著者

吉田 太郎

出版者

横浜国立大学

雑誌

横浜国立大学教育紀要 (ISSN:05135656)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.6, pp.39-59, 1966-12-26

---

During the period of about 260 years of the Edo Dynasty 1610~1868, there had developed throughout the country a total of over 15,500 Terakoya schools or private educational institutions for the public. The purpose of Terakoya schools was to give the mass of the people fundamental knowledge necessary for their daily lives as well as to teach them writing and reading. This was just what had happened with Writing schools or Reading schools found in the seventeenth-century Europe. At Terakoya schools in Japan the students were free to enter and to leave when they liked. The graduation from the same involved no social privileges of any kind on the part of the students. Most of such institutions were of one-room and one-teacher, with completely meagre educational content. One should not, however, overlook the fact that the prevalence of Terakoya schools in Japan had contributed towards a very small number of the illiterates, as compared with those of the world at large in its contemporary period. Some of the textbooks or readers used at Terakoya schools consisted of articles, dealing with works of great men in history or with main historical events of Japan. The present writer intended to analyze the content of such textbooks or readers, and to look into the educational influences such textbooks or readers had left upon the people. He regrets to say, however, that on account of the extreme shortage of relevant materials he has not been able to make researches into the actual curriculum building, and methods of examination as well as of evaluation of the results. In conclusion, it must be emphasized that the role of Terakoya schools was so important and their educational achievement was of such great magnanimity that in 1872, when western educational system was first introduced to Japan and the elementary school was made compulsory, the ratio of enrolement was extremely high, proving that Terakoya schools had cultured the enthusiasm of the people for the necessity of education.