The bar chart illustrates how many hours each teacher was supposed to cover in Japan, Spain, Ireland, and the USA, based on three different levels of education in the year 2001.
Overall, the total hours of teaching of all the three levels in the United States were consistently higher than the other three countries. It is also evident that upper secondary education required more teaching hours, with the exception of Ireland where the focus was on lower secondary education.
Regarding primary schools, every teacher spent 600 hours of teaching at this level in Japan, Spain and Ireland, which was lower than the figure for the USA, with approximately 850 hours. In terms of lower secondary education, the amount of time spent teaching in Japan was equal that of Spain, with 600 hours, compared to 800 hours in Ireland and around 1050 hours in the USA.
In comparison, teachers in the USA were required to teach about 1100 hours when it comes to upper secondary education, followed by Spain (just under 1000 hours) and Ireland (roughly 780 hours). The figure for this level in Japan was lowest, at only 650 hours per year.
