(166) MAKING INROADS FOR ICT IN JAPAN: FINDING PLATFORMS FOR CHANGE IN A TRADITION-BOUND CULTURE

摘要

ICT has become widespread in classrooms around the world. Despite having the financial resourcesneeded to support extensive ICT-based programs in schools and the technical sophistication requiredto maintain such programs, Japan has been a latecomer to the world of ICT learning in schools. In2011, a Ministry of Education directive addressed the need for ICT in the classroom, the impetusbehind it being a growing sense of insecurity surrounding the future of Japan and its ability to remaincompetitive, not only on the world stage but even within Asia (MEXT, 2011.) No doubt the devastatingeffects of the earthquake and tsunami of March 2011 only exacerbated this society-wide feeling ofvulnerability.So what has impeded the acceptance of ICT in the public school classroom, despite its popularity ininformal settings? To answer this question, we must understand the nature of Japan's complex andconflicted relationship with technology, particularly where compulsory/public education is concerned.By contrast within society in general, ICT has gained a foothold in Japan. In fact, ICT has becomeextremely popular as a means of learning in private locales. Home use of ICT language software hasskyrocketed in recent years, and private language schools and juku, or cram schools, have begun torely more and more on ICT for instruction.Despite Japan's technical sophistication, there is often in Japan a reluctance to rely on technologywhen other means are available. For example, although Japanese companies make excellentcalculators that millions of students around the world depend on, Japanese students themselves aregenerally not permitted to use them in school, the idea being that students should master fairlyadvanced mathematical skills before they begin to rely on any mechanical means of problem solving.By the same token, Japanese were slow in adopting personal computers, which were initially seen ascomplex calculators.A second and more serious obstacle to the adoption of ICT is the insistence that learning shouldideally be a matter of direct transmission from teacher to student. This has roots both in traditionalcraft culture and in the custom of passing down Buddhist teachings from master to disciple. Any otherform of instruction is generally viewed with suspicion and regarded as informal and inferior. Thisattitude has greatly limited the willingness of school authorities and teachers to accept any technologythat is perceived as coming between teacher and student.ICT is therefore often seen as useful in situations where no teacher is available, such as homelearning, or as a ploy used by profit-making businesses to reduce teaching expenses, but not as alegitimate tool for language acquisition in a formal school setting. Even if the effectiveness of ICT wereacknowledged, many would still resist its adoption out of a concern that the teacher would appear lazyin an ICT-equipped classroom, robbed of his or her essential status and usefulness. Consequently,any progress in the acceptance of ICT-based programs in Japan's public schools depends on theclear subordination of ICT to the classroom teacher's authority and expertise and a programmaticacknowledgement of the primacy of the teacher-student relationship.The Ministry of Education's 2011 ICT initiative has yet to jell into any sort of concrete plan for a morerigorous application of ICT in public school classrooms. For a country that rose to the status of aneconomic giant on the strength of a stubbornly low tech yet remarkably effective education system,accepting change has not been easy. This paper discusses various platforms for introducing ICT in atradition-bound culture and will address the implications this might have for other traditional culturesfacing educational landscapes altered by the appearance of new technologies.