Author(s): MORITA, H., Institution: OSAKA UNIVERSITY OF HEALTH AND SPORT SCIENCES, Country: JAPAN, Abstract-ID: 640

Introduction
At last year’s conference, I presented my study of the widely held belief that playing sport provides many educational benefits in school education in Japan. Many instructors set forth the goal of achieving human education and character building through sport, and many players also report experiencing human education through their participation in sport activities.In moral education in Japan, the Course of Study recommends including a variety of sport to foster the learning of diverse virtues. In relation to this, a story involving baseball has been discussed. In this story, a player ignored the manager’s order to bunt and instead hit a double, leading the team to victory. The manager then suspended the player from games for violating team rules. I see many problems with using these sport-based stories as subjects for moral education.
Discussion
The Ministry of Education, Culture, Sport, Science and Technology advocates morality achieved through thinking and discussion as an important aspect of moral education. However, there is concern that conclusions may be limited because the title of this baseball-themed teaching material includes phrases, such as "rule," "as a member of the team," and "for a better school life and group activities."
This class is designed to teach rules, but this rule is a special one that can (or should) be valid only within the realm of sport. Normal rules applied in general situations should differ significantly from these rules. A class is fundamentally flawed if it ignores this difference and attempts to have students follow the rules presented in this teaching material in general settings. The following three reasons explain why following rules in this teaching material is so special and should not be applied to cases other than sport. The first reason concerns how the rules are created. The second reason involves the process by which the rules exert their power to control actual behavior. The third reason relates to how members who do not follow the rules are punished.
Conclusion
The rules in general society and the rules in sport are entirely different in nature. Keeping this point in mind is essential when sports are used as teaching material in moral education. This teaching material can then be used effectively by taking the difference between the two into account. In the example of the baseball story, the theme of the class should be set as "developing the ability to think about how rules should be." The specific class structure corresponding to this theme involves having students analyze facts related to the following points and consider the right way to make decisions. (1) The grounds for why rules must be followed; (2) how to determine whether someone has violated a rule; (3) how to handle punishments for those who break rules; and (4) the authority and duties of both those who enforce the rules and those who are subject to them, among others.