How many of you clean up your classrooms and school grounds every day? It varies from school to school, but the most cleaning we might do includes erasing the whiteboard, and maybe giving our desks a quick wipe. We would of course have a big end-of-the-year cleaning before classes ended for the year, but even then all that consisted of was emptying out our desks and wiping them down.
In Japan, students are responsible for cleaning areas of the school everyday. This includes dusting, sweeping, and wiping down the floors in their classrooms, hallways, and throughout other areas of their school - including the toilets and staffroom.
According to one primary school teacher Kyoko Takishima she explains that children do this to build confidence and to help prepare them for adulthood.
Alice Gordenker, a writer for The Japan Times, explains that it also helps the kids to respect their surroundings, writing: “They are learning that it’s better not to make a mess if you are the one who has to clean it up.” Gordenker also alludes to a custom at some schools that she finds especially endearing: “A group of sixth-graders is sent to each first-grade classroom to help the little kids clean. Many schools provide this kind of interaction between the upper and lower grades because so many Japanese kids are hitorikko (only children, i.e., they have no siblings). Teachers believe older students need to experience helping younger children. And little kids need older role models.”
Of course, this doesn’t mean that Japanese schools don’t have custodians. Janitors or cleaners, called yōmuin, are still employed by schools to handle maintenance and repairs, clean any areas that students may not be in charge of (not all schools have students clean the toilets, for example), and to follow up with a deeper clean than what the students may be able to achieve.