve the video letters we made during the preparation period. I think it would be more familiar if we included everyday scenes, such as school lunch scenes. Also, our students who interacted this time were 4 years old, so we think that when they turn 5 next year, they will have a deeper understanding and will be able to have more experiences in contact with culture. In the video letter from our Australian nursery, we saw the children making sushi, so we would like to incorporate more activities like that.
If you have any other ideas, please let us know
・We have also noticed an increase in interest in English among guardians, and as this exchange was well received and generated interest, we would like to continue it. We believe that in the future, when these children live, there will be no strong divide between the world and Japan, and they will feel closer to overseas countries and more part of their daily lives. Currently, there are children at the nursery school who have one parent from Korea or Bangladesh, and I think that there will be fewer environments with only Japanese people. In that respect, I think it was a good project.
■Conclusion
We also spoke with Vicki, a teacher at the Australian nursery, who said, "I believe that by connecting with a wider community, we can increase the children's learning opportunities and build lasting relationships. I hope we can continue this initiative with the teachers at Chaileck Izumi Nursery School, with whom we were fortunate enough to have made connections."
At EN-TRY World Exchange, we don't believe that online conversations are the only opportunity to come into contact with the world. We want children to learn about and imagine other countries with their friends at school, think about them with their parents, and feel closer to the world because they have had the experience of playing with friends from overseas. We believe that various opportunities can be incorporated into daily life through small things.
These small opportunities may make you want to try speaking English or learn about other countries. We hope that through this exchange, we can sow the seeds that will broaden children's worldview.
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