Problems with English Curriculum in Japanese schools

Our 3 grade elementary kid has come home with his ローマ字の表 Romanji (Roman letters) Study Chart as they are going to start learning English in the second semester.

Working with high school and university students for many years, I see so many students who cannot spell unfamiliar words or even sound them out when reading. This is, I have concluded once seeing the textbooks and observed classes, due to the style they are taught English in early education in Japan.
 For example, in presentations yesterday, I had a student saying she was under so much stress and "fa-ti-gi-you-a" and when I asked her about it after, the word was "fatigue".

Okay so the French derived words we use in English are particularly hard, that may be a bit harsh, but our 4 year old can speak rings around my university 20 year olds and is even starting to write better than the lowest level learners I teach. Even at age 4, she can spell things out with her phonetically based Zoophonics education at YIK (YMCA international kindergarten).

My university students have run into problems and been asked, when sending letters to their home stay families abroad, where "Hirosima" is and is that near "Hiroshima"?

I witnessed another mis-communication over flawed "romanji" when some students who were helping tourists get to Hiroshima's most famous sights on an island of "Miya-Zima" got strange looks and then the group leader said "Actually we were hoping to go to the island of Miya-Jima, do you know where that is?" Which was really confusing to the students who thought they had said that in the first place...

When writing journals to improve their writing and ability to express their own opinions, 80% of my low level students gave up and copied news articles or sentences from their TOEIC study books instead of attempting to write their own opinions on given topics.
 When I ask them about it, they argue that they were always taught to write and re-write English example texts in lower school to Learn English and have no confidence in writing anything original. Sure, copying from someone's essay to your notebook may help your handwriting, but it certainly doesn't help you learn how to communicate! When I tell them that their original sentences, no matter how flawed, are preferable to copying someone else's, they look rather shocked.

Another curriculum style problem is when I ask them to write sentences and there is never a subject. Once again, when I look at lower school texts (even entrance tests) it models the same problem.
I wonder if this is more of a cultural mis-communication as a vague reference to "him" or "her" is more common in Japanese. In English, however, we expect to be told who or what we are talking about. The following example often gets raised eyebrows in 1st year classes.

• My sister is studying French at school.* (is better than)
• She is studying French at school.

* Especially good if it is actually true.

When done right, writing in English can be a great way to discover things about students lives, thoughts and opinions about topics. But we have to teach them how to be accurate and clear in both how they speak and write. I hope this can start in earlier education in Japan too.