Japanese children’s perspectives on the


“Soji” (Cleaning own classroom and school)



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1.9.8 “Soji” (Cleaning own classroom and school)

Without exception, in all schools from the primary to the upper secondary school, children and pupils themselves are expected to keep their school clean. The cleaning activity, called “Soji” is on a daily basis, and this is a very common approach at Japanese schools. This is a typical sample of how schools employ the peer support programme into their own school activities. Soji is a Japanese traditional custom in school, and according to the historical records, Soji had been carried out more than 300 years ago (Okihawa, 1979). Thus, Soji is not considered as a peer support activity, however, this kind of activity provides opportunities for pupils to complete their tasks in cooperation with other pupils as a team. Knowing Soji activity helps to understand the pupils’ cooperative relations and cultural customs which Japanese peer support programmes were employed into.


Cleaning activities are conducted after school, and it takes between 20 and 30 minutes to complete the task. In the secondary school, pupils need to finish their cleaning activities before their school club activities start. In most cases, children in a class have been divided into several groups, and each group has about 6 to 10 members. Each group is allocated their duties and they work together as a team to complete their tasks. The places to be cleaned include the class room, corridors, stairs, lecture hall, entrance hall, schoolyard, school gate, and all toilets.
At the secondary school level, the cleaning activities are carried out by mainly pupils without teachers. In this sense, the cleaning activity is a peer-led activity, and it is the pupils’ responsibilities to complete the tasks. However, it is natural for them to clean their own school as they get used to cleaning as a traditional daily activity. Also, because pupils work together with other members of the team, they must feel peer pressure from others in the group. In addition, pupils are often taught to fulfil their own responsibilities; in this case, to clean the places they have used, meaning it seems natural for them to do it.
However, in the UK, children’s cleaning activities are not common at all. Generally there are adult employers who do all the cleaning in the school. In Japanese culture, which has strongly been influenced by Collectivism, it seems to have more opportunities to have the activities and school events, which are based on peer-led and group activities. These school events include sport festival, chorus contest, cultural festival, school trip, school arts festival, and farm work activity. This seems to show that Japanese schools fundamentally possess suitable conditions, which are used for peer support activities as they can provide more opportunities for running group activities (Nakabayashi, 2005).
In this sense, it is of interest to see how the schools have been changed after employing peer support programmes, which activate and utilise the power of pupils to improve their own lives. Thus, in the current research, it is critical to know the details of Japanese cultural activity, and how pupils experience and feel about peer support activities in terms of their emotional and behavioural development.

1.10 Training of peer support in Japan

1.10.1 Training for children -peer supporter-

As mentioned in section 1.7, in Japan, peer support programmes have been facilitated by mainly three groups; Taki’s group, Nakano’s group, and the Japan Peer Support Association (JPSA). Each group has the distinctive features of the peer support programmes, and in terms of the peer support training, JPSA has provided more substantial and systematic training programmes.


Core concepts and assumption

As mentioned, the JPSA borrowed core concepts from the Western nations through their annual overseas educational tours. This meant JPSA could develop a training programme based on Cole’s model, whose main concept is underpinned by ‘Kids helping kids-peer helper training manual’ (Cole 1987). This training model is grounded in a person-centred counselling approach and promotes values as proposed by the psychologist Carl Rogers. As such, it is distinctively different from the citizenship and the moral education curriculum. Its focus is person-centred in that it places value on the person who is non-judgemental, and stresses the importance of empathy for those who are distressed. The assumption is that each person is essentially good, no matter what their behaviour.


As a reflection of this view, Cowie and Wallace (2003) also stated the qualities of a good peer supporter (see table 5.1), and the training sessions aimed to encourage peer supporters to gain and develop their emotional and behavioural skills.
Table 1.7: The qualities of a good peer supporter

*trustworthy

*doesn’t judge you

*listens and doesn’t tell you what to do

*friendly and approachable

*won’t tell anyone what you have told him, even if you are fighting and

he could use it against you

*kind

*honest but not critical



(Cowie and Wallace, 2003)
Regardless of the particular type of peer support practices, Cowie and Wallace believed that peer supporters need to gain similar qualities and attitudes, including: trustworthy, non-judgemental, doesn’t tell you what to do, friendly and approachable, kind, and honest but not critical. Based on this assumption, Cole (1987) defined peer counselling as follows;

‘Basically, peer counselling is a way for students to learn how to care about others and put their caring into practice. It relies strongly on communication skills to facilitate self-exploration and decision making. Peer counsellors are not professional counsellors or therapists. They are students who provide supervised assistance to other students to help them think through, and reflect on concerns they might be experiencing’ (Cole 1987:2).


This peer support counsellor training model (Cole, 1987) recommends the importance of an effective consultation that concentrates on communication, problem solving, decision making and conflict resolution and skills.
Similarly, in the JPSA’s peer supporter training, the following key skills are generally recommended: introduction of peer support, self-awareness and understanding others/motivation, communication skills, problem solving, conflict resolution, the knowledge of peer support activities, planning of peer support activities, practice of peer support, evaluation and supervision (Takano, 2009). Based on these key concepts, the training programmes have been devised and have been applied into the local schools. Figure 1.10.1 shows the specific content of peer support training programme provided by JPAS.
Table 1.8: JPSA’s training schedule for peer supporter




Theme

Skills & activities

1

Self-Introduction

To introduce yourself , assertion skills

2

Understand myself

Egogram (Transactional analysis)

3

Nourishing others’ heart

Using positive stroke

4

Building trust

Blind walk, trust work.

5

Active listening

Practice active listening

6

Questioning skills

How to use open-questions

7

Understanding feelings

Repeating others’ comments & feelings

8

Summary

Three steps in listening

(Sasaki, 2005)

These sessions were often carried out through the role-play among peers who join the same training sessions. In general, the sessions have been conducted during lunch break and after school. The training sessions were designed to help children to learn counseling and communication skills, which help them to work as a peer supporter.


Selection of peer supporters

Interestingly there is a notable difference between Japan and other countries, regarding selection of peer supporters. Usually in the UK, Canada, USA and Australia only selected children who want to be peer supporters, have been given training by peer support trainers or teachers. In the Kids Helping Kids training manual, Cole (1987) mentioned that the peer support programmes have been successfully run in two ways. Firstly, it provides training to an entire class, and secondly it selects volunteers from various classes (Cole, 1987). In this vein, Cole described the advantages and disadvantages of both approaches. The advantage of training the entire class is that the teacher will be released for special events with peer counsellors. When training selected volunteers for peer counselling, students are generally motivated to undertake this role. The disadvantage of training the entire class is that students who do not want to be involved would get bored with this idea. The disadvantage of training selected volunteers from classes is that teachers would not be able to meet as frequently with peer counsellors to arrange a work activity schedule. However, from the literature in peer support, most practices in the western nations are based on the select volunteers, and actually none of the papers referred to the entire class training.


In the selection, the trainers and teachers draw up a short list on the basis of the candidates’ documents and/or interviewed those candidates, and a relatively small number of peer supporters were selected for training (Cowie & Olafsson, 2000). On the other hand, in Japan there are many cases where training was given to all children as a whole class activity (Kurihara, 2007). This is because peer support seems to be educationally a very meaningful activity for children’s emotional development, and it seems much more effective to give training to all children in order to create supportive school atmosphere (Cowie & Kurihara, 2009). In some Japanese school practices, skills training is only given to selected children (peer supporters), and supporters are given opportunities to undertake supporting activities. In a sense, depending on the aims of peer support practices, the trainings require slightly different programs and its processes of trainings are also carried out in different ways.

Four step cycle training model

In terms of the whole process of the peer support programmes, Kakegawa (2002) summarised peer support training model as four step cycle; 1) Training, 2) Personal planning, 3) Support and 4) Supervision.


Figure 1.6: Four step cycle training model

       1) Training     →   2) personal planning

    

        ↑           ↓

       

      4) Supervision   ←    3) Support

(Kakegawa, 2002)


By the training, children gain the skills which are essential to improve interpersonal problems. The training is designed so that the peer supporters would help peers who were being bullied or having other interpersonal difficulties with their classmates. This approach meant each child sets personal targets and objectives of supporting activities. Also children make clear plans and solution strategies in order to achieve their targets. According to personal plans, children complete the supporting activities. Then, in the supervision, not only the evaluations of their activities, but also their self-awareness through the activities are discussed for the further improvement. Then, the children go back to the training.
As described in Figure 1.7, it is a circulation structure, which involves training, planning, supporting activities and supervision. Peer support activities have often been carried out through the whole term or whole year, therefore, the four step cycle model seems a very useful concept to give the peer supporters opportunities for both receiving regular supports from the peer support trainers and evaluating their supporting activities. This four step cycle model summarised by Kakegawa (2002), has been regarded as a general training model in most peer support programs related with Japan Peer Support Association (JPSA).
1.10.2 Training for adults -peer support trainer-

With the aim of fostering adult trainer, The Japan Peer Support Association (JPSA) had regularly provided the training sessions and workshops three or four times per years. These regular activities led to the development of systematic training programs and in 2006 JPSA had eventually set up the authorisation systems at the three levels; 1) peer support trainer, 2) peer support coordinator, and 3) peer supporter (The Japanese Peer Support Association, 2006). “Peer support trainer” is a person who is qualified as peer support trainer. “Peer support coordinator” is a qualified senior trainer who foster peer support trainers. “Peer supporter” is a high school pupil or a University student who is trained by qualified peer supporter trainer. These high school and university students often work as volunteers to organise the nationwide school summit and other activities in local primary and secondary schools.


To gain the qualification as “peer support trainer”, it needs the following requirements; 1) being a member of JPSA for more than 1 year, 2) taking counselling training sessions of any psychology association for more than 24 hours, 3) taking peer support training sessions for more than 13.5 hours, and 4) submission of a report regarding peer support practices. In 2010, JPSA provided the four peer support training workshops and had two qualification assessment meetings. For example, one of the training workshops were held in Hokkaido. The workshop was a three days course with 48 participants. The details of workshops were as follows;

Day one

1. Introduction of peer support (90 mins)

2. Self-awareness and understanding others / motivation (90 mins)

3. Communication skills I (90 mins)


Day two

4. Communication skills II (90 mins)

5. Problem solving (45 mins)

6. Conflict resolution (45 mins)

7. Crisis management and supervision (90 mins)
Day three

8. Personal planning and activities (90 mins)

9. The program design for peer support (90 mins)

10. Evaluation / maintenance of programs (45 mins)

11. Discussion and Q&A.
Most participants were school teachers (40 people) who were in charge of peer support programs in the schools. Generally these participants were supposed to be in charge of peer support programme in school and to give trainings to peer supporters (children).

1.11Summing up

In summary, even though moral education for children has always been important in Japanese society, in recent years, there has been an increase in emotional and behavioural difficulties amongst children. Educators and policy makers have had many discussions about how to improve the moral and social educational curriculum. One influential approach from the West is Peer Support, and this method has been quite widely adopted by Japanese schools. JPSA is one of the leading organizations which offers resources and which holds regular general meetings and workshops on the subject of peer support. These activities strongly support the practitioners of peer support and work as a driving force for the improvement of its activities, and training programmes. This movement seems to be a new way to promote moral education in Japan. In the following chapter, a review of the literature on the impact and influence of peer support both Western and Eastern countries is presented.




CHAPER 2

Literature review

2.1 Overview

This chapter presents a review of the studies of peer support in educational settings (secondary schools), both in the Western nations and in Japan. As explained in chapter one, peer support programme is peer-led educational activities, which encourage children to provide support with other children who have emotional and behavioral issues. Especially, peer support has been mainly applied to support children who are in distress due to school bullying both in the West and Japan.


Since the late 90’s, many studies in peer support had been conducted in terms of the various viewpoints, which include the evaluation of peer support programmes as anti-bullying scheme, users’ benefits, its influence on the wider peer group and whole school, and the benefits of peer supporters. The literature review provides the background for understanding current knowledge on the topic. Also it helps to identify research problems, formulate research questions and provide direction for research methods, providing strategies for collecting data, analysis of the data and interpreting findings (Caulley, 1992).
The first half of this chapter provides the four influential theories, Carl Rogers’ person-centered theory of counselling, participant role theory (Salmivalli, 1999), Bronfenbrenner’s ecological theory of human development (1979), and Hofstede’s cultural dimensions theory. These theories are used to guide, interpret and explain the current research findings of peer support.
The second half of the chapter presents a critical review of evaluations of peer support. The review presents four key areas; the impact of peer support in school, cultural issues in peer support, the lack of qualitative studies in Japanese peer support, and critique of citizenship-oriented approach. These reviews help to grasp the nature of peer support and cultural differences in their practices, which also show the research gaps and research questions about the topic. The chapter ends by summarizing the gaps in our knowledge and identifies the research questions.

2.2 Theoretical perspectives

Four influential theories inform peer support. The first two influential theories enhance understanding of peer support. The other two further theories enhance our understanding of cultural diversity and the issues that surround the transfer of a method from one cultural context to another. These theories are explored below.


  1. Carl Rogers’ (1951) person-centred theory of counselling,

  2. Participant role theory (Salmivalli, 1999),

  3. Bronfenbrenner’s ecological theory of human development (1979), and

  4. Hofstede’s (2005) cultural dimensions theory.

Carl Rogers’ person-centred theory of counselling provides the fundamental principle which underpins peer supporters’ supporting activities. Participant role theory provides important insight into the dynamics of children’s peer group relationships and defines bullying as a group phenomenon, in which most members of social groups take part. By contrast, Bronfenbrenner’s theory views children’s relationship in a much wider social cultural context. These two theories have been selected as they provide explanatory models for understanding face to face relationships on the one hand, and also the wider impact of culture on these relationships. Since this thesis explores the experiences of Japanese peer supporters, each theory provides a useful perspective on this phenomenon. Both theories are discussed below.


The work of Hofstede has been very influential in companies but it has much to offer our understanding of peer relationships in schools and our perceptions of interventions such as peer support and the possibility of transferring such interventions from one culture to another. The most relevant of his dimensions to the present study is individualism versus collectivism since it concerns “the relationship between the individual and the group” (Hofstede and Hofstede, 2005, p.23). As indicated in Chapter 1, Japan is a collectivist society which has a long tradition in schools of educating children in groups with a strong tendency to conform to peer pressure.

2.2.1 Carl Rogers’ Person-Centred theory of counselling

Carl Rogers’ person-centred theory of counselling (1951, 1957 & 1959) is one of the counselling and helping approaches. The peer support programme has been greatly influenced by Rogers’ theoretical approach in both peer supporter’s training and their practical stance as a helper. For example, Kids helping kids (Cole, 1987) is a famous peer helper training manual, which is based on a counselling approach. In this manual, Cole (1987) clearly mentioned that peer counselling is a vital extension of the counselling and guidance service, which aims to create a caring and supportive environment through the influence of peers.
Generally the counselling approaches have been categorised into three main schools, deepening on their therapeutic positions, which are psychodynamic school, humanistic school, and cognitive-behavioural school (Nelson-Jones, 2008).


Table 2.1: Three counselling schools and the six major counselling approaches

Psychodynamic school;

Classical psychoanalysis – Originator: Sigmund Freud (1856-1939)

Analytical therapy – Originator: Carl Jung (1875-1961)


Humanistic school;

Peron-centred therapy – Originator: Carl Rogers (1902-1987)

Gestalt therapy – Originator: Fritz Perls (1893-1970)


Cognitive-behavioural school;

Rational emotive behavioural therapy – Originator: Albert Ellis (1913-2007)

Cognitive therapy – Originator: Aaron Beck (1921- )



Even though there are numerous counselling approaches and schools, the person-centred theory of counselling particularly has been based on humanistic stance (humanism), which emphasizes the better qualities of humankind and people’s abilities to develop their human potential (Nelson-Jones, 2008).
Rogers did not consider his approach to be an actual theory and in fact he was suspicious of an over-inclination to apply theory to practice. Essentially, the person-centred approach to counselling has at its core a concern for the subjective experience of the person. For Rogers, it was important to trust his own experience as a therapist and, even more importantly, to trust the experience of his clients. Any theory that undermined this trust became his barrier to the therapeutic process. At the heart of his approach to counselling was an emphasis on the relationship between the therapist and the client. His is an essentially optimistic view of human nature. The three core conditions of this approach were:
Congruence/ genuineness: The counsellor is what he or she is in the relationship. The counsellor does not hide behind a professional façade but tries to be truly him/ herself in the relationship. This means that the counsellor must be in close touch with his/ her own feelings and must hold these feelings present in the counselling session. This includes negative feelings which must also be acknowledged.
Acceptance: Rogers believed that the need for positive regard is fundamental in human beings. So it is essential for the client to receive unconditional positive regard from the therapist. This stance must be non-judgemental and must be expressed through a warm, caring, genuine warmth for the client. Clients are to be accepted as they are.
Empathy: Of all the core conditions, this is the one that is most amenable to training. The therapist must strive to achieve as full an understanding of the client’s point of view as is possible. This involves entering the client’s world without fear or judgement. Rogers’ model has strongly influenced training in peer support. Of course, young peer supporters cannot acquire all of the professional skills of a counsellor in a few sessions of training. They are also not to be viewed as psychotherapists. However, the Rogerian approach can be adapted to the needs and developmental level of young people in the following ways:
Emotional support: The core aspect of peer support training is its emphasis on training young people to develop skills of emotional and social support for their classmates; often the focus is on children who have been bullied or isolated by their peers.
Conflict resolution: Another aspect of peer support is its focus on conflict resolution between pupils in dispute before such a disagreement evolves into bullying; again the focus is on a positive outcome for all parties with a strong emphasis on actively listening to each person’s point of view and a willingness to see their perspectives.
Social action: Yet another aspect of peer support involves training young people to tale positive action and develop systems to counteract aggressive or anti-social behaviour in the peer group. This might involve the development of anti-bullying campaigns within the school or social clubs for children who, for example, find it hard to make friends, or induction activities for children in transition from primary to secondary school. Whatever the focus, peer support training in Western systems typically involves a person-centred approach with an emphasis on active listening, non-judgemental attitudes and openness to a range of perspectives. Training is usually experiential and involves, through role play, opportunities to experience different situations and to practice a range of ways of providing emotional support to vulnerable peers.

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