Abstract
The National Achievement Test was conducted in Japan in April 2007, incorporating common Japanese test content along with mathematical literacy content similar to PISA. The most important topics to be addressed are: What content should be included in mathematics education with regards to contemporary society? What skills should be developed? Discussions on these topics have been inadequate to date. In this paper, I survey the influence of education policy on mathematics education in Japan over the past ten years. Then, I look at the positive results that restructuring mathematics education content has had on the National Achievement Test. Section 1 discusses "achievement" in Japanese mathematics education. In research on mathematics education, researchers and teachers pay particular attention to the following points when thinking about "achievement": What are important mathematical concepts that students should learn? How much should students be able to use mathematics? However, importance has also been placed on studying changes in annual test scores for conventional "achievement tests." Section 2 considers actual conditions in schools. Teachers have become perplexed because in recent years the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology has changed education policy considerably. One of the by-products of this confusion can be seen in the spread of myths of "brain science" related to claims of exaggerated learning effects from performing simple calculations. Section 3 classifies the content of the National Achievement Test into five verb categories and analyzes prominent features of each. The results showed that test (A) used conventional content, but test (B) was different. Test (B) required problem-solving and communications skills in mathematics, resembling PISA. Section 4 illustrates several cases where restructured mathematics content has shown positive educational benefits. The lessons studied involved the teaching of calculation structure and methods of calculation, and teaching the meaning of formulae used. This National Achievement Test pointed out the importance of explanation and discussion in mathematics, not just standard problems as conventional mathematics education has traditionally focused on in Japan. However, there were some issues with the test because it did not deal with the importance of quality of content in mathematics. From this point forward, it will be important to improve contents and methods of education to restructure mathematics education in Japan.
