Some schools may have a cafeteria, but most do not. Even in schools where a lunch is prepared and provided to the students, they usually eat together in their homeroom classrooms. In most schools, students bring a box lunch from home, almost always consisting of foods prepared by the mother in the early morning hours, such s rice, fish, eggs, vegetables, and pickles. Although many of those days are spent preparing for annual school festivals and events such as Culture Day, Sports Day, and school excursions, Japanese students still spend considerably more time in class than American students. Course selection and textbooks are determined by the Japanese Ministry of Education.
Schools have limited autonomy in their curriculum development.
Other subjects include physical education, music, art, and moral studies. All the students in one grade level study the same subjects. Given the number of required subjects, electives are few. At the end of the academic day, all students participate in o shoji, the cleaning of the school. They sweep the classrooms and the hallways, empty trash cans, clean restrooms, clean chalkboards and chalk erasers, and pick up trash from the school grounds.