What is Your Score for Today?
By: Amanda Gillis-Furutaka
This is an activity that I learned from the students in my university’s English Studying Society (ESS–a club for students who love using and improving their English). It has always struck me as a great way to finish a lesson because it helps students share something of their personal lives (to the extent they wish to) and encourages empathy as well as problem solving on some occasions.
Tell the students to think back over the events of their day so far and give a score out of 10 for how good the day has been (or not). They then share their score with their group or partner and explain why their score is so low or so high. Here are a couple of true and highly memorable examples from Kyoto Sangyo University ESS students.
One young man gave his day a score of zero (it was about 5:30 one winter afternoon). Why so very bad? He had woken up to find that his small rental apartment was freezing cold, dark, and with no hot water because his electricity had been cut off. He had forgotten to pay his bill! He was also late for his 9 o’clock class, so he had no time for even a hot drink, let alone breakfast. He had a meeting during the lunch break, so no time for lunch, and then classes and ESS club in the afternoon, so no time to go to the bank ATM and transfer the money for his electricity to be restored. He was expecting to spend another cold night at home that night…. Some of us were dabbing our eyes by the time he had finished, and he was showered with snacks and sympathy!
A young woman gave her day a score of 1 because she had woken up that morning naked on her bed! She had a hot bath the night before and must have lain down to cool off and fallen asleep. She slept very soundly but woke up very cold and she was sure that she was coming down with a cold by the time she shared her story! We all laughed because even she could see the funny side of her story.
These glimpses into the somewhat chaotic lives of our students help remind us that they are still learning to be responsible adults and dealing with so much else that life is throwing at them outside our classrooms. My scores were always far higher than those of the students and this made me appreciate how much easier life gets in later years when we have stability, security, and for me on ESS club days, a husband at home cooking dinner that night!
Amanda Gillis-Furutaka, retired academic advisor for the Kyoto Sangyo University English Studying Society, joins their activities once a week as a volunteer, which raises her score for that day by at least 5 points!