Japanese good manners trained in school lunch

Do you have a good memory about school lunch? Japanese school lunch (Kyushoku) is the biggest thing I want to be proud of in the Japanese social system. As I wrote about an inconvenient truth of Japan in last article, I’m going to write something good today. When I thought so, the first thing coming up in my mind was kyushoku. I happened to find that a YouTube video about Japanese school lunch is buzzing for people outside Japan. Surprisingly enough, it’s got more than 28 million views! Please do check out the video after reading this article. It’s just a part of normal daily life of Japanese school kids. It’s nothing special for us, but I learned from feedback comments for the video that viewers had found some good points about Japan.

Japanese school lunch is one of the school subjects

In the first place, I need to explain a little about Japanese school lunch. In most elementary and junior high schools in Japan, lunch is served fresh off each school kitchen. Of course, professional dietitians prepare the menu, which is handed out monthly and studied thoroughly by kids with joys and sorrows. The most popular menu was curry rice when I was a kid. In the fourth class period, the flavor of curry floated from school kitchen even into a class room, and we kids couldn’t focus on class any more. As I just made research, curry rice is still No.1 with unflagging popularity.

Japanese compulsory education system has six years in elementary school followed by three years of junior high school. In elementary and junior high school in the last week before graduation, special menus are served only for the graduating (sixth and third grade) students. I still remember we chewed on school-day memories while eating the special menus.

As school lunch, students are supposed to do everything from preparation to cleaning up. When they eat, it’s a rule to make a group, and a homeroom teacher joins one of them day by day. By the way, I belonged to the faculty of education, and so, practical training at an elementary or junior high school is a compulsory subject. I did it at a junior high school. The five-week training course was very tough for lazy college students like me, but I truly feel it was worth because I was able to have yummy school lunch again, at least.

Many of the viewers’ feedback comments said, “Japanese school lunch teaches kids more valuable lessons than what they can learn in other ordinary school subjects.” As you can see that in the Youtube video, it seems we’ve learned a lot like, courtesy, how to manage and cooperate in group collective actions, public sanitation, environmental protection, etc. Sometimes, I saw visitors coming from overseas to our factory admire the discipline of our production. I believe the foundation of the discipline may be built in school lunch.

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Photo Credit: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-03-16/japan-s-school-lunch-program-puts-others-to-shame

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