Ms. Fumiko Harada-Ziemer
Father Duenas Memorial School
Guam
Fumiko Harada-Ziemer has been known on Guam as Harada-sensei since the early 80’s. After obtaining a B.A. in Japan, she triple majored in East Asian Studies, Japanese Studies, and Secondary Education at the University of Guam (UOG). She further received a Masters in Education from UOG.
Harada-sensei began her teaching career at Father Duenas Memorial School (FDMS), Guam’s only Catholic boys’ high school. She was invited to Guam by her high school social studies teacher, a Mercedarian sister who then arranged for the Franciscan Sisters of Perpetual Adoration to sponsor her in their convent, instructing her in Western living and English language. Finding her vocation, she has been teaching Japanese to grades 8-12 at St. John’s School (SJS) since 1994, and has been an adjunct professor of Japanese at UOG since 1998.
Harada-sensei helped initiate a brother school program for FDMS and a secondary school in Osaka in 1989. Several FDMS students experienced snow skiing in Japan through this program. In 1993 sensei traveled throughout the former Nan’yo Micronesian islands as a research assistant and translator, interviewing elderly Japanese speaking Micronesians. This was funded through the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Among the grants Harada-sensei has been awarded are the Japan Foundation’s “Pedagogy Workshop for High School Teachers of Japanese” in 1997, “Infusing East Asian Studies into the Primary and Secondary Curriculum on Guam” by UOG in 1998, and the Japan Foundation’s “Training Program for Japanese Language Teachers Abroad” in 2001, which formed a worldwide Japanese teacher’s network to exchange teaching ideas and methods.
Harada-sensei’s teaching has benefitted from her creativity and her vivacious class activities. She created a keyword mnemonic strategy to teach kanji by which students learn to link new characters with their own knowledge. Students create sentences combining onyomi, kunyomi, and meaning, then create a picture containing kanji characters. She presented this strategy at the annual ACTFL meeting in 1998. To her classroom Harada-sensei invites presenters from Japan such as Mr. Koda (Panel Theater), Mrs. Metsugi (e-tegami), Mrs. Kobayashi (tea ceremony), Ms. Tadokoro (calligraphy), and Ms. Yasuoka (yosakoi).
Harada-sensei’s teaching is enriched by her international travels. Since 1998 she has visited Karuizawa three times through the Rotary Club student exchange program. Every year only five students from Guam are selected to attend this prestigious program. Sensei helped to build the bridge between Ritsumeikan High School (Rits) and SJS. Consequently, SJS was invited to attend the Rits Super Science Fair in 2004. In the spring of 2006, 100 Rits students visited SJS and enjoyed a cultural exchange and sports.
Located just three jet hours from Tokyo, tourism is the main industry for the tropical island of Guam. Most tourists are from Japan, thus the demand for teaching Japanese is high. Harada-sensei, together with several Guam teachers, helped revitalize the Japanese Language Teachers Association (JALTA). JALTA organized the Guam’s 1st Regional Japan Bowl in 2004. Harada-sensei had the honor of taking the SJS team together with the FDMS teams to the National Japan Bowl. JALTA also organizes the Japanese Ultra Quiz for Japanese secondary and college learners, a Japanese version of the Academic Challenge Bowl.
The impact of Harada-seisei’s teaching can be seen in the success of her students. In the ten years that she has been teaching Japanese International Baccalaureate students, all have successfully completed the exam. Furthermore, her graduates have pursued Japanese studies in both the U.S. and Japan, including Kyoto University, Keio University, Sophia University, International Christian University, and the East-West Center. Also, some of her students have become sensei through the JET program.
Harada-sensei intends to use the grant to help students create a Guam promotional video for use in student exchange programs. The funds will also help a winner of the Ultra Japanese Quiz to visit Japan for a home stay program, and help send the Guam team to the 2007 National Japan Bowl.