The Current Situation of Parent Education between China and America

石若瑾

【摘要】不同國家，不同文化下的父母在教育子女的方法上面也存在著較大差異。由于社會體系、文化背景和教育目標的不同，中國與美國家長在家庭教育的許多方面也存在著較大的差異。本文聚焦于引起廣泛關注的“虎媽”事件，并由此事件進一步探討中美兩國家庭教育現狀的不同。

【關鍵詞】父母教育差異 中國 美國

【Abstract】Parents in different countries have different ways in educating their children. Because of the different social systems, culture backgrounds and education aims, parent education for the children is different in many aspects between China and America. This thesis focuses on the current situation of parent education between China and America. The inspiration is caused by Tiger Mom, a Chinese American mother who is famous for her very Chinese way of educating her two daughters.

【中圖分類號】G78 【文獻標識碼】A 【文章編號】2095-3089（2014）03-0054-01

Tiger Mom, a forty-eight-year-old Chinese American mother Amy Chua is known all over the world nowadays for her very Chinese way of educating her two daughters. As a professor in Yale University, this mother not only led her two daughters to Carnegie Hall, but also took them to the front page of mass media in America. Amy Chua also became the cover person of TIME.

What made Chua become such a hot issue is her totally different and strict way of educating children in Americans eyes. As a Chinese-American, Tiger Mom Amy Chua holds the point that the strict Chinese family education is far more superior to the American way. In order to help the younger girl Lulu play the piano adroitly, she forced her to keep practicing from dawn to night, with no water, no food and no bathroom during her practice. Eventually Lulu got the opportunity to perform in the world famous Carnegie Hall.

Chua declared that the exceptionally strict practice is the key to the childrens success. There are ten restraining orders in her family, including “no watching movies, no spending night at friends, no failing in getting A in the exams, no giving up practicing piano and violin”.

Tiger Moms way of educating children attracted attention of both American and Chinese mothers. It also led to a huge global debate about the comparison between Chinese and American parent education.

Educationalist Xiong Bingqi said that knowledge, capability and caliber are three key factors which determine ones life greatly. Parent education in China emphasizes knowledge alone.However, knowledge can be acquired by long time practice. The more time you spend on study, the more knowledge you will obtain. So the high scores Chinese children get is the natural result of Chinese way of education.

The training of capability and caliber are the shortage in Chinese way of education, because they cant be acquired simply by extending training time or increase the intensity of training. “It is generally believed in China that entering an elite school is the key to future success. This opinion is one-sided, and we need to change it desperately from the view of life-long development.” Xiong also said.

Children who are brought up under the environment of Chinese education show a lack of the social skills of communicating with others, and they also lack the social care.

According to the observation of a Harvard graduate, Ned, what the Chinese students really lack is not creativity. “They can write beautiful essays; they also can achieve successful result from the experiments in laboratory.” But they share a character which is they seldom consider things from the point that “what can I do to change this world; how to make this world become different; how to make this world a better one”. What they think mainly focus on “how to find myself a suitable job; how to make more money; how to make my family live a better live under the existing system.”

From all that above, it can be seen that many people have deep interest and debate a lot about Chinese and American education. Education is a social behavior which nurtures people and passes down social culture and experience. As an old Chinese saying: “Parents are childrens best teacher.” Parent education is the earliest and most important one of all the education. It plays an essential role in forming ones character and world view. With the development of social economy, Chinese parents are paying more attention to education. However, due to the lack of theoretical support, many parents hold big misunderstanding in family education. Although some parents do know the key role of parent education, they do not use appropriate way when educating their children. Understanding and absorbing the valuable methods of parent education in other countries can encourage parents to pay more attention to family education on one hand; on the other hand, it can help them to find better ways in educating next generation. Although we Chinese cant absorb American ways of education totally because of different social environment and historical reasons, still this open world is combining different educating modes and sources around the world together. As a result, every country can find and carry out the most appropriate mode to their families.

References：

[1]Eugenia Hepworth Berger. 2003. Parents as Partners in Education, Families and Schools Working Together. New Jersey: Merrill Prentice Hall

[2]陳鐵梅，方可成，2011, “別無選擇的中國媽媽”，《南方周末》第4期：A2-A4

[3]黃菜方，黃小勇，2009，“中美家庭教育的比較及啟示”，《武漢理工大學學報》（社會科學版）第4期：101-104