抄録
The present paper is the sequel to "'English Communication I': A Guide to New Textbooks Authorized by the Ministry of Education in Japan" (March, 2013), dealing with twenty new "English Communication II" textbooks authorized by the Japanese Ministry of Education in 2013. Seemingly panicked by the disastrous results of its erroneous yutori policy, the Ministry has started a revised educational program, not only making the English textbooks far more difficult, but also ordering all the Japanese high school teachers of English to teach the foreign language to Japanese students in English itself. After all the confusion that the responsible Ministry caused perhaps unintentionally in the previous year, the newly published textbooks for the second year students, which are going to be used for upcoming four years, from 2014 to 2017, seem to have returned to the former state: the instructive pages of "Classroom English" printed in English Communication I textbooks having almost completely disappeared, the contents of English Communication II textbooks look both old and familiar in spite of being the newly- named subject with the key word "communication." This paper consists of the general introduction and the brief outline of each textbook, including some critical comments on the typical, too moralistic themes which have nothing to do with the study of English and undoubtedly will only prevent ambitious teenagers from enjoying learning the international language, ironically again, contrary to the good intentions of Japan's Ministry of Education.
