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HUNTINGTON, W.Va. (AP) — In its fifth year, a camp focused on Japanese culture has established a small culture of its own among local students who return to the camp year after year to learn more about the country located more than 6,000 miles away from Huntington.
The Japanese Immersion Summer Camp has offered students in Cabell and nearby counties the opportunity to learn more about Japanese food, games, traditions and language during the camp, which is taking place at Altizer Elementary School.
A total of 80 elementary school-aged students are participating in the camp this week, and 80 more are expected for next week's camp, said Megan Joseph, supervisor of junior volunteers at the camp and Japanese teacher for Cabell County Schools.
"While most high schools have a foreign language program, there is a lack of that education in the elementary and middle schools," Joseph said. "That's where we really need to hit it home because that's where they learn languages the best. The goal of this camp is to hit that age group and not only help them learn a foreign language, but to help them enjoy learning."
The theme of this year's camp is "Under the Sea," so the majority of the phrases, games and food the students are privy to will have to do with sea life, in addition to some everyday use phrases students could use if they traveled to Japan.
The camp annually operates at capacity, and this year is no different.
Among the 80 students at camp, 20 of them are junior volunteers, who are at camp this week and will return to camp next week to mentor their younger camp co-attendees.
During the last couple of years, camp organizers added the junior volunteer aspect to the camp to allow students who have attended the camp for at least two years to return to the camp due to its popularity.
This year, Rei Sakamoto, of Huntington, and Kamryn McCoy, of Charleston, both became junior volunteers at the ripe age of 9.
Sakamoto said attending Japanese school already was a part of his weekly routine, and he said he was excited to get to share his knowledge with other students and make friends in the process.
"I think it's really important because I can help everybody else learn Japanese," Sakamoto said. "Japanese, it can be really hard to say some of it. If you can say it, I think it's amazing."
McCoy said she practices origami with family friends throughout the year, and she said learning in-depth about a different culture was important to understand the world.
"It's very important to learn other cultures," McCoy said. "If you want to move to Japan, or move somewhere else later on, and you don't learn anything about the culture, you won't be able to talk to people or do anything."
Sakamoto and McCoy had explained in their own way a key point of the camps, according to Joseph.
"In any culture, the most important thing to remember that this world, because of technology and social media, is getting smaller and smaller," she said. "In order to understand other people and the people you're interacting with on a daily basis, you really need to kind of study their beliefs and their cultures. It's not necessarily about the studying, but it's about getting understanding of a culture to help you get an understanding about what a person's motivations might be."
The Japanese Immersion Camp at Altizer Elementary School is presented through a partnership among Cabell County Schools, the West Virginia Department of Education, Toyota Manufacturing WV and Nippon Tungsten, and Joseph said the camp also represents an investment in area students, business and the future of the state.
"West Virginia gets a bad rep for being closed-minded, and that's not necessarily accurate, especially in this area," Joseph said. "We have so many Japanese companies in the area, and we have a great relationship with Marshall University and its Japanese program. It's helpful because the students are going to be able to see all of that. On a personal level, I'm looking forward to seeing students who come to the camp start coming up into high school and having that head start in Japanese because of this."
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Information from: The Herald-Dispatch, http://www.herald-dispatch.com
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