(Xinhua)
Updated: 2007-11-26 15:56

Teachers have generally welcomed the changes. Liu Kui, Chinese education research director at Beijing No4 Middle School, one of the city's most prestigious, appreciated the rearrangement.

"In this way students can learn gradually, so it doesn't seem like a second language," Liu said.

Han Lu, a Chinese teacher at the school, said: "I don't know why people are so obsessed with a few texts."

Nevertheless, almost every change in the school textbooks in recent years has prompted controversy among the public.

Many were offended by depictions of sex in a domestic award-winning novel included in the reference book for middle schoolchildren by the People's Literature Publishing House in 2003.

Extracts from Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Jin's Chronicles of the Heavenly Dragon, included in the 2004 middle school Chinese textbook, also triggered heated debate. As did the inclusion in a primary school textbook in 2005 of a story on Olympic hurdling gold medalist Liu Xiang - though most people applauded that change.

Jiang Bojing, from northern Hebei province, in an online forum said that people placed great importance on textbooks as the main way for children to learn Chinese.

"But people also hope students will learn morality, culture and humanity - almost everything - from Chinese textbooks, besides language itself," Jiang said.

Mao Zedong's Serve the People and stories of war heroes have been studied for decades and they are still included in textbooks to teach patriotism and devotion to work.

Besides, Jiang said, the CEE makes everything dull - teachers have to train students to pass the exam so students fail to appreciate the literature.

"The textbook is only a tool and it should not be the key to Chinese education reform," he said.

Teacher Han agreed: "How to teach is always of greater significance than what to teach." She said the traditional way, with teachers doing the talking and students taking notes, needed to change - teachers should instead help students learn to think and express themselves, enjoy the beauty of the Chinese language and apply it in their daily lives.

"Only when the teachers get a real understanding of the education of Chinese language can they flexibly use the texts."

Gu Dexi said native-language education was a worldwide difficulty that has always puzzled educators. "It's different from the knowledge-obtaining subjects, such as math, physics and chemistry," Gu said.

Gu said the public should give teachers more time and space to teach Chinese. "In my opinion, teachers should improve self-motivation among students," he said.

One student at Beijing No.4 Middle School said he liked the new textbooks because they provided a wider choice of texts, pointing to the greater number of foreign stories.

He said he had little time for extracurricular reading because of CEE study pressure, and he would not know what to read if he had the time.

"The new books are a good guide to extracurricular reading," he said.

But for Gao Tian, the debate was academic: "I have to get high marks in the CEE no matter what I read in the textbooks."

   1 2   

   1 2