The other day, I received an inquiry regarding ICT from a researcher up north (in Hokkaido, Japan). Today, as I was trying to construct a suitable response, I decided I might as well share my preliminary findings in a venue accessible to others interested in language teacher development. So here they are; they began: “Thank you for your inquiry….”
… I take it that by ICT you mean “Information and Communications Technology, a broad subject concerned with technology and other aspects of managing and processing information” (Wikipedia, ICT, retrieved 2008.03.16).
Since I have been more involved in continuing teacher education than in pre-service teacher training, details of the current core curricula elude me. At present, I am unaware of any compulsory ICT coursework for teachers in training in Japan. (Readers, if you know of any, please leave a comment to let us know.) It seems however that you are suggesting that teacher-trainees should be compelled to bang away on computers both in training and in practice teaching, as you say their counterparts in Singapore must do for at least 60 hours (personal correspondence, 2008.03.13).
Well, as of 2005-06, the National Institute of Multi-media Education (NIME) was undertaking surveys for the Ministry of Education, Science, Culture, and Technology (MEXT) to ascertain whether using ICT for educational purposes influenced desired academic outcomes. See for example: Projects and Activities – Primary/Secondary Education and Life-long Learning (NIME, 2006). You may interpret that as a suggestion the MEXT may be beginning to encourage the horses to catch up with the cart, and also that there is not yet agreement on educational value added by current expenditures on glamourous carts in prestigious, selected venues.
In 2007, the MEXT promulgated skills checklists for educational leadership in the ability to use ICT for educational purposes at both primary and secondary school levels. Those checklists apparently went to committee for continuing deliberation.
How many hundreds (or thousands) of hours it might take trainees and practitioners to acquire and hone the ICT-related teaching skills listed up already may be anyone’s guess.
Then, whatever the number you postulate, there are questions about what those hours might displace in the core curricula for teachers in training (subject matter courses, for instance), or in continuing education courses for teachers already in the field. Moreover, we may find grim assessments regarding when or where teachers in Japan might be able to apply fresh new ICT-related teaching skills in traditional teaching practices, especially within common, shall we say, less than individualized, learner-centered, or technologically advanced teaching environments.
The National Institute for Educational Policy Research (NIER) might be a good place to look for leads on planned or recent developments. The NIER, for example, has published Fukumoto & Kikuchi’s paper on teacher-librarians’ information literacy, information morals, and ICT-related skills:
Research on Teacher-Librarian’s ICT Education Skills Using Pathfinder (2008), in which the government resources that they’ve cited stretch into 2007. Journals of the Japan Society for Information and Systems in Eduction, in both English and Japanese, might touch upon teacher training requirements, too.
All in all, perhaps these preliminary findings suggest that we’re not there yet. Although Japanese educational culture in general (pre-tertiary at least) may be poised to embrace notions of learners’ ICT-related needs, it may be having trouble agreeing what those needs will be 10 or 20 years down the road. Under these circumstances, it may be up to tomorrow’s teachers to prepare themselves, and yesteryear’s teachers and schools to seek elsewhere than on high to find the support they need in guiding learners in the directions that they’ll need to go.
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March 18th, 2008 at 10:53 pm
Thank you very much for posting the response to my query here. I have been reading the English translations of MEXT documents and a fascinating book edited by J.M. Bachnik (see refs below).
There are indeed many barriers to tech adoption, adaption and appropriation at schools here in Japan, and I contrast this with my 8 years in Singapore where IT at all levels of schooling is integrated into all curricula to meet the nation’s desired outcomes of education. In my 8 years I witnessed a transformation from simply adding PC’s to labs (and hoping someone would actually turn them on) to a more informed training of staff to consider teaching approaches that encourage a more personalized, dialogic classroom. Use of e-mail, Yahoo groups, BLOGS and, more recently, Podcasts by teachers and pupils change the roles of the instructor and the learner, and teachers in Singapore are gradually beginning to see the benefits of a more ‘westernized’ (social constructivist, experiential, situated. .. call it what you like) approach as children enter universities much better prepared for the independent responsibility of learning that higher education entails.
In contrast, trying to get a clear picture of IT usage in schools of a larger country like Japan is much more difficult. Shinohara’s document state that pre-service teachers (students on BA Education courses) have to participate in compulsory IT courses. But is that compulsory for the particular university’s BA or a MEXT requirement (as it is in Singapore)? I am still learning about Japan and its schooling, and much saddens me as I see how another Asian country like Singapore allows their children to be creative, to express themselves openly, and develop digital literacy skills (not simply tech skills but skills that attempt to use technology to harness the abundant (overwhelming) information and make meaning from it all).
Teachers there are beginning to understand that they do not need to be the information providers per se as access to the Web enables access to a vaster pool of information than any teacher could possibly broadcast from a podium. However, it is being skilled at searching, organizing, evaluating, and making sense of the information is increasing in importance. Teachers can provide amazing insights of the information gleaned but this would mean teachers changing their beliefs as broadcasters of content. China is beginning to send its smart students to Singapore on scholarships as that country too appears to see value in Singapore’s Asian interpretation of western educational practices. Here in Japan I hear so much about the barriers to change or simply a reluctance to adopt technology as it is perceived to be about tech skills and there is little understanding (by decision makers? School Principals?) of value that IT can bring to a teaching (and more importantly, learning) experience; as exemplified above.
Please let me know if indeed IT courses are now compulsory for Education undergraduates and/or in-service teachers. Any comments about your experiences trying to use IT in schools (whatever subject) in Japan will be most welcome. Any questions to me about the Singapore model can be posted here too (I guess!).
Useful References
Bachnik, J. M. (2003) Roadblocks on the information highway. Oxford: Lexington Books.
MEXT (2001). The education reform plan for the 21st century – the Rainbow Plan. http://www.mext.go.jp/english/topics/21plan/010301.htm [viewed 25 August 2007].
MEXT (2003) Regarding the establishment of an action plan to cultivate ‘Japanese with English abilities’. http://www.mext.go.jp/english/topics/03072801.htm [viewed 25 August 2007].
Shinohara, F. (2001). Current Trends and Prospect on ICT Training in Japanese Context. http:// http://www.u-gakugei.ac.jp/~shinohar/news/kokusai/workshp/un010310.pdf [viewed 14 March 2008].
Further links will be very much appreciated.
NOTE: Any comments here will NOT be used in any articles without the express permission of the contributor.
Kind regards,
Michael Vallance
March 19th, 2008 at 11:40 am
This is a quick capture from reading about the suitability of ICT-related teaching and learning activities to commonplace teaching and learning environments, namely classrooms. It comes from a Canadian source, and reflects on classrooms in Ontario:
“When students have 2 computers in the classroom and 40 minutes a week in a computer lab it is unrealistic that teachers and students become bloggers without a committed energetic teacher who embraces technology” (Blogging in the Classroom, People are blogging all over the world and in Ontario too! December 29, 2007).
In the last Japanese high school homeroom that I visited, two computers might be a stretch. There may only have been one if the teacher brought hers/his to class that day. I’ll ask about classroom connectivity and lab time.
March 19th, 2008 at 12:00 pm
Right! A student has confirmed that the academic senior high school homeroom I’d visited has no computer, unless the teacher, an English teaching specialist with tens of years of experience, brings a laptop to class. He/She’d use it to play music.
That classroom is in one of the newest public high schools in a city with a population approaching a million. The school is only about 10 years old, but there is no network connection in the English teacher’s homeroom. The school does have an Internet-connected computer lab. in which first year students get 50 minutes of exposure to glowing screens once a week.
March 20th, 2008 at 8:49 pm
Wow! This is in such stark contrast to the Singapore schools; though it must be added not all schools in SG adopt ICT enthusiastically and it is mostly down to the younger teachers and informed school principals to take risks and use tech in their teaching. But ICT usage is actively encouraged, expected, rewarded and measured (in teacher appraisals).
Michael