Archive for the ‘Japanese education’ Category

“You’ve been in Japan too long”- A reason given a foreign employee’s Japanese boss on why their contract was not being renewed. Michael Kitamura- Japan Times

Full article here:

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fl20070710zg.html

The rainy season (tsuyu) is completely screwed this year. In fact, every year since I got to Japan I’ve been told that “The weather this year is strange”, same as “The cherry blossom this year is early/late”. This may well be true, but I think it is much more a case of the Japanese wanting the weather to be as predictable as the train timetable. At times the whole country seems set up to make sure there are no surprises- I wonder how many Japanese people would be able to tell that Radiohead are being sarcastic in the “No Surprises” song (but then again, how many Americans thought The One I Love by REM was a love song??)

And the same most assuredly goes for lessons. With anything less than a year of careful learner training, skipping around in the textbook is likely to cause something between a mild flurry and complete panic depending on the age of the students.

Primary school students are generally fine for the first few years, taking surprises and new stuff as all part of the fun. Then the Japanese education system gets to work and the idea of skipping reading the instructions and just doing what your teacher says brings on increasing incomprehension and stress. One theory has it that the Japanese establishment has decided to keep kanji (Chinese characters) mainly because learning it means learning this unquestioning approach. The good news is that as my teenage college students are learning to cope with all this new and unexpected stuff in class, I really think I am teaching them a skill they are going to need when they get to Australia, NZ and the UK.