A Cultural Experience     Mrs. Hiroko Hill assists a student write the Japanese character for a number.

What is life like in Japan? Students in Mrs. Leslie Yach and Mrs. Sheila Golden’s third grade classes learned about Japanese culture through a special presentation given by Hiroko Hill, one of their classmates mom. This presentation complemented the students’ social studies and geography curriculum, as they are beginning to research countries for their first report.

Dressed in a Kimono, Mrs. Hill showed the students where Japan was located on the classroom map and explained that it took 10 hours to fly from Seattle to Tokyo, Japan’s capital. Japan has four main larger islands, with thousands of smaller islands in its chain. She shared that while students in America learn 26 letters for their alphabet, Japanese students learn 52 characters, Chinese characters, and words created just for foreign words like “pizza.” She brought in Japanese books, which illustrated one big difference. While Americans read left to right, in horizontal rows, top to bottom, in Japan books are read right to left, in vertical rows, top to bottom! Next she illustrated just how similar children are in both countries by showing one of Brandon’s toys, A Bud Lightyear. The catch was that this Bud, spoke in Japanese! “They’re just like you!” she said in reference to Japanese kids.

Then, Mrs. Hill led two workshops that allowed the students to experience a part of Japanese culture. For one, they learned to count in Japanese. Mrs. Hill made comparisons to words in English to help the students learn to pronounce the Japanese words: 1- “Itchy;” 2- “Knee;” 3 - “Sun;” 4- “She;” and 5- “Go.” Then in small groups the students used India Ink and authentic calligraphy brushes to write one of the numbers. For the other workshop, students learned origami. Mrs. Hill showed the students how to fold a square piece of paper into a “warrior’s helmet.”

Though this experience, these third graders learned about life in Japan from an expert. Mrs. Hill was very adept at giving the students examples of both similarities and differences in the cultures in ways the student could relate. All students went home with examples of items that are widely associated with Japanese culture. “It was really fun,” commented one student. “I liked learning about another culture.”