Abstract
The objective of this research is to do a cultural comparison on the daily lives of the children of Korea, Japan and China. To achieve this objective, the questionnares were distributed to the 2940 mothers of children from the ages of 3 to 6 in the countries of Korea, Japan and China. The target audience consisted of 941 mothers living in Seoul and Kyunggi area for Korea, 1007 mothers living in Tokyo for Japan, and 992 mothers living in Beijing for China. As a result of the research, we found out that firstly, although children in general got up anytime between 7:00am to 9:00am and went to bed between 8:00pm and 11:00pm, 61.5% of the Korean children went to bed after 10pm and 16.8% after 11pm. Besides that, we found that compared to 3.51% of Korean children who got up before 6am, 13.41% of Japanese children and 17.24% of Chinese children got up before 6:00am. So we could see that the Korean children got up later and went to bed later than their Japanese and Chinese counterpart. This pattern could also be seen in the average rising time and bed time. Korean children went to bed at 10:00pm and woke up at 7:75am whereas the Japanese children went to bed at 9:28pm and woke up at 7:39am, and the Chinese children went to bed at 9:05pm and woke up at 7:05am. The average sleeping hours for Japanese children was 10.12 hours, 9.50 hours for the Chinese and 9.75 hours for the Korean. As a result, we could see that the Korean children went to bed later, got up later and slept fewer hours than their Japanese and Chinese counterparts. Also, since the rising time and bedtime of the Korean children was later than those of the Chinese and Japanese counterparts, the former s' breakfast and dinner time was also much later. Secondly, we looked at the time children went off to and came back from institutes such as kindergarten and child care centers. The Chinese were earliest at going with average attendance at 7:83am, the Japanese came next at 8:59am and the Korean children were last at 8:90am, whereas the Japanese came first in coming back home at 3:36pm, Korean next at 3:91pm and the Chinese last at 5:46pm. Next when we looked at the hours spent at the kindergartens and child care centers, Japan spent 6.76 hours, Korea 7.01 hours and China spent the longest hours with 9.63 hours. Excluding China where all preschool institutes are centralized into kindergartens, we nest looked at time children went to and came back from the institutes as well as the time spent there. In the case of kindergarten, there was not much difference but in the case of child care centers, the Japanese children went to the child care centers mach earlier and came home later than the Korean children. Also, the time spent at the child care center was much longer for the Japanese than the Korean children. This fact coincides with the Korean mothers' number one wish to the kindergartens and child care centers i.e. for the institutes to prolong their school hours. Thus, the time spent at child care centers for Korea was 7.75 hours, 9.39 hours for Japan and 9.63 hours for China. The time for Korea was comparatively much shorter than that of Japan and China but if we consider the fact that 50% of the target audience was working mothers, we could easily presume that the working parents who usually use the child care centers would want the child care centers to prolong the hours looked after their children. Besides this, the next most wanted wish mothers have towards the child care centers and kindergartens was for those institutes to "look after their children when sick". This item showed high marks in all three countries, and the marks in Korea was especially higher when compared to Japan and China. Thirdly, we looked at the private extracurricular activities of the children. We found that 72.6% of the Korean children, 61.7% of the Japanese children, and 64.6% of the Chinese children were doing private extracurricular activities after attending kindergarten or day care centers. Amongst the private extracurricular activities done by Korean children, the most popular one was worksheet with 51.9% of the children doing it. Drawing (15.20%) and English (11.6%) came next. Swimming (21.95%) was the most popular activity for Japan, with English (17.48%), music (15,79%) and sports (14.70%) coming next. For China, art (30.95%) was first with English (22.08%) and music (19.96%) following next. All three countries had English as the most popular activity related to art and physical activities after school hours, but the rate for worksheet studies was much higher for Korea compared to Japan China. The reason Koreans universally use worksheet in because the parents who buy the worksheet are mothers who have easy access to advertisement or salespeople selling those products. The price is also relatively cheap, the worksheet helps the children to grow the basic learning ability in preparation for elementary school, and it is thought to help the children to build the habit of studying everyday. Not only that but it is estimated that the worksheet education is being conducted because parents can share the responsibility of the children's learning with the worksheet-teacher who make home visits. Looking at the expenses spent on private extracurricular activities as compared to income, we found that China spent 5% of income for activities outside of regular education, Korea 3% and Japan 2%. Fourthly, we looked at the amount of time children spent on using multimedia. The majority of the children in Korea, Japan and China watch television almost every day. In terms of video games, the Japanese children played the games the most, with Korea and China following next. The Korean children used the computer the most, with Japan and China next. The Korean children used about 21.17% of their daily time on computers which is much more than the Japanese who used 20.62% of their time 3 or 4 times a week, or the Chinese. The Chinese children were found to use considerably less time on multimedia compared to the Korean of Japanese.
본 연구의 목적은 한국, 일본, 중국 유아들의 일상생활을 비교문화적으로 탐구하는 데에 있다. 이러한 연구목적을 달성하기 위해 본 연구는 한국, 일본, 중국의 3-6세 유아를 이머니 2,940명을 대상으로 유아의 하루일과 활동들을 설문지를 통해 조사하였다. 조사대상자들은 한국의 서울/경기에 거주하는 어머니 941명, 일본의 동경에 거주하는 어머니 1007명, 중국의 북경에 거주하는 어머니 992명이었다. 연구 결과 첫째, 하루일과 부분에 있어서 한국 유아들은 일본, 중국 유아들에 비해 기상시각 아침 및 저녁식사시각 취침시각이 모두 늦게 이루어지며, 수면시간 또한 일본, 중국외 유아들에 비해 짧은 편으로 나타났다. 둘째, 교육기관 부분에 있어서 중국, 일본, 한국 유아들 순으로 교육기관에 등원하였으며, 일본, 한국, 중국 순으로 귀가하는 것으로 나타났다. 평균 교육기관 재원시간은 중국이 가장 길었으며, 그 다음으로 일본의 보육시설, 한국의 보육시설, 한국과 일본의 유치원 순으로 나타났다. 또한 어머니들이 교육기관에 바라는 사항을 살펴본 결과 아이가 아플 때에도 교육기관에서 맡아주기를 가장 희망하였다. 셋째, 조사대상 유아들 중 한국은 72.6%가, 일본은 61.7%, 중국은 64.6%가 정규교육 이외의 조기 특기활동을 하고 있는 것으로 나타났으며, 그 활동유형으로 세 국가 모두 예체능 관련 활동과 영어를 많이 하고 있었는데, 한국은 학습지를 하는 비율이 일본, 중국에 비해 월등히 높게 나타났다. 넷째, 전자매체 사용에 있어서는 한국, 일본, 중국의 대다수 유아들이 거의 매일 텔레비전을 시청하고 있었으며, 게임은 일본 유아들이, 컴퓨터는 한국 유아들이 사용 비율이 높은 것으로 나타났다. 전자매체의 경우 상대적으로 중국 유아들이 한국, 일본 유아들에 비해 그 사용비율이 현저히 낮았다.