ABSTRACT
This chapter deals with an overview of the history of the Course of Study Guidelines from the first guidelines announced in 1947. It examines the latest guidelines reform in primary and secondary schools by discussing promote project-based learning (PjBL) in comparison with problem-based learning, a similar but separate pedagogical approach and offers pedagogical implications from a genre-based English for Specific Purposes (ESP) perspective. The chapter discusses the introduction of a genre-based ESP approach prior to tertiary education can help students understand, or at least raise their awareness of, the concept of genre and enable them to smoothly continue on to English for academic purposes studies at the university level. English education in junior high school focuses on the development of communication skills to convey ideas and feelings in English, instead of grammar and translation. The chapter also discusses the possibility of a genre-based ESP approach leading to positive effects on the introduction of PjBL to English education in primary and secondary schools in Japan.
