185 Japan Education Facts To Learn About The Cultural Difference

Japan has been declared the 11th most crowded country on the planet, the most densely populated and urbanized, but it is also the third-biggest public economy on the planet, after the United States and China.Japan is a remarkable country with tremendous potential and a wide range of customs. A Japanese student takes about 12 years to finish their basic education.Japan is what is called - for self-explanatory reasons - an island country, situated in East Asia, in the northwest portion of the Pacific Ocean. It is set to the west of the Sea of Japan and spreads out to reach from the lovely Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the deep East China Sea and Taiwan in the south. Being a part of the Ring of Fire, Japan encompasses an archipelago of 6852 islands. The five fundamental islands are Honshu, Hokkaido, Shikoku, Okinawa, and Kyushu. Tokyo is Japan’s capital and biggest city; other significant urban communities incorporate Yokohama, Fukuoka, Nagoya, Osaka, Sapporo, Kobe, and Kyoto. Japan is isolated into 47 prefectures, each regulated by a chosen lead representative and governing body.Schools allow children to get information in many different educational fields such as culture, literature, history, mathematics, and politics; this helps in the development of their thought processes. Schools also educate young children on social skills that will be useful to them in their future lives and careers. School also teaches children how to work with others effectively.Similarly, education in Japan is concerned not just with textbook knowledge but also with other life skills such as cooking - knowledge of different cuisines, preparing them for life, and various high-tech projects as well. Japanese martial arts like judo and kendo are taught as important practices and are part of the compulsory curriculum of junior high school. The contemporary Japanese culture taught in these schools impacts not only Asia but Europe and North America too.Japanese artistic expressions incorporate artworks like ceramics, materials, lacquerware, swords, dolls, exhibitions of bunraku, kabuki, dance, and different practices, the tea function, ikebana, hand to hand fighting, calligraphy, origami, onsen, and many games are also taught from a young age.Additionally, at the top of that, among Japanese schools, we can see a remarkable, free, and non-standard educational system that varies from most systems in the world. If at any point you have wondered why the education process in Japan merits such a lot of consideration, then you’ve found the right place to look for answers. Here you can find everything there is to know about this country’s unique education system.What sets the Japanese educational system apart from any other system in the world is that most of their public elementary schools have pools and a major field or playground. Japanese school uniforms resemble a sailor’s uniform. Boys wear suits and trousers, whereas girls shirts and skirts. There are separate uniforms for winter and summer and different athletic sports such as acrobatics and swimming. In a primary or elementary school, not everyone wears uniforms, but caps are worn by a majority of the students. The Japanese education system values cleanliness, punctuality, participation in extracurricular activities, teamwork, and cooperation. Students get schoolwork during the holiday seasons as well. A few students even go to special classes and take part in club activities on weekends.In Japan, all schools have a nutritionist responsible for planning the food and diet provided by the schools for the students.The principal subjects taught to the children in Japan are Japanese, Math, Sociology, Arts and Craft, Music, and Physical Training. Presently pretty much every elementary school in Japan has started teaching its students English.In 2019, the average student in Japan accomplished a general score of around 57-73% in all subjects. Then again, the Japanese education system has regularly been condemned and criticized. Some say that it disproportionately values rote memorization and scores. To fix this apparent shortcoming, the MEXT upheld the fifth schooling reform.This transformation plan hopes to encourage active learning and independent thinking skills in schools and among students. Education in Japan has for some time been held as significant. In the last part of the 1800s, the Meiji pioneers set up a government-funded education system. Indeed, more than 70% of all kids went to class even in the Edo time frame. Today, almost everyone in Japan can read and write! But what makes the Japanese education system unique from others? Read on to find out!If you like this article, why not try reading other fun fact articles such as Japanese flag facts and Japanese government facts from Kidadl?Japanese Schools’ Age SystemUntil the eighth century, education in Japan was based on the models of China and Korea.In the primary portion of the sixth century, Buddhist teachings and scriptures along with philosophy, science, astrology, and visual arts started to spread in the nation. Due to the development of compulsory public education, private schools became irrelevant (as children everywhere were given educational rights and schools provided the students with the needed supplies).The fundamental Japanese school system basically comprises six years of elementary school, three years of middle school, and three years of secondary school, followed by four years of college or university. Compulsory education in Japan lasts for nine years; in other words, in Japan, education is compulsory for children aged from 6-15.Students are typically at least 18 years old by the time they graduate high school in Japan. As part of the JAPAN Educational Travel, school trades are predominantly done in middle school and secondary schools.There is a system called ‘Special Needs Education’ to help and support any special needs student in elementary, middle, and high school. Education is mandatory just for the nine years of elementary and middle school, yet 98.8% of students go on to high school.Is school free in Japan?For the Japanese people, the word ’education’ incorporates not simply getting a certain qualification or certificate for graduating from an educational institution.This term in the Japanese language implies both the overall upbringing of a child and formal Japanese education. For the most part, these two ideas incorporate deep significance and mirror the true aim of the Japanese education system.Classes are held regularly from morning until early evening or late afternoon, similar to elsewhere. Japanese individuals are known to be extremely pleasant and conscious when it comes to greetings. Thus, children are taught essential habits, basic manners, and proper greetings even at an early age.The Japanese education system highly values cleanliness, timeliness, participation, and group work. There are no cleaners in Japanese schools as each class cleans study halls, passages, and even toilets. This way, students from a young age figure out how to function in a group and help one another. The children in Japanese schools have far fewer discipline issues than anywhere in the world!As of May 2020, nearly 20,000 primary or elementary schools are active in Japan, with around 19,000 being government-funded public schools. Public primary and lower secondary schools in Japan don’t charge educational costs. Government educational cost support makes public upper secondary schools essentially free for families making under a yearly pay limit. Families earning over this limit pay the educational cost at the upper secondary level.There are no entrance examinations or tests and no educational expenses for elementary and junior high schools; the books required are distributed for free. The only cost for a student’s parents or guardians is expenses for supplementary materials, lunch fees, uniforms, and fees for optional school trips. Numerous private elementary and junior high schools offer a much better chance of getting into top high schools. In elementary school, there are typically no uniforms.International students and other non-resident children who live in Japan are not obligated to go to school, yet if they wish to do as such, they can get free education and also free textbooks at the public elementary and also junior high schools - just as Japanese children do.Kindergarten in Japan is mandatory, and generally, kids begin going there at three years old. Currently, in kindergarten, Japanese kids master the basics of arithmetic and can read Hiragana and Katakana (Japanese syllable systems).In Japan, there is nothing as a mode of school transport. College or university students drive vehicles. Students walk, ride a bicycle, or utilize a public transport vehicle. Students go to elementary school in little gatherings. Japan doesn’t spend a large chunk of change on its schooling framework, with the Japanese government contributing 3.3% of its GDP on education. For instance, the Japanese government uses its resources to build simple school structures rather than fancy decorative ones.How long is a Japanese school day?Japanese schools are active for around six and a half hours each day from Monday to Friday. As a general rule, children must be at school by 8:45 am, and the teachers are expected to arrive before the students and return home around 3:15 pm.Be that as it may, many children additionally go to after-school clubs, and many attend juku - cram school - in the evening to do extra studying. Tochigi, Saitama, Kanagawa, Tokyo, Kyoto, Osaka, Yamaguchi, Fukuoka, Okayama, Hiroshima, Saga, and Kumamoto prefectures all have schools that expect that students should attend classes on all six days. However, some districts have classes only five days a week.Japanese students dedicate around two hours for every workday to schoolwork and around three hours on Sunday; what’s more, students are given loads of homework to finish throughout their summer vacation! The school year usually starts in the month of April and finishes in March of the next year. Most schools follow a three-semester system, the first semester lasting from April to August, then the second semester from September to December, and then the third semester from January to March.Japanese schools give their students a six-week-long summer vacation and a few weeks off during winter and spring as well. During classes, teachers mainly focus on helping and teaching the students how to think and come up with ideas and solutions of their own.Japan, unlike other nations, does not lean towards teaching students exactly what will be on standardized tests. Instead, it focuses on showing students how to tackle and solve issues faced by people in real life and promotes critical thinking. This helps Japanese students prepare and be ready to take care of issues they have never seen before on tests. Teachers often plan new lessons for their class, and afterward, present new ideas to fellow teachers to get their feedback.Moreover, to guarantee the school’s smooth activity, teachers take on various responsibilities, such as taking care of educational activities, students’ school life, and employment guidance for students after graduation. A teacher may call out to a student for sleeping in class, as it is not considered disciplinary, but this rarely happens as the students are well-mannered.If everything we’ve told you so far sounds like the kind of school your children would like to go to, make certain they bring along a lot of determination and self-discipline. Going to class and being a student here isn’t dreamy or as easy as portrayed by the famous Japanese anime!Numerous Japanese schools additionally set up their boards of trustees.How do Japanese colleges operate?Grade schools, optional schools, and colleges were presented in 1872 because of the Meiji Restoration. Since the 1947 Fundamental Law of Education (compulsory education), to get into a Japanese college, you need to pass through cutthroat selection tests, which high school students work super hard for even during their final exams!In any case, when a college accepts your application, you’re going to enjoy the good life, in fact, the best a student can have. In Japan, the college years are frequently viewed as a four-year extended vacation between the toil of high school and a working career.Japanese students claim that their college days are as good as a day spent at the country club. There are not many tests or research projects. Additionally, students in Japan have a solid feeling of having a place in school. They don’t feel like outcasts or left out. The Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology (MEXT) in Japan is considered one very important ministry and is said to be in a constant endeavor to improve and develop Japan through education, especially in relation to the other nations. Private establishments in Japan make up 80% of the nation’s colleges and charge extra expenses, which are almost twice the expense of going to a public college.Here at Kidadl, we have carefully created lots of interesting family-friendly facts for everyone to enjoy! If you liked our suggestions for 185 Japan education facts to learn about the cultural difference, then why not take a look at Japan geography facts or Japan tsunami facts?