It's the Orient expressed

Transition Times: In Japan, people say "hello". They don't say "hi", "hey there", "howya", "story", "morning", "alright" or "it's himself". This makes the Japanese language a lot less scary than many students expect.

Once you have the basics of everyday exchange, you can rely on your Japanese friends to stick to the script. That's just one reason why the language is growing in popularity as a subject in Transition Year.

Here are a couple more: Japanese has no future tense, and the grammar rules are devised with such mathematical consistency that once you learn them you can trust they will always apply.

On the tricky side, Japanese has three alphabets.

To help Irish students learn the first Asian language ever to appear on the Irish school syllabus, the Post-Primary Language Initiative has devised an original method of teaching Japanese. Instead of starting with the Hiragana alphabet, which is primarily concerned with grammar, or the Kanji alphabet, which has thousands of characters, Irish students are being introduced to the 48-character Katakana alphabet. The Katakana comprises symbols that represent words not native to the Japanese language, such as "Ireland" and "restaurant". This type of word makes up 15 per cent of spoken Japanese, 30 per cent of written Japanese and 80 per cent of Japanese advertising.

The Katakana is relatively simple to learn and a student could fare quite well in Tokyo armed only with these 48 characters. Although Japanese has only been available as a Transition Year subject for two years, it is already taught in 22 schools and is growing fast in popularity. It's not just the language that students are attracted to; there is a large cultural component to the programme that is entirely new to most Irish students.

"I wanted to get across to Irish students that Japanese culture is not all kimonos and geisha girls," Ursula Zimmerman of Institiuid Teangeolaiochta Éireann explained. "I devised these class resources with modern Japan in mind - Manga comics, baseball and J-Pop."

Some of the more traditional aspects of Japanese culture have also been a hit, however. Calligraphy, Japanese cuisine and martial arts have attracted a number of students to take Transition Year Japanese and there are now at least three classes of students taking Japanese for the Leaving Cert in 2004.

Zimmerman believes that the inclusion of Japanese on the post-primary curriculum offers students a chance to "start again" with language.

"Students who have not had a great experience with European languages often shine at Japanese," she says. "It's a level playing-field, a whole new set of rules. The experience of the new culture is exciting and, in a relatively short period of time, a student can get the hang of basic Japanese."

The Post-Primary Languages Initiative was launched in 2000 as part of the National Development Plan. Four languages have been targeted: Japanese, Spanish, Italian and Russian. The aim of the initiative is to diversify the choice of languages on the syllabus and to bring more language choice to schools around Ireland. Many students will only sample the new languages in Transition Year and so will enjoy the experience of a new culture without the pressure of an exam curriculum.

Transition Year resources are being developed for Japanese, Spanish and Italian. Call the Post-Primary Languages Initiative at (01) 8057794 or visit www.languagesinitiative.ie