My Taiwan Adventure

I was teaching my most advanced class (eleven-thirteen year olds) the words for subjects that come up in school (geography, science, history and math). I started listing things in a mock schedule, North American style. I stopped the list at 3:30 pm and the class looked at me expectantly. With a smile I said, "That's it."

May frowned at me, and chewed a little on the gum she thought she was hiding. "Huh? Teacher, not good," she waved a finger at the chart. Her cheeks were twitching around her shifting gum-chewing teeth.

I arched an eyebrow, "No, May. It's not good. Spit out your gum." I point at the back of the classroom. (Ha! See? Really, I'm a teacher now.) "You can't practice English while you're chewing gum."

May clomps rather glumly the seven point five steps to the back of the class. Everybody else is staring at the board. I can see them thinking that I've stopped to make May spit out her gum. I smirk a little and wait for the questions to begin. At the back of the room Elva smiles with me. She's been to North America and is willing to play along for a minute or two only to end up trumping her classmates by shouting, "Teacher, I KNOW!" rather smugly after I explain that students in North America only go to school until 3 or 4 pm. After getting over their shock, the students wanted to pick up and move just so they didn't have to go to school for so many hours in a day. They also liked the concept of recess and not napping at lunch time.

I feel some genuine sadness that the kids aren't really allowed to be kids here. They are expected to conform at an incredibly early age and then perform like the rest of their classmates, but better. I leave to your imagination what happens to a child the age of 7 or 8 who's body and brain aren't done developing that is stuck in a classroom for about 10 hours a day under a constant pressure to achieve 100% marks.

I have a question for the schools in this country. If children are learning fruit names (apple, banana, orange etc.) during English class in their regular school, then WHY are they learning words like traditional, induction cooker and comfortable in their bushi-ban English lessons? I'll stop short of a full rant, because I already read one on a friend's blog today, but goodness gracious it makes my blood simmer when I see the quality of 'education' these kids are getting.

Most schools here don't have time for individuality. Exhibit A - I give you the twins, K. and C. After a few weeks of vainly trying to guess who was who in class, the girls pointed to their student badges today and kindly informed me that one is always xxxx22 and the other xxxx33. My faux pax for not acknowledging their student id numbers that they must wear at their public school sooner, but I'm just not used to referring to anybody as a number. Exhibit B - I've taught in a prestigious private school in Taipei. In Grade 4 there were 42 children per class and my classes were 40 minutes long. That makes less than one minute of class time per student. Parents were, of course, rich enough for private school and expected to pay a tutor for personal time.

I question over and over the level of real learning the education system here accomplishes. Unless a parent can afford a tutor or an after-school class, you really are left to your own devices when it comes to achievement as a student. And after 10 hours in school, what 10 year old will have the energy to, or the interest in, further study?

Sometimes I watch my smart students fail if the test isn't poured into them almost verbatim. Eighty percent is a pass in my class, and most students are near tears if they don't score 90% or above. And who's too blame for this whole scene? Me, for not ruthlessly cramming vocabulary words into their head? The students, for wanting to play a little, while they are still kids? The schools, for teaching them inadequately? Or the parents, for making them go to school for 10 or 12 hours a day?

I have no answers, only frustration at a system that I have no power to change. Flat out, I think it sucks. I think maybe some of the Taiwanese think it sucks too, but who will change the status-quo? After-all who doesn't want to brag about their kids getting 100's all the time? Maybe it's North America that has it wrong with accepting grades as low as 50 to 65 to pass a class. Certainly, the United States can't be too boastful about it's educational system and beyond attending, I'm not qualified to make any kind of accurate statements about Canadian schools. I just wish that there were some way that students world-wide could have their unique learning styles valued and honored in an educational system instead of being forced to memorize things they'd just as soon forget.

Oh-oh, did I rant there? Um.... I just had to get that off my chest. I'm done now. :)

T. Destiny

I don't think the US educational system is that bad. There's an education to be had in public schools. You get out of it what you put into it, really. It's true that people who aren't that interested in education aren't pushed as far as they would be in east Asian countries.

However, when you look at the top people in nearly any academic field, more than half were educated in the US.

If you look at the top universities in the world 17 of the top twenty are in the US, two are in the UK, and only one is in Asia. Also, of those US universities in the top 20, more than half are public schools.  

_____________________

Mark, I appreciate your response to my post. My primary commentary is that I feel sorry for children who have to engage in competition in order to feel valued. This of course, is making grand assumptions about the children and their lives that, in fact, may be inaccurate. However, I can only speak from my personal observations as a teacher. While I agree that there is an education 'to be had' in just about any situation, I still maintain that the US educational system (like all systems,) is flawed.

And if I were to critique the educational system in America, I'd present elementary education as my case study. It has been consistently shown with that American students score lower on standardized math and science tests (TIMMS)
than those from Singapore, Taiwan, Russia, Canada, Finland, Hungary, the Netherlands and Australia. I particularly enjoyed reading this site.

I can appreciate the high level of education available to post secondary students in the United States. (At what price?!) Of course, all studies like the one you and I have presented are subject to controversy and debate.

Incidentally, I enjoy reading about your school and quietly envy the results that I can see you achieving. It must be hard work, but what a joy to have the students actually LEARN!  

_____________________

Post a Comment