Let’s Choose a Right Path for Your Better Future!

Congratulations to our graduating students!

Congratulations to everyone completing his/her grade of the fiscal year 2016!

This school year is coming to an end and new year is about to begin. In this context, you may miss the days when you were together with your friends. Sometimes you may wish you could go back in time. However, I would like you to look for a way to build up your brand new class and school year on your own and change the great atmosphere even further better with everyone, rather than looking back the past. “Making use of your past experience” is not achievable by just missing those days. Let’s move forward by taking advantage of your previous valuable experience.
I strongly feel you should choose a right way, which is not an easy way, needing some additional effort. In this way, there will be a bright future waiting for you. 続きを読む…

Be a Strong and Flexible as bamboo tree

The graduation ceremony will be held next Saturday, March 11.　The school year is coming to an end. Do you remember the fun and tough times and the unforgettable moments of school activities in your daily life? These events can be compared to bamboo nodes on the stem. If a bamboo doesn’t have nodes, it will fall down quickly. Because of nodes, a bamboo stem is able to stand strong and flexible under snowy and windy days. Your experiences that has been overcome are the bamboo nodes. The more nodes you have, the stronger of a person you are able to grow into and take in deep consideration, right judgement and right action. 続きを読む…

Completing one thing now, Another mountain to go over

Let me share a poem called “One Thing” by Kihaku Saito.
“Completing one thing now, another mountain to go over. Wind crossing the field, A song blending in my mind, Mulberry tree filling up and clouds shining, People follow and a road never ends, A road far away and a road far away, Find a mountain to go over tomorrow, Completing one thing now”
The poem expresses the joy to accomplish one thing -climbed a mountain, and the eagerness to go over a higher mountain next. We used to sing the song at a graduation ceremony. A graduation day is approaching. I hope students have found time they spent at school valuable – the time they studied together, played together, and shared together. There are only two school days left before graduation. Let’s cherish every moment with all of your friends. 続きを読む…

When you observe the character 人間:human…

Humans are sociable. People interact with one another to thrive. This interaction forms one’s happiness and purpose in their lives.
When you observe the character; “人間 (human)”, its meaning deeply touches my heart that people bearing one another to carry on their lives and a person can truly become a person among this interaction of people. Great respect in the wisdom of our predecessors for creating these characters.（extracting from “Kodomoeno manazashi by Masami Sasaki） 続きを読む…

Looking yourself through others’ view

As children become teens, they start feeling self-conscious about their looks and check themselves out in the mirror more than ever. They are not only focused on how they look on the outside, but also their inner selves. With peer pressure to fit into the teen culture can be more important than anything else. Mirrors reflect on the outside appearance, but friends reactions impact their inner self image.
(Kodomono manazashi by Masami Sasaki) 続きを読む…

Graduate everybody

I think the graduation is the compilation of school life. I wish every students could spent the satisfying school life. 続きを読む…

Bringing up thoughtfulness, kindness and geniality of the heart

If our kids are growing without a nice and thoughtful heart, that is pretty sad. If that happened, it might be because they were growing up without a chance to meet people who have a thoughtful mind. This is also a sad situation for our society because we might be losing our kindness of human nature. And unfortunately, these chain reactions show up on weak people like kids as a negative chain.
By the way, I think we have both ‘egoism’ and ‘altruistic’ in our mind, and I would say that ‘altruistic’ means having wide vision and being able to make the right decisions. And you can also say that’s a thought that ‘good for others’, so it’s easier to get somebody else’s help. Furthermore, people who have this sort of mind think of others and even live for others, so they can find a purpose in their lives and can feel comfortable in their heart.
I think ‘thoughtfulness’, ‘kindness’, ‘geniality’… these words have in common with ‘altruistic’. So why do we start up with making a good environment to bring up the kids’ hearts at school and home? 続きを読む…

At Daikan, spring is still far away, and snow forecast worries us

January 20 is called “Daikan” in Japan and is considered to be the coldest day of the year. It also means that once it is over, the spring is near. However, there has been a lot of snow in Japan recently, and spring still seems far away.
If you look around the world, we see a lot of abnormal weather like heat waves in south western parts of the U.S. and India, heavy rain in southern part of Thailand and Chinese Yangze River, and cold waves in central Europe through western Russia. They were thought to be caused by global economic activities, El Nino (where the sea-surface temperatures rise), and La Nina (sea-surface temperatures decrease).
For our school, snow fall and snow accumulations are enemies to our academic activities. In fact, since the year end, there have been snow forecast three times in a row, with two of them actually causing moderate snow fall and snow accumulations, forcing us to adjust our schedule. I have heard that these were just the beginning winter activities and the snow here is much heavier.
Looking at the sky reproachfully, we are so looking forward to the spring. 続きを読む…

Sagicho, Dondo-yaki, Dondon-yaki

Our culture is filled with many traditions, especially around New Year’s. In Japan, all the items related to toshigami such as the New Year Decorations or the lucky charms are never thrown away but are collected at shrines and burned at the beginning of January, in a ritual fire. Households with children decorate Bamboo grass with colorful strip of paper. They burn Bamboo around their community from the evening of Jan. 14th through the morning of Jan. 15th. They make Adzuki-Bean gruel with Bamboo charcoal and eat　it to wish a safe and healthy new year. Please take some time to talk with your children about New Year Traditions and fun games of your hometown. 続きを読む…

A Happy New Year!

We are now at the beginning of a new year! It is interesting how an artificial construct like the New Year reinvigorates us with renewed enthusiasm and goals. However, I believe that it is important not to just freshly start from scratch but to also to take the past into consideration. Learning from the past is not just about reminiscence. It is important to come up with concrete steps to achieve your goals for the New Year. In other words, using your past experiences as a foundation, it is important to clearly establish what is necessary for the successful accomplishment of your goals. With persistent hard work, I am sure that all of you will have a bright future ahead. 続きを読む…