Notes from a School Food Education Visit in Japan: How Taiwan, China and Japan Do Things Differently

(Continued from the previous article) Huang Hong-song, a teacher at Longdu Elementary School in Meinong, went to Japan in the spring of 2014 for a four-month study visit, traveling from Kyushu to Hokkaido and visiting a total of twenty middle schools, elementary schools and kindergartens. In early October, Teacher Hong-song gave a talk titled "Food Education and Agricultural Terroir of Japanese Children," sharing his study trip to Japan. The previous article shared "Food Education in Practice at Nakamatsu Elementary School in Minamiaso Village", and this article gives an overall account of the differences between Taiwan and Japan in school-related and food-education measures.

1. Different school environments:

Compared with Taiwanese school grounds, which are mostly paved with concrete hard surfaces, kindergartens and elementary schools in Japan almost all keep large areas of bare earth and flower beds, and children often go outdoors during breaks or art class to play in the dirt and catch small insects. This educational method, learned from Germany, has been practiced in Japan for many years; playing in the dirt not only helps stabilize children's emotions but also cultivates scientific thinking and creativity.

2. Different ways of eating:

Japanese children start learning from kindergarten (ages 0-6) to prepare their own tableware, tables and chairs for meals, so by the time they reach first grade and eat the school lunch they can all serve the food themselves. This shows that Japan lays the foundation of food education starting from early childhood education; in contrast, first graders in Taiwan, when they first start school, are helped to serve their food by sixth graders.

3. Different ways of having breakfast:

At present, students in Taiwan almost all carry their breakfast to school, or eat their fill at a breakfast shop along the way before entering school, whereas Japanese people believe that eating breakfast together is the best time for parent-child interaction, so they mostly choose to prepare it themselves at home. Teacher Hong-song mentioned that when he visited his first school in Japan, he told the principal that in Taiwan very few people eat breakfast at home now, and that mothers mostly no longer need to get up early to prepare breakfast for their children. The principal, who was herself a mother, replied, "Oh my! How enviable!" It is not hard to imagine how much care Japanese mothers put into preparing breakfast for their children.

4. Different body weights:

Before Teacher Hong-song went to visit Japan, he first sent out questionnaires asking each school to reply. One question mentioned that Taiwanese schools currently have too many students who are overweight or underweight and are promoting health promotion, and asked the Japanese schools how they respond to this situation, and the Japanese schools all replied that no such problem had arisen. The Japanese central government has set standard body measurements for schoolchildren, and currently almost more than ninety percent of children meet the standard, which is greatly related not only to eating habits but also to how much exercise children get on a daily basis.

5. Different ways of getting to school:

Japanese schools do not have parent drop-off zones; elementary school students mostly walk to school on their own, and only after middle school do they ride bicycles, whereas in Taiwan, even up to senior high school, parent drop-off zones are still provided. Traffic accidents, kidnappings and other social incidents in Japan are likewise endless, yet regardless of city or countryside, cold or hot, on the main roads of cities or in the winter snow, one can still see elementary school students lining up in walking groups on dedicated paths, with upper-grade students leading the middle- and lower-grade students to and from school. Only in this way can they walk alongside the Oriental stork on the way, smell the lavender blooming by the roadside, and the community elders, in order to help children develop the habit of walking, also form crossing-guard volunteer teams to stand at street corners. In contrast, Taiwanese children who rely on being driven can hardly perceive cold and heat, sun and rain, and are severely disconnected from their communities.

Teacher Hong-song said that not long ago Meinong Elementary School in Japan came to Meinong in Kaohsiung for an exchange, and mentioned that their students all walk to and from school on their own, about half an hour each way, an hour round trip, so they get enough exercise, the students' builds are all standard, and the added value includes getting to know their community, interacting with classmates, and developing their own independence; by comparison, elementary schools in Meinong at present, during break time, still need to use broadcasts to force students out of the classroom to exercise.

6. Different ways of handling school lunches:

In order to exchange with Japanese schools about how school lunches are handled, Teacher Hong-song specially asked the Kaohsiung City Education Bureau to provide relevant materials before setting out. From the questionnaires he found that nine out of ten schools raised questions such as whether they could stop running the lunch program because of insufficient manpower, or whether more manpower could be assigned, which has a great deal to do with the burden brought by Taiwanese school lunches mostly being run by the schools themselves. Japan mostly uses central kitchens, cooking everything in one place and then distributing it to each school, which saves manpower and resources; miscellaneous tasks such as purchasing ingredients and hiring cooks are handled by the local education bureau, so schools only need to focus on the "education" work of food.

Teacher Hong-song also explained that almost every school in Japan has its own dedicated nutritionist. Because Nakamatsu Elementary School in Minamiaso Village has fewer than one hundred students, it shares one nutritionist with another middle school and two elementary schools, and the nutritionist safeguards the dietary health and nutrition of all students in the area. Principal Qiu Yuan-fu of Nanlong Junior High School, who specially came to take part that day, added: at present in the Qishan-Meinong area of Kaohsiung, only Qishan Junior High School and Qishan Elementary School have dedicated nutritionists. After the county and city merged, because funds were limited, a support system was adopted, so for example the nutritionist for Nanlong Junior High School in Meinong is supported by Fengshan Youth Junior High School.

In addition to drawing up menus, nutritionists in Taiwan are also responsible for handling the school lunch program, including supervising kitchen staff, controlling the quantity and quality of ingredients purchased, and the safety of the cooking process, all of which the nutritionist carries on their own shoulders. Stretched thin as they are, schools are still quite lacking in resources for carrying out food education, which is a major predicament at present domestically, while Kaohsiung City is promoting a food education plan for elementary and middle schools, and has already worked hard to move forward.

At a time when food safety incidents are frequently reported, Teacher Hong-song's sharing reminds us that we should pay more attention and devote more effort to food education, and in the process should value interaction with families and communities, as well as understand traditional food culture and etiquette. And just as Mr. Hattori Yukio put forward the key point of food education, "cultivating the ability to discern safe food for oneself," children should learn this from an early age, and all the adult consumers who buy food for children should do so even more.

Food Education and Agricultural Terroir of Japanese Children - Food Education in Practice at Nakamatsu Elementary School in Minamiaso Village

Restoring the Oriental Stork, Building Rural Pride: The Toyooka Experience in Japan