I saw an argument that classes are a waste of time for a certain percentage of students

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In this note, I am writing down the kind of 'small talk' I would like to have with someone in person, even if it might feel unnecessary to read. If you are willing to join me for such small talk, please feel free to read on.

I have no intention of arguing against this, and I genuinely believe that simply allowing online attendance would improve productivity for elementary school students while simultaneously reducing the burden on teachers. Why don't we think about this together?

For excellent students, 'not getting in their way' is the top priority

There is such a thing as deviation scores in the world, isn't there?

It is a value that shows relative evaluation of academic performance in school education, etc., converted to an average of 50 and a standard deviation of 10. At 55, you are in the top 30.85%; at 60, the top 15.87%; at 65, the top 6.68%; and at 70, you are in the top 2.28%. The higher the score, the higher your academic performance is.

So-called 'F-rank' universities do not mean universities with low deviation scores, but rather 'Border Free.' It refers to universities where the entrance exam competition ratio for a department or faculty is 1.2 times or less—in other words, universities where you are likely to be accepted just by submitting an application. I will note that this has nothing to do with deviation scores.

...And so, even in compulsory education institutions like elementary and junior high schools, there are top-tier, middle-tier, and lower-tier students like me. The top-tier and upper-middle-tier students have enough reading comprehension to understand just by reading the textbook, even if left alone.

This is because they have the ability to do so, which is why their grades are at the top. Students who cannot read textbooks or who misunderstand their meaning wouldn't have good academic grades, would they?

Excellent students can be left alone. If we are to assume a situation where we should intervene, it should be limited to when they want to ask questions or when there is a way of solving a problem that they cannot accept. Other than that, I think it is basically fine to leave them be.

In other words, do not get in their way. Being too obsessed with equality and adjusting the progress of the class to the 'slower side,' forcing others to go along with it, is actually a detriment to excellent students.

If online attendance is allowed, school non-attendance will decrease

As a factor in not hindering excellent students, one could mention online learning, online attendance, and recognizing such attendance.

Students with high reading comprehension, understanding, and learning intelligence who can advance their studies on their own can make their time much more beneficial for their future by spending it on their own exploration and essential learning based on intellectual curiosity, rather than being forced into equality in the same classroom at school.

Furthermore, by recognizing online attendance, it becomes possible to avoid educational setbacks for students who become non-attenders because they cannot fit into a class they are forced to join simply because they 'live in that area' or 'happen to be there due to their parents' circumstances.'

As a secondary effect, if school attendance can be recognized, we can also expect a decrease in the total number of non-attending students.

(Of course, I have no objection to the point that if essential problem-solving is required, that should be prioritized. Please understand that this is strictly a hypothesis/assumption.)

At the same time, by not having to deal with excellent students at school, it becomes possible to provide more thorough approaches and support for students with lower academic performance.

In a class of 40, having one homeroom teacher support learning is clearly understaffed even without much thought, but by eliminating the need to keep the top-performing students tied to the classroom, it will become possible to support students who struggle with learning or whose development has not yet caught up.

For teachers, this not only reduces the workload related to classroom management, but it also prevents students who don't understand from being 'automatically promoted' while still in a state of not understanding, so I think it would be a win-win-win situation.

Uniform and equal treatment is itself unequal

Treating people equally and treating them fairly are different things. I understand the intentions of adults who want to leave wonderful memories of elementary school days, such as the whole class working together toward events, but I think we should look calmly at whether there are any students being held back by that.

For example, we have footraces at sports festivals, but is that really necessary? When you think about things like that, you realize that uniform treatment, such as having the whole class do the same thing or having the whole grade level match their progress, becomes unequal in itself.

This kind of segmentation might be difficult to judge at the field level, and it would be difficult even at the school level, so it becomes a matter of systems and policies, but I don't think this will change in five or ten years.

The fact that it hasn't changed since the Meiji era is nothing more than the fact that those who are in charge of educational policy and administration are the very people who pride themselves on having become successful individuals by receiving that system and policy.

Recently, it seems that there are more cases of people like private-sector principals being appointed, but unless it becomes a place open enough for classes and events to be planned and operated by external talent, I feel like it might be futile to have any expectations...

In the end, the current situation is a structure where the more you try to take a uniform and equal approach, the more only those in the middle benefit, while both the top and bottom performers in terms of grades lose out.

I would like to calmly consider who exactly is wishing for this state of affairs, but could someone tell me where the people who are thinking about this are?

▷ Segmentation of 'students who can advance on their own' and 'students who are struggling'

Japan has a high level of literacy among developed countries; in fact, it proves that education is widespread to the point of taking first place in the PIAAC (Survey of Adult Skills) published in 2016.

However, when you look at the details of the survey results calmly, the following points become clear.

• About one-third of Japanese people cannot read Japanese.

• More than one-third of Japanese people have only the numerical reasoning skills of a third or fourth grader in elementary school.

• Less than 10% of Japanese people can perform basic work using a computer.

• Among the Japanese labor force under 65, one in three cannot use a computer at all.

This survey is apparently going to be conducted again between 2022 and 2023, and I feel like the discussion about what education really is will depend on how we accept the results here.

The major issue in current school education is that it ignores the development of students and promotes them automatically, and because it tries to treat grade levels and classes equally, it ends up operating in a way that holds back high-achieving students due to half-baked learning progress.

In the first place, locking students who can learn on their own and students who are developmentally behind their grade level in the same learning environment is not sane, and what is being implemented to improve this is the individual optimization of learning in the GIGA School Concept.

I am conversely impressed that school education has managed to function at all until now without even grasping whether students in the middle or lower tiers are struggling due to developmental issues with reading comprehension or understanding, or if they are just falling behind due to their own ability.

I believe that separating the top and bottom tiers, at least in terms of learning, is essential for creating a proper learning environment for students. At the same time, I want people to recognize that forcing everyone to keep pace with each other indefinitely ends up holding both groups back.

If we are aiming for personalized, optimal education, we need to create a structure that doesn't hinder high-achieving students, allow for online attendance, and continue to invest human capital into the lower-achieving students.

What else is needed besides these three points? While I'm sure any number of minor details could be brought up, as a guardian of a child who refuses to attend school, I feel that if these three points were established in the big picture, it would be more than enough.

Well then.

Endo

Bonus

A note I want to introduce

It's been over 30 years since I was in elementary school, but after 30 years, devices like iPads have been created, and I think it's only natural that students should possess them. At the same time, I don't think it's sane to still be handwriting in contact books or printing and distributing things on rough paper. I'm not saying they should be abolished, but I would like them to be an option.

There was someone who looked into the operational status of the GIGA School program using public information. It might be a good idea for everyone to check what the situation is like in their own local municipality. If it's lagging behind, I think one option is to get out of that municipality as quickly as possible.

I take a positive view of schools becoming more open to the outside world and the integration of ICT. In reality, it's not practical to live in a state where you don't have access to the internet or Web 2.0 and beyond. Open up more, school education.

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