The possibility of accommodating an immersion education option in Japan
Michael Smith, 理学療法
Key Words: ① Japan ② Foreign language education ③ Language learning④ Bilingual education ⑤ Global Jinzai
Ⅰ．はじめにDespite extensive foreign language study, it is often said that students in Japan cannot
use foreign languages well (McConnell, 2000; McVeigh, 2002; Sato, 2009). In recent years,
in attempts to make the subject more communicative, many additions and changes to curricula
and teaching approaches have been implemented. Investigation of the following questions
has guided this research:
What connection exists between development of global jinzai and education?

How do students feel about their experience as foreign language learners?

What are some examples of effective bilingual approaches that could inform and shepherd
foreign language education in Japan?

Ⅱ．目的The purpose of this study is to gauge the perceptions of first year university students
regarding their experience with foreign language education in junior and senior high school.
A secondary goal of this study is to begin to gauge students’ awareness of popular rhetoricassociated with globalization and bilingual education.
Ⅲ．研究方法
80 first year students participated in the study. All respondents gave permission for theirdata to be used by the researcher as required by the Ethics Committee at AUHW. Participants
completed a survey containing a total of forty-five items. A number of different item types
were utilized in the survey. Data analysis of results is not at this moment complete. Data
will be analyzed and reported in a summative manner.
Ⅳ．結果
In light of responses provided, despite largely positive feelings toward language, themajority of respondents feel that the foreign language education they have received is notparticularly effective.
At the JHS level, slightly more than 60% of respondents indicated feeling pressure to dowell on high-stakes, standardized, knowledge-based high school entrance exams, one of which
is a written English exam. At the SHS level, that number jumps to more than 76% for university
entrance exams. Bridging the gap between skill development and academic expectation willcontinue to be an integral part of foreign language education and policy in the years tocome.
Ⅴ．考察
What this research was really about was determining how open students were to the idea ofbilingual/immersion education. Baker (2011) provides in-depth descriptions of immersion
in context. An example of a successful bilingual/immersion education in Japan is KatohGakuen, where students in the bilingual program study at least half of their subjects inthe target language. Basically, immersion is a carefully considered learning environment
where teachers who themselves are bilingual support students’ learning in a variety ofways.
Respondents provided mostly positive reactions to the idea of immersion. Nearly 90% ofrespondents indicated that they felt learning subjects other than English in English would
be beneficial to developing English abilities. The general consensus from respondents seems
to be that technical subjects would be easier to learn in English than subjects in the socialsciences. These feelings prove to be accurate as this resembles Katoh Gakuen’s approachto bilingual curriculum planning (Bostwick, 2001).
Though immersion is a proven and effective approach to bilingual education that could haveoutstanding positive effects on the developing globalism of Japanese students, some feelthat giving increased prominence to English medium education will have adverse, negative
effects on learners’ self-identity as Japanese citizens. Downes (2001) found these concerns
to be mostly unfounded, but the fact that they persist illustrates the nature of thesignificant roadblocks that exist for immersion in Japan.
Ⅵ．文献
Baker, C. (2011). Foundations of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism. Bristol, UK:
Multilingual Matters.
Bostwick, M. (2001). Bilingual education of children in Japan: Year four of a partial
immersion programme. In: Noguchi, M. and Fotos, S. eds. 2000. Studies inJapanese Bilingualism. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters.
Downes, S. (2001). Sense of Japanese Cultural Identity Within an English Partial
Immersion

Programme.

InternationalJournalofBilingual

Education

andBilingualism, 4 (3), pp. 165-180.
Hino, N. (1988). Yakudoku: Japan’ s dominant tradition in foreign language learning.

JALT Journal, 10(1).
McConnell, D. (2000). Importing diversity: Inside Japan’s JET Programme.
Berkely: University of California Press.
McVeigh, B. J. (2002). Japanese higher education as myth. United States: East GateBook.
Sato, R. (2009). Suggestions for creating teaching approaches suitable to the Japanese
EFL Environment. The Language Teacher, 33(9), 11–14.
Rian, J., & Schinckel, P. (2011). On the feasibility of English immersion programs inJapan.札幌学院大学人文紀要, 90, 75-91.
Ⅶ．発表（誌上発表、学会発表）
平成 28 年度青森保健大学雑誌に発表する予定がございます。