Trip to Japan

Today we started our unit on Japan. We have so much to do that I'll be surprised if we can fit it all into one month! We started the day learning how to count to 10 in Japanese, looking at pictures that I took on my trip there many years ago, locating places on a map and learning how to use an abacus. They were surprised to learn that the abacus wasn't just for fun. I bought real ones and they struggled in the beginning to understand that some beads meant one and some meant five. I'm sure by the end of the week, this won't be an issue and I won't hear anymore complaining, but that part of the morning did not go smoothly. I'm pretty sure at one point I said "what, did you think I wasn't going to challenge you to think this whole time?" To which they hung their heads in same and mumbled "no."

We have a lot of things planned for the unit which will end with a Japanese night at our house complete with a kabuki production, haikus, and of course sushi for dinner. They both seemed really excited to start the unit. I'm just happy to be done planning and into the execution stage. Someday, I'd really like to take them there. In the meantime we'll just learn about it and write to our Japanese penpals.