School children across Japan will soon be given a crash course in what radiation entails.
School children across Japan will soon be given a crash course in what radiation entails.
The education ministry is set to distribute a supplementary pamphlet to teach children basic knowledge of this issue as early as September.
A copy of the supplementary reading material will be provided to each of the nation's elementary schools, junior and senior high schools.
The government hopes schools will use it to educate children and teenagers to prevent kids moving from Fukushima Prefecture to other prefectures from getting bullied.
The material focuses on helping students acquire a basic knowledge about radiation.
For example, the book will explain that people can be exposed to radiation from nature and from X-rays as well as from accidents like the one at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant.
It will also explain what levels of radiation poses a health risk, as well as the difference between a becquerel and a sievert, and the fact that radiation is not transmitted from one person to another.
The content will include prevention measures and countermeasures in the event of an accident at a nuclear power plant. In such a case, the students are recommended to evacuate, following information provided by the central and municipal governments.
The pamphlet will also be posted on the Internet so teachers can download it.
How to use it will be decided by each school, the ministry said.
Since the Great East Japan Earthquake, the ministry has received inquiries and requests from schools and education boards across the nation for radiation education material.
As most teachers have never needed to teach anything about radiation, the ministry has been providing seminars nationwide on this topic in the months following the crisis at the quake-stricken Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant.