Educator takes teaching Japanese to a new level

Using her own experiences learning a new language, this teacher is this year's Teacher of the Year.   - - Donna Poisl

By JULIE GREENE, The Herald-Mail of Hagerstown

BOONSBORO, MD. — Ayako Shiga knows how difficult it can be to learn a foreign language.

When she was growing up in Tokyo, she failed her first semester of English in middle school.

During a break that semester, she went to visit her father in Australia and couldn't answer the waiter when he asked her, in English, how old she was, because she didn't understand the question.

Shiga said that last experience motivated her to learn English and apply to be a high school exchange student in America.
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