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Dayton Daily News education reporter Scott Elliott writes about schools, kids, teaching and learning.
Home > Blogs > Get on the Bus > Archives > 2007 > April > 03
Tuesday, April 3, 2007
Seeking a liberal arts education … in China?
Snapshot USA: Our kids are too leisurely. Their instruction is too unfocused. They lack basic skills. They come out of school without the ability to perform basic functions and disappoint employers who have to send them for retraining in order to compete on the world economic stage. To rectify this problem, we create standards and connect them to tests kids are required to pass and judge schools on the results the way effective national education systems do in places like China. Critics say this crowds out important creative thinking instruction that has been a hallmark of our education system.
Snapshot China: Chinese kids are too rigidly focused on monotonous drilling of basic skills. They aren’t trained to consider the application of the skills. Everything is about passing the next test. They come out of school without the ability to think creatively and disappoint employers seeking an innovative edge in the world economy. To rectify this problem they create new schools which give kids more choices and freedoms they way effective national education systems do in places like the United States. Critics fear their children will lose the basic skill proficiency that has been a hallmark of the Chinese education system.
Here in the U.S., critics of our education system often speak admiringly of our international competitors and how they teach their kids. In Sunday’s New York Times, some Chinese reformers talk of the need to emulate the U.S. system.
This was one of three big education-related stories in the Times recently.
The No. 1 most read story today at NYTimes.com is the latest in a series of stories about the pressure on girls be perfect in school. And the Times also took an interesting look Sunday at parenting gay children today.
(I guess the DDN isn’t the only paper that’s a little education happy lately.)
The story on education in China I found interesting. The star of the piece is a Chinese girl now attending Harvard who is urging families back home to break with their tradition of relentlessly drilling for tests by instead including American-style extracurriculars into their studies in an effort to become more well-rounded.
Critics of the American system must have choked on their Corn Flakes at the thought of China emulating the U.S. education system rather than the other way around. But this story seems to point to the desperate need to find a middle ground. Can we somehow discover a way to produce well-rounded graduates with curiosity, outside interests and creative thinking skills who also, on a wide scale, possess top-flight basic skill proficiency?
What do you think? Do both nations need to seek a middle ground?
(Image credit: www.theodora.com)
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