6th June 2012 13:10
By Blue Tutors
We Should Learn from Japan
Stephen Twigg, the shadow education secretary, in an article on the BBC Education News website on 14th May 2012, has been reported as saying that our education system needs to learn from the continuous personal development system used in japan to keep teachers and teaching getting better all the time. While our system has been subject to many overhauls, he says that it is largely the same as Victorian schooling.
Along with other Far Eastern countries, such as South Korea and Singapore, Japan constantly outperforms England in international studies on maths and science.
This is something that has been highlighted by Education Secretary Michael Gove.
Mr Twigg says that although Labour improved results in the core subjects during its time in office, it was clear that "more of the same isn't the answer. In Japan, teaching practices have changed markedly in the last 50 years, through a process of gradual, incremental improvements over time. Japan gives teachers themselves primary responsibility for improving classroom practice."
He highlights how participation in continual professional development, known as kounaikenshuu, is considered a core job requirement in Japan.
Mr Twigg also points out that in England, teachers lead students through a series of steps to help them learn how to solve problems.
In Japan the focus is on allowing students to develop their own methods for solving problems, through trial and error.
He adds: "If we want to change teaching, we can't just change teachers - we must change the culture of teaching, its very fabric and DNA."
This is something we can bring to our ‘classroom’ for private tuition. Allowing the students to form their own ways of problem solving is to teach them how to learn for life rather than how to cram for exams. It does seem a much healthier approach.