English Language Education Policy and Practice in Japan Based on a
Comparison between Japan and the Philippines:
An Overview for Filipino English Teachers
Shigeru OZAKI

Abstract
The goal of this article is to inform Filipino English teachers why so few Japanese people canspeak English well. To that end, the article discusses policies implemented by Japan to improve
English language education, comparing Japan and the Philippines whenever appropriate, so thatthey will be able to understand their Japanese students better. One of the most significant reasons
why Japanese people in general cannot speak English well is that they rarely have the opportunity
to speak it in Japan since the country has never been colonized by an English-speaking country;
English is not used as an official, second, or educational language unlike in the Philippines.
However, the Japanese government has been attempting to educate students to be fluent in English
in a number of ways: introducing English to elementary schools, changing the content of the
Course of Study and the entrance examination system, and designating some schools as a superEnglish language high school or a super global high school. The article concludes with a discussionof both advantages and disadvantages of teaching English in English and adopting it as a medium
of instruction across other subjects. These strategies are a major reason why Filipino people canspeak it well, and they can possibly improve Japanese people’s English dramatically.

Keywords: Japan, the Philippines, English education policy, entrance examinations, medium of
instruction

1. Introduction
Whenever I come to the Philippines, the locals say to me, “Few Japanese people can speak English,”without knowing why this is the case. There are a large number of both offline and online English schools
for Japanese people based in the Philippines (Ozaki, 2011; Ozaki, 2015). However, when I talk to English
teachers from the Philippines who teach Japanese people regularly, it seems that even they do not knowmuch about English education and the status of the English language in Japan, although it is crucial toknow about them in order to fully understand and help their students. It is thus essential for Filipino
teachers to learn about English education policy and practice in Japan. This article therefore aims to
explain the historical and current context of English language education policy in Japan, comparing it to5NEXT GENERATION STUDIES No.1, November 2017that of the Philippines whenever appropriate for the purposes of clarification to the readers of this article
from the Philippines. However, it should be noted that this article does not go into the details of the statusquo of English education in the Philippines since the other two presenters in the discussion group to which
I belonged explained this in their presentations. I hope this article will be a first step to connecting thePhilippines and Japan through English language education, to which the conference title aspires. In
explaining English education policy in Japan, I will mainly address the following three questions:(1) Why can so few Japanese people speak English well?
(2) What policies has Japan recently implemented in order to improve English language education?
(3) What are the advantages and disadvantages of using English as medium of instruction for English
subjects and subjects other than English?
There have been relatively few studies comparing Japan and the Philippines from the viewpoint of
the English education system: Kawahara (2005) compared oyatoi gaikokujin, i.e., Western scholars invited
to Japan by its Government to educate university students in the 1800s to catch up with Western countries,
especially in terms of modern technology, and the Thomasites or English teachers sent to the Philippines
by the U.S. at the time of colonization. Nakahara (2011) made suggestions on improving English educationin Japan on the basis of a comparative study with the Philippines. Nakahara (2008) also compared thePhilippines and Japan in terms of the importance of English for work and people’s overall level ofcompetence. In addition, Ozaki (2015) discussed the beginnings of English education in both of thesecountries. This paper draws on the major points of these studies as well as some other literature where
relevant and further adds its own discussion of historical and current issues to the debate.
This article first explains one of the most fundamental reasons why so few Japanese are able tospeak English; second, historical facts are outlined to support the explanation; third, the current situation ofEnglish education in Japan and future policies proposed by the Government are described; and finally, two
crucial issues that are important to improve Japanese people’s English, namely, teaching English in English
and adopting English as a medium of instruction (EMI) across other subjects are discussed.

2. One of the Main Reasons Why So Few Japanese People Can Speak English Well
In Japan, English is used by very few people, who are mainly the elite; and most Japanese encounter
it only as a school subject. The majority of Japanese people rarely have the chance or necessity to use or
speak English in their daily lives, unlike in the Philippines, where English has commonly been used as an
official language, a second language (especially for business and commerce), and an important medium of
instruction for various subjects. For example, Nakahara (2008, p. 46) found that only 4.67% of theJapanese respondents in his study used English in their work, by comparison with 80.04% of the Filipino
counterparts. Consequently, in Japan it is not easy to make English language education more oriented tooral communication skills, as learners rarely speak or hear English either inside or outside school.
Nakahara (2008, p. 45) also asked both the Japanese and Filipino respondents to evaluate theirEnglish according to the four skills of listening, speaking, reading, and writing. The self-evaluation scores
6

English Language Education Policy and Practice in Japan Based on a Comparison between Japan and the Philippines

out of 100 were as follows: for the Japanese—listening (30.15), speaking (26.63), reading (36.82), andwriting (27.44); and for the Filipinos—listening (89.01), speaking (84.30), reading (92.16), and writing(88.89). These figures clearly show a lesser confidence in English skills among the Japanese than theFilipinos. It should be noted that in Nakahara’s study, the Japanese participants even lacked confidence intheir skills of reading and writing, which can be attributed to the fact that most of the Japanese rarely reador write English in their daily lives, despite considerable attention being given to these skills at school,especially to the former.
The negative washback of entrance examinations, i.e., their influence on education, many of which
do not have oral communication components, leads English language education in Japan to be even lessoriented to oral communication. The goal of many Japanese secondary school students and their teachers is
for the former to pass entrance examinations and enter prestigious universities (Ozaki, 2012), but not to beable to use English in their daily lives since there is little opportunity to use it in Japan. In contrast, thewashback effect of entrance examinations on English education in the Philippines is unlikely to be as
strong as in Japan, since it is counterbalanced by the use of the language in daily life.

3. Brief History of English Education: Japan and the Philippines
In 1808, a British battle ship arrived at Nagasaki Port in Japan, demanding that the local government
supply it with food, water, and fuel (Kawazumi, 1978). In 1809, the Japanese Government ordered a few
Japanese-Dutch interpreters to learn English for national security (Sato, 2002). This marked the beginningof English education in Japan (Imura & Wakabayashi, 1980). On the other hand, the Philippines wascolonized by the U.S. in 1898, and English was introduced and spread throughout the islands upon theestablishment of the public system in 1901 (Bautista, 2001). Most of the American teachers, known as
Thomasites, were assigned to primary schools, and English became the medium of instruction (Bernardo,
2008; Kawahara, 2005; Martin, 1999). Thomasites also trained Filipino teachers to be able to teach in
English (Misch, 2013). Hence, from the very beginning, English has been used by only a minority in Japan,
while in the Philippines, it has been spoken by a majority; and this situation has not changed.
However, English was once a medium of instruction even in Japan. In the Meiji Era (1868–1912), it
became used at the university level (Kawahara, 2005; Reesor, 2002) because the Japanese Government
invited foreign scholars, particularly from the U.S. and Britain, to modernize the country; and those whocame from English-speaking countries gave lectures in English (Kawahara, 2005). Thus, Japan had alreadyadopted EMI a long time before the Philippines. However, only an elite minority were educated in English
unlike in the Philippines, and the popularity of EMI did not last very long, since a great deal of literature
was translated into Japanese so that students would be able to study various subjects in their own language.
Consequently, English gradually became merely a school and entrance examination subject (Imura, 2003).
Another important historical fact is that the U.S. failed to make English the official language ofJapan after the Second World War, although they had occupied the country for a while and had sought todo so (Kawahara, 2005). In contrast, the U.S. enforced EMI when it colonized the Philippines (Bernardo,
2008).
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NEXT GENERATION STUDIES No.1, November 2017

4. Brief Description of the Educational System in Japan
Before discussing the current situation of English education in Japan, this section briefly outlines its
basic educational system to provide a broader context for the current situation and proposed plans forreform.
Compulsory education in Japan starts from elementary school (6 years), followed by junior highschool (3 years), after which 97% of the students (Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science andTechnology, n.d.a) go on to senior high school (3 years) . In 2015, a further 56.5% went on to attend either
2-year colleges (5%) or 4-year universities (51.5%) (Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science andTechnology, n.d.b). Formal English education at public schools does not currently start until junior highschool.

5. Current English Language Education Policy and Practice in Japan
This section explains what is stated in the Course of Study, one of the most important English
education policy documents revised by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology(MEXT) approximately every 10 years, which presents what should be taught and learned at elementaryand secondary schools. The following subsections summarize the main points of the Course of Study (as of2015) and critically evaluate them from the viewpoint of practice, whenever necessary. The source of themain points is indicated in parentheses under the subsection title.

5.1 Course of Study for Elementary Schools(Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, n.d.c)
While English is not specifically mentioned as a subject in the Course of Study, it can beincorporated into a course entitled Foreign Language Activities, to which 35 classroom hours (45 minutes
per hour) are allocated per year in the fifth and sixth grades. The overall objective is to provide afoundation for pupils to positively develop communication skills through familiarization with the very
basics of foreign languages and cultures, as in singing songs and playing games using English.
One problem is that the subject does not currently provide the pupils with an adequate grounding in
English to meet the demands of the next educational level of junior high school, which is an issue that both
policy makers and implementers need to address and that concerns one of the plans proposed by theGovernment to be discussed in Section 6.3.

5.2 Course of Study for Junior High Schools(Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, n.d.d; Ministry of Education, Culture,
Sports, Science and Technology, n.d.e)
English should be taught for 140 classroom hours (of 50 minutes) in each year, totaling 420
classroom hours over the course of 3 years, during which time approximately 1200 words are taught. The
overall objective of foreign language education at junior high schools is to develop the students’ basic
communication abilities in the four skills (speaking, listening, writing, reading), deepen their8English Language Education Policy and Practice in Japan Based on a Comparison between Japan and the Philippines

understanding of language and culture, and foster a positive attitude toward communication throughforeign languages. More specific objectives of English education at junior high schools are as follows:
1. To enable students to understand the speaker’s intentions when listening to English.
2. To enable students to talk about their own thoughts using English.
3. To accustom students with reading in English to enable them to understand the writer’s intentions.
4. To accustom students with writing in English to enable them to write about their own thoughts.
One problem is that it is not feasible to achieve all these objectives within 140 classroom hours ayear, especially because students need a relatively high level of reading skills for senior high school
entrance examinations. Consequently, the third objective of reading is most likely to be focused on in
actual classes due to the limited time available.

5.3 Course of Study for Senior High Schools(Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, n.d.f; Ministry of Education, Culture,
Sports, Science and Technology, n.d.g)
The Course of Study states that individual schools can decide on subjects and the number of units forgraduation. However, some subjects are compulsory, and students must obtain a minimum of 74 units intotal to graduate from a senior high school. While there are six English courses listed in the Course of
Study, only Communication English I is compulsory, comprising 3 units (equivalent to 105 classes of 50
minutes), which can be reduced to 2. The titles and objectives of the six courses listed in the Course of
Study are as follows:
1. Basic English Communication
To develop students’ basic abilities such as listening, speaking, reading and writing, while fostering a
positive attitude toward communication through the English language.
2. English CommunicationⅠ
To develop students’ basic abilities such as accurately understanding and appropriately conveying
information, ideas, etc., while fostering a positive attitude toward communication through the English
language.
3. English CommunicationⅡ
To further develop students’ abilities such as accurately understanding and appropriately conveying
information, ideas, etc., while fostering a positive attitude toward communication through the English
language.
4. English CommunicationⅢ
To enhance students’ abilities such as accurately understanding and appropriately conveying
information, ideas, etc., and enable them to use such abilities in their social lives, while fostering a
positive attitude toward communication through the English language.
5. English ExpressionⅠ
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NEXT GENERATION STUDIES No.1, November 2017

To develop students’ abilities to evaluate facts, opinions, etc. from multiple perspectives andcommunicate through reasoning and a range of expressions, while fostering a positive attitude toward
communication through the English language.
6. English ExpressionⅡ
To further develop students’ abilities to evaluate facts, opinions, etc. from multiple perspectives andcommunicate through reasoning and a range of expressions, while fostering a positive attitude toward
communication through the English language.
It is not easy to achieve all these objectives, especially due to the negative washback effect ofentrance examinations mostly focusing on reading skills, as well as the limited time available. Especiallyspeaking skills can be easily neglected since university entrance examinations rarely have speaking tasks.
The Course of Study further states that various language activities in all these courses should be conducted
in English. This policy statement is crucial to improving English education in Japan through increased
exposure to the language, which is one factor accounting for the difference in English proficiency between
the Japanese and the Filipinos (Nakahara, 2011). In the Philippines, EMI has been implemented for a rangeof subjects, including math and science. Consequently, Filipino students are exposed to a large amount ofEnglish, which enables them to speak the language fluently. EMI may therefore be the best way to improve
English skills in Japan, an issue that is discussed in detail later with regard to relevant Government policy
proposals.

6. Policies for Improving the Current Situation
This section covers the Japanese Government policies for improving the current situation: superEnglish high schools, super global high schools, plans to improve English education for globalization, andentrance examinations. After summarizing the policies, the following subsections critically evaluate them,whenever necessary.

6.1 Super English Language High Schools (SELHi)(Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, n.d.h)This policy was implemented between 2002 and 2009, with 169 schools selected as super English
language high schools in 2009. The goals of this policy were the development of writing and speaking
skills; evaluation methods; and cooperative relationships between elementary, junior and senior highschools, and universities; etc.
Positive results concerning SELHi students included their improvement in the four skills andvocabulary acquisition, increased exposure to English, participation in extracurricular activities related toEnglish, and higher motivation to learn English. Positive results concerning teachers included theirdevelopment of objectives, syllabuses, and materials that could be shared across schools, teaching ability
and evaluation methods, teaching English in English, and English environments outside school, etc.

10English Language Education Policy and Practice in Japan Based on a Comparison between Japan and the Philippines

6.2 Super Global High Schools(Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, n.d.i)
This policy evolved from the super English language high schools and was implemented from 2014
for a period of 5 years, with 56 schools participating in 2014. The objective is to educate students to be
global leaders with an interest in social issues and the role of education, high communication ability, andgood problem-solving skills, as necessary in the international community. Specific methods of achieving
these objectives are fieldwork with overseas high schools, overseas study tours to present results, academic
workshops with international students at Japanese universities, and the active use of foreign teachers andreturnee Japanese teachers.
It seems that the focus of super global high schools is to educate students to be able to play activeroles using English in the international community rather than merely improving their language skills,
which had been the goal of the super English high schools. This new objective reflects the Government’s
positive attitude toward English as a language of international or intercultural communication, beyond
merely representing a set of symbols for expressing oneself. As of yet, the positive results of these schools
are unknown.

6.3 Plans for Improving English Education for Globalization(Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, n.d.j)Some plans for improving English education to cope with globalization were proposed by theGovernment on 13 December 2013, on the basis of which an expert committee was formed for further
discussion (at nine meetings from February to September 2014). The following goals were set: The Courseof Study should emphasize what students can do using English. Elementary schools should start Foreign
Language Activities in the middle grades, cultivate a positive attitude towards writing and reading in thehigher grades, and make English a formal subject in the higher grades in order to teach it systematically,
paying more attention to the connection between elementary school English education and junior highschool counterpart. Junior high schools should teach English in English, emphasize practice in conveying
one’s thoughts and feelings without placing too much focus on the Grammar Translation Method, andintroduce more advanced language activities, such as presentation, discussion, and negotiation. Senior highschools should introduce students to language activities on a variety of topics. In summary, the two major
goals were to start teaching English at an earlier age and to get students to use it more.
Although the Government has been trying to improve English education by introducing it into theelementary school education, it is questionable whether earlier English education will dramatically
improve students’ English proficiency. Proponents of this idea often refer to the Critical Period Hypothesis(Nakabachi, 2007). However, learning English only a few times a week is unlikely to have the same effectas living in an English-speaking country and being exposed to the language for many hours every day(Nakabachi, 2007). Kanatani (2007) insists that learning English for many years from elementary school is
not very effective unless students are taught the language frequently enough to master the basics and thatneither elementary or junior high schools allocate enough class hours to English.
11NEXT GENERATION STUDIES No.1, November 2017

On the other hand, those who are against the idea of introducing English education into elementary
schools often claim that children will lose their ability in their own language (Nakabachi, 2007). This idea
is similarly misconceived, since learning a foreign language only a few times a week is unlikely to
influence the students’ first language competence, unless the number of Japanese classes is reduced toaccommodate the English classes (Nakabacji, 2007). Therefore, this policy is not likely to have any
dramatic influence on students’ competence in either English or Japanese, although it may encourage
students to make continuous efforts to improve their English language skills.

6.4 Policy Concerning Entrance Examinations
Before discussing the actual policy, this section will first provide a brief overview of the university
entrance examination system and its importance for high school English education in Japan.
There are three major types of universities in Japan: national, municipal (prefectural or city-run), andprivate universities; there are different types of entrance examinations. The influence of tests on education,
often described as washback, is considerable in senior high school English education because teachers
must prepare their students for these entrance examinations (“Koukou Rishuu Busoku,” 2006; “Nyuushi
Taisaku,” 2006; Otagaki, 1996; Ozaki, 2012; Watanabe, 2004). The results of university entrance
examinations are critical, since graduates of prestigious universities tend to have a bright future in terms of
their careers. However, the content of entrance examinations does not always match official English
education policy that is stated in the Course of Study; this gap leads to a disparity between policy andpractice (Ozaki, 2012). Therefore, changes to university entrance examination content could greatly
contribute to English education at school. Although Watanabe (2004) has found that teachers’ beliefs canmediate the washback of entrance examinations, his finding does not deny the significance of entrance
examinations. In contrast, in the Philippines the washback of English entrance examinations is unlikely tohave as strong an effect on high school English education as in Japan, due to the prevalence of English ineveryday life. It is a very important language as an official language, medium of instruction, and second
language especially in business and commerce. For example, there are a large number of call centers forclients living in English-speaking countries (Keitel, 2009) and online as well as offline English schools(Ozaki, 2011; Ozaki, 2015) there; they provide Filipinos with good job opportunities. In other words,
students are motivated to improve their English whether or not they take entrance examinations.

6.5 New Form of Entrance Examination(Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, n.d.k)
The Government is now planning to implement Daigaku Nyuugaku Kibosha Gakuryoku Hyoka
Tesuto (provisional name), which means a scholastic ability test for university applicants. The new test
aims to comprehensively assess each of the four skills, thereby also including the productive skills of
speaking and writing, e.g., through interviews and writing tasks. The Government is correspondingly
planning to revise the Course of Study to present objectives that suitably integrate the four skills fromelementary school onwards.
12English Language Education Policy and Practice in Japan Based on a Comparison between Japan and the Philippines

The above-mentioned idea seems good; however, the autonomy of individual universities needs tobe taken into consideration with respect to their entrance examinations. Currently, most applicants to alarge number of private universities take tests created by individual universities, although some private
universities allow their applicants to choose to take either their own tests or the national standardized test.
Since the application fees for private university individual tests are a major source of university income, it
is highly unlikely these universities will give up their own entrance examinations. This means that the
number of students who will receive positive washback from the new test will be limited.
In addition to the new form of entrance examination, English proficiency tests created by private
corporations can be used as entrance examinations. According to Obunsha (2016, p.1), 110 (14%) out of
764 universities were planning to utilize such tests for their entrance examinations for the year 2017. While
this may appear to be a good idea, as they often integrate the four skills and can be taken more than once a
year, the goals of private company tests do not always match those of university entrance examinations,which aim to measure applicants’ achievement on the basis of the Course of Study. For example, the goalof the TOEFL is to examine whether applicants’ English proficiency is of a sufficient standard to follow
university or graduate school level instruction in English-speaking countries. Therefore, the content is far
removed from the Japanese high school English curriculum.

7. Adopting EMI
Comparing English education in Japan and the Philippines as well as reviewing the status quo andfuture plans of japan lead to the key issue of adopting EMI, which would dramatically increase thestudents’ exposure to the target language. The following two subsections therefore discuss both the views
for and against EMI for English and other subjects.

7.1 Teaching English in English
Erikawa (2014) argues that individual teachers should have the freedom to decide whether to use
English or Japanese depending on the situation; therefore, enforcing a policy requiring all teachers to teachin English is a questionable practice. However, without this policy, teachers may not opt to use English intheir classes; if teachers do not use it, students also may not use it (Ozaki, 2015). In the Philippines, people
were forced to use English as the medium of instruction by the U.S.; otherwise, they would not haveadopted it as the educational language (Ozaki, 2015). Erikawa (2014) continues that there is no evidence
for the effectiveness of instruction given in English. In contrast, Ozaki (2015) presents thecounterargument that in order to be competent in English, learners must receive plenty of opportunity topractice and use it, the benefits of which are clear when we consider the situation in the Philippines. Given
that English is not an official or second language in Japan, one of the most practical ways to increase
exposure to the language is to implement EMI in English education, thereby maximizing opportunities for
its use also by students within limited classroom hours.
However, a concern of EMI in English classes is that students may not be sufficiently proficient tounderstand the teachers and follow their instruction (Terashima, 2009). Furthermore, students cannot
13

NEXT GENERATION STUDIES No.1, November 2017express themselves even when they have questions, which may cause them to get frustrated and give up
learning the language. Nakahara (2011) maintains that Japanese should be used for low-level students andcomplex grammatical explanations. Ozaki (2015) suggests that teachers should teach in Japanese first,
gradually reducing the amount of its use to English only either at high school or in university courses forEnglish majors, namely, in the case that the washback effect of entrance examinations prevent this fromfeasibly being undertaken earlier on. MEXT needs to take this into consideration when they state that
English should be taught in English.
Terashima (interviewed by Boku and Sen, 2013) claims that it is not only students but also teachers
who struggle with their English proficiency: Few Japanese teachers of English have sufficient competencein the language for EMI, and the Government has not allocated sufficient funds to teacher training. For
example, as of 2015, the National Center for Teacher’s Development only offered study tours to the U.S. or
UK to 30 English teachers for 2 months (National Center for Teacher’s Development, n.d.), although there
used to be 6-month and 12-month programs (Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science andTechnology, n.d.l). The Government should provide more English teachers with the opportunity to study in
English-speaking countries, both preceding and during the course of their employment, at least partiallycovering their expenses.
Furthermore, the Government needs to hire teachers with a better command of English, although thismay require reform of the whole educational system in Japan, given the varied roles and duties of Japanese
secondary school teachers, such as developing curricula, taking care of club activities, organizing school
events, disciplining students, counseling those with problems, and even supervising their private lives tosome extent, since schools are also seen as accountable for their students’ behavior even outside of school.
Making effective use of assistant language teachers (ALTs) is one way to support teachers withinsufficient English ability, without the requirement of extensive funds. As of 2015, there are 4,404 ALTs
participating in the Japan Exchange and Teaching (JET) Programme (Council of Local Authorities forInternational Relations, 2015). The JET Programme is part of the foreign language policy of Japan, which
invites young adults from various countries to teach at elementary, junior high, and senior high schools.
However, not all schools are able to make use of them on a regular basis since there are 20,852 elementary,
10,557 junior high, and 4,963 senior high schools as of 2014 (Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports,
Science and Technology, n.d.b). Furthermore, if Japanese teachers of English do not have a good commandof English, it is difficult for them to communicate, make teaching plans, and teach classes with ALTs,
many of whom do not understand Japanese. On the other hand, if they do, they can use English in theirclasses without depending on ALTs. Thus, training Japanese teachers to obtain a good command of English
is critical to improve English education in Japan. If it is too costly or unrealistic to subsidize study abroadfor teachers in English-speaking countries, the Government should nevertheless offer them more practiceout of school hours or during vacations, utilizing the numerous ALTs throughout Japan. This would also
minimize the cost to their personal lives since they would not have to leave Japan or be separated fromtheir families.

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English Language Education Policy and Practice in Japan Based on a Comparison between Japan and the Philippines

7.2 Adopting EMI for Other Subjects
In the Philippines, English has been a main medium of instruction across various subjects. This is
one of the main reasons why a large number of Filipinos have had regular opportunities to use the language
and become fluent in it. In Japan, with the exception of the Meiji Era (1868–1912), when English became amedium of instruction at the university level, English has been relegated to a school subject. This is one of
the most significant reasons why relatively few Japanese people have the chance to use or speak English
regularly and have consequently been unable to develop their practical English skills.
The biggest hindrance to EMI is that there are not many teachers who can actually teach various
subjects in English in Japan. This poses problems even for Japanese teachers of English. In the Meiji Era,
the Government invited scholars from the U.S. and Britain to Japan, who educated Japanese university
students in English (Imura, 2003). However, there are so many more universities now that it may not be
feasible to invite so many people from English-speaking countries to teach at different educational levels.
In the Philippines, Thomasites, who were native speakers of English, not only taught various subjects toFilipino students in English but also trained Filipino teachers to use English as a medium of instruction(Misch, 2013). In addition, approximately 200 Filipinos were sent to the U.S., and they majored in various
subjects such as law, medicine, or veterinary science at universities (Gonzalez, 2008). Consequently, thePhilippines no longer have any need for teachers who are native-English speakers.
Another concern is students’ insufficient English ability to follow instruction given in English. They
are likely to have an even harder time than when they are taught English in English since the difficultylevel of academic instruction in non-language subjects tends to be higher. Thus, teaching English in
English can be a good first step on the path to EMI for subjects other than English. Another solution to the
problem is to teach the same or similar content in Japanese first, and then in English later (Ozaki, 2015).
When we address the idea of adopting EMI, we need to not only consider the students’ improvementin their English proficiency but also their understanding of the subject matter and their academic
achievement, as Terashima (interviewed by Boku and Sen, 2013) claims. Filipino students’ level ofacademic achievement in math and science is not as high as that of Japanese students (Nakahara, 2011).
This result, at least partially, comes from Filipino students’ insufficient proficiency in English, which istheir second or third language yet used as the medium of instruction (Yanagihara, 2007). In fact, someresearchers (Ramirez, Yuen, & Ramey, 1991; Thomas & Collier, 1997; Walter & Dekker, 2011) found thatminority language students who were educated in their own language achieved higher academic goals thanthose who studied in a second or third language. Terashima (interviewed by Boku & Sen, 2013) insists that
it is not easy to develop creativity and critical thinking in a second or foreign language for high-level
discussion. This is a reasonable criticism since it is difficult to train students to think analytically, logically,
and critically at a high level in a language that they are unable to fully understand or produce. It is almost
impossible to acquire CALP (Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency) in a foreign language; learners’
logical thinking ability is negatively affected by the lack of CALP (Kawahara, 2005). Constantino (n.d.)
explains this issue, referring to the educational system of the Philippines:
A foreign tongue as a medium of instruction constitutes an impediment to learning and to thinking
15NEXT GENERATION STUDIES No.1, November 2017

because a student first has to master new sounds, new inflections, and new sentence constructions. His
innermost thoughts find difficulty of expression, and lack of expression in turn prevents the further
development of thought. (p.13)
In fact, the Department of Education in the Philippines decided to implement a policy to educate
children in their mother tongues, which may support the development of their cognitive and academic
abilities faster than when educated in a second or third language (Burton, 2013). Japan can learn a great
deal from the Philippines in this regard, since the latter has been using English as a main medium of
instruction for over 100 years.
The medium of instruction in schooling may be merely one of the factors contributing toward thetechnological and economic development of a country, since there are many other countries whose people
are educated in their own languages that have not developed to the extent of Japan. Terashima (interviewed
by Boku & Sen, 2013) compares Japan and Korea with respect to the relationship between English and thecountries’ development, noting that although the average TOEFL score of the Koreans is much higher thanthat of the Japanese, Japan outweighs Korea in terms of the number of Nobel laureates. He further makes
the point that young Japanese people can find a job without a high command of English in Japan. They arevery lucky since they do not have to rely on someone else’s language. The prosperity of a country and its
living standards obviously do not depend on the number of fluent English speakers, which should be bornein mind when discussing whether Japan should drastically change its English language education.
Nakahara (2011) claims that subjects other than English itself should not be taught in English at any
educational level, except for schools recruiting students with exceptionally high English ability. Some
Japanese universities have a department or faculty in which all or most of the courses are taught in English,
and the number of such universities has been increasing. Admitting that English is unnecessary for mostJapanese in their daily lives, including their careers, Ozaki (2015) suggests that some university courses
should be offered in English, especially to English majors whose main academic goal is to attain highEnglish proficiency. Using English for different subjects will dramatically widen students’ vocabulary as
well as topic range, and they will be able to discuss diverse issues in English. It may also be beneficial tooffer some courses in English for majors of other subjects, such as science or commerce, who can be
anticipated to need English for their future career.

8. Conclusion
Currently, relatively few Japanese can speak English fluently, since there is little opportunity ornecessity to use the language in their daily lives. This is one of the main reasons why it is difficult to makeEnglish education more focused on oral communication. However, the goal of English education should beto enable students to use English in both written and spoken communication because it has become themost commonly used international language; and some, if not many, of the students will use it in the future.
Moreover, nobody can predict exactly who will make use of English in the future; therefore, English
education should attempt to prepare all students to be able to use it. In order to achieve this goal, botheducators and policy makers should do their best to improve English education overall. Nevertheless, this16

English Language Education Policy and Practice in Japan Based on a Comparison between Japan and the Philippines

requires some careful handling, since improvement of pupils’ foreign language competence might affectthe development of their cognitive and academic abilities if EMI is enforced across the curriculum.
Furthermore, having a large number of people with a fluent command of English does not necessarily leadto a country’s prosperity.
In aiming to improve English education, the Japanese Government and educators can learn a great
deal from the Philippines, both positive and negative, since it has a long history of an educational systemenabling a large number of people to use English as a second language in their daily lives.

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About the author
Shigeru OZAKI, PhD is Professor of Foreign Language Education and Head of the Department of
the English Language, Takushoku University, Tokyo, Japan. His research interests include language testing,language education policy, and education for international education. Email: sozaki@ner.takushoku-u.ac.jp20