Many of the readers of my blog are teachers who teach English at Japanese schools, I guess. You are watching students, teachers, or classes everyday. Also, you understand (or sometimes don't understand) what's going on at schools or within education in Japan. I have been teaching at schools for more than thirty years, (I am still teaching some students who are not attending school), and I worry about education and the future of this country.
Before WWII, higher education was only for rich people and for men, not women. Nationalism and militarism prevailed in schools, and so, no one could teach against the nation. When we started the new constitution after the war, education was also quite changed. The basic law about education, which was changed last year even though many people were against the change, said, "We should rely on education to realize our ideal to make a peaceful country, which is prescribed in our constitution.”
However, Japan is changing a lot for two reasons, I think. First, the new conservatives are getting power. (The reason should be discussed.) Second, globalization and new liberalism, which emphasizes free market, are destroying people's life, as in other countries. The government, which obeys those two masters, has intended to control education--sometimes with an iron fist.
Did you hear the news of the big gathering in Okinawa about the school textbooks? The people of Okinawa were against erasing the fact of the war in Okinawa from the history textbooks. In Japan, the government checks all the textbooks that will be used at schools and when they find descriptions or pages that they don't like, they demand the publishing companies to rewrite them. So, publishing companies make only textbooks the government prefers and children are taught with those textbooks.
One more example: Do you know the national anthem of Japan? The government demands schools to sing it, and the teachers to teach it to children. But there are many problems with it. For example, the words of the song celebrate the Emperor. This doesn’t seem appropriate for the anthem of a democratic nation. In addition, the anthem was sung when Japan was ruled by militarism. There are many people who don't want to listen to the song, especially in Asia, because people were forced to sing it, which infringed upon their liberty and spirits, etc. A lot of people opposed the way the government forced the anthem on schools and teachers, but at last the government made a law to make students sing the song. These two examples show that the government is intending to go backward to nationalism and not regarding democracy and people's rights as important.
The government of Japan is trying to reduce the money for education (How much money is used for useless places!), and so, as you see, a class has many students, teachers' work seems endless and they are tired and losing their pride and creativity. When teachers are not creative and liberal, education must be conservative and it's just what the government wants. Only children with parents who can pay for the private schools or the cram schools can get better education and better jobs. The difference of their parents' income decides the children's future, and class distinction will be fixed in the society. I worry about the children and their future… the future of our society.
You, as foreign teachers, are eyewitnesses to the education in Japan. Education is a very important factor of culture and future of the country. I would like to know what you think of it. Feel free to write to me. Leave a comment with any new insight.
1 comment:
That is very well written, thank you for taking the time to write it.
It is interesting to hear the view of a Japanese person speaking out against conservatism in Japan. My Japanese isn't very good and I don't have many Japanese friends, so my only access to Japanese political news is through news papers but they don't tell me what normal Japanese people think.
Japan definitely seems to becoming more conservative and nationalistic, and the only way that it can change is for people to use their political power to change the system from the ground up, but if the education system is bad (which is something that I can see for myself everyday) then the people won't have the knowledge to demand what is rightfully theirs. A poor education system only helps to keep the majority ignorant of what is being done by the powerful minority, and it is that minority that maintains such a status quo through the government.
Many Japanese people I have spoken to have no idea about things like the environmental effects of whaling or using waribashi, and don't seem to have an interest in it. They don't care about the darker side of Japanese war history that is preventing them making recompense with their asian neighbours, or aren't interested in topics like racism against foreigners in Japan.
I was in a sushi restaurant reading a book when one of the waiters who likes to talk to me to practice his English (all 10 words of it) came to say hello. He asked me what book I was reading, and when I showed him that it was an autobiography of Hirohito, he told me "No thankyou!" and ran away to the back of the store.
I think that says a lot about the way some Japanese people think.
However, Japan's falling population will force something to change in the not-too-distant future, and I think it will be interesting to see what that is.
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