The Around the World In Six Weeks Parenting Blog Carnival continues today!
Over the next several weeks, Deb of Urban Moo Cow, Jessica of School of Smock, Lauren of Omnimom, Stephanie of Mommy, For Real, and I will be writing about our reactions to Christine Gross-Loh’s Parenting Without Borders, exploring parenting practices around the world. For more information about the Parenting Blog Carnival, and future topics, click here.
Today we are discussing Part 3: The Teaching of Children.
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Suspended in Webs of Significance We Ourselves Have Spun
My favorite quote about culture comes from anthropologist Clifford Geertz:
{photo credit below}
This quote circles in my head every time I read Parenting Without Borders. Gross-Loh’s subtitle reads, “surprising lessons parents around the world can teach us.”
The tricky part of these lessons is the integrated nature of culture. It is a complex web, as Geertz describes. The interconnectedness of all the aspects of our culture makes it hard, if not impossible, to simply change one strand of the web ~ it’s deeply intertwined with everything else. Our society’s institutions and practices reflect certain cultural values, traditions, and worldviews. We can no more disentangle one aspect from the web of a culture that we like {say, free university education} and insert it into our own, than we can take a single beloved thread from a friend’s personality and knit it into ours, without causing a cascading ripple of change and, perhaps, conflict and dislocation.
With the previous topics we have addressed from Parenting Without Borders ~ sleep, food, and self-esteem ~ we considered topics over which parents have a lot of individual control. While we certainly have a large influence upon our child’s work ethic and attitudes about schooling, education is a large societal institution connected to much broader issues about government spending, teacher quality and preparation, poverty and social welfare, college admissions, and cultural assumptions about family and children.
In her consideration of cultural variations in education, Gross-Loh visited China, South Korea, and Japan to explore Asian models of schooling, as well as Finland, to learn more about the reasons for the internationally-celebrated success of Finnish schools. She outlines two contrasting approaches to education, one which emphasizes drills and rote-learning, and views schooling as an extension of filial piety {the Asian model}, and one that focuses on learning over achievement, and emphasizes creativity and the interests of each child {the Finnish model}.
Asia: The Web of Filial Piety
Gross-Loh shines some interesting light on the Asian model of education {if such a broad term can be used} by stressing that the mothers she interviewed assured her that the “Tiger Mom” concept was outdated, and also misunderstood. Americans often view the Tiger Mom approach as a discredited authoritarian model that stifles creativity and personal initiative in our children. Gross-Loh helpfully points out that “authoritarian” parenting means something very different in China. It is rooted in Confucian values that have been taught in China continuously {with some interruptions in the 20th century} for over 2000 years. She writes, “Confucian ideas about family and learning permeate society and have a strong influence on child-rearing. Learning is both a moral endeavor and a family obligation.” Learning isn’t about becoming “smart” ~ it’s about becoming a better person. Parents are expected to inculcate this into children, and children are expected to honor their parents.
The Confucian emphasis on family obligation also leads to a different view of autonomy and identity in China {sociologists have broadly identified these as collectivist, as opposed to individualist, cultures}. Gross-Loh cites a Stanford study that revealed Anglo-American children showed more motivation and performed better when working on a project they chose for themselves, and Asian-American children were most motivated when they were told the work had been chosen for them by their mothers. In western societies, we assume that adolescent rebellion and the search for and assertion of a unique identity is a hallmark of adolescence, when, in fact, it is not universal. In cultures that emphasize family duty and social harmony, identity is about honoring parents, living up to their expectations, and maintaining closeness with them, not breaking away. It’s not surprising that the Tiger Mom approach was widely criticized in the US, as it was a perfect example of trying to bring one single strand of the web into a very different cultural network.
Finland: The Web of the Welfare State
Gross-Loh next visits Finland, which has been much touted recently for its successful educational outcomes. In Finland, students spend less time in school: 300 fewer hours per year than American children. They also have the least amount of homework among all industrialized countries, but manage to consistently score at the top on the Program for International Student Assessment each year. Many educators and researchers have been studying the Finnish model to find the secret to school reform in the United States.
I would argue that the number one thing the Finns have gotten right is teacher quality. All teachers are required to possess a master’s degree, and entrance into teacher-preparation programs is highly competitive. Teachers in Finland teach about 300 fewer hours each year than American teachers, and their time not in the classroom is spent on professional development, curriculum planning, and collaboration with colleagues. Gross-Loh states that in Finland, “Teachers don’t just teach; they are also expected to remain active as researchers in the field of education.” Teachers are mentored, and have many observations each year to help them improve their craft. The high quality and amazing outcomes of Finnish education should not be surprising; nearly all education researchers would agree that the most important factor in student achievement is having a highly-qualified teacher in the classroom.
But then we need to look again at the complex web of culture in Finland. High-quality university education is free, relieving the stress American students often feel to pursue extracurriculars in hopes of scholarships, or add activities and other service hours to their resumes to have a “well-rounded” college application. Additionally, Gross-Loh cites UNICEF data that reveals while 23.1 percent of American children live in poverty, only 5.3 percent of Finnish children do. “There is so much attentiveness and social support for a child’s basic needs for food, housing, shelter, clothing, healthcare, and a quality education,” she writes. Many of the changes that would improve the quality of education in the United States would require fundamental transformations in our culture ~ our attitudes towards the welfare/social service state, our entire structure of funding for public and post-secondary education, and our education culture focused on high-stakes testing to evaluate both students and teachers.
There are many lessons to be learned from the Finnish example, but the US and Finland weave their webs from two very different types of material.
Weaving our Own Webs
So what lessons have we learned? I don’t want to imply that we cannot change our institutions because they are so big and complex. To the contrary, another amazing aspect of culture is that it is not static, but dynamic. Transformations can and do occur. But where do we start? What can we do to help our children, and all children, learn?
- Recognize that learning is also a complex web. Gross-Loh cites the Asian model as primarily based on rote-learning and memorization, and the Finnish model as based on the interest of the child, so that they find learning fun and “learn how to think.” I think we need a mixture of both. There’s no use learning how to think if there’s nothing in your head to think about, and memorizing facts is useless if you don’t know what they actually mean. We certainly want children to pursue their interests and enjoy learning, but sometimes they will have to learn things that aren’t “fun.” The brain is a complex web, too, that needs multiple forms of exercise.
- We need to support our children. Regardless of whether they grow up with Confucian values of family harmony, or western ideas about individualism, Gross-Loh reminds us that “children in both the East and the West benefit from feeling responsible to, committed to, and close to their parents.” The attention and nurturing that we provide, and the attachment that we develop with our children in these early years provide them with a safe “home base” from which they move out into the world as they grow older. We can set high expectations which are not “controlling” or “authoritarian,” but create a sense of responsibility and a desire in our children to do their best.
- We need to support our teachers in a web of connections, too! According to the National Education Association, a third of teachers leave the profession within the first three years. And the primary reason they leave is a lack of support, cooperation, and respect {three things they have in abundance in Finland}. New teachers need mentors. Frequent non-evaluative observations. Reduced teaching assignments so they can have time to learn and reflect. That first year of teaching is so tough ~ let’s support teachers in a web of collaboration, mutual trust, and empathy.
I wish I had more answers. Luckily, the world wide web 🙂 has four other bloggers writing about the same topic today in our Parenting Blog Carnival! Check them out here:
Deb of Urban Moo Cow: How Should We Educate our Children?
Jessica of School of Smock: Whose Fault Is It That American Education is Broken?
Lauren of Omnimom: Hothousing
Stephanie of Mommy, For Real: Finding Academic Balance: Finland Got It Right
Spider Web photo credit: photo credit: ccrrii via photopin cc
Modified with permission
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