こけし Kokeshi

Introducing Your Class to Kokeshi

Making a Kokeshi 鳴子系こけし／こけしの岡仁 (4:13)

Featuring Okazaki Yasuo from the Kokeshi no Okajin doll shop in Osaki City, Miyagi Prefecture.

This Sora News article features the above video, with more information.

Kokeshi Activity

Target language: describe body parts, size, shape, color, even design elements like flowers, birds, and mountains

Step 1: Options for getting a blank kokeshi for each student:

A) Students color virtual (kokeshi-shaped) Minecraft figures on this Minecraft Skin Editor website.

B) Print out a blank Cubee cubecraft template for each student to cut out, color, and fold together.

C) Or buy a physical, blank kokeshi or peg doll for each student to paint. I recommend penciling in the details before finalizing in paint or marker.

Step 2: Students match descriptions to kokeshi

1. Color your kokeshi. If it is virtual, a screenshot of the front and back may be used.

2. Each student describes their own kokeshi in Japanese. No saying what it is (“it’s a crocodile”, “it’s Mickey Mouse”, or “it’s a ninja”). Students submit this description to the teacher.

3. The teacher revises the received descriptions, which are redone if need be.

4. The revised descriptions and the kokeshi are displayed in class separately – Each kokeshi is labeled with a hiragana, while each description is labeled with a number.

5. Students try to match each kokeshi with its description. To avoid students relying on the process of elimination, the teacher can add one extra description that doesn’t match any kokeshi, or add their own kokeshi that has no matching description.

6. As a game (not a grade), tell each student, “you get 2 points for each other student who correctly matched your description with your kokeshi, and you get 1 point for each time you correctly match another student’s description to their kokeshi”, so a student is rewarded both for their own description's detail and for properly reading others’.