Dear Diary Boy, Kumiko Makihara
Dear Diary Boy, Kumiko Makihara
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Dear Diary Boy
An Exacting Mother, Her Free-Spirited Son, and Their Bittersweet Adventures in an Elite Japanese School

Author: Kumiko Makihara, Deborah Fallows

Narrator: Cindy Kay

Unabridged: 6 hr 40 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 06/29/2021


Synopsis

When her five-year-old son passed the rigorous entrance exams to one of Japan's top private elementary schools, Makihara, a single mother, thought they were on their way. Taro would wear the historic dark blue uniform and learn alongside other little Einsteins while she basked in the glory of his high achievements with the other perfect moms. Together they would climb the rungs into the country's successful elite.

But it didn't turn out that way. Taro had other things in mind. While set in Japan, their struggles in the school's hyper-competitive environment mirror those faced by parents here in the US and raise the same questions about the best way to educate a child—especially one that doesn't quite fit the mold. Public or private? Competitive or nurturing? Standardized or individualized? Helicopter parenting or free-range? Amid this frenzied debate, how does one find balance and maintain a healthy parent-child relationship?

Dear Diary Boy is an intensely personal, heartwarming, and heartbreaking chronicle of one mother and child's experience in a prestigious private Tokyo school. It's a tale that will resonate with all parents as we try to answer the age-old questions of how best to educate our children and what, truly, is in their best interests versus what is in our own.

About Kumiko Makihara

Kumiko Makihara's work has appeared in the International Herald Tribune, the New York Times magazine, and Newsweek, as well as in the books Reimagining Japan: The Quest for a Future That Works and Tsunami: Japan's Post Fukushima Future. She previously was a reporter for Time Magazine and the Associated Press and a features editor at the Moscow Times. She resides in New York City and Tokyo.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Azjatycka on September 11, 2022

Kumiko Makihara zabiera nas ze sobą w podróż przez sześć lat wczesnej edukacji swojego syna Yatara Makihary. Poznajemy z pierwszej ręki, jak wygląda japońska podstawówka, szkoły przygotowawcze i edukacja domowa. Biegamy z Yatarem na zajęcia dodatkowe i siedzimy po nocach. Wszystko to w atmosferze ci......more

Goodreads review by Tanya on May 21, 2019

It's been awhile since I read a book that was hard to put down, and this was one of them. This memoir intersperses excerpts from her son's (Taro) diary in elementary school and was written in chronological order from when he was infant to eighteen years old. Taro is a bright boy who loves to read an......more

Goodreads review by Suzanne on July 19, 2018

I found myself reading this memoir of a Japanese "kyoiku mama" (education mama) with a mixture of bemusement and horror. Makihara, a single Japanese mom with an illustrious past as a foreign correspondent, writes of her success at getting her adopted son into a prestigious private Tokyo school and o......more

Goodreads review by Monika on January 31, 2024

This was an interesting read on extremely high requirements set for a very small children who are expected to study and advance 24/7 and who need to prove their worth on every possible field - for example by winning the swimming cap that has the most prestigious colour, as by its colour you can show......more

Goodreads review by Katarzyna on October 07, 2022

Książka niejednoznaczna, wzbudzająca wiele emocji - wielokrotnie negatywnych. Japońska edukacja i zachowania względem uczniów (rodzice, nauczyciele) pozostawiają wiele do życzenia. Nie liczy się kreatywność. Masz być nijaki, średni, taki jak reszta grupy.......more