Learn about talking about children
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Natsuko: こんにちは。夏子です。 |
| Naomi: 直美です。 |
| Peter: Peter here. Problem Child. Natsuko san |
| Natsuko: はい。 |
| Peter: どうでしょうか。 Problem child. |
| Natsuko: Yeah いや、このタイトルだけでは何のことかわからないですよね。 |
| Peter: Yeah I don’t think you can derive much just from the title. So Naomi Sensei, can you tell us about this lesson. What’s going on here? |
| Naomi: えっと、先生と校長先生がお話してますね。 |
| Peter: The teacher and the principal are having a conversation. |
| Naomi: 多分、えーと、場所は学校だと思います。学校で先生と校長先生が… |
| Peter: At the school. |
| Naomi: はい。話してます。 |
| Peter: And now Natsuko san, the title kind of makes sense right? |
| Natsuko: そうですね。どうも、問題のある子がいるみたいですね。 |
| Peter: The problem child. So before we get in, what kind of Japanese will be covered today or what kind of Japanese is spoken in the conversation? |
| Natsuko: 丁寧ですね。これね。 |
| Naomi: そうですね。 |
| Peter: Polite Japanese. |
| Natsuko: はい。 |
| Peter: Alright, with that said, let’s see what’s going on. Here we go. |
| DIALOGUE |
| 先生: こういう言い方はよくないですが、あの子は子供のくせに妙にさめている感じがするんです。 |
| 校長: どういう風に。 |
| 先生: 休憩時間でも、お友達の輪に入らないですし感情表現というか、喜怒哀楽を全然おもてに出さないんです。 |
| 校長: でも、いろいろな子供がいるでしょう。あなたも新人の先生じゃあるまいし、いままでの経験があるでしょう。 |
| 先生: 授業中も答えがわかっているくせに、当てても何も言いません。そのくせに、テストの点数はいつもクラスで一番です。心を開かせようと、色々努力しているんですが・・・一向に。 |
| 校長: そうですか。来月から家庭訪問が始まるので、その辺りを親御さんに婉曲に聞いてみてください。それからまた話しましょう。 |
| 先生: わかりました。 |
| もう一度、お願いします。今度は、ゆっくりお願いします。 |
| 先生: こういう言い方はよくないですが、あの子は子供のくせに妙にさめている感じがするんです。 |
| 校長: どういう風に。 |
| 先生: 休憩時間でも、お友達の輪に入らないですし感情表現というか、喜怒哀楽を全然おもてに出さないんです。 |
| 校長: でも、いろいろな子供がいるでしょう。あなたも新人の先生じゃあるまいし、いままでの経験があるでしょう。 |
| 先生: 授業中も答えがわかっているくせに、当てても何も言いません。そのくせに、テストの点数はいつもクラスで一番です。心を開かせようと、色々努力しているんですが・・・一向に。 |
| 校長: そうですか。来月から家庭訪問が始まるので、その辺りを親御さんに婉曲に聞いてみてください。それからまた話しましょう。 |
| 先生: わかりました。 |
| 今度は、英語が入ります。 |
| 先生: こういう言い方はよくないですが、あの子は子供のくせに妙にさめている感じがするんです。 |
| TEACHER: I don't mean to sound rude, but I feel like that student is a bit jaded despite being a child. |
| 校長: どういう風に。 |
| PRINCIPAL: In what way? |
| 先生: 休憩時間でも、お友達の輪に入らないですし感情表現というか、喜怒哀楽を全然おもてに出さないんです。 |
| TEACHER: Even during breaks, he won't join his friends and he doesn't express any emotion. Rather, he doesn't show his joys, anger, sorrows or happiness. |
| 校長: でも、いろいろな子供がいるでしょう。あなたも新人の先生じゃあるまいし、いままでの経験があるでしょう。 |
| PRINCIPAL: But there are different kinds of children. You're not a new teacher. You have plenty of experience to learn from, don't you? |
| 先生: 授業中も答えがわかっているくせに、当てても何も言いません。そのくせに、テストの点数はいつもクラスで一番です。心を開かせようと、色々努力しているんですが・・・一向に。 |
| TEACHER: During class, he won't say anything even though he knows the answer. And yet he gets the highest test scores in his class. I am really trying hard to make him open up his heart...But there is no change. |
| 校長: そうですか。来月から家庭訪問が始まるので、その辺りを親御さんに婉曲に聞いてみてください。それからまた話しましょう。 |
| PRINCIPAL: Is that so. Well, next month, the teachers will start visiting students' homes to talk to parents. So try and ask the student's parents about this. Let's talk again after that. |
| 先生: わかりました。 |
| TEACHER: Sure, no problem. |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Peter: Naomi Sensei, let’s ask Natsuko san what she thought of today’s conversation. |
| Naomi: 夏子さん。今日の会話をどう思いましたか。 |
| Natsuko: なかなか深刻ですね。 |
| Naomi: そうですね。 |
| Natsuko: 最近よくこういう話を聞くような気がします。 |
| Peter: Yeah this is a pretty deep conversation and the one that’s heard very often recently. |
| Naomi: Yes 小学校の先生、それから中学校の先生は最近本当に大変ですよね。 |
| Peter: Yeah recently Elementary school teachers and middle school teachers are in kind of a fix. They have it kind of tough. |
| Natsuko: こういう子供の場合って、親も子供の考えていることがわからないなんていう話を聞きますよね。 |
| Naomi: Sometimes even the parents say they don’t know what their child is thinking. |
| Peter: Yeah I can definitely see that. I mean yeah the things change so fast now. |
| Natsuko: ちょっとJapanesePodにしてはシリアスなテーマですね。 |
| Peter: 珍しいですね。 |
| Naomi: そうですね。でももしかしたらちょっと大人っぽい子供なだけかもしれないですよね。 |
| Natsuko: そうですね。それとか、恥ずかしがりやなのかも。 |
| Peter: Yeah maybe he is just mature or maybe he is just shy. |
| Naomi: そうですね。喜怒哀楽を全然表に出さない。 |
| Peter: Ah that’s one of the words we have to cover. So before we could actually translate this, why don’t we take a look at the vocab? |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Naomi: はい。喜怒哀楽 |
| Peter: Human emotions. |
| Naomi: (slow)きどあいらく (natural speed) 喜怒哀楽 |
| Peter: And Natsuko san, this is. |
| Natsuko: 四字熟語 |
| Peter: Meaning a word or concept that is expressed in four Chinese characters. |
| Natsuko: 日本でもよく試験に出てくるんですよね。 |
| Naomi: 出てきますね。 |
| Natsuko: 四字熟語。 |
| Naomi: 国語の試験の前はたくさん覚えなければいけないですね。 |
| Natsuko: Because there are so many of these kinds of words that often appear on your test. |
| Peter: Yes the Japanese tests for Japanese students. |
| Natsuko: そうですね。 |
| Peter: And in this case, we have one of these. Now the four characters each mean something. Naomi Sensei, what does the first character mean? |
| Naomi: これは喜ぶという意味です。 |
| Peter: Joy. This is followed by |
| Naomi: 怒る |
| Peter: Anger and we have |
| Naomi: 悲しむ |
| Peter: Sad. |
| Naomi: そうですね。 |
| Peter: To be sad and finally we have |
| Naomi: 楽しむ |
| Peter: Have fun. So we have joy, anger, sadness, fun and this translates to human emotions. |
| Naomi: 日本人は喜怒哀楽が少ないですか？ |
| Natsuko: So did they show their human emotions or not? |
| Peter: お酒を飲むと When they drink. 倍くらいなります。 Like they double it. |
| Natsuko: That means the child doesn’t have the way to express their emotion. |
| Naomi: Because they are not drunk. |
| Natsuko: うーん。だからproblem childになっちゃうんだ。 |
| Naomi: ああそっか。 |
| Natsuko: お酒を飲まないと。 That’s a joke. |
| Peter: Yeah just the joke. I think but it’s true. When they have some alcohol, they are much more expressive or… |
| Natsuko: I agree. |
| Peter: If you approach them first, then they are much more willing to be open. |
| Natsuko: Oh yes right. Ask them first right? |
| Peter: Yeah. |
| Natsuko: You know, they don’t voluntarily show their expression but when asked, they reveal their inner emotion. |
| Naomi: Really? |
| Peter: Yeah. |
| Naomi: あー気づきませんでした。すごい。これはすごいいい方法ですね。 |
| Peter: Okay. Next we have |
| Natsuko: 感情表現 |
| Peter: Expressing emotion. Facial expression. |
| Natsuko: (slow)かんじょうひょうげん (natural speed) 感情表現 |
| Peter: And this is made up of two words. First word is |
| Natsuko: 感情 |
| Peter: Emotion. Second |
| Natsuko: 表現 |
| Peter: Expression. So usually with facial expressions, this is |
| Natsuko: Yes something that appears outside. |
| Peter: Okay next we have |
| Naomi: 新人 |
| Peter: New face, newcomer. This is followed by |
| Natsuko: 家庭訪問 |
| Peter: To visit the home of students. |
| Natsuko: (slow)かていほうもん (natural speed) 家庭訪問 |
| Peter: And finally we have |
| Naomi: 婉曲 |
| Peter: Roundabout, indirect. Natsuko san, how can we use this word in dialogue or sentences? |
| Natsuko: 婉曲表現という言葉でよく使いますね。 |
| Peter: Roundabout expression. |
| Natsuko: Yes. |
| Peter: Or indirect in expression. |
| Natsuko: So trying not to be rude by mentioning it directly. |
| Peter: Would ちょっと be one? |
| Natsuko: Maybe, but I have a feeling that you know Japanese conversation is based on very indirect expressions. So the basis is already kind of indirect and in this case, 婉曲表現 the person using the expression is strongly aware of you know, not mentioning it directly. So I think you know, more kind of elaborate. |
Lesson focus |
|---|
| Peter: 了解しました。ありがとうございます。 Okay now let’s move on to the conversation. There are few points of interest here. Naomi Sensei お願いします。 |
| Naomi: First line あの子は子供のくせに妙に冷めてる感じがするんです。 |
| Peter: I feel like that student is a bit jaded despite being a child even though he is a child and before the teacher said this, she used the following phrase to kind of soften the strong remarks about the child. This was? |
| Naomi: こういう言い方はよくないのですが |
| Peter: I don’t mean to sound rude or I don’t mean to sound harsh or I hope it doesn’t come across this way and then we have the part about the child. Now what’s of interest here to us is |
| Naomi: くせに |
| Peter: And this is a conjunction we introduced earlier. It’s similar to のに which means although or in spite of in English but here this expresses the speaker’s emotional state which is usually anger, disdain or some kind of strong feeling. |
| Natsuko: ちょっと見下している感じですよね。 Kind of looking down. |
| Peter: Yeah. Let’s see if we can have a really good example. Naomi Sensei |
| Naomi: はい。 |
| Peter: 例文をお願いします。 |
| Naomi: はい。彼は学生のくせに会社を作りました。 |
| Peter: Even though he is a student, he made a company. |
| Naomi: あんまりこう、いいことだと思っていないんですね。 |
| Peter: Or あるいは the speaker is a little jealous. |
| Naomi: そうですね。学生のくせに… |
| Peter: Yeah. |
| Naomi: みたいな感覚ですね。 |
| Peter: You know, so you could picture a 25-year-old working at a convenience store seen as little kid. So it’s just disdain for this person who is doing something better than him where he uses くせに。 |
| Natsuko: Or maybe the teacher scolding the student who doesn’t study but you know starts business. |
| Peter: Ah seems like you are speaking from experience, Natsuko san? |
| Natsuko: No I am not a teacher. So it’s yeah this kind of negative or looking down kind of nuance. |
| Peter: Whereas のに is more neutral. |
| Natsuko: Yes 学生なのに会社を作りました。 that’s pretty neutral. |
| Peter: Even though he is a student, he started a company. |
| Naomi: そうですね。で、もっとポジティブな感じなのが、学生ながらも会社を作りました。ちょっとポジティブな感じがしますね。 |
| Natsuko: そうですね。あ、学生なのに偉いなあ。という感じですよね。 |
| Peter: So not this negative nuance to it. Next point of interest. |
| Natsuko: The sixth line あなたも新人の先生じゃあるまいし、今までの経験があるでしょう。 |
| Peter: You are not a new teacher. You have plenty of experience to learn from. Don’t you? So we are going to take a look at じゃあるまいし which is a grammatical construction of – it’s pretty complex and usually found probably on level 1 Japanese test. |
| Natsuko: じゃあるまいし、はもっと丁寧な言い方をすれば、ではないのだから。 |
| Peter: And meaning because you are not with the nuance of you are better than that. So here the principal is telling the teacher, well you are not a new teacher. You should be better than that. So literally you are not bad among other things the し at the end and the nuance is, you are better than that. So come on, you are not a new teacher. |
| Natsuko: うん。そういう感じですね。 |
| Peter: And Naomi Sensei, we were listening to the Mr. Children song. |
| Naomi: 終わりなき旅という歌ですね。わたしは聴いたことが無かったんですが、ピーターさんが知ってました。 |
| Peter: This grammatical construction comes up in the song and in the song they said. |
| Naomi: ガキじゃあるまいし |
| Peter: You are better than a spoiled little kid. You are better than a spoiled brat. |
| Natsuko: ふうん。あ、そういう歌詞が出てくるんだ。 |
| Peter: So here we have noun plus そのまま、じゃあるまいし Noun followed by じゃあるまいし。 |
| Naomi: 例えば、もう子供じゃあるまいし、ばかなことは止めなさい。 |
| Peter: You are not a kid and again this among other things, you know what’s right, you know what’s wrong et cetera, et cetera. So you are not a kid, stop doing foolish things. So it’s this not only but among other things this nuance and usually it has that you are better than nuance to it. |
Outro |
| Peter: Okay so we are going to stop here. So if you have any questions stop by and leave us a post. Inside the PDF, detailed write up on くせに and inside the learning center, drills, quizzes, tests to bring everything together. That’s going to do for today. |
| Natsuko: それじゃあ、また今度。 |
| Natsuko: さよなら。 |
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