Japanese intern learns as he teaches

BELLEVILLE, Ill. -- Donning a blindfold, Joey Waligorski, 10, did his best to pin a paper "hana" on the chalkboard during a Japanese lesson at Belleville's Governor French Academy.

Hana means "nose" in Japanese, and Joey was relieved to have put it in the right place on the face drawn on the chalkboard by his teacher Shinya Kyugo.

"I like the language because it's different than Spanish," Joey said. "Once I said 'yes' in Spanish in Japanese class."

Kyugo, 23 and a teaching intern from Nagoya, Japan, said he will spend the rest of the school year at Governor French to become more fluent in English.

Nagoya is a major city and prefecture capital on the main Japanese island of Honshu. It's about 150 miles west-southwest of Tokyo.

"I want to be an English teacher in Japan," Kyugo said. "We had to learn English from junior high through the university years."

And like many teachers before him, Kyugo has realized that teaching and learning go hand-in hand. While his students learn Japanese and Japanese folkways, Kyugo is absorbing American culture.

Absorbing culture

Carol Wilson, director of admissions for Governor French, said Kyugo has been teaching basic Japanese to students since he arrived at the school in October.

"He wants to absorb everything about American language and culture," Wilson said. "If you're telling him what a word means, he'll write it on his hand while you're talking so he doesn't forget."

Kyugo said his students usually are respectful and show him more courtesy than students he observed at public schools in Japan.

Kathy Runk, a teacher at Governor French, said the school tries to teach students about other languages and cultures. Runk and her family are Kyugo's hosts during his stay at the school.

"Once a week, we get all the students together to teach them a few words in a different language," she said.