Science Curriculum Reform in Japan and Indonesia

Edgar W. Jenkins

For all but the declining years of the Tokugawa Shogunate (1603-1868), Japan was
effectively closed to the outside world, apart from occasional contacts with Dutch or
Portuguese traders (Barr 1967; Fox 1969). Despite the feudal nature of the Shogunate,
literacy was widespread among the population, with many schools catering for different
social classes that shared enjoyed comparatively homogeneous cultural and linguistic
traditions. The political overthrow of the Samurai-dominated Shogunate in 1868 marked
the beginning of the modernisation of Japan and the so-called Meiji Restoration, a term
that indicates the return to the Mikado of the supreme powers denied to him by the
Shoguns. Under the Emperor Meiji, the Japanese government looked for models in
various western countries, then industrialising rapidly. A central Ministry of Education
was established in 1871 and it assumed responsibility for an education system that owed
much to the USA for the structure of schooling and to France for the centralised system
of educational governance. In the early years of the Meiji era, Japanese students were
sent to study abroad and western specialists were employed as teachers and advisers.
Particular importance was attached to applied science and schemes were drawn up for as
naval college and a technical engineering college. As the Imperial College of
Engineering from 1877 onwards, the latter was able to attract some of the best engineers
and mathematicians from the United Kingdom. For example, W.E.Ayrton was appointed
to the chair of natural philosophy and John Perry to a professorship of engineering,
although along with some of the expatriate assistants at the college, both had returned
home by 1878. Their return was of seminal importance for science education in the home
country since Ayrton and Perry joined H.E. Armstrong at Finsbury Technical College
and, as Brock has shown, much of the work at the College owed much to the experience
gained in Japan (Brock 1981).

As far Japanese schools were concerned, individual subjects and the associated textbooks
were copied from American models, the latter not always being translated. American
influence is evident in the setting up of the Tokyo Normal School for training teachers.
Since the school was given responsibility for selecting textbooks, curriculum
development and the preparation of handbooks for teachers and students, its influence on
Japanese education was substantial. Perhaps inevitably, the Meiji plan for large-scale
educational development and modernisation fell short of realisation with only one of the
eight planned universities (Tokyo) being established by 1877. No less inevitably, there
was also something of a backlash against western influence and, in 1879, the Emperor
decreed that emphasis was to be placed in schooling upon traditional Confucian ideas of
duty, loyalty, filial piety and patriotism. In 1890, the promotion of Imperial public
education was reinforced by a proclamation that set out the standards of behaviour
expected of Japanese people and emphasised the virtues of loyalty to the country and to
the emperor. The proclamation, circulated to every school in Japan and read out on the
occasions of school or national celebration, was a major influence on Japanese education
and society until the end of the Second World War.
The aftermath of Russo-Japanese war (1904-05) and the First World War both prompted
the development of Japanese industry and the expansion of the Japanese education
system. In 1905, there were 272 vocational schools, 100 girls’ high schools, 69 normal
schools and two universities. Five years later, these figures had increased to 481, 195, 84
and 3. By 1935, influenced by ultra-nationalism and militarism, there were 1,253
vocational schools, 974 girls’ schools, 106 normal schools and 45 universities. Defeat by
the Allies in 1945, led to occupation of Japan, a new constitution and the reorganisation
of the education system which, following a law enacted in 1947, marked the end of the
Imperial edict of 1890. This law effectively set out the structure of post-war education in
Japan, a structure that decentralised the education system along American lines,
abolished normal schools and introduced a new system of textbook approval. During the
1950s, the East-West tensions and anti-communism led to a purge of teachers and others
judged to be ‘red sympathisers’, while the ending of the occupation led some to argue for
a reversal of the American-led post-war changes in favour of more traditional Japanese
practices. In 1953, a law was enacted to promote science education in elementary, lower
and upper secondary schools. Importance was attached to practical work and
experimentation and provided for subsidies for those schools unable to meet the cost of
providing the teaching materials and equipment needed to undertake the specified
experiments.

The eventual expansion of education in post-war Japan was rapid. During the 1960s, 138
four-year universities and 199 junior colleges were established. The percentage of
students entering junior colleges and universities increased from 10.1% of the cohort in
1954, to 23.6% in 1970 and 37.4% a decade later, with girls gaining most from the
growth in enrolment. The quality of Japanese education was indicated by the success of
Japanese students in various international tests. In the IEA survey of science education in
1970-73, Japan ranked first in science at the 5th grade elementary and 3rd grade lower
secondary levels. During the 1970s, the rapid expansion of the previous decade led to
demands for a fresh look at the Japanese education system and a report of the Central
Council for Education recommended comprehensive reform in order to support further
expansion at all levels. The report prompted a vigorous debate but, in the face of strong
opposition from the Japanese Teachers’ Union and from the higher education community,
most of the recommendations w ere never implemented. However, during the 1980s, the
government established a National Council on Education Reform which, between 1984
and 1987 produced four reports, the last of which led to several important policy
initiatives, including obligatory in-service training for newly-appointed teachers, reform
of eth teacher licensing system and the introduction of six-year secondary schools. Much
of the debate associated with the National Council continued into the following decade
and in July 1996 the Council produced a report which, among much else, urged the
revision and streamlining of the school curriculum to reduce duplication and the
emphasis on rote learning of content. In due course, the Ministry of Education announced
new courses of study, involving a reduction of some 30% of the elementary and lower
secondary school curricula. These and other earlier measures prompted several science
and engineering professors to assert that academic standards had fallen since students
were less well-prepared for advanced study than they had once been. Assertions of
declining standards coincided with a weakening of the Japanese economy and the rise in
the performance on international tests in science and mathematics of students from other
parts of Asia, notably Singapore, Korea and Taiwan. However, as in other industrialised
countries, the issues surrounding ‘standards’ are complex and objective evidence for a
decline is hard to come by. Nonetheless, the Ministry of Education felt obliged to point
out that the new courses of study, implemented in full in 2002, represented the minimum
required of all students in Japan and that, for the more able students, more advanced
work, based on individual study or small group work, was to be encouraged (IIC 2004)

REFERNCES

Barr, P. 1967, The Coming of the Barbarians: a study of western settlement in Japan,
London, Macmillan.

Brock, W.H. 1981, The Japanese Connexion: Engineering in Tokyo, London and
Glasgow at the end of the nineteenth century, British journal of the History of Science,
14, 227-43.

Fox, G, 1969, Britain and Japan 1858-1883, Oxford, Clarendon Press.

IIC 2004, The History of Japan’s Educational Development: What implications can be
drawn for developing countries today? Tokyo, Institute for International Cooperation,
Japan International Cooperation Agency.

INDONESIA

Indonesia, the world’s largest Muslim country, is an archipelago of more than 13,000
islands, of which almost 1000 are inhabited. This geographical character has promoted
the development of many different cultural practices and indigenous languages. Formerly
the Netherlands East Indies, Indonesia as occupied by the Japanese in 1942 and gained its
independence in 1946.

Education in Indonesia has thus been shaped by several factors. Since the 13th century,
Islam has been a strong influence but later Western contact through trade and
colonization also brought Christianity and European schooling to parts of the country. As
elsewhere in the Islamic world, Muslim schools were dominated by teaching the Quran,
the sharia, Muslim traditions and history and the Arabic language whereas European
schooling was essentially secular. Today, schooling is structured around kindergarten, a
basic education of nine years (six primary, three basic secondary) and secondary
education. Science and technology are included within primary education. Those
graduating from basic education enter one of several different types of secondary school,
oriented towards, for example, general education, religious education, vocational
education or the education of children with special needs. There are 30,000 primary
schools, 22,000 basic secondary/junior high schools, 4,500 vocational high schools and
13,000 secondary/high schools. An essentially secular system runs alongside Islamic
Madrasah Aliyah so that there are Muslim primary, lower secondary and higher
secondary schools. Students can leave the latter to embark upon Islamic Diploma,
Master’s and doctoral programs that parallel those available in non-Muslim institutions.
Overall all, Indonesia has some 4,000 university level institutions. The formal education
system is complemented by substantial out of school programmes, catering for a wide age
range and organised around family or other self-learning/teaching groups.

Concern about the rise of Islamic fundamentalism has led the USA to provide
development funds to Indonesia. However, unlike American aid to other countries such
as Egypt and Pakistan where money was directed towards the building of schools, the
focus in Indonesia was raising the quality of teaching in existing institutions. Indonesian
education is directed towards pancasila (belief in God, humanitarianism, nationalism,
social justice and democratic rule) which is integrated into all subjects of the curriculum.

Some general comments

Japan, Indonesia and a number of countries in Asia, including China, seem to me to share
the following characteristics even though the way in which these characteristics are
manifest varies from one education system to another. The detailed impact on school
science remains to be elaborated. I await further, more specifc,sources.

1. A commitment to promoting a sense of national identity and social cohesion. The

relevant literature is replete with words like discipline, perseverance, common
good, moral values. This is especially important in countries with a historically
diverse cultural background, e.g. Singapore, Indonesia. This commitment is often
manifest in references to patriotism.
2. Where there is a strong religious influence, e.g. Indonesia, religious schools have
a major and direct effect on the curriculum, especially in determining what is
taught and the purpose of knowledge and education.
3. Schools are widely used to promote the political ideology of those in power.
China and South Korea being the most obvious examples. One consequence is
that changes in a political regime can lead to abrupt changes in the school
curriculum.
4. The economic impulse is ever present, with the structure of schooling and/or
school curricula being adapted to meet the perceived needs, e.g. improved
agriculture, greater industrialization, improved ICT skills, development of a
service-based economy. The key word her is usually ‘development’. During the
1970s and beyond, the reform of school science education was seen as key to
economic and social development. Initially at least, in former colonies, the reform
model, in form and largely in content, was essentially that of the metropolitan
countries. Selective systems were in place, teaching was in English and adaptation
and indigenisation were on a modest scale. By the end of the decade, locally
designed programmes were much more common and further curriculum reform
was underway or contemplated. The 1990s saw some important differences
emerge between countries that economically had once seemed to have much in
common. Thus Japan, Singapore and Hong Kong flourished whereas other
 countries, especially some in Sub-Saharan Africa e.g. Nigeria, seemed to have
made little or no economic or social progress.
5. There are differences between countries in the way in which knowledge is
regarded. The dominant modern Western tradition might be loosely described as
‘rhetorical cum scientific’ and seen as dependent upon asking questions of the
natural world that can be tested by experiment. Different traditions such as the
Confucian or Quranic prioritise documentary sources and new knowledge is
gained by interrogation of these sources rather than in some other way. Moreover,
in the case of the Quran, the knowledge embedded here is deemed to govern all
other knowledge than is, or can be known. This dichotomy is, of course,
overdrawn but it is not invalid and it helps illuminate some of the tensions
between the modern secular and other world views.

References

Dori, G. 2000 Science Education and Economic Development: Trends, relationships and
research agenda, Studies in Science Education, 35, pp.27-58.

Loo, S.P. 2001. Islam, Science and Science Education: Conflict or Concord, Studies in
Science education, 36, pp.45-78.

Swift, D. 1992, Indigenous Knowledge in the Service of Science and Technology in

Developing Countries, Studies in Science Education, 20, pp.1-28.

Yager, R. 1993, Science education in the Pacific Region, Studies in Science Education.
22, pp.43-65.