Thesis (M.A. in Education)--University of California, Berkeley, Dec. 1921. / eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (leaf 41).

The research recorded in this thesis examined the experience of eight foreign teachers who have taken up residence in China as teachers of oral English language. The study grew out of my reflections on my own challenging, yet rewarding, journey as an international student in New Zealand, and aimed to investigate and unfold the reality of foreigners living and working experience under the influence of traditional Chinese culture, specifically in Pan Yu district, Guang Zhou City, Guang Dong Province. I was interested to find the cultural differences that the teachers struggled to accept or understand. I wondered whether the foreign teachers would reshape their personal beliefs and values, especially about teaching, because of the cultural differences they encountered in China. A sample of eight foreign teachers, from Australia, America, Canada and New Zealand, took part in semi-structured interviews in which I hoped to capture critical incidents in their inter-cultural experience. I was also able to undertake two observations of classroom practice. The data collected was then analysed using Boyatzis' (1998) system of thematic analysis. The research found that participants had similar experiences during their residence in China. For instance, the majority of participants showed a long period of cultural adoption and they all defined their experience as challenging. All participants refused to reshape their moral beliefs about teaching in response to traditional Chinese culture, but that they all, to some extent, eventually adjusted to a Chinese way of thinking. However, issues that direct connected to their own cultural heritage remained unchanged. An interpretation of the findings was that perhaps, on one hand, while the environment and cultural difference initiated various forms of difficulties, on the other hand, participants are trying to reset their personal limits. Most likely, their desire to introduce their Chinese students to a different style of learning convinced them to hold on to personal beliefs about effective teaching and learning, hoping to pass this on to a new generation of Chinese. My research, however, focused on only very small proportion of foreign teachers in China. Further research should be pursued with an expanded focus, to find the potential of the implementation of cultural awareness programmes and support groups for foreigner.

The dissertation consists of eight studies in combination with a longer work, which links the eight studies together. The aim is two-fold: to develop a scientific approach within philosophical hermeneutics for the study of the culture-specific dimension of teaching in China, and to analyse the culture-specific dimension of teaching in China on the terms of this approach. An explicit ontological foundation makes up the base of the hermeneutic approach, and epistemology, methodology and so on are adapted in accordance with this. Implications of this hermeneutical approach for educational research is further outlined, and the hermeneutical approach is more clearly positioned in relation to so-called qualitative research. With this hermeneutical approach, cross-cultural educational research can be conducted without either universalism or exoticism, since it offers a possibility to understand phenomena in other cultures without claiming to share them. Based on this hermeneutical approach, an interpretational framework named traditional thinking is constructed as a theoretical synthesis of Chinese philosophy, that is Confucianism, Taoism, Chinese Buddhism, Moism and Legalism. With traditional thinking, the analysis of the culture-specific dimension of teaching in China generates an understanding consisting of a number of themes. The themes are: concrete activity, sociality, collectivism, relationalism, balance, order, patriotism, aesthetics, perfection, good examples, the nobility of teaching, family, hierarchy, equal competition, responsibility, talent, examination, body, improvement, critiques, effort, self-study. In this understanding, moral has a central position and refl ects on all themes. This is a social and relational morality that embraces knowledge and aesthetics, which is achieved and realised in concrete bodily activity. Morality serves a system in order, i.e. it helps keep its balance. It facilitates the functioning of the collective and gives patriotism a moral character. Perfection is the optimal moral standard, which characterises all good examples, and the striving for improvement depends on critique and effort. Since perfection is always attainable, teaching and self-study make up the human way to harmony. In this, family is a precondition for moral cultivation, just as equal competition is a precondition for a balanced hierarchy and for correct responsibility. Talent is decisive, which in turn requires examination.

The purpose of this study was to explore the selected middle years teachers’ experiences of promoting student learning in student-centered classrooms, and how these recalled experiences might affect their own future teaching and assist other teachers to promote student learning. Based on social constructivism as the epistemological foundation, I chose Appreciative Inquiry (AI) as the research methodology. AI values people’s positive experiences and emphasizes the importance of the positive core of change (Cooperrider & Whitney, 2000). In total, there were 53 middle years teachers in China and Canada who responded to an online survey. Four Chinese education experts were interviewed online, and 12 Canadian education experts participated in an interpretation panel. The findings showed that both Chinese and Canadian participants believed that engaging students in their learning was the core of creating student-centered classrooms. They regarded group study as the most popular instructional strategy that was used to promote student-centered learning. Most participants stated that they had changed or planned to change their teaching practices because they had positive teaching experiences in student-centered classrooms. Chinese participants stated that they had shared their positive teaching experiences with other teachers at three levels: school divisions/districts, schools, or grades/subjects. The main activities for communication among Chinese teachers included group discussion, collective lesson planning, and classroom visits. Canadian participants reported that they usually shared their educational ideas and teaching experiences with other teachers in both formal and informal ways, such as chatting with each other during breaks, developing learning projects together, and communicating with each other through school networking websites. In addition, findings also showed that most Chinese middle years teachers teach a single subject, but many Canadian middle years teachers teach multiple subjects. Based on this research, I suggested that teachers should apply multiple instructional strategies in their classrooms, serve students, and collaborate with parents/families. School boards and schools should make more efforts to encourage their teachers to communicate with each other, formally and regularly by providing policy, technical, and financial supports for relevant programs and activities. Teachers should choose either a single subject or multiple subjects to teach according to their own willingness and abilities. Future researchers may benefit by using Appreciative Inquiry to explore people’s positive experiences in education, and should be more open-minded by conducting cross-cultural and inter-cultural research to facilitate educators to communicate with each other and learn from each other.

China’s curriculum system has been undergoing substantial transformations since 1986. In response to public criticism of the highly prescribed national curriculum, the central state of China is attempting to build a more inclusive system which is composed of national curriculum, province curriculum and school-based curriculum. The new curriculum system accommodates more flexibility in carrying out national curriculum policies and even encourages local input in curriculum development and management. Apparently, the current curriculum reform in China is moving toward decentralization. The purpose of this work is to demonstrate the complexity of decentralization reform in China’s curriculum system and examine the dynamics of policy formulation and outcomes of reform efforts in great depth. The main argument made in this socio-philosophical work is that the on-going Chinese curriculum reform is a process of centralized decentralization, which merely transfers work to the local level but not real authority. With an inquiry into the impetus of current Chinese curriculum reform, this theoretical research illustrates that centralized decentralization is taken as a strategic imperative by the state to avoid loss of control over school curriculum that carries particular social and political significance for China in a transitional period. Another major task for this cultural studies research is to problematize the strategy of centralized decentralization, investigating the consequences of the superficial decentralization in reality and analyzing the bottlenecks in promoting current Chinese curriculum reform. In this research, Mark Hanson’s conceptual framework of education decentralization is used to clarify ambiguity in defining decentralization reform in the education sector in China. Meanwhile, Foucault’s theory about power/knowledge and governmentality and Williams’ theory about hegemony are used to deepen the understanding of the state-education relationship in contemporary China. Besides a descriptive analysis of phenomena in current Chinese curriculum reform, the discussion is deployed through pragmatic approach and logic-based reasoning. Most data are obtained from literature review, including previous studies on Chinese education reform, government documents, laws and regulations related to current Chinese curriculum reform.

The research recorded in this thesis examined the experience of eight foreign teachers who have taken up residence in China as teachers of oral English language. The study grew out of my reflections on my own challenging, yet rewarding, journey as an international student in New Zealand, and aimed to investigate and unfold the reality of foreigners living and working experience under the influence of traditional Chinese culture, specifically in Pan Yu district, Guang Zhou City, Guang Dong Province. I was interested to find the cultural differences that the teachers struggled to accept or understand. I wondered whether the foreign teachers would reshape their personal beliefs and values, especially about teaching, because of the cultural differences they encountered in China. A sample of eight foreign teachers, from Australia, America, Canada and New Zealand, took part in semi-structured interviews in which I hoped to capture critical incidents in their inter-cultural experience. I was also able to undertake two observations of classroom practice. The data collected was then analysed using Boyatzis' (1998) system of thematic analysis. The research found that participants had similar experiences during their residence in China. For instance, the majority of participants showed a long period of cultural adoption and they all defined their experience as challenging. All participants refused to reshape their moral beliefs about teaching in response to traditional Chinese culture, but that they all, to some extent, eventually adjusted to a Chinese way of thinking. However, issues that direct connected to their own cultural heritage remained unchanged. An interpretation of the findings was that perhaps, on one hand, while the environment and cultural difference initiated various forms of difficulties, on the other hand, participants are trying to reset their personal limits. Most likely, their desire to introduce their Chinese students to a different style of learning convinced them to hold on to personal beliefs about effective teaching and learning, hoping to pass this on to a new generation of Chinese. My research, however, focused on only very small proportion of foreign teachers in China. Further research should be pursued with an expanded focus, to find the potential of the implementation of cultural awareness programmes and support groups for foreigner.

published_or_final_version / Education / Master / Master of Education

Research in cooperative learning in education generally and second language education in particular has documented the apparently successful and simultaneous achievement of a number of educational goals. For second language learners, these goals include developing the second language (L2), maintaining the first language (L1), and acquiring content knowledge. However, little research has examined the opinions of the learners themselves with regard to cooperative learning together with the process of cooperative interaction. This study explores the opinions and interactions of Chinese immigrant students engaging in cooperative learning in English as a second language (ESL) classes. Drawing on qualitative research and discourse analysis traditions, the study used multiple methods of data collection in a Canadian secondary school ESL program: (1) individual interviews were carried out with 49 Chinese students; (2) 120 hours of observations in natural classroom settings were conducted; and (3) 30 hours of audio taped recordings of Chinese students' interactions during cooperative learning activities were also analyzed. The findings of the study present a complex picture of cooperative learning in the ESL classroom. The Chinese students seemed to be sitting on the horns of cooperative learning dilemmas between cooperation and individualism, between achieving results and sharing understandings of the task, and between using L1 to help with L2 / content learning and developing L2 for academic purposes. Particularly with cooperative learning goals of developing L2, maintaining L1, and acquiring content knowledge, Chinese students had difficult choices to make between developing L2 and maintaining L1, between using L1 for academic language and developing academic language in L2, and between learning content in L1 and learning content in L2. At a detailed level, tensions and dilemmas that Chinese students confronted appear to be intrinsic to the simultaneous pursuit of the three cooperative learning goals claimed for L2 learners. Cummins' (1991b, 1992) bilingual proficiency theory, which offers a possible theoretical model of how these goals are related, needs to address the various conflicts and dilemmas involved in these three cooperative learning goals. While recognizing other contributing factors, this work suggests that cooperative learning dilemmas may arise from conflicts of socially shared values and beliefs, and that discrepancies between Chinese students' home educational culture and their present Canadian secondary school culture add a layer of complexity to the dilemmatic situation of cooperative learning in an ESL context.

Set in the context of the Chinese Exclusion Acts, the Woman's Missionary Association (WMA) of the Church of the United Brethren in Christ supported the community education and evangelistic work of Moy Ling in Portland, Oregon, from 1882 until his death in 1926.Moy immigrated to the United States in 1872 at the age of 19. Settling in Portland, Moy worked as a household servant for General Oliver Otis Howard who was stationed in Portland as commander of the Department of the Columbia from 1874 to 1880. Howard was instrumental in Moy's conversion to Christianity. Moy opened a night school for the Chinese community of Portland in 1877. In 1882, Moy came in contact with Bishop Nicholas Castle who brokered a partnership between Moy and the WMA. Over the next half century, the Portland Chinese Mission made important contributions to the education of the Chinese immigrant communities in Portland, established the Kwan Hing Church, and shaped the attitudes of a generation of United Brethren members toward the Chinese.The United Brethren Church experienced a schism in 1889, dividing into the New Constitution and Old Constitution branches. Moy was instrumental in the establishment of United Brethren missions in Guangzhou, China, for both branches of the church. In 1889, Moy traveled to China with a New Constitution delegation to open a mission in Guangzhou. In 1924, Moy introduced the Old Constitution WMA to Chiu Yan Tsz, a professor at Canton Christian College in Guangzhou, who then founded the Old Constitution mission in China.Moy sought to influence United States immigration policy. His relationship with Howard developed into a lasting friendship, and they kept in contact for over 30 years. Letters between the two men show that Moy, together with a group of Portland merchants, engaged Howard to use his national reputation to advocate against the permanent congressional renewal of the Geary Act in 1902.The relationship between Moy and the WMA displayed characteristics which are consistent with current missiological definitions of healthy partnership. Such characteristics, as described by Luis Bush, include autonomy, trust, agreed-upon expectations, complementary resources, and mutual goals. / Department of Educational Studies

The Chinese education issues in Malaysia appear frequently in political discourse, often featuring contentious discussions of language learning and national education policies. Applying an historical approach to contextualize a political discourse, this thesis examines the politics and transformation of Malaysian Chinese education, in microcosm, at the level of a renowned Chinese school, Chung Ling High School in Penang. It explores and maps the question of "Chineseness" through the examination of the history and development of Chung Ling since its establishment in 1917. This thesis also aims to elucidate the complex negotiation between multiple stakeholders of the Chinese community which took place at different historical junctures in a postcolonial and multi-ethnic nation. I discuss memorial activities for two deceased educationists, David Chen and Lim Lian Geok, which have been readapted into contemporary discourse by different factions of educationists to express their dissatisfactions toward state hegemony on education policies. Lastly, I argue that the persistent pursuit of "Chineseness" is counterproductive to the aim of safeguarding interests of Chinese schools within and outside the national education system today.