Silent Challenges, Audible Solutions: Rethinking English Education in Japanese Schools

For the past six months, I have been crafting a manuscript delving into the detrimental facets of English education within Japanese elementary and junior high schools, with aspirations of publishing it as a book. Throughout the writing process, I have experienced numerous realizations. I found myself compelled to make decisions whenever I encountered such instances. These conflicts arose repeatedly until the completion of the final chapter. Currently, I am in the process of revisiting and refining the manuscript, meticulously ensuring the sequential flow from the introduction to achieve a consistent thread of arguments.

Through the process of writing and re-reading for months, several facts have become apparent. While guidebooks for school textbooks are published by textbook companies, only a few concrete books specifically point out the peculiar descriptions or deceptions in English textbooks. Moreover, there are practically none that thoroughly scrutinize the textbooks from the first chapter to the last. I wonder if concerns about potential copyright infringement or defamation lawsuits from the publishers of these textbooks hinder the publication of such books.

More than 30 years ago, a well-known publishing company in Japan faced controversy when a Japanese English teacher, assisted by their English-native colleague, released a book. The book criticized the numerous errors in example sentences and explanations in an English-Japanese dictionary that the company had published for many years. The cause was likely their inappropriate selection of example sentences from the American Random House English dictionary. The publishing company was furious and sued the author of the critical book for defamation. The case reached the Supreme Court, resulting in a decision to halt the publication of the criticized book. During this trial, the publisher completely revised the English-Japanese dictionary. As a result, the memory of this critical book was erased from the Japanese people's minds.

Now, I am contemplating the possibility of creating "unofficial guidebooks" for the English textbooks used in Japanese elementary and junior high schools. I would extract examples from various publishers' English textbooks for elementary and middle school students and provide annotations. I would elucidate how native English speakers would interpret the English sentences and suggest necessary corrections. I believe there is significant demand for such guidebooks. However, I also anticipate potential resistance from some Japanese English learners. After all, no one wants to be told that their initial learning was flawed. Nevertheless, I believe that someone eventually needs to undertake the role of being the "provocateur" who addresses these issues.