EDUCATION

Prehistoric Period
The root of a system of formal education in China can be traced
back at least as far as the 16th century B.C. later Shang Dynasty
(1523-1027 B.C.).
Throughout this period education was the privilege of the elite few,
and for the most part existed for no other purpose than to produce
government officials.
The imperial government had an active hand in education only
inasmuch as it administered the various levels of the imperial or
civil service examinations, which were used for the selection of
imperial officers.

Six Arts:
Rites
Music
Archery
ChariotRiding
History
Mathemati
cs

 Based on the teachings of

Confucius during the Spring
and Autumn and Warring
States
periods
(770-221
B.C.),
the
curriculum
gradually gave way one based
on The Four Books and The
Five Classics.

The
Four
Books:
Great
Learning
Doctrine
of
the Mean
Analects
Mencius

The Five
Classics:
Classic of Poetry
Book of
Documents
Book of Rites
I Ching (Book of
Changes)
Spring and
Autumn Annal

1840-1949
Following the defeat in the
Opium War (1840-1842) and
the ensuing cessation of Hong
Kong to Great Britain, Western
education gradually began
to take root in China, for the
most part through schools
founded
by
Christian
missionaries.

 With the defeat in the Sino-Japanese War in 1895, the Chinese finally
became convinced that their own future would rest, at least in part, on the
acceptance of certain aspects of Western-style education.

 In 1905 the civil service examination

system was dismantled, and a series of
reform measures were issued by the Qing
Dynasty court calling for the old
academies to be reorganized into a
modern system of primary, secondary
and tertiary levels of education, to be
based on Western models.
The Chinese Communist Party was
born in 1921, with its own ideas about the
correct form of education in China.

1949-1966
Shortly after the Liberation
by the Chinese
Communists, a new
educational system was
imported: the Soviet Model.
Soviet Model - driven by
technological needs.
Soviet model did very little
to address the problem of
mass illiteracy.

 Government
resumed
earlier
attempts at a balance between
Confucian
and
Western-style
education. Mao's walking on
two legs exhortation, took its
form as a two-track educational
system:
1. vocational
and
schooling, and

work-study

2. regular university, college and

college preparatory schooling.

1966-1976
Cultural Revolution (1966)
Classes stopped until fall
1967 each level shortened
Development
of
commune
schools
for
agricultural regions

1976-PRESENT
Four Modernizations
science & technology

- agriculture, industry, national defense,

Four Cardinal Principles the socialist road, the peoples

democratic dictatorship, the Chinese Communist Party leadership,
and Marxim-Leninism-Mao Zedong thought

Educational elite schools weeded out

Rural primary enrollment declined children needed to work
rather than go to school
4 types of secondary schools Key point middle schools, non-key
general or ordinary middle schools, specialized technical secondary
schools, vocational schools

(Post Mao) Decision of the Reform of the Education System

To bring about the Four Modernizations
To increase state funding for education
To insure that the education system shall supply a sufficient number
of qualified personnel
To institute a 9-year compulsory education policy
To expand the system of technical and vocational education
To give provisions for reform of higher education (eg. To change the
system of job-assignments to graduates and to grant colleges and
universities more decision making powers)
To strengthen educational leadership