On November 16^th 2015, 24 current and prospective volunteers attended a Training Day for the Japan Foundation’s Japanese Taster for Schools (JTS) Programme, in which native and fluent Japanese speakers conduct free Japanese taster sessions in UK schools. The Training Day was held at Conway Hall in London.

After an overview for new volunteers about the Japan Foundation and the JTS programme itself, the participants heard reports from volunteers who had held Japanese tasters at schools via the JTS Programme. Miss Lisa Barrett reported on her visit to The Priory School, which was an unusual taster as not only students, but also the teachers, took part as part of a staff training session. Next, Dr Eunmi Pearson talked about her visit to Reading School, which had been a complex visit involving 4 volunteers but had gone really well.

This was followed by workshops held by two of the JTS Programme’s most experienced volunteers. Mrs Kyoko Delaforce, who has been volunteering for JTS for over 2 years and has visited 8 schools, presented some of the ways to teach Japanese in Primary Schools, including the use of song. She was followed by Ms Emi Yabe, who has been a JTS volunteer for over 5 years and has visited 19 schools, and she presented on teaching activities for Secondary School pupils.

At the end, the Japan Foundation announced that we would now be issuing certificates and prizes to volunteers  according to the number of schools they had visited, and presented volunteers present at the training day with a Silver or Gold certificate plus prizes.

All the volunteers enjoyed the training day and said that they found it useful. Miss Sarah Dopierala, who was attending the training day for the first time, said, “I was glad to meet people in our taster community and to get such wonderful ideas for sessions.”

We would like to thank all participants for coming, especially our guest speakers!

Photos from the event can be found here.

If you are interested in taking part in the JTS programme as a volunteer, please click here for more information.