by: Alain Thys
I first caught onto this in an issue of Adbusters of a few months ago, where it was stated that China had taken the decision a few years ago to transform their complete educational system from being "teacher centric" to "pupil centric".
In other words, rather than organising classes the "teacher-centric" way the Europeans taught the world, the objective has become to create learning experiences which focus on personal interest, creativity, self-reliance, social skills, and an interest for life-long learning. With over with over 200,000,000 students and an amount of schools and teachers to match, such an overhaul is not a simple one.
After reading around a little more about the topic, it's amazing how big this movement is across Asia. It also makes me wonder what will happen when the West gets confronted with this new generation of Asians, who play by rules we are always talk about, yet never really apply.
Add to this an ease with new media which is even greater than with our kids (if you want to know what I mean have a walk through downtown Shanghai), and I think it would warrant a proverbial "Houston, we have a problem"
Perhaps our educational system needs some shock therapy.
Original Post: http://alainthys.blogging.com/blog/_archives/2005/8/4/1106598.html
