Two worlds, two ways of learning

From Michael Feng's, "Snuffles," Fall '99 From Michael Feng's, "Snuffles," Fall '99There are some people who seem genetically predisposed to be teachers' pets, who always sit in the front of the room and raise their hands in response to every question. The response to questions in class is invariably the same. The only raised hand belongs to me, the lone American, while the Chinese, Korean and Japanese students stay silent. University professors, many of whom have studied abroad in other countries, seek to duplicate the climate of hearty debate that exist in Western schools. Yet their students often have nothing to contribute. The "practice makes perfect" mythology of Eastern education has taught them to avoid the risk of answering questions. And so, in every class, I am the apple of my teachers' eyes, the only person not seated as far away as possible from the front of the room, one of the few not sprawled out asleep in full view of the teacher. All in all, I have not been terribly impressed with the vaunted Asian educational machine, supposedly able to churn out mini-Einsteins who can solve differential equations and play the violin at the same time. Despite the annual statistics that show American students lagging farther and farther behind their Chinese counterparts in math and science, I much prefer our style of education. Through class presentations, debates and grades for participation, Western education rewards creativity and punishes passivity. In essays, the most cherished characteristic is original thought, while the most abhorred is plagiarism. In contrast, Asian schools emphasize approximation of the material in the textbook. Class assignments require students to memorize entire chapters of text and then recite them in class. The ideal essay duplicates a given thesis in the most literal manner possible, as concisely as possible. Somewhere during these last few eons, the Confucian ideal of "respect your elders" has been warped. Today, children hear, "Obey without question your parents, your teachers and your government." Every day, children listen like drones in school for seven hours, then do homework at home for another seven hours. Accustomed to being assigned more homework than they can possibly complete, students meet the bare minimum requirements and nothing more. Modern Eastern education teaches students to work harder, but not better. The primary skills that students learn are efficient time management of an impossibly large workload and the patience to endure that workload. In the huge government-subsidized companies that still dominate Asian economies, people work with the same mindset with which they studied. Because they learned that the best way to approach a job is to get it over with as fast as possible, everyone, from top-level managers to manual labor, works to the lowest common denominator. Therefore, slacking off is accepted as long as your boss either doesn't notice or doesn't care. In this context, it is unsurprising that many Asian companies are riddled with corruption and inefficiency. The goal of education is to prepare one for life. In no way does learning by rote and passive obedience -- the primary characteristics of Eastern education -- accomplish that. On the other hand, Western education has injected me with personality and taught me how to compete effectively in a social setting. And so, I'll take the title of teacher's pet gladly, if only because it sure beats being as boring as everyone else in my class.