P.E. in Japan is awesome!

I just watched a 研究授業 (kenkyuu jugyou), a special observation lesson where a teacher-in-training taught a class.  It was a P.E. class, and it was so cool!  I had never in my two years here actually watched an entire P.E. class, and now I have an example of great physical education.  I wish my gym classes had been like the ones they have here in Japan.

Okay, lemme 'splain.

First, a little context.  As I've seen, gym classes are generally split up by gender so only girls have classes with girls and boys with boys.  Also, P.E. is a serious class here treated like any other class, and P.E. teachers get a lot of respect.  Often, P.E. teachers are the ones who are given the role of disciplinarian and are seen as moral role models for all the students.  They usually are super involved in students' lives and scold them when they act out whether or not it's during their class and praise them for the good they do, again, whether or not it's during their class.  It's really nice.  And, I feel like students here are very well-rounded since they are educated in the basic subjects, a foreign language, physical education, music and art, and morality.  Very "Renaissance Man" or polymath.  I think it's an ideal we humans should really all strive for.

Anyways, so the lesson I went to.

Japanese Work Clothes for School

こんにちは。よろしくお願いします!

Winter has come, and that means winter fashion!  Yay!!

So this post is about what people wear to work when work is a Japanese public school and when it's cold.  ALT and JTE #OOTD, if you will.

ALT= Assistant Language Teacher (so usually the foreign teacher who helps teach English)

JTE= Japanese Teacher of English (usually Japanese native teachers who teach English)

OOTD= Outfit Of The Day

This post is mainly to help those who are thinking about coming to Japan to work as an ALT, like through the JET program, Interac, direct hire by a Board of Education, etc.  But I guess it's interesting just to see what people wear, too, right?

As always...
DISCLAIMER: ESID (Every Situation Is Different!)  
I actually dislike this acronym because I feel like it states the obvious.  Of course, ESID applies to working in Japan or working anywhere really.  Everyone knows you should wear a suit and tie or whatever other professional clothing that customarily matches a workplace position, but, especially for those who are new graduates or new to the working world or new to Japan's working world, we need examples!!  We want a general idea!  Some work places provide a very clear-cut dress code or even uniform to make it easier for us newbies while others don't seem to specify a thing.  

So yeah, ESID, or whatever.  Just know that the following examples are what I choose to wear and what other individuals choose to wear at my junior high school.  I feel that I would categorize my school as somewhere in between those super formal schools where everyone wears suits and the more casual schools where everyone basically shows up in sportswear since it's the most comfortable (and makes sense to wear when you're a sports club supervisor before and after classes, so why change clothes, right?)

Okay!

ALT #OOTD

If you're interested in what an ALT might wear to work, please watch the video below.  It's me!

JTE #OOTD

If you're interested in seeing what everyday teachers, including JTEs, wear to work, please scroll through the following pictures.  Each picture is labeled to give you a little more information about the teacher, but faces, names, and other identifying information are not given to protect the privacy of each individual, of course.  They all are or were my coworkers, and they all so kindly allowed me to take their pictures anonymously to help me out in making this blog post.

Here they are!

Female, English

Female, Math

Male, Vice Principal