The New Trend of Disaster Mitigation Education in Japan

To have the students realize that the degree of the disaster are strongly influenced both by the natural phenomenon and by the social environment (vulnerability).

The Students use a wide paper. Write "Kobe Earthquake" at the 1/3 from the top of the paper. Upper side of the "Kobe Earthquake" is the social environment before the disaster took place. The lower side is the society after the earthquake. They write and draw as many social factors as possible in the "before the disaster" part (traffic, buildings, population, fire bureau, life line, and so on). In the "after the earthquake" part, they write and draw the damages and the problems during the process of the emergency management and the recovery.

The students learn the complexity of the society and the difficulty of the disaster mitigation. The students think what they can do in the complex society. They may realize that disaster management must be done totally with as many coherent sectors as possible.