China sends kindergarten teachers to learn from Taiwan

Want China Times, Chien Li-hsin and Staff Reporter 2015-02-25

Members of the Taoyuan police department pose with kindergarteners
during a visit, Feb. 2015. (Photo/Yang Ming-fung)

Various provincial education authorities in China have been sending educators to Taiwan to study how to improve their local educational model, reports our Chinese-language sister paper Want Daily.

Lin Pei-rong, head of the Department of Early Childhood Education at the University of Taipei, said China's government has budgeted 50 billion yuan (US$8 billion) for a three-year project to provide quality childhood education and give more children access to preschool education.

Over 70% of kindergartens in Shanghai are government-funded, according to Lin, compared to under 30% in Taipei. Even Shanghai's suburbs are rife with kindergartens, especially in farming and blue-collar communities.

China's government is not only determined to combat the shortage of early childhood education but is now also improving the quality of existing institutions. In this respect they have much to learn from Taiwan, said Lin. China's provincial authorities are also planning to impose a certification system to produce qualified kindergarten teachers, a system they have replicated from Taiwan, he added.

Lin said the characteristics of Taiwan's preschool education is the combined essence of material and educational methods from both West and East.

"When I led a group of Chinese early childhood educators to visit kindergartens in Taipei, New Taipei and Yilan, they were surprised at how well we could implement the theories of the Montesori and Waldorf (Steiner) education systems. Children appear to be playing and having fun, but were able to express themselves and be sensitive to beauty. They were not only playing, but also developing their creativity. This is what they are still unable to achieve in Shanghai," Lin said.

The northern China municipality of Tianjin, which has a population of 15 million, has also signed an agreement with Taipei to send 15 delegations to visit kindergartens and attend classes in order to learn the Taiwanese know-how of early childhood education.