Let's Get Educated in Here

I'm no expert on special education programs, the differently-abled or even education, for that matter. So you'll have to take the following observations as they are; simply the ruminations of an outside observer.

Having worked at four different schools for just under five months now, I can't help but notice a fundamental difference between the US and Japan with regards to special education. In the States, children with disabilities are identified early on through standardized testing and are accordingly placed in special education programs. While there is some debate surrounding the capability of standardized tests to adequately measure a child's capacity to learn, the responsibility of identifying those with special needs is held by an institution and is judged in accordance with a set of nationally recognized benchmarks.

While Japan seems to have special education programs and facilities that are just as robust as in any other developed nation (if not more so), the manner in which students are selected for these programs is quite different. Parents must voluntarily request that their child be identified as differently-abled in order for the child to receive special education. The problem with this system is that, for a variety of complex reasons, parents are rarely willing to do this. This article touches on a few but be forewarned, it seems a bit reductionist and poorly-informed when it comes to Japanese culture and society (is it just me, or does it seem like the authors of the article learned everything they know about Japan by reading a copy of Robert Whiting's You've Gotta Have Wa on the plane ride over?). Still, they bring up a valid point in stressing that Japanese people on the whole are much less willing to stray from the herd than their individuality-obsessed American counterparts. An unfortunate consequence of this is that many differently-abled children spend years in schools where they have no hope of keeping up, simply so that their parents can avoid acknowledging the fact that their child is differently-abled.

At Momoishi Elementary School, I teach a number of classes with differently-abled students. Since these children may not have been formally identified as such, we ALTs have to simply infer whether or not a student has special needs from their classroom performance. As Matt pointed out to me over the weekend, this often introduces and added layer of difficulty when teaching. However, in most of my classes, differently-abled students are quite obvious; the teacher and other children all seem to acknowledge their presence and in some classes, an extra teacher is present just to help with these students. I can see that one advantage to this kind of system might be that it integrates these students into the classroom instead of isolating them from others in their age group. However, a few weeks ago, I taught a class where this seemed to be quite the opposite.

It was one of my second grade classes and I was playing English bingo with the kids. There's a student who sits in the front of class who obviously has special needs. He has a lot of trouble focusing and a second teacher stands behind him to help him with classroom activities. During this class, he decided, for one reason or another, that he just wasn't having it and attempted to make a break for it. The problem is, with a teacher directly behind him, he didn't make it very far. He usually does this sort of thing a few times every class but today he was especially determined and literally got up from his desk and made a beeline for the door every minute or so. Each time he was dragged back to his desk by the teacher, visibly distraught. Eventually, the other students attempted to physically restrain him and although they may have meant well, it only made him more upset and steeled his resolve to escape. Not only is this sort of thing a huge distraction for everyone in the classroom, it's also in no way beneficial to the differently-abled student. It's clear that he's not learning anything and on top of that, his difference is only being emphasized, both to himself and the other students.

Most experts on Japanese education will tell you that Japan is currently in the throes of the third great reform of the educational system (comically termed, the "Rainbow Plan"). The most sweeping reform is that the mandatory national English curriculum will now start in elementary school as opposed to junior high school; an attempt to catch up with the rest of Asia's rising English literacy rates. I can only hope that special needs assessment will be reviewed along with some of the Rainbow Plan's flashier initiatives, as it seems to me that a change in policy is desperately needed.

By the way, if you're wondering about my choice of graphic for today, I simply thought it was funny. Just imagine Koizumi asking the kid "Why did the chicken cross the load?"