"中学生ですか？"
Translation:Are you a middle school student?
43 Comments
Can someone explain to me how the Japanese's education system works? Because in our country, it goes something like ;
Primary = Nursery + Kindergarten 1 & 2
Elementary = Grade 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, & 6
High School = Grade 7, 8, 9, & 10
Senior H.S. = Grade 11 & 12
Then College.
Where are you from? In Japan it's Elementry school 1-6 Middle school 7-9 High school 10-12
Our primary school: 4-12 years old High school: 12-16 years old And then you go study
In British schools including former colonies, it would be something like
Nursery + Kindergarten 1 & 2
Primary = 1 - 6 [ 7-12 years old ]
Secondary = 1-5 [13-17 years old] - in Singapore there is an option to do a 4 year secondary education = 'O' levels
2 year junior college Or 3 year pre-university = 'A' levels
then University [ Americans call them College ]
Note this is the typical path. May include any technical school, musical conservatory, arts school, mandatory military service either in lieu or in addition to those stated above
We call them universities, too. University and college can be interchangeable at times.
In the USA, we have:
Pre-k Primary/elementary school (kindergarten to 4th grade) Middle school/junior high (5th grade to 8th) High school (9 to 12) College/University
We still call secondary years: Years 7-11. And in England we only have 2 years of College/Sixth Form, unless you choose to retake a year.
In Canada, at least Ontario, it is: - JK-8 Elementary school - 9-12 High school - Then post secondary either college or University
This is actually pretty interesting that grades are different in other countries!
In the U.S, preschool is optional and is before kindergarten.
Otherwise the public school system starts with kindgergarten, then is grades 1-6
Middle school is grades 7-8
High school is 9-12 (freshman, sophmore, junior and senior) most people graduate at age 18
then college (aka university for uk peeps)
Things are different across the US as well. In North Carolina and in Texas the places I went to school it was set up as such: Pre-k optional. Elementary school wad kindergarten to 5th grade. Middle school was 6th-8th grade. High school was 9th-12th grade. And then you had the optional college/universities.
Here is the French system, matching Japanese one:
Primary school ("Enseignement primaire"):
- First cycle (TPS, PS, MS, GS): no match
- Second cycle (CP, CE1, CE2): 小学校
- Third cycle (CM1, CM2): 小学校
Secondary school ("Enseignement secondaire"):
- First cycle - Adaptation (6e): 小学校
- First cycle - Central (5e, 4e): 中学校
- First cycle - Orientation (3e): 中学校
- Second cycle (2nd, 1ere, Terminale): 高校
Not really, because "secondary school" could contain the equivalent of both middle and high school
Nice to see some British here.. I've been teaching middle school students for years, but had never even heard of middle school until I came to Asia
"Secondary school" should be accepted. 小学 is "primary school", 中学 is "secondary school", and 大学 is "university". And "pupil" should be accepted: where I come from (Scotland) "student" is not used of youngsters attending primary or secondary school.
There are many different school systems, even within the English-speaking world, and it may well be that some of them have "secondary school" as the correct term for the equivalent of 中学 -- that is, school year 7-9 (year 10-12 are 高校, "high school", which you missed in your list.) -- but it is not the only term available. In any case, the official translation into English used by the Japanese government is "middle school" (note that 中 literally means "middle") and so that is the one we are taught.
I do agree with you about "pupil", though.
1612
Any reason why this couldn't mean: "Are they middle school students?"
Or should it be accepted?
no because that would need a plural form of that word. which would be tachi. chuugakusei -tachi desuka
Is it me or does middle school student and foreign exchange student sound confusing? ><
Definitely related! 中 means "middle" in Chinese. Fun fact: 中国 (zhōngguó) literally means "middle country." China is the middle/center of the world. :-)
Thanks! I was wondering if there was a reason they use the same character and i appreciate the etymology
I like to use pressing the characters to hear the individial sounds and break down the pronunciation but on some of these it doesn't work. Is there a problem or should it not work like that?
I think it's because some of the characters that you're pressing are kanji which have multiple readings
- 438
"Are you middle school student?" was not accepted as I missed an "a".
In Wales our education system goes: Rising Threes (age 3), Nursery (age 3-4), Reception (age 4-5), Infants (years 1-2) Juniors (years 3-6) or these two can be put together as Primary School (ages 5-11), Comprehensive School (years 7-13, years 12-13 are called Sixth Form, ages 11-18), College (for those not going into Sixth Form, ages 16-18), University (3 year degree, ages 18-21).
