Taught at a highschool today where I teach from time to time. An excellent example of how the Japanese education system is NOT working. Some of the kids are what I would call high school students. Most, and I mean the vast majority, are not. My guess is that it is not their fault entirely, though in some individual cases it might be. I lay the blame at the feet of an educational bureaucracy that is so huge, cumbersome, and interested in maintaining its own interests, that it cannot possibly deliver. The MOE claims to have an English component. If Toyota produced as many disfunctional cars as the MOE produces students who cannot perform the simplest communication task in English, Toyota would have folded long ago. The students, parents, and industries of Japan are being ripped off blind.