Education Chinese Style – Part 5

February 11, 2010

In America many children are bored with school and use excuses to not study or read. This has led to high drop-out rates.

Here are the most common complaints heard over the years:

“I don’t like to read.”
“Why do you give us so much home work?”
“This class is no fun.”
“The reason I don’t do the work is because this class is boring.”

An American High School

“You failed me.”
“You are boring.”

It was bad enough to hear this from students. The parents of many failing students I taught made the same accusations. Not once in thirty years did I hear one parent take the blame. It was always the teacher’s fault when their kid didn’t pass a class or improve their reading ability.

A lot of the blame for this attitude is because of the self-esteem movement that was based on flawed logic proven with research to be wrong. It seems, that once the Titanic was on course, there was no stopping the ship of education from hitting the iceberg.

See Part 1

Lloyd Lofthouse is the author of the award winning novels My Splendid Concubine and Our Hart.

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Education Chinese Style – Part 4

February 11, 2010

In America, liberal minded professors talk about ways to limit entrance to the qualified and allow the unqualified in. I witnessed this dumbing down of America many times during my thirty years as a public school teacher, and I refused to take part. I challenged my students and was always under attack from parents and administrators. Some parents demanded that their children be removed from my class so the child’s self-esteem wouldn’t suffer.

In China, students spend most of their school years intensely studying to take exams that will allow a few to get into college. The universities in China  have room for only a few eligible students. For that reason, after school, many students are tutored or take private classes to get ready for the next school day.

Chinese elementary students where the pressure starts.

My wife told me a story about a boy she knew when she was growing up in Shanghai. His grades were horrible. When his parents found out, they took off their shoes and started to beat their son to death. The teacher had to step in and save the boy. The parents did not blame the teacher for the boy’s lack of success. They blamed themselves and the child.

 See Part 1

Lloyd Lofthouse is the author of the award winning novels My Splendid Concubine and Our Hart.

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Education Chinese Style – Part 1/7

February 10, 2010

Words are cheap. Actions speak loud, and the Chinese are not smarter than everyone else is.  They just work harder and have different values than Americans. The best way to learn about another culture is by comparing and contrasting that culture with yours to see the similarities and differences.

With that in mind, let’s examine Christianity first. Emperor Constantine lived 280-337 AD. He ruled the Roman Empire and is responsible for Christianity eventually becoming the state religion a century later. From that time, Christianity, more than any other influence, set the tone for morality and ethics in the West.

One of my primary Biblical sources is a Concordance of the Holy Bible given to me by a student teacher in 1982. When I checked to see what that Concordance had to say about the importance of ‘education’, I found nothing in the index under that word. I then looked up the word ‘learning’ and discovered six passages. I also looked up ‘teacher’ and there were a few references but nothing significant. That hunt to discover the importance of learning to early Christians was a revelation.  Those passages from the Bible will be covered in Part 2.

Also recommended The Reasons Why China is Studying Singapore

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too. 

If you want to subscribe to iLook China, there is a “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar. 

5 Comments | American culture, Chinese Culture, education, parenting | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , | Permalink
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A Maternal Assault Against Pornography

February 8, 2010

I’ve written about piety and what it means to the Chinese, and I’ve written about heroes from China’s past that the Chinese still honor. Now I’m going to write about some of China’s modern day heroes.

General Yue Fei (1103-1142)

I’ve read complaints about China’s control over the Internet and media. The Western media hates that one. Imagine, not being able to practice Yellow Journalism with a potential audience of 1.3 billion.  Think of all the copy sold.

 Today, I read an example of Chinese common sense the rest of the world could copy. In the war against pornography, China has recruited moms. Who better to protect children?  Even most Westerners should agree that pornography is not a good thing.  Polluting young minds and making money from it should be ranked alongside heroin or crack with a death sentence or at last a life sentence after castration.

Since I’m married to a Chinese mother, and I know how dedicated Chinese moms are to their children, I’d rather have a U.S. Marine parked on my butt. Beware pornographers. You may have met your match.

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too. 

If you want to subscribe to iLook China, there is a “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar. 

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Posted by Lloyd Lofthouse

The First of all Virtues – Part 9/9

February 1, 2010

There are always exceptions when it comes to practicing piety. Even in China, there will be the occasional rude individual. The thing is, I haven’t seen or heard one yet, and I have visited China many times since 1999.

I did have a disrespectful, American born Asian student (once) during the thirty years I was a teacher.

I also had a small number of hard-working, respectful students from all ethnic groups—even those that were American born, but those types seem to be a dying breed in Western culture.

My best students were usually immigrants that came to the United States after living in their birth country for several years.

In addition, I had one American born student enter high school as a freshman after being home taught for eight years by his Caucasian, conservative Christian parents. He was a great person—polite and he worked hard.

He never said, “Hey, old man.”

Visit this site and you will quickly discover that someone does not agree with me about China. China, rude, dirty and annoying.  Maybe this person has a Chinese face.

The Chinese can be very abrupt and rude with each other but usually treat foreign faces with respect.

Return to The First of All Virtues Part 1 or return to Part 8

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too.

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4 Comments | American culture, Chinese Culture, Confucianism, cultural differences, family values, parenting | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , | Permalink
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