FLIPBOOK: Ikkyu-san

いっきゅうさん is the nickname of Ikkyū Sōjun (一いっ休きゅう宗そう純 じゅん1394-1481), a Zen monk from the Muromachi period. He has been featured in Japanese folktales and anime and has long been beloved by children in Japan. He appeared to be a folk hero who is mischievous and always outsmarting the head priest of the temple and even the Shogun.

みずあめ is a sweet, sticky traditional candy. It tastes sweet and looks similar to honey. It used to be popular among children, who would stretch it, twirl it around sticks, and eat it like chewy taffy.

とんちばなし (Witty stories)

The wit of いっきゅうさん was legendary and he is the subject of many とんちばなし. These stories flourished during the Edo Period, about 200 years after his death. Some were confused with stories of other monks and some were made up, but they all reflect his wit and humanity. The story of this flipbook introduces a famous とんちばなし in which the young いっきゅうさん outwits the greedy おしょうさん (old priest of the temple). This story is also the subject of a famous Kyogen (狂きょう言げん), a performance presented between Noh plays, called ‘Busu’ (附ぶ子す).

ACTIVITY IDEAS

1. Arranging the Story

Download and print the story for students to read.

Variation 1: Arrange the story in order
1. Print out the page and cut the story panels apart.
2. Ask students to read them and arrange the story in order.
3. For more advanced students, separate the English text from the pictures.

Variation 2: Match text and images
1. Give students the English story strips and the story images separately.
2. Ask students to match each text strip to the correct picture.

2.  Filling in the Speech Bubbles

Give students some pictures from the story with blank speech bubbles and ask them to write suitable dialogue in the bubble. Students can write freely or may be given the expressions as below. Click the pictures to download the worksheet.

「いってらっしゃい」「いってきます」「 みずあめ」「たべたい」「いただきます」「ああ、おいしい」

3．Roleplay

Students work cooperatively in groups or as a class to prepare and perform the skit of いっきゅうさん for their classmates or at a school event.
*Please note that the following skit is a different version, so the language and details are slightly different from the flipbook introduced above. Students’ handout for doing the roleplay can be downloaded from PLAY Ikkyu san

Wikipedia information on Ikkyu-san.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ikkyu

A very brief background to Zen Buddhism, and an interesting section on how to perform “zazen”.
https://www.britannica.com/topic/zazen

More information on Buddhism and Shinto.
www.japan-guide.com/e/e2055.html

• Japanese Folktales

• More about Ikkyu-san

This resource was revised and updated by Tomomi Chiba and Himiko Negishi-Wood (July 2026).

Illustration by amachakoubou (https://amachakoubou.com/)