Westfields Sports High School, Australia's First Sports High School

Westfields Sports
________________________________________________________________ First In Australia

Our trip to Kasukabe Kyoei, Japan By: Ms Daniela Zanet 1st November 2003

WELCOME CEREMONY (pictures 1-2) Saturday, September 27 On arriving at Narita Airport, Japan, we were taken directly to school some 90km away. Here we see photos of our welcome ceremony. The band you see is the school band. At the beginning of the ceremony they played both the Australian and Japanese National Athlems and later played some different pieces of music for us. They were awesome.
Students at Kasukabe Kyoei attend school every second Saturday. Students at Kasukabe Kyoei start school at approx 7.30am and finish at around 6.30pm. Each day begins and ends with Club Activities. Club Some of the activities include sports, music, cheerleading, calligraphy, Green Tea Ceremonies,

Picture No 1

Picture No 2

Kendo, ... Lessons are 50 minutes long and at the conclusion of each period students have a 10 minute break in their homeroom.
Yes the teachers do the moving in Japan not the students.

IN THE CLASSROOM (pictures 3-7) Here we see a collection of photos of Sean Ireland, exchange student from Westfields Sports, with the students of Homeroom 2-12. Sean attended school everyday and participated in all 2-12’s lessons.

In the first photos we see Sean with Wataru and Tatsu (Miss Zanet’s host brother). Other photos include Sean with his classmates, Sean participating in lessons and Sean assisting with Mr Messer’s English lessons.

On Wednesday, October 1 we attended English lessons at Kasukabe University. The class lecturer Nick (yellow shirt) was great and his Directions lesson was really interesting. Students were divided into groups of 4/5 and each group was provided with a tape recorder. Once we reached our starting points groups were asked to listen and following the instructions provided to them by the tape. You’ll never guess which group got lost and arrived back to class 20 minutes late!!

Clue: this group had the “advantage” of a native speaker .....

Picture No 3

Picture No 4

Picture No 5

Picture No 6

Picture No 7

Picture No 8

Picture No 9

WORKING HARD ... (pictures 8-9)
Here we have Sean’s photography skills at their best!
Here we see Miss Zanet getting ready for her Presentations. During the stay at Kasukabe Miss Zanet presented various PowerPoint Displays to different year levels of students at Kasukabe Kyoei.
Students were introduced to Australia, its history, culture, people and its main attractions. Students were really interested in Sydney and its attractions.
Students asked lots of questions about Sydney and were particularly interested in Westfields Sports High Students. Senior Year 2 students will be travelling to Sydney and will visit Westfields Sports December 4 and 5 this year. But what was the most common question ........ .... (not telling)!

National Park Nikko (pictures 10-12)
On Sunday, September 28 we were taken to the famous tourist attraction of Nikko. Temples located in Nikko were founded in 766, during the Nara period, by Shodo-shonin, a high Buddha priest.
Some of the photos show ..
The Shoyo-en (Strolling Garden). This garden, located in the compound of Rin-no-ji Temple

Picture No 10

Picture No 11

Picture No 12

displays its grace and beauty throughout the year. The Sacred Fountain at Nikko Mausoleum Rin-no-ji Taiyuin.
Yomeimon Gate is a compendium of cultures from the Edo period. Sanbutsu-do (a National Cultural Property)
The largest temple in the Nikko mountains, it was built by Jinaku-daishi by order of Emperor Ninmei.

Picture No 13

Picture No 14

Picture No 15

Miss Zanet and the staff of Kasukabe Kyoei High School (pictures 13-15)

Miss Zanet was made to feel very welcomed by the staff at Kasukabe Kyeoi. She attended many various lessons and also taught and assisted in the teaching of others.

Here we see Miss Zanet with many of her colleagues from Kasukabe Kyoei.

Miss Zanet’s Host Family (pictures 16-18)
These photos show Miss Zanet’s wonderful host family.
The Kataoka family consists of; Masayuki (father), Satomi (mother), Kaoru (sister), Tatsu (brother), Yukie (sister - not shown) and Hiromu Kasahara (grandfather). Hiromu Kasahara was dubbed the “trendiest” grandfather by Miss Zanet because he was so technologically advanced. You should see

Picture No 16

Picture No 17

Picture No 18

him email on the computer and on the mobile. Hiromu Kasahara also kindly gave Miss Zanet her own kanji name

and wrote
some haiku poems about and for her. There were some tears shed on Miss Zanet’s departure!!!

Organised Activities (pictures 19-24)
Whilst on our stay at Kasukabe Kyoei High School we had the opportunity to experience some other activities. Some of these included;

Picture No 19

Picture 19 We were taken to a factory where they made Hagoita raquets. Hagoita raquets are traditional Japanese raquets. We got to make our own raquets and were instructed on how to paint them. It was most interesting - Miss Zanet enjoyed this activity!

Picture No 20

Picture 20 This picture shows Sean and Miss Zanet together with Jeff, an Amercan Exchange Student, and his host family. Jeff’s host dad is a Shinto priest.

Picture No 21	Picture No 22	Picture No 23	Picture No 24
Picture 21 This picture shows Miss Zanet with her and Westfields Sports dear friend Akihiro Sekiguchi. Akihiro has been a friend to Miss Zanet and Westfields Sports since the 1997 Japanese Soccer Tour.	Picture 22 Shopping by night. Notice they have a floor dedicated to Disney. Walt Disney characters are extremely popular in Japan. Most favourite character: Pooh Bear!	Picture 23-24 Asakusa. Asakusa is filled with temples and shrines and also has the longest shopping stretch filled with many souvenirs.	Other activities participated by Sean included ... Sean went Japanese pear picking, bike riding, site seeing in Tokyo city and to his horror relaxed in a Japanese bath.