It is better to teach fish to fish.

[Post] Dear! This is how Americans educate primary schools.
When I took my nine-year-old son to the United States and sent him to an American elementary school not far from the apartment, it is like giving my favorite things to a person I don't trust to keep them safe. What kind of school is this! Students can laugh loudly in the classroom. They can play for at least two hours a day and go home from school at less than three in the afternoon. What impressed me most was that there were no textbooks.
　　
After seeing the fourth-grade Chinese Elementary School Textbook taken by my son, the golden-eyed American female teacher said in a gentle manner, "I can tell you that before the sixth grade, he didn't need to learn mathematics !" In the face of her smiling face, I felt like a sap. For a time, I really suspected that bringing my son to the United States was the most stupid thing in my life.
　　
One day later, I watched my son go to school with an empty schoolbag every day, and my heart couldn't stop worrying. In China, he started from the first year of elementary school, his school bag was full and heavy. From the first grade to the fourth grade, he changed three school bags. One bag was bigger than one, and people felt that the weight of "Knowledge" was increasing. In the United States, he has no burden. Can this be called school? After one semester, I called my son and asked him what impressed him most. He smiled and gave me an American English sentence: "Freedom !" These two words are like bricks on my head.
At this time, I really miss Chinese education. It seems that they have a deeper understanding of why Chinese children are always able to win the gold medal in the Olympic learning competition internationally. But this is already the case? It can only be resigned.
　　
Unconsciously, a year has passed, and my son has grown a lot in English. Instead of going home after school, he often goes to the library and carries back a huge schoolbag from time to time. Asked him what he was doing by borrowing so many books at a time. He looked at the books he had borrowed while holding a computer and said, "homework ."
　　
Is this a job? When I look at the title of my child on a computer screen, I am a little dumbfounded-"yesterday and today in China". Do you dare to do this big question, even a doctor?
　　
So I strictly asked who the idea was, and my son told me: The teacher said that the United States is a country of immigration, and asked every student to write an article about the country where their ancestors lived. It is required to summarize the history, geography, and culture of the country, analyze its differences with the United States, and describe its views. I have heard of it, and I have no strength to sigh. I really don't know what it would be like to let a ten-year-old child do a project that even adults may not be able to do? I only think that if a ten-year-old child is not well-educated, I am afraid he will not even be able to eat in the future.
In a few days, the son completed the assignment. Unexpectedly, I printed a booklet with more than 20 pages. From the Yellow River to the hieroglyphics, from the Silk Road to the five-star red flag ...... Busy. I did not approve of it, nor did I criticize it, because I was a little worried. First, I saw my son split the article into chapters and sections. Second, I listed the bibliography at the end of the article. I think this is a way of writing that I used after I was a graduate student. At that time, I was thirty years old.
　　
Soon, another son's essay came out again. This is "How do I see human culture". If the last assignment still has a scope to follow, this time it is really no small margin. My son sincerely asked me, "Is dumplings a culture ?" In order not to delay future generations, I had to consult the authoritative tool book with my son. After a great deal of effort, we have completed the repetitive and repetitive changes from abstraction to concrete and to abstraction. The son sat down in front of the computer for several nights to write a story. I can't help but smile. How can a pupil understand the concept of "culture", which is infinitely rich, extended, and uncertain? I hope that my son will not be interested in dumplings or steamed stuffed buns. In education in the United States, my son has undoubtedly made an article. This time, ten pages are printed and his own covers are printed. This article is followed by a reference book. He proudly said to me: "What are you talking about culture? In fact, it is super simple-it is what people create to make people enjoy ." That self-confidence seems to have found the truth that others cannot find. Later, the child brought back the homework that the teacher had read with the instructor's approval: "the original intention of my assignment was to allow the children to broaden their horizons and actively think and read the results of their homework, I often enter the realm that I want my children to enter." Ask your son what this comment means.
The son said, the teacher was not proud of us, but she was shocked. "Isn't it ?" Ask me, son.
　　
I'm speechless. How do I think this kid understands so many things at once? When I think about it again, it's no wonder that there is anything I dare to say about, even if I am a child of cultural issues?
　　
At the end of the sixth year, the assignment left by the teacher was a series of questions about the Second World War. "Who do you think is responsible for this war ?" "What do you think is the cause of Nazi Germany's failure ?" "If you are a senior advisor to President Harry Potter, what attitude will you take to the US atomic bomb ?" "Do you think there was only one way to end the war with an atomic bomb ?" "What do you think is the best way to avoid war today ?" -If I saw this problem two years ago, I would surely complain: Where is the job? It is clearly the preliminary training for the candidate! At this time, I have been able to follow the truth calmly.

In these questions, schools and teachers transmit a humanitarian value to children, guide them to pay attention to the fate of mankind, and let them learn how to think about major problems. There is no standard answer to these questions in the classroom. Some of the answers may require children to seek answers all their lives. Looking at my 12-year-old son reading materials with great enthusiasm to complete these assignments, I can't help but remember what I did when I learned the history of the second war, the conclusions in the book are known as pedantic and used as the Bible. Otherwise, how can we make a bright future through the exam? At this time, I was thinking that when we pursue knowledge, we often repeat the conclusions of our predecessors much more than we think. Without thinking, it is difficult to create a new one.
　　
When my son graduated from elementary school, he was able to use the computer and micro-film system in the library to find all kinds of text and image materials he needed. One day, we both argued about the feeding habits of lions and leopards. The next day, he borrowed a videotape from the library about this animal from the National Geographic Society of America. He took me and watched it and discussed it. The child knows where to find the answer to what he doesn't know.

My son's changes prompted me to go back to primary education in the United States. I found that although primary schools in the United States did not instill a lot of knowledge in their classrooms, they tried to direct their children's eyes to the boundless sea of knowledge outside the school. They wanted to let their children know, all the time and space of life are their learning classes. They didn't let their children memorize a lot of formulas and theorems, but they tried to tell them how to think about problems, they teach their children how to look for answers in the unfamiliar fields. They never divide their students into three, six, or nine tests. Instead, they do their best to affirm all their efforts and praise all their conclusions, protect and inspire all creative desires and attempts of children.

On one occasion, I asked my son's teacher, "Why don't you let your children remember important things ?" The teacher smiled and said, "There are two things that are more important to human creativity than rote memorization: one is that he needs to know where to find the much more knowledge he needs than he can remember; another is his ability to use this knowledge to create new ones. This is my point of view ."

I can't help remembering a conversation between a good friend of mine and me. He studied astronomy. From the first day of his entry into the U. S. University Research Institute, to the full five years of his doctorate degree, he has been enjoying the generous scholarship offered by his Department with excellent performance. He once said to me: "I think it is strange that if I receive a scholarship based on my academic performance in the classroom, Americans are often not opponents of the Chinese. But when I first got to practice, I had some research questions, chinese students are often less clever and creative than American students." I think his feelings may be the difference between people caused by two different basic education systems. The Chinese are so accustomed to traveling in a defined frame. Once the conventional reference is lost, many Chinese may feel not free, but flustered and lost.
　　
I often think of primary education in China, the children who sit straight behind their hands in class, the heavy courses, a wide range of homework, and strict examinations ...... It makes people feel a kind of sacred and majestic, but it also makes people feel a huge amount of oppression and restraint, but how many generations follow its will, regard it as a way to change the fate. This is a continuation of culture. It may have its own glory, but in the face of information society that requires everyone to exert their creativity and the world of tomorrow, how can we review the civilization that has nurtured us?

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