I was teaching at Okabe Junior High during Sports Day season (September), and every P.E. class for several weeks beforehand was dedicated to practicing Sports Day events. The whole week before the big day—which was Saturday, September 12—classes were cancelled all afternoon and students were sent outside straight from lunch, to work on their teamwork skills and strategies for each competition. I spent my afternoons out there with them on the dirt field, clapping in rhythm and counting "1, 2, 1, 2!" to try and keep them upright during the three-legged race rehearsals. I also made a stellar marking post when teams were practicing jogging in formation and there weren't enough orange plastic cones to go around.
On the 12th, the sky was dull and sprinkles fell throughout the morning. Nevertheless, opening ceremonies commenced with a full-school march onto the field, the flag raising, the National Anthem, and several speeches of encouragement from the school principal, the president of the PTA, and the leaders of each of the teams the student body was divided into: red, blue, and yellow.
The competition commenced with a zillion different track events: sprints, distance running, and various relays. Hands down, the best part of this portion was that the music teacher had created a soundtrack for the races (lots of peppy marches and battle tunes—think "William Tell Overture"); the switch to the sound system was flipped on at every crack of the starting gun and faded out with every cross of the finish line. Along with the background music, some ridiculously cute students were giving race commentary along the way: So-and-so's in first! He/she sure is fast! Good luck, so-and-so who's falling behind!
After relays came the team events, where homerooms competed against each other in the three-legged race (except an entire homeroom of about 30 students was tied together instead of just a pair of students...so many twisted ankles, scraped knees, and ripped track pants during practice for this), and the group jump rope.
After lunch, spectating parents were incorporated into a couple events, including a game where teams had to try and sink as many bean bags as possible into a basket, raised high on a bamboo pole, in a given amount of time.
I didn't quite understand the scoring system, but there was a nail-biting lead-up to the final score display (a drum roll and cymbal crash with the posting of each digit), and the red team came out on top. Made sense since their team had a whole extra homeroom (yeah, I was rooting for yellow)...
And then it was time to go home and enjoy the weekend, including the following Monday off to make up for having to go to school on a Saturday. Nice.
I was glad to be a smaller, laid-back school for this occasion, since I've heard Sports Day competitions at other schools can be ultra-serious: months of training, drilling, honing team cheers...and lots of tears from those who don't win on the big day. It might have been cool to see some of the more elaborate contests larger schools include, but I'm all for seeing everyone still smiling on the way home.
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