Edison Chen
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Shanghai Maths Book to Be Exported to UK
A famous supplementary textbook on maths from Shanghai will soon be published in the UK this year, as part of the country's efforts to learn from the city's world-class mathematics teaching methods.
The English version of the book "One Lesson, One Exercise (yi ke yi lian)" will be designed on the base of the original Chinese version and integrate with the local curriculum as well.
The Chinese version of the book has been an essential part to the teaching and learning process for many Shanghai teachers and students for some 2 decades.
In 2012, UK 15-year-olds ranked 26th in maths among global rivals on the Program for International Student Assessment, issued by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development(OECD)since 2000 to evaluate the skills of young students across the globe.
Shanghai's students, on the other hand, ranked top overall in maths, reading and science on the 2012 exam.
The OECD says children of working-class families in Shanghai are on average better at maths than middle class children in the UK.
UK's education authorities have started to learn from Shanghai's maths teaching since last year.
Sixty of China's top math teachers from Shanghai were invited to selected British schools to share their skills in a bid to lift standards in Britain in September 2014, while some British teachers flew to Shanghai to study teaching methods in China.
Later this February, another 29 maths teachers in Shanghai will visit selected primary schools in the UK to share their teaching techniques.
Chen Zhuhui, also known as "Mr Bean" by all his students, starts his Shanghai-style maths lesson, with a mental arithmetic activity. He invites one student from each group to compete against the others to answers questions at the fastest speed.
This fast-paced activity lights up the whole class immediately, and Chen appears to blend in very well with the students throughout the one-hour session. The way Chen interacts with his students gives the impression that he has been teaching at the school for a long time.
Chen joined St Vincent's Catholic Primary School in central London three weeks ago.
According to Chen, familiarity with his students didn't come easy. He said that the first week was the most difficult since he was new to the school.
"The first week was very difficult for us as we did not know the students' level and were unfamiliar with the teaching plan," said Chen. "I think we made some mistakes."
Li Dong, another Shanghai maths teacher teaching at St Vincent's through an education exchange between the British Department for Education and the Shanghai Municipal Education Commission, said that the biggest difficulty they faced was the language barrier. There was difficulty expressing math terms.
"But my partner Katrina (a Math teacher at St Vincent's) helps me a lot," Li said. "We discuss the lesson plans and objectives before the class and also communicate after class."
Chen agreed, with Li about communicating with the local teaching staff.
"Before every lesson I would ask English maths teachers many English words I don't know how to say," said Chen. "For example, the plus sign, I didn't know whether in England it was called a plus sign."
"In class, the English maths teachers would help some of the students who are not good at school or studying. For that, I am very thankful; thanks to them I could teach more easily, " Chen added.
Tess Hackett, a teacher at St Vincent's, said that she thinks the Chinese teaching style has a larger focus on numbers and basic number skills.
"There is also a lot of competition to see who gets to be the first, to be the fastest, which we do sometimes but not to the same extent as them," said Hackett.
The school appears to be supportive in accommodating the two Shanghai math teachers.
Marina Coleman, head-teacher at St Vincent's, said that she thinks having the Chinese teachers is an excellent opportunity for her school.
"Parents and children are very positive about the program," Coleman said. "We've tried to facilitate the lessons to be taught as they would do Shanghai. So the desks are in rows, and the children are sitting in rows, which is different from the way we usually teach our lessons here."
Debbie Morgan, Director for Primary at National Centre for Excellence in the Teaching of Mathematics, is very pleased with the outcome of the exchange program after observing the math lessons across England.
"I feel that it very much is working, our teachers have learned a lot from seeing Shanghai teachers' teaching their English students. And some of the key themes coming out are our children need to know their tables better," Morgan said. "They are better at times tables in Shanghai than they are here and that's perhaps getting in the way - it's slowing our children down with their calculation. "
Morgan also said that the the Shanghai approach is a very thorough one.
"One of the other things that are coming through is that the Shanghai style is a very step-by-step, logical approach, with far more detail," she added.
