Chinese children’s books focus on hard work and overcoming obstacles, while American books prioritize happiness. This may explain why Chinese students often score higher on academic tests. Chinese students attend school for longer hours and watch less TV, and are not allowed to use calculators.
The Chinese education system is known for instilling respect for effort, determination and perseverance. And according to a study published in the Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, there may be a more surprising reason why Chinese students often score higher on academic tests than their American counterparts. The study found that children’s books in China mainly focus on achieving goals and overcoming obstacles through hard work. On the other hand, American children’s books primarily promote the importance of happiness, with book characters typically smiling, laughing, and surrounding themselves with happy people. This kind of connection is also vital to a child’s development, one of the researchers pointed out, adding that neither approach is necessarily ‘correct’. Both have their good and bad sides, so there may be a lesson in this research for American and Chinese educators.
Educate yourself on the Chinese school:
Chinese students attend classes for at least eight hours a day, typically staying in school from 7:30 to 5:30
Only 16% of Chinese children watch more than two hours of TV a day; in the United States, the figure is 84 percent.
Chinese students are not allowed to use calculators, as this may make learning higher-level math more difficult.
Protect your devices with Threat Protection by NordVPN
