Hello! I am a first year ALT at an integrated elementary and junior high school. I have two new sisters (8年 and 9年) from Peru who moved to Japan not knowing any English or Japanese. They are currently attending English, Music and P.E. classes and spend the rest of the day with a dedicated Japanese teacher. They have a translator who comes twice a week, but I believe she will not be attending their English classes.
My JTEs have asked me and my co-ALT (who only comes 2x a week) to help prepare worksheets to help them learn while the class continues with the lesson. At first I didn't think much, until yesterday when we had our first class and I found myself with one of the sisters for the entire period trying to quietly teach her months and days of the week. Then I realized, they will need their own material 4 days a week during English class. I plan to ask my JTEs for clarification, but it kinda seems they are a bit unsure what to do as well.
I don't know what direction to go from here. Along with preparing for my elementary school classes and my attendance for other JHS classes, I am pretty busy for most of the day with little time for prep. I studied a bit of Spanish in high school, but haven't used it in 5 years. Also, my Japanese is not good at all.
Since I'm a first-year ALT with no teaching background, this is really challenging for me. I already feel bad as I feel more pressure to do well for these sisters, who are already in a more stressful environment as new kids in a foreign country without knowing the language.
So far I've been resorting to finding online resources, and considering following the flow of the elementary textbooks so they can learn basic phrases and increase their vocabulary.
Any help would be greatly appreciated, thank you so much!
by starvilight11