Kukita, Stephanie Mitsuko; (2019) Connecting the 'Local' and 'Global': Japanese Secondary School Students' Perceptions and Attitudes Towards the World. Doctoral thesis (Ph.D), UCL (University College London).

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Abstract

The growing interests in global citizenship education (GCE) necessitates educators to truly understand what it means to implement such programs, for one’s views on global citizenship dictate approaches to be taken, which in turn diversifies the outcomes. GCE has largely focused on measuring learners’ level of global citizenship by assessing their perceptions and engagements within one geographical sphere (e.g., global), often based on key stakeholders’ views. These studies have overlooked examining (1) how learners’ engagements across geographical spheres (e.g., local, national, global) relate to one another, and (2) how learners’ life experiences could impact their engagements with the world. Spotlighting these areas, the present study examined how Japanese secondary school students engage socio-emotionally, cognitively, and behaviorally with societal issues happening at the local, national, and global spheres. A mixed methods approach was employed, administering survey questionnaires (N = 558) and interviews (N = 22) with Year 2 students from four senior high schools in Tokyo, Saitama, and Chiba prefectures. Follow-up student interviews (N = 6) were also conducted four years later. As a general pattern, students showed moderate levels of engagements in the local and national spheres, while showing lower engagements in the global, reflecting Japanese societal and educational agendas that strongly emphasize local (national) identity. Nevertheless, through examining how students’ engagements relate across spheres, results revealed that engagement in one sphere could be positively related to engagement within another sphere, challenging the notion that the cultivation of local (national) and global identities are counterproductive to each other. In line with Bronfenbrenner’s bioecological model, the findings also highlighted the importance of attending to the contextual factors that may influence how learners engage with the world in search for how best to implement global citizenship education.

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