Japan and the California ProblemIyenaga, T. (Toyokichi)
History
Japan and the California Problem
Iyenaga, T. (Toyokichi)
Japan -- Emigration and immigration; Japanese -- California
My general observation has been that given anything of an equal chance,
children are children, human nature is human nature, and brains are
brains--whatever the mother tongue may be. Compared with our other foreign
children, or with other children born in America of foreign parentage not
Japanese, keeping in mind the differences in social position that exist in
all classes, whatever the nationality may be, I cannot see much difference
along any line between our Japanese children and our Mexicans, our French
and our Italians; nor do I think any of them differ radically from what we
are apt to term "American" children. Few families are many generations
away from some foreign ancestors....
Our Japanese children are called brighter and more studious, sometimes,
than the others. I think this is due to the fact that they have, in many
cases, ambitious, educated parents who follow school work up very closely
in the home. Where home restrictions are lifted, such conditions do not
always prevail, any more than in cases of other neglected children. _They
must_ be studious. Discipline of American-born Japanese children is not so
close in the home as it seems to be with children born in Japan and reared
along Japanese lines, yet such children show much more initiative in all
of their work at school. They catch the American spirit.
As summary, I would say that physically, mentally, morally, given the same
chance, there does not seem to me to be a great difference among children
of the different nationalities, but this difference is most readily
noticed. The other nationalities do assimilate quickly, and lose, to a
great extent, their parents' national traits in short time; but it is
exceedingly hard to get the same results with our Japanese children. They
cling to one another, to their own ways, and to their own language, even
after many years of work in public schools, where most social barriers are
broken down. My personal feeling in the matter is that this condition is
the result of lack of American education in the Japanese homes and lack of
American touch with the Japanese mothers.
Our Home teachers are doing much to help along this line, but it is slow
work, and work that takes much time, and requires great tact on part of
the workers.
Most important to me is the work our public schools are doing with the
Japanese girls, the mothers of tomorrow.
Yours respectfully,
MARY A. HENDERSON.
(3)
_Report of Intellectual and Moral Status of American-born Japanese
Children_
MONETA SCHOOL, LOS ANGELES SCHOOL DIST.
As a rule American-born Japanese children know no English when entering
school. Their progress at first, therefore, is more slow than that of
English speaking children. Japanese children require one year to complete
one half year's work through the first, second, and third grades. After
the third grade they complete the work in the time assigned.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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