The Chinese community in Singapore can be divided into two clusters that is, the Chinese migrants from China that still regarded China, as their “home” as well as the Straits Chinese who mostly did not consider themselves as citizens of China rather, they were British citizens that considered Singapore their home. Straits Chinese or the Queen’s Chinese was not bothered about the politics in China and were mostly educated in English schools. This paper will therefore discuss the challenges in education faced by the Chinese community, more specifically the China-born Chinese migrants, in postwar Singapore.
During the period of colonial rule, the Chinese community received the least amount of support from the colonial government from an education perspective. Teachers and students alike were subjected to biased treatments for example, Chinese school teachers received a lower remuneration as compared to English school teachers and Chinese middle school graduates also found themselves with the predicament of no employment opportunities. This is consistent with the newspaper article titled, Education in Chinese that says, “Yearly, there are thousands of Chinese schools passing out from vernacular schools who are left jobless and ramble up and down the streets of the Federation because they have no bilingual qualifications.” The Chinese community had to finance their own schools as well as the employment of teachers from China.3 Predictably, the teachings in Chinese schools here, correspondingly modeled that as in China: with textbooks being imported from there.3 Students were taught “compilations that were vehicles of Confucianism” and materials that reiterated lessons of filial piety and loyalty towards one’s land.3 Chinese schools in...
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...n system came at the expense of the language and identity of the Chinese community. Furthermore, the Chinese community was at a rather disadvantage with them facing the predicament of no employment opportunities, no avenue for furthering their studies between 1952 – 1956, unequal treatment as well as a lack of financial resources. However, the colonial government cannot be blamed entirely for the challenges faced by the Chinese community as the uniformity in the education system was targeted at shaping a common identity for the people. Furthermore, it was not indisposed to helping the Chinese community but rather could not allow them the upper hand in the education system. In 1959, education remained fragmented along languages; it is therefore not difficult to imagine why such systems of education using foreign teachers and text could not lead to a unified citizenry.
The first Chinese immigrants to arrive in America came in the early 1800s. Chinese sailors visited New York City in the 1830s (“The Chinese Experience”); others came as servants to Europeans (“Chinese Americans”). However, these immigrants were few in number, and usually didn’t even st...
Prior to immigrating to America, Nicole attended a public school in China where all of her teachers were Chinese natives. At Nicole’s school in China, however, English is a required course of study taught mostly by emphasizing English vocabulary, completing short one-page writing assignments, and practicing spelling. Learning English pronunciations and engaging in realistic English conversation wasn’t the goal for educators in China. The goal in China was to prepare students to pass their post-high school exam, which was their ticket into attending a university. The exam is highly demanding for Chinese students because it requires knowledge of English reading, comprehension, spelling and writing. For Nicole, the most stressful part of this exam was that students taking it
In “Père du Halde: The Chinese Educational System”, (Document 3), Pere du Halde talks about the Chinese Education system. In the document, he says, “That boys should not learn is an improper thing; for if they do not learn in youth, what will they do when old?” This shows that the educational system in China was very hard and strict and the students learned a lot. Since the boys that were going to school were one day going to be men, those men were going to have to make many decisions for China. In order to make sure China was on the right path to great rulers and government workers, the schooling system was very prestigious and difficult. This is an example that China needed a good educational system so they would have strong, future rulers. In my opinion, the Chinese learning system was hard because everyone wanted to have great leaders and they knew that the students who were going to school were going to be future leaders. As it says in “Matteo Ricci: On Chinese Government”, (Document 5), “It may be said in praise of the Chinese that ordinarily they would prefer to die an honorable death rather than swear allegiance to a usurping monarch.” This is an example that the people of China wanted a strong ruler/rulers and would rather die than be ruled by a weak leader. The statement shows that all of China, not just government officers,...
Throughout history, Americans have always been intimidated by immigrants. The idea of an immigrant coming to America and easily being able to get a job scared Americans. Americans feared that good jobs would be taken from hard working Americans and given to immigrants for less pay because they required less money to live on or were used to no wages or lower wages in their Country of origin. People would immigrate to America in search of a better life, and often times they could find homes and jobs that made them want to stay. A melting pot is described as being a mixing of different cultures into one universal culture. In Erika Lee’s, The Chinese Exclusion Example, immigrant exclusion helped re-define the melting-pot
In many cases throughout America’s history immigrants have settled here for many different reasons. In conclusion these reasons were known as push and pull factors. Push factors are factors that repel migrants from their country. And pull factors are factors that attract migrants to move. In my main immigrant group which is the Chinese, there were several push and pull factors that I will be mentioning. First, some of the push factors that were included in my group were the fact that there were a lot of disasters. For example there was draught, poverty, a famine, and floods were also included in these disasters. To state these factors more specifically, it was around the 1840s and 1850s when China faced these disasters. In the fact of the draught, it was a place called Henen that suffered this tragic event. Then two years later that’s when the famine struck Guangxi. The flood affected many provinces such as Hubei, Anhui, and Jiangsu which was caused by the Yangtze River. These factors killed and injured a lot of people, as a result numerous amounts of them settled in the United States. On the other hand Chinese also came to the United States because of pull factors. Which I mentioned before that it is a factor that attracts a migrant to move. The things that attracted them to the United States were the fact of having better jobs, education, health, and economic funds. But the most important and major factor that lured the Chinese to the U.S was the California gold rush. The way that they have obtained their information on the opportunities that America held were from random people, advertisements, and last but not lease the most important way that they learn was by trading vessels. Th...
As the evidence shows that, "The Chinese value education as a stepping stone to success, and children - especially only children - are under a lot of pressure to excel in school. There is also an unspoken code of conformity, and there is a lot of pressure to fit in, for to be singled out is the penultimate in humiliation, causing students to 'lose face' in front of their peers. In addition to academics, parents also try and enroll their children in a wide variety of after-school activities to enhance their overall development."("History of Chinese Education, Five Necessities of Chinese Culture", Paragraph 2) This evidence shows not only teachers but also parents or students from China are still keeping the traditional mind to study. Thousands years ago in ancient China, schools are competitive, students needs to have high quality of studying and good relations with the school as well. Even they might feel stressful on learning when they are in elementary school. Nowadays, parents still think their kid must have the best education, more strong points. Childrens are learning lots of skills and knowledge when they are extremely young. In Canada, it's totally different. Students like team-work, they don't have bias on any schools. They study breezily without any pressure. So, more traditional makes Chinese education different from Canadian
(TS) In the article “Zhan Haite and the Case for Change” by Katherine Majewski, Zhan Haite had to work through many hard times. (C) However, one day Zhan was told she could not go to the school she wanted to do to the system of education. (E) Even though this was her only option, she decided she should be able to go to any school she wanted to. She tried so hard. She even got newspapers interested in her story. She did not give up even though people called her names like,”Locust or a pest and implying that she was greedy for seeking the right to continue schooling in Shanghai ” (Majewski 1). Zhans family was also punished because they wanted better schooling for their daughter. One day their
My mom would always say, “American born Chinese students have it easy in America.” One key difference between the American education system and Chinese education system is the way they are taught. Being raised in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, I went to school to understand the idea of analyzing and understanding concepts. After reading Only Hope, I realized that their education is based on more memorizations. To Chinese students, understand the concept and apply it is not the most important, you must just memorize it for the exam. Many parents in China would say that going on vacation and relaxing is a waste of time because they need to focus on learning. In Greenspan’s article, it mentions that a student in China is the top of her class and is fluent in English, yet she cannot go on vacation because her mother wants her to spend time learning, many students in China
Yeh, Wen-Hsin. Becoming Chinese: Passages to Modernity and Beyond. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000. Print
We have all been in a situation where we have immigrated to a new country for different reasons regarding, better future, or education. In the book Jade of Peony, Wayson Choy describes a struggle of a Chinese family as they settle in Canada, with their new generation of kids born here, the family struggles to keep their children tied to their Chinese customs and traditions as they fit in this new country. The Chinese culture needs to be more open minded as it limits the future generation’s potential. Chinese culture limitations are seen through the relationship expectations, education, gender roles and jobs.
Millions of immigrants over the previous centuries have shaped the United States of America into what it is today. America is known as a “melting pot”, a multicultural country that welcomes and is home to an array of every ethnic and cultural background imaginable. We are a place of opportunity, offering homes and jobs and new economic gains to anyone who should want it. However, America was not always such a “come one, come all” kind of country. The large numbers of immigrants that came during the nineteenth century angered many of the American natives and lead to them to blame the lack of jobs and low wages on the immigrants, especially the Asian communities. This resentment lead to the discrimination and legal exclusion of immigrants, with the first and most important law passed being the Chinese Exclusion Act. However, the discrimination the Chinese immigrants so harshly received was not rightly justified or deserved. With all of their contributions and accomplishments in opening up the West, they were not so much harming our country but rather helping it.
Voiced at mid-century, this statement paradoxically depicts the Chinese as both "enveloped" by backwardness, yet capable of reform and progress; as ignorant, superstitious, and characterized as pest-like "vast hordes of populations," yet also seen as equal partners with the British in a "mutual intercourse." This varied and contradictory opinion could just have easily been voiced at the end of the nineteenth century. In a way, this statement can be seen as representative of the history or, more accurately, the story of the relationship between ...
America is often known as the land of opportunity, a place where you can be free. Many Immigrants came to America so that they could have a greater possibility at succeeding in life. Immigrants took a leap of faith when coming to America, for some it worked out well but for others they had a difficult time here. Despite the struggles that the immigrants encountered such as; standing out from others, being separated from their families, and breaking their culture, the immigrants are still grateful to be in America because they were in better conditions than they were in their home land. When viewing interviews or looking at an immigrant’s perspective you get many responses to being in America, some major things that stood out were the amount of freedom the immigrant had, and the age of the immigrant. These two things had a huge impact on the opinion of America from an Immigrants point of view.
Through the characters and their experiences in The King of Children, Ah Cheng shows the effects that the Cultural Revolution had on education and how that affected the people’s search for personal meaning in education. The Cultural Revolution and Down to the Countryside’s elimination of all practical and economic incentives for receiving an education caused characters to find moral and ethical incentives for education, such as to protect others and to be able to communicate effectively.
Chinese children entered school at age six and stayed for six years. They would study the Chinese language, math and other basic subjects. After going to an elementary school children would enter a middle school. The subjects the Chinese taught were particularly important for the advancement of the country. During the Ming dynasty Chinese novels became very popular. There were many poems and collections of short stories. The Ming also established free schools for the public hoping to expand education in china.