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Japan Times Supplement: Experts weigh import of elementary school English

This policy might help introduce enough material that junior high/middle school EFL could be made a bit more ambitious. That is about the only hope for its 'success'. 



Experts weigh import of elementary school English

excerpt:

Most of about 25,000 public elementary schools across
Japan have introduced foreign-language education,
mainly English, during a three-year experimental period.
This will be followed by once-a-week compulsory lessons
set to start for fifth and sixth graders at the beginning of
fiscal 2011 this April. English teaching will be introduced in
the form of ‘‘foreign-language activities,’’ not as a formal
curriculum with evaluations given for pupils.

New issue of ELT in Japan (ELT-J) in the works

There are two articles still being edited. When these are done, the next issue will be published here. The deadline I have set for myself is end of May.