Why do we do what we do? For the international JOEE volunteers, our best reward is seeing the happy faces of the children as they play, dance and sing while learning English. Being able to speak English and to connect with people from many different cultures are important skills that will help them in the future and they grow up and seek out jobs in Japanese society.
It has been almost six years since JOEE began teaching English lessons in orphanages in Japan. Our volunteer teachers have collected many meaningful and heart-warming memories connecting with eager children and watching them learn and grow. Volunteering is its own reward, of course, but recently JOEE was presented with a recognition award at an event in downtown Tokyo called, “Mochi-Fes.”
“Mochi-Fes” is an annual event sponsored by the Japan Child Foundation. This year, we were invited to participate and to set up a booth to distribute pamphlets and inform the public about our work. A group of energetic JOEE volunteers met up at the Shibuya Line Building on February 6th, ready to spread “JOEE to the world.”
We gave out light blue bracelets printed with the JOEE.jp website and our kangaroo logo (joey means baby kangaroo), which was designed by author-illustrator, Satoshi Kitamura. Over 300 people of all ages stopped by our booth. Many of them met Mehhhgumi the Sheep and stayed to hear about the work that we do with kids growing up in protective care homes.
Later, during a concert and program highlighting the ten different organizations that make a positive difference in the lives of children in orphanages, JOEE, along with other NPOs, was called to the stage to accept a framed award along with a golden soccer ball signed by a famous soccer player, Nahomi Kawasumi.
The best thing about this event was that many people who had never known that there were so many orphanages in Japan, now knew of their existence. Many who did not know about the thousands of children in protective care homes, now knew that these children are there and in need of help and support. Knowing that a problem exists is the first step in finding a solution.
JOEE volunteers give of their time and share their hearts with children who have ended up in orphanages, not through any fault of their own. They are removed from hurtful and neglectful circumstances and placed in a care home where they receive food and clothing and nurturing care until they are 18 years old… and then they are on their own. The kind-hearted souls who help out with JOEE lessons know that the greatest reward is having the privilege to be with these children who deserve a bright future. The best reward is being able to share love.
On October 15, Mehhgumi the Sheep made her singing debut in Tokyo at a fundraiser for a nonprofit benefitting kids in care homes. Mehhgumi, (who is also known as “Baaa-bara”), with a bit of help from me, sang the Sesame Street classic, created by Jeff Moss, “I Don’t Want to Live on the Moon.” Have a listen:
10月15日、羊のめ～ぐみは、養護施設の子供たちを応援する非営利団体の東京での募金イベントで歌手としてデビューしました。め～ぐみ(「バ～バラ」とも呼ばれる)は、私の助けを借りて、ジェフ・モスが作成したセサミストリートの名曲「I Don’t Want to Live on the Moon」を歌いました。聞いてください:
I Don’t Want to Live on the Moon
Jones, that old hound dog, had begged with his big, old puppy eyes, to be taken along to the fundraising event. He was thrilled when Elvis showed up and belted out the “Hound Dog” song. Jones danced and howled along with the music, gracing us all with doggy breath and delirious drool.
We had a marvelous time, crooning tunes and dancing like loons. I did my best to help by singing and playing the harmonica along with the John Denver classic, “Take Me Home Country Roads.” Towards the end of the evening, something very mysterious and magical happened.
For several weeks, I had been planning trips to Nagoya, Kobe and Osaka on behalf of JOEE. I would be preaching at a couple of churches and visiting orphanages with my puppets. One event that I was looking forward to attending was a birthday party for a little girl in Kobe. The theme of the party was rabbits. Did I have a large rabbit puppet that I could bring to the party to perform with? No, I did not. I had lions, cats, sheep, frogs, even an elephant. But no large rabbits. So, I was thinking hard about rabbits that night. I was wishing for a rabbit puppet. Guess what happened?
While taking a break from singing up on stage, a woman approached me and, out of the blue, asked me, “Would you like to have a rabbit puppet?” My jaw dropped in surprise. “Yes! I would love to have a rabbit puppet!” I wondered how in the world did this woman, (whom I had never met before), know that I needed a rabbit puppet. “Wait here — I’ll be back soon.” She returned with a beautiful puppet that had sat in her house, unused, for forty years. “I would be happy if you could use this puppet with JOEE.”
I accepted the new JOEE puppet with joy and brought it back with me to my home in Nagano. I call it my “Thought Rabbit.” And because “thought” is “kanga-e” in Japanese and because JOEE or “joey” means baby kangaroo, maybe I can call it “Kangae-roo.” It was a thought in my head and then it magically appeared and jumped into my arms.
We hope that good and magical things continue to happen through JOEE and that our supporters will share in our joy at helping others. Please help us reach our goal of raising $50,000 within the next couple of years by donating at the link below. This is our new Global Giving fundraiser, “JOEE to Japan!” Can you help us reach our giving goal? Here’s the link or you can click on the “Global Giving link below:
私たちは、JOEEを通じて魔法のような良いことが起こり続け、サポーターの皆様が人を助ける喜びを私たちと分かち合ってくださることを願っています。以下のリンクで寄付して、今後2年以内に50,000ドル集めるという目標を達成するのを手伝ってください。これは私たちの新しいGlobalGiving募金「JOEE to Japan!」です。募金目標を達成するのを手伝ってくれませんか？このリンクか、以下の「GlobalGiving」リンクをクリックしてください。
For those of you who would like to listen in on a JOEE lesson for children in Ukraine, here’s your chance. This month, in January, 2023, please join us at 8pm, Japan Standard Time, on Monday, Jan. 16, 23 and 30 for a fun, puppet-assisted online get-together. For adults joining, please keep your video and audio muted to let more children participate. This link will go live at 8pm on those three Mondays, Japan time, which is 1pm in Ukraine. You will need the passcode to enter the session:
A few weeks ago, thanks to a donation by the Wesley Center and an additional donation by Folkmanis Puppets, a big box arrived from the States filled with eager, furry new teaching assistants for Joyful Opportunity English Education! Our new puppet friends couldn’t wait to meet their partners.
数週間前のウェズリーセンターからの寄付に加えてフォークマニス・パペットからの寄付のおかげで、大きな箱が米国から届きました！ その中にぎっしり詰め込んであったのは、JOEE (Joyful Opportunity English Education) のためにこれから働きたいと願っている、フサフサの毛がある、教師の新しいアシスタント達でした。沢山の新しいパペット人形達は、これから働くことになるパートナーに会うのを楽しみにしていました。
Folkmanis Puppets Travel to Japan
For the past couple of months, JOEE has been training new teachers. We are gearing up for the reopening of Japan in anticipation of more widespread vaccine availability. As of this writing, TEN new teachers are learning how to present JOEE lessons and how to use puppets to engage and delight young English learners in orphanages and care facilities. Hopefully by the end of summer or early autumn, we will be able to start new lessons in many new places.
JOEE teacher training shows participants the origins and philosophy of Joyful Opportunity English Education. Besides bringing joy into the lives of young children with weekly lessons, JOEE is also focused on their future. Learning English at a young age gives these kids the advantage of acquiring excellent pronunciation skills and builds the mental and emotional facility for learning language as their education progresses.
JOEE教師トレーニングでは、参加者にJOEE (Joyful Opportunity English Education) がどの様に始まったのか、またその哲学について学びます。 JOEEは毎週のレッスンを行い、児童の生活に喜びをもたらすだけでなく、彼らの将来にも焦点を当てています。幼い頃に英語を学ぶことは、子供たちに英語の母語話者に近い発音のスキルを習得するという利点を与え、彼らの言語教育が進むにつれて役立つだろうと考えられる、言語を学ぶための精神的および感情的な心構えを構築するというメリットをもたらします。
Anneliese and Silvia find voices for their teaching assistants
By meeting and interacting with English speakers of many different ethnicities, the children learn to be accepting of a wide variety of world inhabitants. Because personalities and attitudes form at a young age, this open-mindedness will work to their advantage when launching out into the greater world of work after they turn eighteen years old and exit the care institutions.
Our JOEE lessons dovetail nicely with the programs in computer and life skills and continuing English studies for older children that the nonprofit, YouMeWe offers. Our two organizations sometimes work in the same care facility. In these instances, a child can be studying English from the age of two all the way to the age of eighteen.
At the end of March this year, 2021, JOEE was invited by Matelda Starace of the Italian Embassy in Tokyo to participate in their Spring Bazaar. We were so pleased to participate in this outdoor event where every precaution was taken to make sure that, although we are still dealing with pandemic measures, everyone who attended could do so safely. Masks were worn at all times and only removed briefly, while outdoors, for a few quick photos.
JOEE set up a table amidst other vendors who were also raising money for worthy causes. We met many lovely people and exchanged contact information, promising to keep in touch. Matelda was very gracious, introducing us to new friends and contacts.
Matelda’s husband, the ambassador, mingled with the crowd and stopped to answer my questions about the fascinating array of bonsai that decorated the back veranda. I learned about a unique kind of wisteria that I had never seen before. Refreshments of sparkling beverages and delicious Italian pizza and tartlets were served.
Our donors were happy to receive thank you gifts of darling, knit kangaroo finger puppets. Each puppet has two little joeys tucked into its precisely knit little pouch. These puppets were made for us by a women’s cooperative in Mexico, so our fundraiser had a double impact. We are so thankful to Matelda for the invitation, and very grateful for all of the generous donations that we received throughout the day. If you would like to donate to JOEE, please go to the Global Giving link below:
Our summer fundraising efforts were given a delightful boost by an unexpected donation from a couple of youthful philanthropists. Oliver and Jun spent part of their summer hawking hot dogs at a small lakeside stand. As hot doggers, they are not paid for their time, but they are allowed to keep any “tips” that end up in the tip jar on the counter. When the clink of coin is heard in the jar, a cheer goes up from the busy staff inside the hot dog stand. “Yay! Thank you! Domo arigatou gozaimasu!”
This year, JOEE would like to give a rousing cheer right back at them, because instead of keeping their tips and buying some cold “ramune” soda or other delicious summer treats, these two young gentlemen decided to donate ALL of their tips to JOEE, to help support educational programs for kids without parents in institutional homes. Needless to say, the parents of these two kind souls are cheering for them as well.
Thank you very much, Jun and Oliver! Your generous bag of change will help create positive change for many kids this year. JOEE welcomes any donation, large or small, and we are so encouraged by seeing generous hearts and habits develop at such a young age. Hot diggity dog!
If you would still like to donate to JOEE, the Global Giving Fundraiser is still up and running and can be accessed by clicking on the following link:
Mid-July, JOEE launched our first public fundraiser with the help of another NPO that does great work with orphanages around the world, including many here in Japan: YouMeWe NPO, headed up by Michael Clemons. We had been volunteering at the same children’s home in Ota-ku for several months before Michael and I finally managed to meet. He ran a class with the older children on Mondays for computer skills, and I met with the younger children on Thursdays and Fridays for JOEE language lessons. He had been wondering where the younger kids had been learning those new words in English. Our work had been mutually supportive.
Lion Online!
We discovered that we had many goals in common and that our two nonprofits could help each other as we developed programs for the youth in institutionalized care. YouMeWe helped to connect JOEE with the GlobalGiving program just in time to be launched with their matching donations program.
On Wednesday, July 15 at 10 pm Japan Time (9 am Eastern Time in the US), the Global Giving Bonus Day began. Donations of $100 up to $1,000 were matched with percentage funds that went from 15% up to 50% for the highest level of gifts (from $750 to $1,000). The fund drive began with the blessing of one $36 donation and then it took off! Donations of all amounts are adding up. It looks like we might reach our goal of raising $5,000 in donations by the end of the month.
Our nonprofit foundation, JOEE, was featured in the spring issue of Japan Harvest magazine from JEMA, an organization that supports and encourages the Christian missionary community in Japan.
The article, “Surprised by JOEE,” details the journey of our growing nonprofit foundation as we seek to bring joyful and engaging English lessons to children in institutionalized care here in Japan.
The text of the article is included below:
Have you ever been swept off your feet by a wave or a powerful idea? Or launched into an adventure with no map or compass? It’s not exactly comfortable—that feeling of helpless exhilaration mixed with joy and uncertainty, inundated by a large dollop of panic. You’re out of your depth and not at all sure that you can handle being this far from shore.
Being flung into something new
Recently prompted (or possibly flung by a heavenly gust of inspiration!) to start a non-profit organization called JOEE (Joyful Opportunity English Education), I don’t yet feel that I can handle the trajectory upon which I have embarked. I’m desperately trusting God to keep me afloat.
I continue to work at Christian Academy in Tokyo as a teacher–librarian, but every Thursday and Friday afternoon, I pack up puppets and props and go to teach English to youngsters at St. Francisco Children’s Home in Ota-ku. The ultimate goal is to provide basic language instruction and native-level pronunciation skills so that when the children exit the care system at the age of 18, they have a marketable job skill and the confidence to work anywhere in the world. My students sing songs, act out words, and play games while learning basic English vocabulary. Puppets who speak only English help make the lessons fun. It’s both exhausting and exhilarating. But I’d like to do it even more, and so next year I will work full-time for the non-profit. This is a frightening leap of faith for me, with no guarantees of income or success, but I feel compelled nonetheless. I trust that God will provide me with the grace I need.
And I do need grace. I have never been all that graceful (I used to break at least a toe a year!), so this new challenge has not been easy. Yes, it may be 2020 now, but I don’t have 20–20 vision nor am I ready for any sort of Olympic endeavor. I don’t know what God was thinking when I was led into this undertaking (or possibly undertow) that has pulled me out into deep waters. I’m approaching 60, for goodness sake. Aren’t I too old for this? As an answer, the God of Abraham and Sarah reminds me that age is no impediment to being launched on a mission.
Let me give you a personal metaphor for what being launched feels like. Every summer, I escape the muggy Tokyo heat and head for Lake Nojiri in Nagano, where I volunteer as a sailing instructor. Nojiri is a quiet lake with small waves and small adventures. But even small lakes can sometimes surprise you. One day, while I was sailing my little four-meter-long Laser dinghy and reveling in the power of pre-typhoon wind and waves, a sudden gust slammed my sail smack down into the water and launched me off the deck in a soaring arc into the sodden sail.
Starting JOEE has felt like being flung into that sail. I had been swept up by an idea that was much too powerful for me to handle. I know what I can do well: I can teach children and make them excited about learning, I can create silly voices for puppets, I can tell stories, and I can capture and hold the tenuous attention of toddlers through an entire story time. But I’m also painfully aware of my shortcomings: I’m certainly not a non-profit creator, a fundraiser, or an administrator. Business plans, numbers, and red tape tie me up in the kinds of knots that a sailor of my meager experience could never undo. So how did I find myself wrapped up in this latest adventure?
God’s leading
Yua Funato
The feeling that I was supposed to do something to help began a couple of years ago. In March 2018, I read the tragic story about Yua Funato, a five-year old who died from abuse in her home. The police found a notebook where Yua had written heart-breaking pleas for the abuse to stop. She should have been rescued in time. She should have been placed into the safe care of a children’s home in Tokyo. I was haunted by Yua’s story. I knew that more should be done to help the 45,000 children in Japan who have been rescued and are now living in institutionalized care.
In August of that year, while sitting with other children’s authors during a writer’s conference in Los Angeles, the idea of creating a way to bring compelling, play-based English-language education to young children in orphanages began percolating in my mind. Literature and poetry for children have always been my passion, but so far I had only been successful at getting some of my individual poems published. All of my attempts to publish stories or collections of poems have merely taught me what rejection letters feel like. My motivation as a writer has always been to educate and bring joy to kids. Making a child laugh is a satisfying success. Getting published, however, is a different story. So if writing for children was not going to pan out for me, how else could I help children while living in Japan? That is what I started pondering in that room in Los Angeles.
I have always admired families who’ve adopted children. One of my childhood friends had certainly saved the life of the boy that she and her husband had adopted. And I knew several wonderful families here in Japan who had adopted children. Most of these families could speak Japanese, of course. They could communicate with their adopted children in their native language. My French and Norwegian skills did not help me much here in Japan, but I could teach English to children. Perhaps I could teach English in orphanages.
I began to pray about it. I know full well that the results of prayer are powerful, but I was not prepared for what happened next. I began to be confronted with stories about orphans and began meeting people who were interested in helping with my project. Bible verses about orphans kept popping up: “I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you” (John 14:18 ESV); “The Lord protects the foreigners among us. He cares for the orphans and widows” (Psalm 146:9 NLT); “Pure and genuine religion in the sight of God the Father means caring for orphans and widows in their distress” (James 1:27 NLT).
At the end of August, I realized I would need a competent, bilingual administrator to help make this project work. When I mentioned my dream of starting a non-profit foundation to a friend, Hiroko, she shocked the socks off of me by replying that she had just quit her job that very day and that helping me with a non-profit foundation to help orphans was exactly what she wanted to do! God’s timing was perfect.
Within a year, Hiroko had managed to register us as a non-profit foundation able to accept tax-deductible donations from individuals and large corporations. In the meantime, I had set up a website (JOEE.jp) and gathered friends who could help to serve on JOEE’s board of directors. We are currently teaching English lessons twice a week at one children’s home and a friend is teaching one lesson a month at another children’s home. The children at the home I go to have begun using English words and phrases in their daily life and singing songs in English, surprising their caregivers with their good pronunciation.
Looking ahead
Although we have had some success already, JOEE has a long way to go with fundraising and promotion. I am well aware that this small non-profit might eventually fail, but I am determined to do the best I can with the resources I have. The Holy Spirit sends the inspiration and wind, and I merely need to use that power to move forward. I must admit that I have been surprised by JOEE. Life is an adventure, and I am blessed to be part of this astounding voyage.
Note: If you are interested in volunteering at JOEE, please send an email to ruth@joee.jp.
A warm and heartfelt THANK YOU to Julie Fukuda, master quilter, who donated this amazing hand-stitched quilt to JOEE this month. Wow! We are so grateful and we have so many plans for using this wonderful quilt during our lessons once they start up again.
This quilt is an “I Spy” quilt, bursting with beautiful fabrics showing lots of objects that can be found and named. The quilt calls to mind the traditional game of observation. “I spy with my little eye… ” This quilt will be perfect for teaching English words to young children. “Where is a cat? There it is! Find an owl. Yes, you found it! Can you find the kangaroos? There they are on each of the corners!”
Sewn into the back of the quilt is a little pocket containing two bean bags for use in more creative games. I can’t wait to use this colorful language learning tool. The JOEE kids at the orphanages are going to LOVE it!
