Good evening, everyone... I hope you had a nice national holiday today (Feb. 11th), and I hope you have a nice Valentine's Day on Monday (Feb. 14th)!! In Canada and America, Valentine's Day is a little bit different than Japan. Here, it's almost always women who give chocolate to men on that day. But in North America, anyone (men or women) can give something to anyone else. And it doesn't have to be chocolate. A lot of people give a Valentine's Day card instead, or they give flowers. It's mostly women who receive flowers, though (usually from men).
Recently, I've been talking about junior high school students in my blog. That's because I've been explaining about the March presentations, when our Grade 7, 8, & 9 students will give a speech about SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals). I've mentioned all of the 2nd and 3rd year groups of students already, but not yet the 1st year ones. So today I'll let you know what they're doing. Sorry, I don't have photos of those students right now! Maybe in the future I'll add a few pictures of them. The first group is Takeru, Taishin, Funa, and Hiori. They come every Tuesday, and their SDG topics are #4 (Quality Education) and SDG #5 (Gender Equality). They will focus especially on "Gender Equality", which means discussing how men and women can become more equal in the future. The Thursday students are Kodo, Mei, Airi, and Riho. They are researching SDG #2 (Zero Hunger), which means helping everyone on Earth have enough food. The Friday students came to Starry today. In one group, Nana, Min, Shu, Genki, and Sotaro have been working on SDG #14 (Life Below Water). In other words, they are looking at ways to help living things in the world's oceans. The second Friday group is Riko, Ichita, Ryo, and So. Their topic is #11 (Sustainable Cities and Communities), so they are thinking of how to make places with lots of people (like Sendai or Tokyo) much better in the future. Lastly, the two Saturday groups are Daisuke, Gaku, & Ryosuke (doing SDG #4: "Good Health and Well-Being); and Erika, Haruna, & Monami (doing SDG #2: "Zero Hunger). These are important issues today, especially with the coronavirus situation affecting everyone's health, and lots of places in the world where people are really hungry. Next month, I'm sure we will be able to hear some great presentations from our junior high school students.
One more thing I wanted to mention: this week, we have been making natto chocolate in our Starry classes! It's not natto, actually... it just LOOKS like natto because we are using chocolate crispies with marshmallows. It's very sticky. Everyone followed the English instructions and helped the teachers prepare the special treats. Here is a photo of my Grade 3 class from yesterday:
Haruki has made a nice chocolate heart!! Behind him, you can see Kaede, Rinka, Hiiragi, and Kyoshiro all hard at work shaping their "natto chocolate" to take home. Good job, boys and girls! Hopefully you all showed your family members what you made. And I'm sure the treats were really delicious!!! OK, have a great weekend.
- Peter 
