The aim of this paper is to examine the possibility of introducing the learning of making meaning from multimodal texts in Japanese language textbooks that have been approved by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT), especially focusing on interpersonal meaning. For the aim of this paper, three meta-function frameworks (ideational meaning, interpersonal meaning, and textual meaning) that were developed by Systemic Functional Linguistics are used. Concerning interpersonal meaning, Painter et al. (2013) pointed out the importance of examining two kinds of relationships; one relationship is between the reader and characters, and the other is that between one characters and other characters. On the basis of these frameworks, this paper focuses on the concept of “graduation” in interpersonal meaning, which has an important influence on our emotions during the reading of multimodal texts, using visual appraisal frameworks. In the conclusion section, various educational materials, along with their learning points, are presented.

This study clarifies the differences in reading elements between manga and continuous texts, including explanatory texts. “Piihyoro-Rope” (Fujiko F. Fujio, Doraemon Vol. 7, Shogakukan 1975) was utilized as teaching material for reading for fourth-grade elementary school students. After the class, a questionnaire survey related to the three reading processes (manga, story, and explanatory text) was administered. In the analysis, Modified Grounded Theory Approach (M-GTA) was employed, alongside the SCQRM (Structure-Construction Qualitative Research Method) as a meta-research method. The results suggest that reading manga not only includes reading elements unique to manga but also elements similar to those used when reading stories and explanatory texts. Moreover, this study illustrates the structure of reading elements across media.

The purpose of this paper is to clarify the transformation of Tsunekichi Masubuchi’s Japanese teaching around 1955–1956 as well as its historical significance.

Around 1955, the empiricism of Japanese teaching was being reviewed and change to a meritocracy. In this period, Masubuchi changed his teaching method based on students’ research and announcements based on teachers’ questions.

The background of such a change was his stance on Japanese literary education as well as movements in Japanese education at that time. His transformation shown in this paper can be regarded as parallel to the movement of Japanese education in postwar Japan.

In this study, we focus on the epistolary-style teaching materials found in the works by Yuzo Tsubouchi and second-stage and third-stage government-designated higher elementary school textbooks recorded for general use as well as for girls, and through an analysis of their content and literary styles, we discuss the characteristics of the letters in the Japanese language textbook teaching materials from the mid-Meiji era to the early-Showa era.

We found differences in the content of the recorded texts and composition of the sentences for general use and those for girls with regard to the characteristics of the letters recorded in the works by Yuzo Tsubouchi and second-stage and third-stage government-designated higher elementary school textbooks, but there were no differences in the styles, and the majority of the recorded letters were written in an epistolary style. Additionally, we noticed that, for the letters recorded during this period, the materials requested that students write letters through reading the textbooks. This was particularly noticeable in the third-stage government-designated higher elementary school textbooks for girls, and we found that the practical use and format of the letters were emphasized more than had been done previously.

In this study, I examined the contents of “Chutou-Bunpou,” a grammar textbook compiled by the Ministry of Education in the Showa 10s. This study does not focus on continuity with Shinkichi Hashimoto’s grammar theory, but rather determines the originality of “Chutou-Bunpou” by focusing on the differences between the two.

The arrangement of Shinkichi Hashimoto’s grammar theory in “Chutou-Bunpou” was based on considerations of making grammar instructional content more familiar to learners. In addition, the other content used in “Chutou-Bunpou” is similar to the content of the so-called “Five-Selection Grammar Textbooks.” Results show that “Chutou-Bunpou” might have been trying to arrange the teaching content by converging all of the materials into one while taking into account the content of the grammar textbooks used at that time.

Developing an intuitive sense of language is crucial while learning Japanese; however, the lack of objective evaluation methods makes it difficult to procure instructional results. This study identifies and visualizes elements of objective measurements of “language sense” acquisition and proposes strategies for improving Japanese language education materials and methods.

To achieve this, in aiming at shifting the viewpoint of language sense measurement from the traditional instructor’s end to the learner’s end, we conducted an experiment wherein university students compared sentences with an original sentence, selecting the easiest one to understand. Further, common characteristics most frequently selected by students were an increase in punctuation marks and changes in their placements and division of 75-character-long text into two sentences. Objectively measurable elements were visualized and identified, revealing that the students made these choices intuitively.

Based on these results and an investigation of past educational practices, this study proposes the following as teaching methods for acquiring language sense: reading comprehension instruction, focusing on a sentence’s length and placement of punctuation, and instructions for creating examples in specified formats.

Enosuke Ashida is one of Japan’s most outstanding educational practitioners. He made a remarkable contribution to Japanese writing education by proposing a novel composition pedagogy called Zuiisendai—a free composition in which children select their own essay topics. This method influenced the “Zuiisendai debate” and the “sakubun-suzurikata debate” is interest, however, was not in writing itself, but in the emancipation of students from the pictures that had held them captive. This paper reconsiders Ashida’s “critique on modern education,” focusing on his pedagogy of “educative instruction.”

This paper begins with an exploration of the theoretical characteristics of Ashida’s composition pedagogy. Second, it presents the educational history of his work. Third, it confirms Ashida’s vision of writing education as a means to overcome modern education through the incorporation of educational aspects of Zen thought. It then presents the significance and limitations of the study.

The paper concludes that “educative instruction” in Japanese writing education should be guided by the following teaching objectives: perceiving writing education as a continuous renewal of world recognition, being organized to ensure transfer of ability, and considering whether the method of recognition is not inclined toward “edification.”

This report describes the high school curriculum standard of Chinese promulgated by the Ministry of Education of the People’s Republic of China in 2017 against the prevalence of education for university entrance exams, the increasingly ubiquitous presence of IT, and globalization. The main feature of this curriculum standard is that its goals have been defined and the curriculum has been decided using core knowledge that incorporates the concept of key competencies in line with the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s Definition and Selection of Competencies. Each optional course, compulsory course, and elective course in the curriculum has a plurality of learning tasks, and the objectives and contents of learning and teaching suggestions are outlined in detail. Moreover, it is noteworthy that detailed criteria have been established for the evaluation of academic quality of students’ work, and that there are references to the nature of university entrance exams.