Keywords

1 Introduction

Like other countries, the education system in Japan has been affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. This chapter provides an overview of the strategies and responses to the educational challenges caused by COVID-19 in Japan. The government is responsible for the establishment and implementation of an educational system and policies that depend directly on the national policy. Thus, on February 27, 2020, the Prime Minister announced a policy to request temporary school closures nationwide in coordination with the newly established Coronavirus Infection Control Headquarters. On February 28, the Japan Ministry of Education, Culture Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) notified stakeholders (e.g., the superintendents of education for each prefecture and city board of education) schools would be closed 2 days later, on March 2, 2020. The first state of emergency was declared in seven prefectures on April 17, 2020, and nationwide on April 19, 2020. Overall, school closures affected a total of 20,349,962 learners at pre-primary, primary, secondary, and tertiary schools (UNESCO, 2020). The emergency was almost lifted on May 25, 2020, with approximately 98% of schools reopening as of June 1, 2020 (MEXT, 2020d). In addition, on June 5, 2020, MEXT introduced a comprehensive package for schools to ensure that students continued learning during the pandemic (MEXT, 2020a).

This chapter focuses on the educational changes that took place during the pandemic compared to the pre-pandemic period in Japan. First, to investigate the impact of the pandemic on education in Japan, a systematic content analyses of educational articles published in Japanese academic journals was conducted using the CiNii (Citation Information by National Institute of Informatics) database, one of the largest databases of academic articles, books, and dissertations in Japan. The results address the progress of the Global and Innovation Gateway for All (GIGA) school projects and an increase in online education/learning following the COVID-19 outbreak. Based on the results, the chapter will then introduce the GIGA school project for K–12 education and present the actual practices and innovations of online education in higher education by analyzing weekly nationwide webinars hosted by the National Institute of Informatics (NII).

In addition to government-led emergency acts, professional academic societies in educational technology began to provide effective and efficient online education and learning. In an emergency, expectations and responsibilities of expert groups are significant. The Japan Society for Educational Technology (JSET), one of the major academic societies in educational technology, works to lead society to accurately track the direction of the new phase for education and learning. Thus, the chapter reports the JSET contributions and practices during the pandemic. Finally, the accomplishments and the challenges that JSET faces are summarized along with future plans to support the integration of technology in education to facilitate quality learning.

2 Educational Changes Between Pre- and during the Pandemic in Japan

This section presents the results of a content analysis using the CiNii database. Then, the concepts and practices reflecting the salient educational changes between pre- and during the pandemic will be explained, as well as the GIGA school and online education/ learning. The GIGA school is a government-led project that digitizes education for primary and secondary education. Then, another content analysis is presented to summarize actual practices and strategies used to solve challenges caused by the pandemic, analyzing simultaneously presentations of the weekly nationwide webinar series hosted by the NII.

2.1 Content Analysis of Academic Articles in the CiNii Database

NII provides one of the largest databases of academic articles, books, and dissertations in Japan: the CiNii database (https://ci.nii.ac.jp). To examine the trends in educational practice and research in Japan before and during the pandemic, the authors summarized keywords in the COVID-related articles on CiNii. All articles and reports published in 2020 with titles including the keywords “COVID-19,” “new coronavirus,” or “pandemic” were listed. Then, the overlaps and redundancies were removed. The total number of articles was 9116, of which 748 were related to education as of July 2, 2021. Higher education studies represented the greatest proportion (380), followed by online education (154). In addition, there were 71 social educational programs, including libraries, museums, cram schools, and community learning. Overall, the research and educational practices implemented during the pandemic have been widespread in both formal and informal education.

Table 27.1 presents the frequency of keyword use in studies on education that were conducted in 2019 (pre-pandemic) and 2020 to identify changes in educational research and practices throughout Japan. The keyword “e-learning” exhibited similar use rates in 2019 and 2020. Other keywords increased in use in 2020, with “online education/classroom” appearing about 50 times more frequently in 2020. The frequency of “distance education” was also three times greater in 2020. Additionally, the keyword “hands-on/practice” decreased in use during this period, reflecting a decrease in in-person education research. The keywords “GIGA school” and “one device for one student” increased in 2020, which indicates the progress of the GIGA school project and the infrastructure development at K–12 schools. The results of this content analysis show shifts from in-person practice to online and distance education. The digitalization of schools at the primary and secondary levels is also evident.

Table 27.1 Frequencies use for keywords in education studies conducted in 2019 and 2020
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2.2 The GIGA School Program

The Global and Innovation Gateway for All (GIGA) school concepts was introduced in 2019, with MEXT, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, and the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry as observers. GIGA aims to develop sufficient infrastructure for information and communications technology (ICT) use at all schools, with the goal of having one device per student by 2023. Using their governmental supplementary budget, most local governments have already realized learning platforms and high-speed communication networks for each student.

The initiation of the GIGA school concept was based on the fragile ICT environment at schools, with four to five students on average sharing one computer and a huge gap in the infrastructure development among different prefecture-level local governments (MEXT, 2020b). The 2018 report by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) ranked Japan second among 49 countries in terms of the teachers’ degree of necessity for professional ICT skills. When COVID-19 began to spread in Japan, teachers’ preparedness for ICT use was insufficient.

Due to the aforementioned school closures, teachers faced the challenge of using ICT to facilitate student learning, while protecting the health of staff and students. This, in turn, promoted the realization of the GIGA school program. The GIGA school program ensures “1 device for 1 student with a high-speed network in schools,” thus providing optimized and creative learning for all students who will live in Japan’s “Society 5.0” (MEXT, 2020c). Society 5.0 can be defined as “a human-centered society that balances economic advancement with the resolution of social problems by a system that highly integrates cyberspace and physical space” (Cabinet Office, 2020). The concept was named to illustrate the major transformation of society and education from being hunting based (“Society 1.0”) to information based (“Society 4.0”). The GIGA school program aims to optimize the learning abilities of teachers and students using a combination of available approaches. Professor Tatsuya Horita, JSET’s ninth president, chaired the “Meeting of Experts on the Utilization of Educational Data” conducted by MEXT. He currently leads the initiative for ICT use to promote effective and quality learning in Japan, predicting that the data-driven education achieved through learning analytics will soon play a central role in the GIGA school program.

2.3 NII Webinar Series

Another content analysis was conducted, examining a weekly online webinar hosted by the National Institute of Informatics. This content analysis provides an overview of the actual practices and ingenious routes of various people engaged in emergency remote teaching, mostly at the higher education level. NII started the weekly webinar series called the “Cyber Symposium on Sharing the Status” on March 26, 2020. It is the largest webinar series to address COVID-19-related educational issues in Japan. The NII webinar began at the time of the school closures, which was right before the new academic year started in April in Japan. The analysis of the 294 presentations from the 30 symposiums (March 26, 2020–April 9, 2021) was conducted to determine what information and topics were shared and discussed during the pandemic among policymakers, faculties, researchers, practitioners, and stakeholders, mainly for higher education. From the analyses of the 1-year series, a shift in presentation topics is revealed, from the struggles, concerns, and trial-and-errors of the practices early in the pandemic to successful cases, student reactions, and effective design a year later.

Fukasawa (2021), one of the chairs of the webinar series, categorized all the topics of the webinar “at his personal discretion” (i.e., his arbitrary selection) and found that topics such as practical examples from universities/K–12 schools, ministry news, and overseas examples appeared throughout the year. In contrast, he reported changes in certain topics, such as solving technical problems, learning analysis, and student talk. He further suggested that the need for technical demonstrations decreased with time, and a greater need for reflecting on this emergency teaching using students’ voices and data began to emerge.

By adapting Fukasawa’s categorization, the authors re-examined the NII webinar series using the data of speakers and topics for the 294 presentations at the 30 symposiums during 1 year. Table 27.2 shows the 13 most frequent talk categories in this webinar series. The results indicate that various actors were involved in the improvement of education, including students and Japanese professors staying abroad as presenters. Regarding student voice, which Fukasawa pointed out was in high demand, the number of presentations by students was still small (4%) in comparison with the total number of presentations. However, it is noteworthy that the webinar series includes learners as presenters, and not only professors, which implies a partial shift in the perspective of learner-centered education. It is expected that there will be a further increase in student presenters in the coming year along with an increase in various other actors such as non-teacher staff of universities or teachers from primary/secondary education as the webinar presenters.

Table 27.2 Thirteen frequent talk categories of the NII Webinar over 294 presentations (March 2020–April 2021)
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Case reports from universities were the most common topic. Case reports can be sub-categorized into online teaching practices, which were common in the early stages of the event; hybrid practices (blended and HyFlex learning cases), which increased in prevalence in the middle of the year, and the use of new technologies, which was a popular topic throughout the pandemic year. Although there were many case reports among the presentations, only six of the 294 presentations discussed the instructional design directly. This also indicates that a greater support for educational technology via instructional design is required for the post COVID-19 situation.

3 JSET Achievements during the Pandemic

This section illustrates the approaches and initiatives of JSET, an academic expert society focused on educational technology. JSET’s activities included presenting at the Association for Educational Communications and Technology (AECT) 2020 panel discussion about emergency responses to education during the pandemic. In addition, this section introduces lessons learned during the pandemic and future paths to realize the goals of digital transformation and optimized learning for what the government of Japan calls “Society 5.0,” as mentioned in Sect. 2.2.

3.1 Contribution: Sharing JSET Expertise

JSET made three major contributions to society during the pandemic: (1) It continued to conduct virtual conferences even during the school closures and other limited-time regulations related to COVID-19; (2) In cooperation with organizations such as NII, it disseminated its expertise on lesson design and ICT use in the context of emergency remote teaching; and (3) it provided recommendations to national authorities on political policies such as copyright law issues.

First, JSET conducted one of the earliest virtual conferences in the country, which was necessary for research, development, and information exchange. In 2020, JSET increased the number of scientific meetings to twice a year (in October and March). At the time of the first conference, in March, JSET announced the cancelation of an onsite conference, replaced with a trial of a virtual conference instead. Due to the efforts of the conference committee members, 116 of the 215 originally scheduled participants were able to deliver presentations via Zoom (JSET, 2020a). This trial was documented, with the results to be used as a manual for holding a virtual conference (JSET, 2020b), and it received high interest both from Japan and abroad.

The next virtual conference , which was not a trial but a fully planned event, was held in September 2020. It was comprised of 276 presentations and 677 participants—approximately 20% and 30% lower, respectively, than during prior years. When creating the program, JSET also succeeded in inviting guest speakers from overseas, including the AECT president (JSET Spring Conference Committee, 2020). The subsequent conferences in March and October 2021 were also virtually held.

Second, JSET provided helpful information regarding the integration of technology in education for teachers and other stakeholders, including through cooperation with the NII symposium. Katsuaki Suzuki, as the JSET eighth president, talked at the fourth NII symposium. Based on instructional design theory, he reported on the design of online classes as an “emergency bridge” before returning to normal times, not aiming for the exact same style of education but rather for providing the same level of education without exhaustion (Suzuki, 2020). In addition to this lecture, booklets, such as the “Practical Guide to Online Learning,” were published thanks to the efforts of some of the special-interest JSET groups. The aim was to contribute to society at large by posting information on a page accessible to everyone, rather than on a page limited to members only. This provision of information represents a major JSET contribution.

Finally, negotiations with authorities could also be considered a JSET contribution. Before the pandemic, it was rare for a typical school in Japan to offer online classes. Thus, the Copyright Act and the School Education Act lacked considerations for online classes, and various other learning approaches that were used during the pandemic. In the case of the Copyright Act, even before the pandemic preparations of a new act for online classes had begun; however, at that time, the act was not yet in effect. In response JSET, as an academic society, made a request to release the act earlier to the relevant ministries in cooperation with other academic societies. Consequently, a response to copyright guidelines was proposed as an emergency measure for online classes.

3.2 Challenges: Cooperation among JSET Members

Although significant contributions were made, as mentioned in the previous section, JSET needs to review the issues it was unable to achieve. JSET was unable to (1) effectively share the labor of the many members who worked hard to implement ICT at their schools; (2) organize hands-on activities for teachers, like AECT did; and (3) connect research and practice.

The first and biggest challenge that JSET faced was sharing and cooperating with too many teachers utilizing ICT in practice. Many JSET members played a central role in the use of ICT as a type of pandemic preparedness in various institutions (from K–12 to higher education). Although this system included a heavy workload for both teachers and staff, each school now possesses a manual regarding the ICT use, especially in the context of online classes. However, research collaboration originally thrived in JSET, with many practical research projects being conducted between middle- and high-school teachers and university teachers or via collaboration among university teachers, as well as with actors from other sectors. Such collaboration can be applied to educational practice and practical school management so that JSET members can reap the benefits of their membership in the future.

The second challenge was related to training. More JSET-sponsored hands-on training for teachers could have been held. To focus on situations in which collegiality among teachers was required in training, common challenges could have been addressed in the JSET-sponsored training, which would have generated a more effective pandemic response. With this regard, in terms of active AECT webinars, extensive JSET efforts can be made in the future. Moreover, continuous cooperation with other organizations, such as the NII symposium, could also help to address this challenge.

Finally, JSET could have made more efforts for paper publication related to the pandemic. By examining the papers in the CiNii database in Sect. 2.1, it is clear that several contributions have been made by JSET members; however, only a few papers related to the pandemic have been published. For experts in educational technology, online education is a research topic with a long history, so the publication during the pandemic has not increased. However, JSET is responsible for connecting scientific research and practice for successful education and learning. As a professional community, JSET has accumulated research findings and strategies for effective online education, online learning, distance education, e-learning, and learning support. Not only has it increased the number of publications, but it also translated the research findings into simple and easy forms to be applied in practice.

4 Summary and Conclusion

The pandemic has led to a revision of the definitions of teaching and learning, as well as a discussion on modified approaches and practices. It has also accelerated the use of ICT in schools, with various policies and guidelines implemented under the nation’s state of emergency. During this time, JSET recognized its responsibility and role as a leader in the integration of technology in education. Consequently, related learning opportunities and approaches have become diversified and flexible, and preparations for individual optimization have advanced. As planned through the GIGA school program, to implement individually optimized learning, it is important to build an educational system well prepared for the next crisis, where all stakeholders, including society, professional groups such as JSET, and schools, can work in synergy. We have all witnessed the concept of education being reconsidered and the benefits of online learning, with students particularly learning new learning approaches. Overall, the dialog between students, teachers, stakeholders, and society regarding more effective, efficient, and enjoyable learning should continue to emphasize the benefits of the ICT use and make the best use of in-person learning in Japan.