During my three years in Japan I've taught a variety of students—young and old, low-level and high-, interested and not—all of whom have challenged me to work out my own answers, yet again, to “What is teaching?” “What is education?”, and, finally “What is authentic learning?”
I think that any teacher I've known in America would answer something like this: authentic learning is that type of activity or experience that leads one to a genuine mastery of a given body of content. Most American educators imagine a society in which most every individual functions actively and willingly in the economic, social, political, and spiritual aspects of his or her world. Moreover, we hope that each individual will gain through education a broad base of information and skills from which to ponder, reason, and dream, as well as the flexibility to apply these knowledge and skills to any given experience. It is for these reasons we want our society to be based on authentic learning experiences.
A “Don't-Get-Involved” Mentality
The Japanese have entirely different values and a different interpretation of “authentic education.” The results of their education are as follows. Many Japanese are afraid of and generally incapable of making an independent decision. They either literally confer with the people around them or, if alone, refer to the invisible group (“we Japanese”) to determine how to think or act. This goes for emergencies and violent situations, as well as everyday ones.
The cultural guideline is “Don't get involved.” In the classroom, Japanese students wait for someone else to respond to the teacher or engage in discussion clusters until the small group generates an answer that is tested against the answers that all the other groups have generated. Only then is the teacher likely to get a response from someone. The only way to speed up classroom process is to call on individual students, then wait for them to confer with or be tutored by their neighbors before they answer.
This pattern is firmly in place by junior high school on into adulthood. In my aerobics class the women were asked to plan a “dance” using aerobics movements to a 2–4 minute piece of music. They spent the first 30 minutes of the planning session playing with scarves they might wear and then trying different aerobic moves to see if they would fit to the music. They never discussed what mood the music suggested, what movements expressed that mood, or how movement and costume might affect each other. They never planned a beginning, a middle, or an end. And, most to the point, no one, at any time, made a specific suggestion of what to do. If one woman tried a movement, everyone quickly joined in. Movements were “voted in” by being repeated later in the session. Others were “voted out” by never being repeated. At the end of 30 minutes nothing had been specifically decided, but it was clear to me that some ideas were preferred over others.
At Taiko training (traditional Japanese drumming) when the teacher shows us a new rhythm pattern, no one touches a drum until they have oh'd and ah'd over the pattern, asked the teacher to repeat it several times, commented on its difficulty (many tasks are labeled muzukashii, difficult, by the Japanese), and discussed whether they had heard the sound right, and so on. Only, after 3–5 minutes of discussion, can the teacher again show us the pattern.
Many Japanese can recite long strings of facts, but only one in, say, 500, can answer “why” or “how” or “what if” or “what do you think” questions about the data. The best example I have in this regard is a conversation I had with a Japanese teacher of English. He told me what he really would like to do would be to teach the Japanese Constitution. “I'd like students to be able to recite every word of the Constitution,” he said.“That's nice,” I said. “Why do you want to teach the Constitution to Japanese students?”“Because then they could know it, too.”“Do you mean they would understand it if they memorized it like you?” I asked.“No, but they would know it.”“Do you mean that they would only memorize it?”“ONLY? It is very difficult to memorize the whole Constitution!” (Oops! My cross-cultural mistake!)“So—what would they do with the Constitution after they memorized it?”“Well, if they wanted to know what the Constitution says about some particular thing, they could remember that part of the Constitution.”“Do you do that?”“Yes, sometimes. But sometimes I have to look it up; I'm getting old and so I'm beginning to forget.” (He's 42.)“Would remembering that part of the Constitution help them understand what to think or do about that particular topic?”“No, but it would tell them what the Constitution says about it.”“Could you explain what the different sections of the Constitution mean?”“No. We didn't study that so much.”“If you chose to be a politician, could you use your knowledge of the Constitution to govern or to write new laws?”“No.”“Could you enter law school after studying the Constitution this way?”“No.”“Then why do you want so badly for young students to memorize the Constitution?”“Because then they will know every word of it!”
Bear in mind, this well-intentioned educator was not pulling my leg or acting obtuse. He was just telling me what kind of learning is designated as important in Japanese education and showing me how graduates utilize what they have been taught.
Why We Should Not Copy Japanese Education
After several years of these kinds of experiences, I get downright scared when I hear or read that American experts on Japanese education are convincing the general public that the only way to improve our American educational system is to copy the Japanese. Apparently this advice is based on the following. First, the Japanese (and Koreans and Chinese) score much higher in math than American students. Yes, that is true. Their test scores are high because their entire education system lends itself to rote memory and rote-memory application. (Nonetheless, I recalculate my paycheck every month because many employers often underpay me or make mistakes in the deductions.)
Second, Japanese students are such diligent students. Yes, some are. Four or five in each class (of up to 40) have done their homework. The others are waiting to fill in the correct answers when the good students or the teacher gives them. That way they can cram for the exam that will be lifted directly from the material and exercises in the text.
Third, Japanese students spend more days in school each year. Yes, there are more school days, but there are probably no more class days. Often no classes are held due to national holidays, school festival, practice for school festival, clean-up after school festival, and so on.
If these are the three reasons that America wants to copy Japanese education, then I fear for American education. In Tokyo, at least, I would never accuse Japanese education of providing “comprehensive experiences for mastery” or “authentic learning.” However, words can be tricky, so I looked up both “authentic” and “learning” in my dictionary. Lo and behold, “authentic” can mean “worthy of respect” as well as “genuine.” “Learning” can mean “memorizing” as well as “gaining mastery of.” In that case, then, the Japanese educational system can be said to be based on respect for memorized information. If that is what Americans really want, then let me give you the Japanese recipe for that kind of education.
Take one Ministry of Education to plan a nationwide curriculum, and designate approved texts to administer that curriculum. Train all teachers to present the textbook material in a thorough and orderly sequence. Give all future teachers two weeks of student teaching so they can watch experienced teachers work through the texts in an efficient and effective manner. At the end of the two weeks, let them teach one class hour to try it for themselves. Train all students to silently listen to the teachers' explanation of the text material. Also train the students to retain the text material exactly as they find it in the texts. Instruct all exam writers, at all levels of education, to reproduce quantities of detailed text materials so that students who are not conversant with the texts will be unlikely to do well on the exams. (That will wash out “handicapped students” and most students attending private schools.) Instruct all teachers to grade on a curve so that virtually all grades will be passing. This will ensure that the students will be motivated to endure the endless pressures of memorization-recognition and that the teachers will appear to be successful in teaching said students.
Supplement the public education system with a private, for-profit system of jukus (cram schools). Design the public school promotion exams in such a way that most parents will feel obligated to send their children to a juku after school for three to five hours a day—at the parent's expense. Design a curriculum of trivia and drill to be presented during juku classes. Allow tacit coordination between public schools and jukus so that the public school teachers introduce the materials and the juku teachers elaborate on it and drill, drill, drill. If you wish, prepare a series of juku texts that are practice exams written exactly like the exam for which students are studying (high school or university entrance exams). For younger students, provide intensified curriculum for all basic subjects in case the students are not at the top of their class in any of them. Provide second-language classes for all levels of juku students, starting at age 3. The Ministry will determine what the universal second language should be.
Upon graduation from high school, technical college, or university, employers base offers on the difficulty of that school's entrance exam, not on the student's academic record at that school. Disregard the students' major area of study; let the company train them to do whatever job they are assigned. The students may pursue an area of academic interest as a hobby, if they wish. This will give students an incentive to excel in all areas of study, since they won't know until after job training what skills might be required of them during their work years.
Well, there it is: a way to achieve authentic learning—“memorizing worthy of respect.” Is that what the experts are recommending? Is that the kind of educational efficiency Americans want? Will this kind of system produce the kind of graduates the American culture wants?
The Taiko Experience
My final example of how the educated citizen is trained goes back to my Taiko experience. There are many forms and uses of Japanese drumming, from simple repetitive patterns beat on small portable drums in festival processions to complex rhythms executed on absolutely huge ones in stage performances. Since Taiko is traditionally a male activity, I looked for a year and a half before I could find a Taiko teacher who would accept me. Luckily I found my way to Sasaki-san who said, sure, I could try it. I've trained with the group for one year now. We meet every Sunday on the green belt along the Tama River and drum our little hearts out from 1 p.m. until just before dark. Next we load the drums back into the truck, head for Sasaki-san's house for a little visiting. Then usually a group of us go to dinner together.
What I'm telling you is, they are my friends and the experience has meant a great deal to me. That doesn't mean that we never have problems—we do. There are bound to be cross-cultural demons that raise their ugly heads periodically. But then life goes back to normal and a few Japanese, at least, find out that a few angry words, or hurt feelings, or tears, even, don't automatically destroy a relationship. Nor have I, to date, lost face with them by being angry or hurt. That's particularly interesting since they have all been taught that if they express anger or hurt, they will lose face! The gift I gain from them is to see everyday Japanese functioning in everyday ways.
I've already said that Japanese education is, first and foremost, rote memorization. That explains why they are “so good at math,” but it also explains why they are not good at putting ideas into their own words, at taking material apart to understand its components, at putting parts together to make (or remake) the whole, or at thinking creatively.
My first surprise when I started Taiko training was when I found out that they learned all the rhythm patterns by rote. They do not have measures, nor do they think in terms of fast-fast-slow-slow, or one-and-two-three; they put syllables to the beats in some cases (for example the basic beat in our group is “don-do-ko”); the rest they just learn through endless repetition until they finally remember it. (Little old American me? I analyzed it, found it to be “ONE-two-and,” then stood around waiting for them to learn the pattern.)
However, my first truly mind-boggling experience with the Taiko group occurred when I started asking them about a certain rhythm pattern within a longer song or exercise. I was usually trying to pin down the exact rhythm of a section, the transition from one pattern to the next, or how many times to repeat the pattern. Every time, they would start from the beginning of the song until they reached the part I was asking about. They always did everything in an exaggerated and elaborate manner, sometimes talking through it as they went, so I first thought that they thought that I needed help with the whole song. Wrong. I finally realized that they could not just launch into the song at any point. Each part was learned only in relation to the whole string of rhythms.
Can you imagine how long it takes to get an answer that way? Now, after a year of dealing with me, they usually start at the beginning of the section containing my question, drum quickly through the part I'm asking about, then give me the answer. Sugaya-sensei (teacher/master), the women's main teacher, can usually focus just on the part I'm asking about, but he often has to drum it himself before he can find the answer to my question. Ever since I first realized what was happening when they tried to answer my questions, I've wondered: do all of the hard-working Japanese salary men, who work 12–18 hours a day, six days a week, and who graduated from the same educational system, go through this kind of thinking pattern to find the answers to their company's questions?
Another common pattern of Japanese thinking can be seen from this experience. We have a performance coming up in which we provide Taiko accompaniment to taped pop music to be used in a grand finale of a huge festival. While we drum and the music plays, dancers will dance, there will be a light show, and fireworks will accompany the ending. Big time!
Two of the young men are in charge of setting the rhythms we will use, teaching them to us, and designing the arrangement of the drums on stage. The first people assigned to drums were the young men and the two teachers (male, of course). Then the women who have been with the group the longest were assigned. That left the older woman (not a strong drummer), the college girl (who has missed several practices lately), another woman who practices but does not perform Taiko, and me. Nothing was said to the four of us women beyond, “Go stand in back of the drums.” We stood there for more than an hour while the two young men taught several rhythm patterns.
Fujita-sensei had told me weeks ago that everyone would play drums in the finale. He even showed me a tape from last year. None of us standing around knew why we were not included or why we were to watch. I finally went to Sasaki-san and told him I was leaving since I wasn't doing anything. He called over a visitor who could translate for us and said that there weren't enough drums today but next week we would practice and then they would choose who would perform.
That put me directly into cultural conflict. If everyone was in fact playing, why was everyone not practicing? If some of us were not playing, why were we standing around? Two women were practicing on tires and we have more than enough other tires for all of us to practice on. Why were we excluded? One drum had been standing empty the whole time. Why wasn't one of us given that drum? Those at drums had been given a paper containing information about the pop music and the length of each section of music. Why weren't we given the same information? Why should four women stand for a two-hour practice. The first-line answer is cultural: precisely because we are women. But didn't anyone think what was happening was inefficient, confusing, wasteful, and thoughtless?
When I pushed for answers, I was placated by being put at the empty drum. I then asked what was going to be done with the other three women. Tanaka-san gave his drum to the college girl; the other two women were left standing at the back. We “practiced” some rhythms for a while, but different people were doing different rhythms at the same time, so I couldn't determine what was supposed to be happening.
They've seen me cry before and my closest friends knew that I was ready to cry again. They are able to break the Japanese habit of “if you don't know what to do, ignore the problem,” and they tried to think of explanations or solutions to help me. Fujita-sensei explained that there would be more practice next week and no one was excluded—yet. The women I'm closest to dubbed a tape of the pop music for me and made sure I knew what order the music would be played in (not the same as the tape). They also explained to me that although they had spent two hours learning and repeating about five rhythm patterns, maybe only two or three patterns would be used (they will decide next week), and maybe the women will play the super-simple beat and the men will play the fast, complex patterns—of course—(they will decide next week). Unbelievable. Much ado about nothing, as so often is the case.
Concentration, Yes; Understanding, No
What's my explanation of why this all happened? According to the thinking I see in the classroom, I would say that the two young men in charge, once they decided how many drums to use and where to place them, were incapable of dealing with anything that didn't fit inside the picture they had established in their minds for the performance. Every drum was assigned so the picture was complete; anything else was extraneous and therefore invisible. I experience this all the time in the classroom. Japanese concentration can be very intense, but it excludes almost everything in the process.
Yes, the Japanese are good at math tests. And they spend a longer time at school. And they appear to be highly disciplined. But in their system, if something is memorized, it is learned. There is no cultural need for analysis, synthesis, creativity, or even application, necessarily. I ask you, is that genuine mastery of the subject matter? Would you be happy participating in this system of “authentic learning”?
