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[denise]

Forgive me if this message sounds a bit silly or naive. I have only been in Japan a short time.

I have of course heard about the education system here--its emphasis on receiving knowledge, not questioning the teacher, etc. And I've seen the results of that system--my students, some of them fresh out of high school. I think I just experienced it firsthand, though...

I signed up for a community ceramics class, and the bulk of the time tonight, our first meeting, was taken up by the sensei speaking (lecturing? about what, I sadly do not know...). For an hour. The students sat there, not questioning, some of them not even looking up. After all, he was the master. As I sat there and tried not to fidget (very hard when you're being attacked by all sorts of flying critters), I thought, "is this How Things Are here? Is my local ceramics class a microcosmic example of Reality here?"

I imagined my students sitting through however many years of similar scenarios through their school years. Many of the expressions on the faces that I saw tonight match the expressions that I see in my classes.

Any thoughts? (Including, "Yes, you naive girl, that's how things are here!" or "No, and stop making such unfair generalizations!", etc., etc.)

d

[guest of Japan]

Yes, you naive girl that's how things are, but please stop making generalizations.

Actually it is probably a lot worse than you imagine. The students that you teach and the people in your ceramics class all want to be there. They are eager to learn.

In my high school I have dozens of student who will not talk if a teacher is anywhere near. And that's in Japanese. They refuse to speak even one word in English.

The primary emphasis of Japanese education is on socialization. They are taught when to stand, when to sit, how to place their hands, heirarchy, expected behaviors, proper emotional displays and appropriate usage of the Japanese language. After that the goal is to collect as much teacher and textbook knowledge as humanly possible in order to get into a good university. How's that for a generalization?

[Gordon]

That is quite a generalization.
That sounds like a horrible existence.

I had a similar experience to Denise when I took a Japanese language class. Repetition after repetition. "Kore wa enpitsu des, kore wa......." for 2 hours. I just had to quit.

[hagakuri]

Hello,

Gosh, when I read these posts I just feel this wind of blackness blow across my face. Now I am depressed. Do I really live here?! In this generalized black pit?!

Really. It is not all that bad.

[shmooj]

But it really CAN be that bad...

My wife just harvested rice with a group from the local community that she joined for the season this year. The final meeting (a week after the harvest) involved a repeat of what Denise described above (barring the pottery) with various old geezers getting up to blow wind across the gathered, silent participants.

Who they were and what they said was a mystery to my wife. More importantly, why they needed to say this would have been an unanswerable question had it been put to anyone there. At best the answer she would have got would have been "wakaranai"

Finally everyone ate onigiri from the new rice, nodded at how much better it tasted than the old rice from last year (despite this being the worst harvest for decades) and went home.

Reflection on this bears fruit in the classroom when we help students gently out of these educational straightjackets as they come in the door. Eventually, after a few years, they go home one night without putting them back on as they leave. They're never the same after that.

[cafebleu]

Denise - you`re not being silly or naive. You are quite rightly questioning why yo were subjected to a one hour lecture which clearly did not interest the listeners, when you signed up to learn ceramics in a community group.

Having lived here a few years, I see this as a symptom of Japan`s heirarchical society. Meaningless lectures and meetings are part of daily life in Japan. I have heard adult students who were confident enough to express themselves in different classes I taught at diffferent schools in my time here, make wry observations about how this is a Japanese custom.

Whether it`s high school clubs, community groups, community classes, PTA mothers, businesspeople, or whatever, there is a tendency here to have unnecessary and unproductive one way meetings. One university teacher I taught complained about how he had to sit in a meeting for five hours, rehashing the same topics and listening to the same people lecturing them. As he said, he could have corrected all his students` papers in that time, and had another couple of meetings.

Most Japanese will never question such unnecessary behaviour. They have been passive recipients of it all their life. In my country, people will make a point of saying, `Where is this discussion going?`, `Could we have a proper agenda please?`, `Haven`t we talked about this before/already heard this?` The Japanese will never do such rational things as their whole society is geared towards not rocking the boat in ways great and small. They are used to having authority figures telling them what to do without questioning it openly.

I enjoy living in Japan but I could never call it a democracy. The passive, never question, don`t think about any issues mentality comes from the feudal past which is very recent history. Remember too that it was only about 60 or so years ago that Japan adopted its present democratic on paper constitution.

All societies have inequalities but in Japan these will rarely be openly discussed, and the fact that the Japanese are so ready to accept unthinkingly authoritarian structures, irrespective of whether they are in government or in a community ceramics class, tells me that thing won`t change. The Japanese naturally organise themselves into heirarchies and absurd as it is in your ceramics class, it is something they know and so they feel safe in their authoritarian structures.

[Vince]

[cangel]

Read, remember, regurgitate...

[denise]

I had a feeling that my experience was not an isolated incident. When I'm out in the community, I believe that I should submit to it, accept things the way they are, etc. After all, I am the foreigner/outsider, and I am here to, among other things, experience another culture. I try not to let my Western upbringing and biases affect me.

The classroom, however, is a whole 'nother story. I refuse to accept that I am ONLY teaching a language. When you teach a language, be it English, German, Japanese, or whatever, you also teach (implicitly or explicitly) the culture and thinking of the people. I cannot accept passivity in my classroom. Not because I think that the Western way is better, but because the students are there to learn another way (and then they can decide for themselves which is better). I know it's an uphill battle, possibly a lost cause, but I must keep hoping for free, independent thought.

d

[Vince]

[denise]

[Dr.J]

The hierarchy.

One of the most important things I've realised is, don't blame individuals. The old guy talking for hours about nothing...it's not his fault, any more than it was your fault when you kept forgetting to take your shoes off when you first arrived. These things are products of culture, more habit than choice.

The system won't change significantly in your lifetime, so for the most part you have to adapt.

[Wolf]