Check out the video of the kids being blessed at the Shinto Shrine -- theyÕre having a great time!
----Shigeru
Shigeru----
I wonder if Americans looking at the scenes of children all in school uniforms will think, ÒBoy, are they regimented and orderly! They must really be severely disciplined!Ó
I lived in Japan a long time and first thought that too, but I came to realize how spontaneous and wild Japanese children can be.
I remember walking into a Japanese fifth grade classroom and I thought, ÒMy God, whoÕs in charge here?Ó The kids were all jumping around and shouting, and pummeling each other, and the teacher was way off to the side, paying no attention.
An American teacher would have been appalled, and would have started pounding the desk or shouting! But these kids were really working hard with each other, and the teacher later told me that he measured his success in motivating kids by the noise level of the classroom!
Americans think that children have to be disciplined from the outside in order to be good; that, left to themselves, theyÕd be wild and destructive or wouldnÕt work hard; Japanese believe that if children understand what is wanted, theyÕll do it, and that children are naturally good. None of this stuff about Original Sin seems to be in Japanese child-rearing!
