For many years in
China, the entrance examinations to
middle school, to senior high schools or to colleges are denounced by the
public. The standard exams focus on test the memories, understandings of what
the students learn for the past few years, and the entrance examinations will
decide in what kind of schools the children will go to, or can partially say
the entrance examinations decide the children’s fate, especially the exams to
college. The schools will be graded based on the entrance examination ratios,
the teachers will be ranked according to the ratios as well, and the families
of the children will be happier or lose face depending on the entrance
examination results of their children. And for the children, they have to spend
a lot of time be trained how to give right answers of the tests a lot, and have
very limited time to play or to develop other skills or interest like music,
social, or arts. The teachers and their parents will decide how they spend
their daily life.
Recently, the situation becomes a little bit
better, since the generation who were born in 1980s becoming the parents now.
The people who were born in 1980s were the first generation after the single
child policy, since they took a lot of pressure from the school and parents in examination,
they normally hope their children to have a happier life. But still, the whole
situation for children is still dull.
Gardner (Berger, 2014) talked about 9 kinds
of mutual intelligences of human beings which include linguistic, logical
mathematical, musical, spatial, bodily-kinesthetic, interpersonal,
intrapersonal, naturalistic, and existential. For the children in school years,
in what ways they are assessed and considered normal development are very
important to help the children become aware of their own abilities, skills and
help them to develop self-concept. But in schools, the assessment mainly are
for the cognitive parts.
Since children develop socialphysical,
socialcognitive, and socialpsychological together to become a well-being person,
I think it is important to assess the whole three areas. A genius maybe feels lonely
because they cannot get along well with others, an athlete maybe is not good at
academic learning. The aim of assessment is to help the children develop in
balance or to focus on their advantages better. And another important role of
assessment is to have the children form accurate self-assessment in their life.
They know well who they are, what are their advantages and disadvantages, they
are self confident and live a happy life.
Reference:
Berger, 2014, The Developing Person Through Childhood
Xia Li
ReplyDeleteRealistically, children cannot remember one year of information after summer vacation but two years! I cannot believe that in China they expected children to recall what they learned in the past two years, no wonder the schools were being denounced. I am happy to hear that standards have improved through the years. I believe that for any parent all we really ever want for our children is happiness and prosperity.
Shelita
Hi Xia Li,
ReplyDeleteThanks for sharing more insight on the school system in China. I studied the Japanese school culture during my Bachelor's program and seeing your post, it doesn't surprise me much. I learned that many Japanese mothers pick their prenatal doctors and birth hospitals based on the rate of academic success cam from the children born there. I still find it insane that Chinese parents put so much into their child's schooling that they tend to forget the other realms to balance the child out. It hurts to see that so many children may not live to their fullest potential all because of how they were placed from the entrance exams. I am glad to hear that some parents are becoming more lax and allowing the children to be more social and creative. Great post!