5th Grade Reflection Activity on Japan Voice Conference

Below is a collection of responses from Will Piper's 5th grade social students student on what the learned from our voice conference with my friend in Japan, George Ayrault. Will had the students write down what they learned and Will summarized this information below.

Things I Learned from our Japan Voice Conference:
-Most of the streets in Japan are very skinny.
-The Japanese take their karaoke seriously.
-When they do karaoke people rent rooms.
-Their houses are small and packed in.
-They have the biggest working clock in the world on a Ferris wheel.
-They’re 9 hours ahead of us.
-Their houses are right next to each other.
-Tokyo tower is based off the Eifel Tower.

-All the kids walk to school in groups.
-They have double-windows because airplanes and army jets pass over their school.
-It takes the same amount of time, sometimes, to ride a bike to work than to drive a car to work.
-Many people use bikes for transportation.
-When it’s morning here it is about midnight in Japan.
-Kids get out of school earlier than we do (around 1:15)

-When it’s 8:00am in Milwaukee it’s 12:00am in Japan.
-I learned that kids in Japan take off their shoes in school and put them in shelves. After that they put on slippers.
-Usually if you live in a house, the ceiling will be around 6 feet tall.
-Since the houses are so close together, some houses have the same address.
-The streets are really narrow.
-Japan has one of the biggest digital clocks in the world.
-There is a big statue of Buddha that survived a tsunami.
-A lot of people ride their bikes to get around Japan because it’s faster.
-Kids walk to school in BIG groups.
-There are pushers that put people onto the shinkonsen.
-They have a Tokyo Tower similar to the Eifel Tower.

-They have a tower in Tokyo like the Eiffel Tower.
-They have a Ferris Wheel that has a big digital clock in the middle of it.
-The streets are really narrow.
-Kids walk to school in large groups.
-Kids put on slippers when they get to school.
-There are earthquake hats.
-The houses are close together and almost attached.
-There is a really big statue of Buddha that didn’t get destroyed by a tsunami.
-A lot of people ride the shinkonsen.
-You don’t really drive your car to work. Most people ride bikes or take the shinkonsen.
-It takes 15 minutes for George to drive or bike to work.

-Japan is really safe.
-Because the houses are so close together, some of them have the same address.
-At the school they had to put in double windows because planes were flying by.
-Football is not a popular sport at all in Japan. Sumo and baseball are really popular.

-Bicycles are very popular transportation in Japan.
-Streets are VERY narrow.
-They like baseball a lot.
-They take karaoke seriously.
-The world’s largest digital clock is located on a Ferris Wheel.
-Japan is mostly based on tradition.
-The kids walk in groups to school for safety.
-Bikes are popular… basketball is starting to become popular.
-Driving is slow and expensive.
-They park their cars in special garages.
-It costs a lot of money to park your car.
-There isn’t a lot of snow there.