School is about teaching. But it's not just about teaching the kids different facts and ways of thinking. It's also about teaching the kids society's rules - how to talk, how to act, to take responsibility, etc. Whether or not you agree with the specifics is not the point. Governments, Boards of Education, schools, and teachers all have their own way of doing things (and it's a good thing, too! I hate to imagine the homogeneity of everyone following the same exact curriculum and lesson planning to a T).
At my schools, in an effort to mold socially functional kids, there's a phrase used a lot. This phrase is 生活リズム,
seikatsu rizumu, or to put it loosely, "daily routine." The model I've seen consists of the following basics:
Wake up (early);
eat (a healthy) breakfast;
study (hard);
clean up after yourself;
pay due respect to others, including proper speech and etiquette;
participate in extracurricular activities;
do your homework; and
get to bed (early).
This isn't a model set in stone, but it's a very typical model. Most all of the students at one point of another have to map out their daily routine and then each month, rate themselves on how well they followed it (Japan uses a the following rating system: ◎ excellent; ○ good; △ satisfactory; and × suck). Leading up to the summer break, teachers stress the importance of protecting one's daily rhythm, so that when school starts back up in September, there won't be lots of late, sleepy students spending the entire month getting back into a "good" rhythm (good for school, but what if you hate school?).
Anyway, with this years World Cup in full swing, I briefly reflected on my own daily routine. I can sufficiently say that it's pretty out of whack. Who in their right mind stays up to watch 11:00 pm start (1:00 am finish) soccer games a few too many nights in a row, and then because a favorite team is playing at 3:30 am a few days later, goes to bed at 5:00 pm (less by choice, more by sheer exhaustion) to wake up and catch that early morning game? I do. But let's be honest, throwing my routine a bit out of whack for a few days this month (it's not like I'm watching
all the games) is worth it to me, because I enjoy soccer, especially at such a level as the World Cup offers.
When it's all over, I'll be on the verge of summer break. And in true anti-establishment style, I'll spend my summer days sleeping in and setting my daily routine the way it should be - the way school will never teach you to live.
