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Survey: Only 3％ of English Teachers Use Digital Textbooks Exclusively; 88％ Use Both Paper and Digital Forms

Yomiuri Shimbun file photo
A digital English textbook is used at an elementary school in Tokyo in August 2022.

The Yomiuri Shimbun

15:21 JST, September 23, 2024

Only 3% of English teachers in elementary and junior high schools use digital textbooks exclusively, a survey by the Finance Ministry revealed. According to the survey, 88% of them use both paper and digital textbooks together.

Although the Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology Ministry is considering expanding the use of digital textbooks, the survey suggests that many teachers are in favor of using paper textbooks. “It is assumed that the familiar paper textbooks are being used more and that digital textbooks are not being used as much as they could be,” a Finance Ministry official analyzed.

The Finance Ministry surveyed 983 elementary and junior high school teachers on their use of digital textbooks in fiscal 2023.

Elementary and junior high school students are provided with learning terminals and digitized contents of paper textbooks can be viewed on the terminals. The digitized versions are referred to as digital textbooks.

The government started providing digital textbooks in fiscal 2021 and has been reviewing their effectiveness and impact. In August 2022, the Education Ministry announced a policy that paper and digital textbooks can be used together.

Regarding which textbooks are used more when paper and digital textbooks are used together, 35% of the total respondents said they use digital textbooks more often than paper textbooks, while 53% said they use paper textbooks more than digital versions. Combined with the 9% who use only paper textbooks, the survey found that more than 60% favor paper textbooks.

“It is pointless to use digital textbooks when paper textbooks have the same content,” said Manabu Sato, professor emeritus at the University of Tokyo and an expert on school education. “What can be done with paper textbooks should be done with paper textbooks and digital textbooks should be used as a ‘learning tool’ for areas such as programming.”