Jackson Fever

Yesterday morning I sent my JTE a message telling her that I wanted to dedicate this week's classes to Michael Jackson. I told her that he was a massive part of my childhood and that I wanted to pay tribute to him by educating the kids about him, his life and his work.

She thought it was a great idea! She said that most the kids only know Michael Jackson by name, not by his work. So I spent literally the entire day and this morning preparing one of my most awesome classes yet. I started at 9.30am and finished at 9.30am this morning - just in time for the start of the class. A lot of effort, a lot of time and a lot of work - but so totally worth it.

So I started off the class explaining why I wanted to talk about Michael Jackson. I told them how I was an 80s child - born one year after the release of 'Thriller', thus growing up in the most successful time of his career. I started with a powerpoint presentation and talked to them about his musical career.

I had no idea that they would listen so intently. I told them before I started that there would be a quiz after the presentation. I had planned to give Michael Jackson compilation CDs to the team with the most correct answers but I didn't tell them this before I started. I was shocked/pleased to see them asking questions and taking notes on what I was saying. I had their full attention. They absolutely loved watching his transformation from black to white. Seeing pictures of him as a kid came the shouts of 'かわいいいい', pictures of him during the 'Thriller' years got shouts of 'handsome!!!', whilst pictures of him during the 'Bad' years got shouts of ’カッコイイ’！！！They loved it.

After the presentation, which was about 20 mins, I put them into groups where they had to answer 15 questions in English. Like I said before, the original idea was to give the CDs to the team with the highest school. Bar one team, they all for 15 out of 15. Bollocks!

Plan B. I showed them the performance of 'Billie Jean' at the Motown 25th Anniversary show. And then I announced that we were going to have a moonwalking competition and then the 7 best moonwalkers would win the CDs. When I asked who wanted to go first, I was expecting to be answered with silence and I thought I would have to pick on people to do it.

There were 30 students in the class. 29 of them raised their hands! I was so shocked - I really couldn't believe it! And so the rest of the lesson was me and my JTE laughing our arses off at 29 kids attempting to moonwalk. I had to run to the bathroom - I was laughing so hard I thought I was gonna pee my pants!!!!!!!!! It was so awesome and they kids had so much fun with it...

Little did they know that my JTE and I had already decided who was gonna receive the CDs. I had explained to her before that I wanted to give them to the kids who had shown improvement, who had participated well in class, and who had tried really hard over the 2 years that I have known them. So we sat down together and worked it out. Lucky for me, none of the people who did receive the CDs had a shit moonwalk so it was allllll good!

What a great lesson.

I also dedicated the English board to Michael Jackson. It was his life in pictures, with short captions in English. It made me happy to see teachers stop and take the time to look and comment and praise me on what I had done.

And then during lunchtime, I asked if I could replace the crappy music with Michael Jackson's Number Ones album. 教頭先生 thought it was a great idea! So throughout the lunchbreak I could see everyone bopping along to Michael Jackson classics. It put a massive smile on my face.

What a great day at school. And I get to do it all again tomorrow with the ２年生 classes. Such a lot fo time and effort on my part - I need to burn another whole load of CDs.

But totally worth it if it means that these kids will understand the legend that is Michael Jackson.

So, so worth it.

This is my tribute.

xx