Article Link: http://exchangepress.com/article/early-childhood-care-and-education-in-china-comparing-caring-east-and-west/5012622/
For five weeks in 1988, I visited kindergartens in and near Beijing quite as I chose and with my own interpreter. Hoping to see what the Chinese considered their finest early childhood education, I concentrated mainly on two "excellent" schools: Wei Xiu Kindergarten - under the auspices of Peking University, with an enrollment of over 500 children - and June First Kindergarten - a boarding preschool for 400 children from leading Beijing families. I returned to China in 1995 with a follow-up visit to Municipal No. 2 Kindergarten for 800 children in Kunming. Whether in Beijing or Kunming, the so-called "best" urban kindergartens in this authoritarian society are very much the same.On a typical visit, my interpreter and I entered the classroom with a nod to the teacher and students, who responded with friendly smiles. Forty-six four year olds sat at wooden tables in orderly rows. With magic markers, the children were copying a wall picture of an elaborate dragon and phoenix. They seemed relaxed. They worked seriously, steadily, with warm intent.
Although skillfully done, the colorful drawings were nearly identical. Afterward, I was given one of the drawings (see page 25). When I later showed it to a Chinese professor of ...