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Post by izumi the kami on Aug 11, 2020 15:37:37 GMT 9
Hi there lovely CIRHPers <3
I am seeking the wisdom of those who have started/continue to run pen pal programmes between middle/high school kids in Sun Origin Country and GAIKOKU.
My office wants to start up a pen-pal exchange programme between our city and a school in the country we are acting as the host town for ahead of the Olympics next year. I pretty much have the schools picked out so finding volunteers isn't really a problem, but I was just wondering if you have any advice on the nitty gritty details? What is something that you wish you'd known sooner? What is something I need to be especially careful of? Any general sort of advice?
I would really love for this programme to go well and even one day turn into a proper homestay exchange programme.
I'd also just love to hear about your experiences in general too, positive and negative.
YOLOSHIK <3
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Post by wapiko on Aug 14, 2020 9:46:45 GMT 9
I just remembered me and Wko were going to do a penpal program too before corona got serious. T____T thelatter don't you run one? You gave me the idea! |
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Post by thelatter on Aug 14, 2020 9:59:07 GMT 9
I tried to start one and it fell through. I was basically the only one that put any work into it and it felt like I was the only one that actually wanted to do it. Everyone that was to be involved (school vice principals included) pulled out every excuse in the book to NOT do it.
So I'm not the best person to get advice from hue.
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Post by izumi the kami on Aug 21, 2020 9:46:51 GMT 9
I tried to start one and it fell through. I was basically the only one that put any work into it and it felt like I was the only one that actually wanted to do it. Everyone that was to be involved (school vice principals included) pulled out every excuse in the book to NOT do it. So I'm not the best person to get advice from hue. I am sorry for not responding to this for so long! I am also sorry your exchange didn't get off the ground ;-; that's a real shame! Thank you for replying to this thread anyway, I appreciate it |
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soyok
Straight outta Narita
Posts: 35 
CIR Experience: 3rd year
Gender (Pronouns): she/her/hers
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Post by soyok on Sept 9, 2020 10:12:35 GMT 9
I set up a pen pal programme between an elementary school here and in the sister city. 1. An important thing to keep in mind is the difference in the gakunen, Japan starts in April whereas most other countries start in September. You have to be especially careful if you are including 6年生 in the exchange as they might graduate before they can get a reply! The 6th graders sent their letters here very early on in january expecting a reply in March but then corona happened  . 2. For the teachers a pen pal programme means more work and loads are already so overworked, so you need to find a way to minimise that amount of extra work for them. I initially wanted to do a pen pal programme where we paired up Dutch and Japanese students but 1) this would be too much work and 2) the number of students didn't match. You can propose to the school to align the letters' contents and timing with the English class syllabus. That way you can argue the students get a chance to use the classroom English in a real setting without putting too much pressure on the teachers to come up with new stuff. Now, the schools just send each other "random" things, such as self portraits for lower grades and posters introducing their city. If the teacher can re-use materials from the regular class syllabus then he/she can just make the letter writing part of the lesson. T |
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