Culture Influence

Social and Cultural and Influence on Learning and Teaching

In the first part of the journal, I have explored some reasons behind the better performance of Asian students (some ethnic groups) in school. One of these is environmental factors. In this part, I will try to identify those social and cultural factors for Chinese learners in particular and argue that these might not be beneficial for the learners.

In ancient China, education was first spread to the common people around the time of Confucius in the 5th century BC (Wan, 1980). Since then, education had been one of the few ways for common Chinese people to climb up into aristocracy and out of poverty through the imperial examinations. Although this is no longer the case after the imperial examination system was abolished in 1905 and aristocracy in 1911, Chinese, especially parents, still regard education as a means to change the fate and fortune of a family. In fact, to the parents, the historical functionality of the imperial examination is just replaced with the university entrance exams (Chen, 2018). This utilitarian attitude towards education becomes a culture passing from one generation to the next, and sticks with the Chinese even after they move to new countries where university entrance requirements are completely different (Cobbold, 2014).

One consequence of this educational utilitarianism is the endless competition among parents and in turn among schools. In order for their children to outperform the kids next doors, in entering better universities, parents are sending them to after-school tutoring and extracurricular activities. This pushes schools in China into test-driven fact-delivering factories. With mountains of homework and tests, the learners become the victim of this millennium-long education competition. For the minority of parents who think this has gone wrong, sending their kids to private international schools or even to oversea become the only option. However, this has become another competition.

As a teacher coming from this education competition culture, there are several potential damages I might bring to my classroom. Believing education is a kind of individual competition, I could give up struggling students and focus on best-performing ones. I could also easily go into behaviourist teaching approaches (Skinner, 1990) since they seem to be more efficient in a competitive environment. As a consequence of promoting fact memorization, I would discourage students from creative, independent and critical thinking. Finally, and more importantly, this competition view or approach towards learning and teaching does not suit students from all cultures (if any at all) (Ministry of Education New Zealand, 2018; Ministry of Education New Zealand & Education Council New Zealand, 2011). Māori students, for example, might find this way of learning discouraging.

To avoid running into this trap of my cultural background, it is best to constantly remind myself of the teacher image I am aspiring to be and the function of education in an equal society. The teacher I want to be is an inspiring teacher who can help learners from all cultures to develop their enthusiasm for the two subjects by encouraging them to discover the beauty of the mathematical description of the world (Liang, 2019). On the other hand, the function of education can be best summarized by educator John Green’s quote in Figure 2.

Go to Part III