English Education in my Japanese schools

Sorry, it's been three weeks and I still haven't blogged about my holiday over Spring Break. Its been busy at work. I've started planning and leading my own lessons.

The Japan's education ministry is worried about the country's ability to compete in the international market, and from last month, has upped it's national curriculum hours for English in elementary (ES) and junior high schools (JHS)... which is great for me and the students, but for the local teachers who OT like I've never seen people OT before, it's perhaps not such a great change.

Throw in the fact that many of them aren't confident in speaking English, let alone speak it correctly, it's pretty unrealistic to expect these teachers to teach English when they lack the training to do so.

Do you know what else scares me? The massive learning gap between the last year of elementary school and the first year of junior high school. A lot of kids lose interest in English during their first year of junior high. The interest and enthusiasm that most new students start off with dwindles away to nothing. Some kids give up completely, others study it out of necessity, in order to pass exams and get into high school.

Do you know what they, the JHS Japanese Teachers of English (JTEs) do? They spend about 2-3 hours reviewing the alphabet - NAMES ONLY - then in the following week, they launch straight into reading text, and expect the students to be able to read it. In ES, these kids only focused on communication and language not literacy. Unless they've been taught out of school, over 90% of these kids enter JHS not knowing how to read English.

Primary education in England allocates time to phonics like any other subject. Over here, phonics are totally skipped over. By some miracle, students who are learning English as a second language are expected to be able to grasp how to read English, without phonics, after one week of learning the alphabet.

Bloody hell, right? Does it make me want to cry? You bet it does, and I would, but crying won't solve anything.

Anyway, the JTEs in my JHS have decided to have me plan and lead the extra English lessons. Games? Check. Phonics? Check. English as the medium of instruction? About 70-80% (1st years) depending on lesson content, and this will gradually increase. 30-40% for 3rd years though, need to stop the JTE from slipping into Japanese all the time. Fun? Guaranteed.