Chinese culture is lauded for its emphasis on education. There’s a persistent stereotype that being “Asian” or “Chinese” means you’re smart. In some sense, that stereotype is grounded in the fact that Chinese students flat out work hard. In high school, they go to class on average 60 to 70 hours a week, 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. with some time off for meals. There’s a test called the GaoKao, which translated means literally “The High Test.” That one score determines if and where a high school student goes to college. It’s comprehensive and they spend the last two years of high school reviewing for it.
Then you get to college, where your major is determined by how high you scored on that GaoKao test. It’s not up to you; it’s up to the school administrators. In college, you probably have an average of 26 hours of class a week. All extracurricular clubs are organized by the school.
It’s striking how talking to the Chinese students here gives me a much better perspective on Whitman and America’s educational system in general. I mean, people are always complaining about how lax it is and how our test scores aren’t as good. But this reflects a basic difference in pedagogy. In China, you are bombarded with information to consume, memorize and rephrase. They start learning English in middle school and by the time they’re in college, many Chinese students can understand spoken English, watch American TV and, in general, enjoy the highlights and pitfalls of American culture.
On the other hand, we get to start clubs at school. Since middle school, there are various forms of student government. Sure, it’s easy to believe they’re just popularity contests, but that’s a rationalization. A key difference between a democratic society like the United States and an authoritarian hierarchical one like China is the lack of trust in the decision-making capabilities of others. Students don’t get to vote who gets involved in student government in China. It’s called the Communist Youth League and the professors select some of the students.
Meanwhile, we at Whitman, with our Associated Students of Whitman College, get to pick which students get to manage a budget of $450,000. Students get to pick which initiatives to fund, what stance to take on political issues and how students should respond to the administration.
Sure, it’s easy to say that student government can’t accomplish anything, but what does that mean? What are the standards determining what qualifies as an “accomplishment”? It’s easy to dream big and do nothing. At the same time, it’s easy to understand how China’s educational system breeds conformity and efficiency rather than innovation.
That’s the thing with creativity. It comes to you; you don’t come to it. It’s not something you can learn, but it’s something for which you need opportunities to take advantage of it. We have those opportunities at Whitman. It’s harder in China. Imagine trying to go whitewater rafting or teach local kids about climate change if you had class for 26 hours and everything had to be approved by a bureaucratic administration.
Luckily for us, we don’t have to deal with that. What we have are the opportunities to train ourselves on how to think “critically.” At a liberal arts college like Whitman (liberal arts colleges don’t exist in China), the emphasis is on communicating your ideas and defending them in front of others. It’s hard to realize how unique that way of teaching is until you come to a place like China. I have a Chinese tutor assigned by my program and we talk about the differences between college life in the United States and in China. It really comes down to what goes on in the classroom. It’s either heads down, notes on the page listening to an endless lecture or giving an oral presentation.
Yes, school can be a bother when there is Ankeny to frolic on. But the great thing about America’s educational system, one in which a college like Whitman can exist, is the emphasis on creativity: where being creative, self-expressive and inventive with words, ideas and the meanings of a book are up for debate or rather, are in play. That’s the hallmark of an open society that gets threatened the second we stop listening, caring and talking.
China may have a lot of advantages in terms of hard work and growth but it’s hard to see how those strengths will ever cover up for an educational system that doesn’t foster creativity.
Ernie Danek • Dec 3, 2013 at 7:30 pm
My thought is that you are referring to students from very good public middle and high schools, when you say that they can speak and understand English when they enter college.
I am now retired, having spent 10 years teaching oral English mostly to Chinese university freshmen who are majoring in English.
When I began teaching at Zhoukou Normal University in Henan province, in 2006, my freshman students (usually 47 in a class) would spend the first 2-3 class periods with hands in their laps, looking down.( Not all were playing with cell phones!) They gradually loosened up when they found that their first foreign teacher wasn’t cannibal.
Something must have happened at the high school level, though. I saw a definite improvement in the general level of English comprehension some rise in the ability to speak and comprehend oral English upon arrival in my classes. This improvement took place gradually from maybe 2008 to 2013.
At best, my students had very limited ability to understand most English language movies. They needed much more basic help with the language; we did role plays (the usefulness of which graduating students later praised), skits which they composed in small groups, and made complex sentences using their weekly vocabulary lists.
Just thought I’d give you my feedback.
Ernie Danek, professor emeritus of English
Reader • Dec 25, 2011 at 5:51 pm
I don’t know which Chinese students or tutors you spoke to, but I’m surprised that the Chinese school experiences you presented here are very different from mine at high school in Fujian and at university in Shantou. I’m sure that my experience is not representative of all the students in China, but I think it would be interesting to compare your observation and my experience.
1. All extracurricular clubs are organized by the school.
Chinese students get to organize extracurricular clubs since Junior High. While the school usually organizes sports teams and the chorus, students organize clubs in various areas, such as writing, dancing, acting, cosplay, chess, etc.
2. Students don’t get to vote who gets involved in student government in China. It’s called the Communist Youth League and the professors select some of the students.
The student government in China is not the Communist Yough League. It’s called the class committee (on the class level) and the Student Union (on the grade level and the school level at high school, and on the college level and the university level at university-in China, a college is often part of a university).
When it comes to the Communist Youth League, the students get to select the applicants by voting. Most students apply to the Communist Youth League at Junior High and Senior High, and apply to the Chinese Communist Party at university. All these selection processes are based on student voting.
3. It’s harder in China. Imagine trying to go whitewater rafting or teach local kids about climate change if you had class for 26 hours and everything had to be approved by a bureaucratic administration.
Many students at my university (Shantou University) are engaged in community services such as tutoring local kids, helping lepers in local villages, babysitting orphans, etc. Some of these activities are organized and funded by school, but many of them do not need to go through the school approval if they don’t need funds.
4. In China, you are bombarded with information to consume, memorize and rephrase.
The education before the college entrance examination (Gao Kao) emphasizes memorization and standardized exam-taking skills, but it is due to the large number of test-takers (in 2010 the number of college entrance examination-takers in China was 9.57 million) and the limited amount of grading time (test-graders have to grade almost 10 million students in 6-9 subjects in about 3 weeks). As a result, multiple choice and short answers are widely used as exam forms (creative writing is tested only in Chinese and English) to boost the efficiency of grading.
5. I have a Chinese tutor assigned by my program and we talk about the differences between college life in the United States and in China. It really comes down to what goes on in the classroom. It’s either heads down, notes on the page listening to an endless lecture or giving an oral presentation.
What goes on in the classroom mainly depends on the number of the students in the classroom. It’s harder to engage every student in discussion if you have 60-200 students in one classroom. However, when it comes to small classes with 15-30 students, it’s easier to have discussions, debates, or even plays. I have more opportunities to talk in a small class than in a big class.
6. At a liberal arts college like Whitman (liberal arts colleges don’t exist in China), the emphasis is on communicating your ideas and defending them in front of others… But the great thing about America’s educational system, one in which a college like Whitman can exist, is the emphasis on creativity—where being creative, self-expressive and inventive with words, ideas and the meanings of a book are up for debate or rather, are in play.
“Liberal Arts” in China is usually distinguished from Natural Sciences. Many universities consist of liberal arts colleges which give social sciences classes and other colleges which give natural sciences classes.
There is a difference in the way of calling, but creativity is encouraged at university. Chinese students also need to be expressive and inventive in classroom discussions, presentations, and paper-writing. Besides, every province organizes the Challenge Cup competition to solicit creative projects in both social sciences and natural sciences. The winners are selected to go to the national competition. Therefore, it’s unfair to say that Chinese students are not educated to be creative.
I believe that your misinterpretations are probably attributed to the Chinese students you met who are not yet very proficient in English, but if you were able to communicate with them in Chinese, you would get a more complete picture about the China’s higher education.
I am glad that you brought up this topic, but I think that it’s a little too arrogant to assume that Chinese students are long on memorization and short on creativity.