Equality, Trade, and Idealism in Chinese International Schools

by James | Jun 30, 2020 | JamesEd

I work with international and private schools in China. The forces of equality, trade, and idealism have had huge impacts on education, and are rooted in Chinese government and society.

Equality, a fundamental force in the ideals of communism, in education has pushed the Chinese government to eliminate testing as an admissions step for private schools in compulsory grade levels. Instead, students are put into an electronic lottery and selected at random (Lin Shujuan and He Qi, 2020). This aligns private schools with public schools. Some parents have been disappointed by this ruling, as the previous admissions testing was seen as a way to surround high-quality students with peers.

Honestly, I agree with this edict, philosophically. In practice, I will observe the results of this policy, and am eager to discuss the impacts with schools and parents. I believe the greater effect is to set the tone of education, and expect to hear words like “equality” spoken and referenced with greater confidence in educational forums and news cycles. I believe this “consumer confidence”, to borrow an American term, in equality is more important than the lottery itself.

Trade is a huge force, and has massively influenced education in China. The presence of international schools in China is directly due to Deng Xiaoping policy that trade and industrialization was more important than military investments, setting a political and social agenda that focused on international trade (Vogel, 2011). Deng’s Open Door Policy went further in explicitly stating that China would encourage international investors to come into China (Naughton, 1993), which necessitated international schools to open in order to teach the children of foreign investors.

Personally, I would like to call out a specific detail in regards to trade and foreign investment driving international schools. Due to the difference in languages and cultures, written contracts and instructions are massively important in determining if a project was performed successfully. In contrast, local trade between Chinese partners relies more on relationships and spoken generalizations. We can see this in international schools, which are managed by Chinese but consumed by foreigners. Systems like International Baccalaureate are successful in part because of deep and detailed documentation. Compare this to Project Based Learning, which has documentation with less specificity and more generalizations. I.B. is scaling more rapidly compared to PBL, and I believe a big reason is the documentation.

Thirdly, idealism as a philosophy has led to teachers needing to be experts. Idealism is pushed by political and social parties, and has deep roots in Chinese culture. The Chinese university admissions test, the Gaokao is in place as a method of achieving equality in education and society (Wang, 2013). I refer to this as “idealism” because equality is an idea that is pursued strongly in China, even in this case where methods might be unreasonable in achieving equality but do accurately represent equality. The promotion and propaganda around communism as a state philosophy rely upon idealism, as the people struggle to achieve a state of communism despite facing many hurdles.

In my views, this is similar to the promotion and propaganda around Democracy in my home country. I feel that idealism is a tool used by both countries to manage and direct the sentiments of society towards systems that each country’s founders desired. It appears to be quite effective, and I would further conclude that it has been beneficial.

Equality, Trade, and Idealism are political and social forces which have influenced international schools in China, and it’s important to understand their origins in order to best arrange new policy with the buy-in of parents and administrators.

References

LIN Shujuan and HE Qi. (2020, March 11). Shanghai regulates private school enrollment – Chinadaily.com.cn. China Daily Newspaper. Retrieved June 29, 2020, from  www.chinadaily.com.cn/a/202003/11/WS5e68e80da31012821727e45b.html

WANG, Y. (2013). National Higher Education Entrance Examination. In Hayhoe R. & Ross H. (Authors) & ZHA Q. (Ed.), Education in China: Educational History, Models, and Initiatives(pp. 350-353). Great Barrington, Massachusetts: Berkshire. Retrieved June 29, 2020, from www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt1j0pszw.82

VOGEL, E. (2011). From Revolutionary to Builder to Reformer,: 1904–1969. In Deng Xiaoping and the Transformation of China(pp. 15-46). Cambridge, Massachusetts; London, England: Harvard University Press. Retrieved June 29, 2020, from www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt2jbw2f.6

NAUGHTON, B. (1993). Deng Xiaoping: The Economist. The China Quarterly, (135), 491-514. Retrieved June 29, 2020, from www.jstor.org/stable/654099

Dewey’s Connections to IB Education

by James | Jun 25, 2020 | JamesEd

John Dewey, an education advocate from the turn of the 19^th century, wrote and spoke of ideals currently found in classrooms where teachers try to move away from lecture-based testing-assessed education models. Today, readers can see many of his heartfelt ideals in Twitter and Facebook education channels when authors post about hands-on learning, PBL, International Baccalaureate, maker education, and design thinking. We can even see evidence of Dewey’s principles in Chinese education systems. Evidence of his writings are present around the world, though he may not always be referenced.

Though the principles of Dewey’s beliefs did not necessarily originate from him, he is considered an origin for the modern popularity of many of these ideas. Dewey writes of some particular purposes of education, the connection is clear. Fully gaining control of yourself and your abilities was part of Dewey’s “pedagogic creed” (Talebi). The assumption that there is a valuable “self” to master, and that many important skills are internal, is something that is hard to focus on in a content- and score-based classroom. An effective teacher can pursue these principles though experiential projects, which often highlight another principle of Dewey’s, the awareness and active contribution to “the social consciousness” (Talebi). Self-mastery and participation in a social consciousness can be at different metaphysical ends; however, it is frequent across philosophies, and even religions, to situate the two as codependent. Dewey saw the two as the fundamental basis for creating a democratic citizen and society (Mintz). This represents a faith that base human qualities are “good”, rather than the goodness coming from inputs of culture and information.

Self-mastery has aligned well with American ideas about self-sufficiency and individual righteousness, and the concepts . In students projects that focus on community service, self-mastery is an expected skill. The IBO.org website, a resourced for I.B. communities, shares that “The International Baccalaureate program is dedicated to … getting our students engaged in real world problems” (“Project Based Learning”). Teachers managing projects where students can address real world problems frequently depend on students to plan independently and self-assess. Research is coordinated by teachers, but empathy for the situations found and the definition of struggles is often left to students, who are encouraged to reflect and generate this information based on their own feelings about the researched content.

Participation in the social consciousness is evident in many progressive classrooms, and we can see some clearly defined examples in the I.B. system. In 2017, Michael Roth, president of Wesleyan University, highlighted Dewey’s visit to China in the early 20^th century and the appreciation the government had for Dewey’s belief that individuals should, as a primary drive, productively support society (Strauss). A century later, many international schools support the I.B. system and find relatable goals with local parents on this topic. Chinese public schools rely less upon self-mastery and more upon content-mastery, but nevertheless combine that mastery with a goal of supporting society and participating in the social consciousness. As China grows in terms of education and economy, it may be that the western world will gain insight into the educational practices of public and private schools. The language barrier and relative lack of individual blog or public social-media posts currently inhibit this, however the flow of educational topics into China is plentiful.

The idea that humans are inherently good crops up throughout Dewey’s principles and I.B. principles as well. Dewey disfavored the idea of a one-way knowledge transfer from expert to novice (Talebi). I.B. encourages research and discussion, in part as a way to avoid this one-way flow of information. Dewey furthermore believed that teachers have a 3.     “…unique responsibility to produce psychological and social goods…” noting that the skills are used in life, not mentioning the workplace (Talebi). This priority of life skills over work skills speaks to an assumption that humans are inherently meaningful and beneficial. Though, it should be noted that Dewey did not lay out his principles as a requirement for every teacher, noting that such things as “building character” in students could be achieved by the most interested and capable teachers, and lacking any chastisement of teachers who did not meet this particular goal. One consequence of this is that it leaves an educational system an option to adopt his principles in some areas of their schools, but not in all areas, and still be able to agree with Dewey’s plans. This may be because Dewey felt that his system was incomplete, or that a state of being incomplete was necessary for a system to be successful.

Teachers at modern day I.B. schools are often hired when their curiosity, empathy, and motivation characteristics reveal themselves to be a priority in the teacher’s personality and behavior. This is at odds, or at least in parallel, with a requirement of expertise in particular subjects. Indeed, as the basic subjects of Maths, Humanities, and Language develop into courses that require students to interact with the community, improve their own self-control, and perform creative studies into high school (rather than pure knowledge consumption), teachers are less able to prepare for the classroom through subject matter expertise. The structure of I.B. lessons require a teacher to behave more like a project manager, and to develop students into productive staff. This ties the success of the group together, which can feel quite risky, and requires a faith in human beings.

In China, where Dewey spent two years, he was regarded as “Dewey the Great” (Strauss). Though the government does not currently endorse his complete philosophy, his advocacy of hands-on learning remains as a reference for I.B. schools. The same can be said of schools in the U.S. who are busy communicating changes of educational style to parents who were not raised in such a system. The gradual change of education is something that Dewey seemed set on, with change being a larger driving factor than the final unspoken goal.

References

Mintz, A. I. (n.d.). “What is the purpose of education? Dewey’s challenge to his contemporaries.” [pdf] Retrieved June 22, 2020,https://www.academia.edu/23693775/What_is_the_Purpose_of_Education_Deweys_challenge_to_his_contemporaries

Talebi, Kandan. (2015, September). “John Dewey- Philosopher and educational reformer. European Journal of Educational Studies.” [pdf] Retrieved June 22, 20120 from https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED564712.pdf

“Project Based Learning” (n.d.). “PBL Brings Authenticity to International Baccalaureate: MyPBLWorks.” PBL Works, Buck Institute, my.pblworks.org/resource/blog/pbl_brings_authenticity_to_international_baccalaureate.

Strauss, Valerie. (2017, January). “Why Pragmatic Liberal Education Matters Now More than Ever.” The Washington Post, WP Company, 13 Jan. 2017, www.washingtonpost.com/news/answer-sheet/wp/2017/01/13/why-pragmatic-liberal-education-matters-now-more-than-ever/

Classroom Management in I.B. and PBL settings

by James | Jun 25, 2020 | JamesEd

In a classroom based around Project Based Learning, new teachers are thrown into a situation that they have likely never observed. Classroom management is quite different, and the areas they must master can appear unfamiliar. The teacher’s school may have adopted PBL as its sole system, or is partially based around PBL such as in some I.B. schools, or is traditionally-oriented in its accreditation and history but with room for teacher’s to deviate into other educational styles. “The IB program places structured inquiry at the heart of the learning process” (Project Based Learning, n.d.) and the change is quite radical relative to more traditional public school classes.

In the U.S. most public schools have teachers who spent their entire K-12 career observing the teaching style that they would one day enact. Indeed, in most of humanity’s history, children have been raised observing elders who were proficient at an activity that the children would later take up as adults. It is only in recent history, less than centuries and in many situations a matter of decades, that children have not been able to observe experts do jobs and then grow up to do those same jobs using the same techniques. Raising crops, slaughtering animals, making durable goods, and construction have had stable technology used across most of the world. In the modern-day U.S. household, children engage in activities that their parents have never seen. Adults are exposed to rapidly changing activities and cultures in their own activities as well. The progress of change is rapid, nearly everywhere, and each industry needs special consideration to best take advantage of the affair.

New teachers in a PBL classroom would be well served to crucially focus on classroom discipline. Discipline is not a first and singular area of responsibility that should be focused on, but rather a consideration to keep at a high rank when designing a plan, and in the midst of managing a classroom. Motivation and purpose are radically altered in an I.B. school, focusing more on self-mastery, knowledge creation, and social service (International Baccalaureate, 2010). “Project Based Learning is finding a natural home within the framework of International Baccalaureate programs” (Project Based Learning, n.d.), and we can find that classroom management across the two has similar focuses. In a traditional classroom content knowledge, endurance, and focus are the targets to motivate students towards, and success in hitting these targets is seen as an excellent and challenging purpose that will propel a student into successful adulthood. Discipline in a such a classroom must direct students towards independence, which can feel like an opposing idea. Students need to be asked to look inward for reasons, rather than respecting the words of the teacher at face value.

To help organize the concept of discipline in a PBL classroom, reviewing the methods of communication with students and between students can be very helpful. Communication is nearly a non-skill in a traditional classroom, relegated below a subset of communication: presentation. A PBL classroom can often appear out of control to a casual observer, as communication is being practiced along numerous non-traditional vectors. Student-to-student, student-to-class, and teacher-to-dynamic groups stand out brightly in a classroom. When teachers communicate to dynamic groups, it often involves students self-nominating themselves into such a group. For example, students deciding that they need more information on the topic at hand and listening, while students who already understand move ahead. In a traditional classroom this group of students would likely have no students nominate themselves, if the subject matter was not immediately pressuring or enjoyable. A teacher new to a PBL classroom should ask themselves how to gradually improve communication in their classroom, and how that will tie into discipline. A common and useful guiding path is making sure students are “on task”, and focused on their work, even if they are talking to each other.

Organization can be unsupported by a teacher’s school, yet massively helpful in starting a new class, and doubly so when starting a new class as a new teacher. Many students in a PBL classroom are often not familiar with PBL processes and require training and experience to be effective members of their classroom community. Visual displays and physical arrangements of materials and furniture can often provide faster and more direct instruction than a teacher’s explanation. For example, public task lists and task-oriented physical spaces can lead a student to independently follow a work plan, rather than having that student rely upon instructions from the teacher. If the teacher can successfully motivate the student into wanting to achieve the goals set forth in the class, plus organize the classroom in such a fashion as to give the student independence of action, then the teacher will find that they have added one capable ally who will work towards the goal and help recruit others to work towards the goal. The feedback cycle is virtuous and can grow class efficiency with multiplier effects achieved by the students.

Of the seven areas of classroom management defined by Cini (2017), Discipline, Communication, and Organization are essential for new teachers in a PBL classroom to focus on. Classroom Design, Rules, Scheduling, and Instructional Technique will evolve from these, and be much easier to handle with the students supporting the teacher.

Michael Roth, president of Wesleyan University, wrote, “Despite the commonplace rhetoric of interdisciplinarity, academics seem all too content creating languages and cultures that are insular. We have gotten really good at education as a form of narrowing, while what we really need is to provide students with intellectual cross-training, and for that we need faculty who can communicate across a variety of fields.” (Strauss, 2017)

The conflict that he refers to is at a university level and speaks to the inability of teachers to collaborate with other teachers to effect change. It is important to note here because it is symptomatic of knowledge being generated at centralized locations and spread out through established channels. Teachers are often being managed at their workplaces through traditional means and rarely experience the type of innovative management that they provide to students. However, as the population of PBL and I.B. educators gain experience and age, there is opportunity to adjust systems and implement change at organizational levels above the classroom. District supervisors and politicians who have benefitted from improved styles of classroom management will one day exist in greater numbers, and will be more capable than ever in implanting their preferences across society.

References

“International Baccalaureate”. (2010). The IB Learner Profile: A singular capacity for invigorating campus life. Retrieved June 22, 2020, https://www.ibo.org/globalassets/publications/recognition/learnerprofile-en.pdf

“Project Based Learning” (n.d.). “PBL Brings Authenticity to International Baccalaureate: MyPBLWorks.” PBL Works, Buck Institute. Retrieved June 22, 2020, my.pblworks.org/resource/blog/pbl_brings_authenticity_to_international_baccalaureate.

Strauss, Valerie. (2017, January). “Why Pragmatic Liberal Education Matters Now More than Ever.” The Washington Post, WP Company, 13 Jan. 2017, www.washingtonpost.com/news/answer-sheet/wp/2017/01/13/why-pragmatic-liberal-education-matters-now-more-than-ever/

Cini, S. (2017).  Seven Key Elements for Effective Classroom Management. Retrieved June 22, 2020, https://classroom.synonym.com/seven-elements-effective-classroom-management-6562940.html