• Journal of Korean Public Health Nursing
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• v.9 no.1
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• pp.17-32
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• 1995

The purpose of this study was to improve upon school health by understanding the present status of school health and escpecially to investigate the performance rate of regular health instruction. 261 schools, including middle and high schools enrolled in the Busan Educational Association, were sent Questionnaires. Data was collected from the 25th of January to the 10th of April, 1994. 229 subjects who responded to the Questionnaires were finally analyzed as samples. Among them, 127 were school nurses and 102 were teachers acting in a school health capacity. The results of this study are summerized as follows: Of the teachers holding additional school health responsibilities, $85.6\%$ worked in private schools. Many of them $(74.5\%)$ were formally dissatisfied with their ability to provide care because $85.3\%$ of them had never studied any school health. Some of them$(30.4\%)$ didn't know about the annual school nursing budget and $23.5\%$ of them hadn't taught any health education to students. In spite of this fact, they were placed in charge of a school health activity against their own will. There were statistically significant differences in the performance of school health affairs between nurses and teachers holding additional school health (p<0.001) as follows: annual school nursing budget, Health Program Planning and Evaluation, annual purchase price for medicines, average students cared for per day, average students who held at least one consultation per month and extra. Surely, the self-confidence of school nurses was higher than that of teachers with school health as an assigned responsibility. This was demonstrated by a significant statistical difference (p<0.01) in the responses by the two groups. $88.2\%$ of the school nurses and $73.5\%$ of teachers for school health thought that regular health instruction was necessary. But regular health education had been performed only by $32.8\%$ of respondents. Among them, 84% were school nurses and $16\%$ were teachers holding additional school health. Of the persons who performed regular health education, $69.3\%$ used less than $60\%$ of the health content of the athletic textbook. And $64\%$ of them said teaching materials were insufficient. Most of them $(69.4\%)$used home made lesson plans. which they compiled from various sources. There was a significant difference in the formality of the health lesson according to the concern of the school principal (p<0.01) and there was a significant difference in performing health education between school nurses and teachers holding additional school health (p<0.001) It appears that there are a lot of problems with providing school health care using people who are untrained. In a word, school health nurses with professional training are needed in order to perform the qualitative management for the health of the students. These days, regular health education is an indispensable part in making students improve their self-care abilities. Therefore a more effective and better defined program should be prepared for regular systematic health education. To resolve these problems, present laws and regulations related to school health should be revised considering the specialist's request for the improvement of school health. In addition, the concern and financial support of the government are essential.

• Proceedings of the KSPS conference
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• 2000.07a
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• pp.235-240
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• 2000

In the age of global communication, more human exchange is extended at the grass-roots level. In the old days, language policy and language planning was based on one nation-state with one language. But high waves of globalizaiton have allowed extended human flow of exchange beyond one's national border on a daily basis. Under such circumstances, homogeneity in Japan may not allow Japanese to speak and communicate only in Japanese and only with Japanese people. In Japan, an advisory report was made to the Ministry of Education in June 1996 about what education should be like in the 21st century. In this report, an introduction of English at public elementary schools was for the first time made. A basic policy of English instruction at the elementary school level was revealed. With this concept, English instruction is not required at the elementary school level but each school has their own choice of introducing English as their curriculum starting April 2002. As Baker, Colin (1996) indicates the age of three as being the threshold diving a child becoming bilingual naturally or by formal instruction. Threre is a movement towards making second language acquisition more naturalistic in an educational setting, developing communicative competence in a more or less formal way. From the lesson of the Canadian immersion success, Genesee (1987) stresses the importance of early language instruction. It is clear that from a psycho-linguistic perspective, most children acquire basic communication skills in their first language apparently effortlessly and without systematic and formal instruction during the first six or seven years of life. This innate capacity diminishes with age, thereby making language learning increasingly difficult. The author, being a returnee, experienced considerable difficulty acquiring L2, and especially achieving native-like competence. There will be many hurdles to conquer until Japanese students are able to reach at least a communicative level in English. It has been mentioned that English is not taught to clear the college entrance examination, but to communicate. However, Japanese college entrance examination still makes students focus more on the grammar-translation method. This is expected to shift to a more communication stressed approach. Japan does not have to aim at becoming an official bilingual country, but at least communicative English should be taught at every level in school Mito College is a small two-year co-ed college in Japan. Students at Mito College are basically notgood at English. It has only one department for business and economics, and English is required for all freshmen. It is necessary for me to make my classes enjoyable and attractive so that students can at least get motivated to learn English. My major target is communicative English so that students may be prepared to use English in various business settings. As an experiment to introduce more communicative English, the author has made the following syllabus design. This program aims at training students speak and enjoy English. 90-minute class (only 190-minute session per week is most common in Japanese colleges) is divided into two: The first half is to train students orally using Graded Direct Method. The latter half uses different materials each time so that students can learn and enjoy English culture and language simultaneously. There are no quizes or examinations in my one-academic year program. However, all students are required to make an original English poem by the end of the spring semester. 2-6 students work together in a group on one poem. Students coming to Mito College, Japan have one of the lowest English levels in all of Japan. However, an attached example of one poem made by a group shows that students can improve their creativity as long as they are kept encouraged. At the end of the fall semester, all students are then required individually to make a 3-minute original English speech. An example of that speech contest will be presented at the Convention in Seoul.