Re: "Good Kid/Bad Kid"

[Susan Ohanian <SOhan70241@AOL.COM>]

As an add-on to George's description. When I visited schools in Japan,  I ran
into an American who had taught at a h.s. where the reject kids were sent.
She told me to ask about "the hitting teacher." Every year at the start of
school they hold an assembly and one kid is singled out for a beating--in
front of all the kids--as an object lesson. Every place I went I asked about
this hitting teacher--and everybody denied ever hearing of this.
"Impossible," I was assured.

Then, by a bit of luck, I  actually got into a h.s. where the reject kids
(kids who didn't pass exams for good h.s.) were sent. The kids were passive,
bored, and obedient but definitely not the "Japanese success story" we hear
about so often. Through an interpreter, I asked the group I was sitting with
about "the hitting teacher, " asked whether this was a fact or a myth.
Students assured me of course it was a fact. They just made sure to keep a
low profile on the first day so the hitting teacher wouldn't choose them as
the bad example.

It seemed sadistic to me but maybe George is right: classes there are very
large...and these students were not on the path to success. The object didn't
seem to teach them but to control them. (They were sitting in groups. Each
person was supposed to solve a sheet of math problems--basic operations--and
then check answers with group. They did this--and when they saw different
answers they just laughed. Nobody bothered to figure out why they were
different or change any answer.)

Susan Ohanian

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