In the podcast, several people who have connections to China and the United State's educational system were interviewed. One student interviewed was born in China, raised in the United States, and moved back to China to study at a Chinese university. The student mentioned that she observed and participated in Chinese classrooms and said, "Chinese students are not encouraged to analyze, argue, or think for themselves." Teachers typically only ask yes/no questions or questions that are going to lead to one correct answer. The interviewee compared the experience to her time in the United States where she was always asked for her opinion or her thoughts. The two vastly different experiences challenged the student's cultural adjustment.
Another interviewee who moved to the United States to study acting in California discussed how he was shocked his first week of school when the teacher was essentially facilitating classroom discussion rather than feeding him information to memorize. The student met with the teacher after the class and asked, "Are you going to give us one final answer?" Adjustments for this student were also difficult.
The head of the division of curriculum development for basic education of China's Ministry Education, was interviewed and said, "We need excellent teachers who interact with the students and we need to find a way to assess not just what students learn but also if they’ve learned how to learn.” China is moving towards including more creativity and critical thinking in their curriculum.
Although previous to listening to the podcast I knew a good teaching strategy for working with ELL's was to learn about their cultures, the podcast reinforced the notion. When teaching ELL's, we may have one idea about how teaching and learning occurs, but other cultures may have different opinions about how teaching and learning transpires. I won't be able to learn everything about a student when I teach, but I can make a concentrated effort to learn as much as I can. Some ways of learning about students abd are their cultures are: talking with the students, spending time with the families outside of school (i.e. family picnic night), visiting other countries/places, reading and sharing ideas.
The part that I'm still confused about is "How do I help students who are unfamiliar with the United State's school system become familar? I want to use their previous educational experiences as assets, but I also don't want the students to be utterly confused."
Additionally, I'm wondering what China's goals are for students and what teaching theories they link to their teaching.
___
Image Source: Teachers Domain, http://www.teachersdomain.org/resource/wds10.sci.engin.design.chedu/
Kelsey,
ReplyDeleteOne of my first ideas for a blog topic was to look at science education curriculums in other developed nations and see what they do differently from us. There are always stats published that show the U.S. lagging far behind other nations in science achievement. I haven't seen much information explaining why this is.
One possible reason that's been suggested is most other developed nations have a more homogenous population than the U.S. Their instruction is directed at a population that has little or no diversity. Think of the challenge you'll have if your classroom has several ELL's. If they represent several different cultures, you'll really have your hands full.
When you teach ELL's, will your approach be to consider their learning styles and modify your teaching style to meet their needs? And if so,
This is a really interesting topic. Thanks for sharing it. I didn't know some of this stuff about China's educational system. I never really about about learning in other culture and how that may affect ELLs. This really made me think about how I view ELL students.
ReplyDeleteIt's weird to hear that Chinese teachers just drill their students with information and no intellectual thinking. I was under the impression that the U.S. is behind in its science teaching performance. To me, I'd almost think we're ahead of the game teaching inquiry and harnessing the generating an argument mode of understanding.
ReplyDelete