Japanese Education

Haven't you ever wondered why Japanese students continually score higher in academics than the rest of the entire world? Education and schooling in Japan varies greatly than the schooling in America. Japanese students have a greater advantage over their American counterparts in such a way that they are gaining more of an education than the Americans. The Japanese students have to study diligently and work hard to gain a hope of getting a continued education. Japanese children have a greater opportunity to seize hold of their education than the American children.

Whenever people start to think about education and IQ's in general they tend to think of Japan. Japan has the leading literacy rate; at over 99% of its population having the ability to read and write. The Japanese system of education is very well organized and structured. This is due, in part, to the standardization of the subject matter and teaching tools. Students have an equal chance to get the curriculum if they transfer to a different school. This is because the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, and Science sets the curriculum at a standard for teachers in all schools to follow. Japan's modern school system was established about a hundred years ago. This was about the time when Japan was opening trade to the rest of the world and westernizing in general. It modeled its education systems after the French and German school systems. However, it does not model just one country; it models many of them. They combine this with their own ideas to form their own personal school system.

Students at the elementary level have great expectations. Their environment reflects their academic priorities. There are around twenty-five thousand elementary schools throughout Japan. A typical Japanese Elementary school will have around 300 students and a variety of activities that go on. This means that the schools are many and can focus more on the children. Students get the chance to excel in their lives.

In the Japanese school day, students are in their classrooms by 8:30 a.m., and school gets out at 3:45 later that day. Those are for their typical public school classes. They have six classes throughout their school day. There are a lot of things to do in addiction to learning and studying. There are committee meetings, club activities, eating school lunch, and even cleaning. The students take almost full janitorial responsibility for their schools.

The students get their lessons from their homeroom classes and have the teachers switch between the classes. This allows for the students to get bonded with their peers that are in the same homeroom. This creates a teamwork ethic that the students follow. They are taught math, Japanese, science, social studies, calligraphy, and some other subjects from their homeroom teacher. Even lunch is served, for the most part, in the homeroom classes. Their lunch also varies greatly than what we're used to eating.

"The school lunch today is deep-fried food on rice, boiled potato seasoned with sugar and soy sauce, sautйed Szechwan pickles and leeks, and milk.()"

The only reason the students would leave the classroom for the curriculum is if they required special conditions. These could be subjects such as physical education or chemistry, which would require a lab.

Students are also encouraged to study for themselves. On top of learning in school and having an average of two hours of homework a night, they also study on their own time to give them an edge at school. Fifth and sixth year students even further this in school in their computer labs. The students are taught the basics of computer functions, after that they begin to learn on their own. They also have one hour of club activities every second week. They decide what activities the club should perform. Schools have many different clubs, including a sports club, science club, computer club, bicycle club, and many other clubs. Schooling is very important to them.

Japanese also have very unique schools that are being developed. Some of these include Akabanedai Nishi Elementary School in Tokyo. This school is one of the leading schools to incorporate computers into the classroom. Each classroom has at least one computer on a LAN (Local Area Network) and is connected to high-speed Internet access. The curriculum is also quite advanced. Lower-grade children learn the basics of computers and begin to learn with them. The gather information over the Internet, use the information in a presentation, and report what they've learned on their own homepages. They also use groupware to set up such things as email addresses, databases, and group Internet study. Another such development is that of an "open plan" method. Inside the open planning method, students have no set timetable and they learn in open areas. And since schools are open to the public, this allows for the outer world to involve themselves with the students. Since students can't conceal themselves in the classroom, they tend to talk to the teachers more freely and also become more outgoing and independent.

Junior high school is quite the jump for the most part. Instead of having six subjects, they have implemented eight subjects, which include math and science. Other subjects that are required are music, fine arts, health, and physical education. All these are required throughout ninth grade. Math and science, in particular, are such subjects that become increasingly difficult. The teachers feel stressed to teach all that is needed to pass the High School entrance exams. They need to get the entire curriculum out in a space of time that is almost insufficient to allow students to learn it.

"The junior high school science curriculum is quite difficult. Even high school teachers will look at it and say, 'Wow, these kids are doing difficult things in junior high.' I feel that content is such that students are probably memorizing it without understanding it. (10th-grade chemistry teacher, Naka Vocational High School)"

Students have to memorize things instead of learn them to pass their entrance examinations for High School. Despite reactions to the difficulty of the materials, the pace of the lessons in the classrooms is not what one would expect from such observations. These classes appeared to progress at a slower pace that what you'd expect. In fact, there are usually a lot of students who finish early and work on homework from other classes.

Textbooks in the Jr. High School situation are much different than here. Most of them are no larger than a short paperback novel. Since they belong to the students, they are allowed to write notes in the margin and keep for review for