General music education in China: conceptual assumptions and peculiarities

Šis tyrimas atskleidžia Kinijos muzikinio ugdymo istorijos raidą: padeda suprasti Kinijos švietimo sistemos pradmenis, pradedant nuo senovinės tautos su turtingais muzikiniais šaltiniais ir baigiant šiandienine Kinija, kuri turi didžiausią pasaulyje mokyklinio muzikinio ugdymo sistemą. Pasak oficialios svetainės, Kinijoje šiuo metu veikia daugiau negu 580,000 mokyklų, mokančių nuo 20 iki 300 milijonų pradinių ir vidurinių klasių mokinių. Tačiau formalusis muzikinis ugdymas yra tik 100 metų senumo, todėl muzikiniam ugdymui mokykloje vis dar trūksta standartizacijos ir daugybės regioninių skirtumų pašalinimo. Kinijos muzikinis ugdymas bendrojo ugdymo mokyklose turi labai skirtingas savybes ir individualius muzikos ugdytojų požiūrius bei gabumus. Taip pat įtakos turi ir ekonominiai skirtumai, dar labiau padidinantys skirtumus tarp bendrojo ugdymo mokyklų iš skirtingų Kinijos regionų. Todėl Kinijos muzikinis ugdymas vis dar yra vystymosi stadijoje, kartu su socialiniu visuomenės tobulėjimu. Tyrimo objektas - bendrasis muzikinis ugdymas Kinijoje. Tyrimo tikslas - ištirti bendrąjį muzikinį ugdymą Kinijoje ir atskleisti konceptualias prielaidas ir ypatumus. Tyrimo uždaviniai: 1. Pristatyti teorinę apžvalgą bendrojo muzikinio ugdymo Kinijoje klausimais. 2. Atskleisti muzikinio ugdymo Kinijoje ypatumus. 3. Ištirti būsimų muzikos mokytojų, muzikos mokytojų ir mokinių požiūrį į bendrąjį muzikinį ugdymą Kinijoje. Metodai: mokslinės literatūros analizė, studentų, muzikos mokytojų, mokinių apklausa raštu, kiekybinė tyrimo duomenų analizė. Remiantis moksline literatūra, buvo sudarytas klausimynas. Per tris atliktas apklausas raštu (klausimynai būsimiems muzikos mokytojams, esamiems muzikos mokytojams ir studentams) buvo siekiama ištirti bendrojo muzikinio ugdymo vystimosi koncepcijas ir charakteristikas.

China is an ancient civilised nation with rich and varied musical resources that can be traced back for more than 8,000 years, starting from a picture of an unearthed clay jar showing primeval singing and dancing. Today, China has the world’s largest music education system. According to the official sources, there are more than 580 thousand schools, and about 320 million primary and secondary schools’ students in 2008 (Ministry of Education, 2008). Formal music education, however, has a history of only about 100 years, and is still lacking standardisation and a real nation-wide adoption at all levels. In both ancient and modern China, music has been regarded as a tool for political and social functioning (Ho, 2010). For instance, in the Zhou dynasty (1045–256 BC), most of the musical ensemble used to perform court music, which varied according to the rank of the aristocracy (Xie & Leung, 2011). In modern China, music is not particularly valued by students and their parents because learning music cannot ensure professional and financial success within the country’s rapidly developing economy. Under the one-child policy, it is understandable that parents might encourage their only child to pursue financial success through the traditional disciplines such as linguistics and mathematics at the school’s level and through professional disciplines such as medicine, law studies, and business management at the university level. As a result of general reforms at all levels of school education, China’s school music education in the 21st century has reached a higher level, if compared to the last three decades. A breaking point for music education was the announcement of the National Music Curriculum Standard for Full-time Schools’ Compulsory Education (Ministry of Education, 2001) and The National Music Curriculum Standard for Senior High Schools (Ministry of Education, 2003), which were designed to provide schools’ music education system for China comprising of compulsory music courses of primary and secondary levels (1 to 2 classes each week), in addition to elective music courses (had 3 credits, subject was not for examination) at the senior high school level. Despite these reforms, music education is still regarded as less important than literature, linguistics, mathematics and science education, especially for senior year students of each level, even though students have a possibility to take music major’s admission tests and graded music examinations. According to Yeh (2001), singing and listening were the two main activities that most music teachers employed, with limited creative additions, slowly introducing it into the classrooms. This type of situation has been largely related to the competency of the music teachers. In addition, there has been a serious lack of music teachers in China’s rural areas, to the extent that the gap between rural and urban schools in terms of quality and has grown wider. Teachers of rural schools typically face very poor teaching conditions and facilities, whereas their counterparts from urban schools have access to excellent technologies and classroom facilities, because elite students choose to study in affiliated schools that can assure them entrance into the most eminent universities. Xie and Leung (2011) studied the music learning motivation of 2,750 Chinese high-school and middle-school students and found that their values, including intrinsic value, attainment value, utilitarian value, and costs of learning music were significantly lower than other academic subjects, such as language and mathematics (Yeh, 2001). Students’ expectancy in learning music declines across the school levels. However, their interest in learning music rises. Zhang (2004) argued that the primary-school music teachers in the new era should possess three basic qualities, organized into modules. The first module is music education’s ideology, which refers to the updated global views on music education. The second module addresses the ways in which professional musical abilities and practices can enhance the progression of modern music education towards the necessary professional competence, which includes basic teaching abilities, such as singing, instrumental performance and dancing, along with the ability to facilitate extracurricular activities. The third module notes the use of modern information technologies as a breakthrough in traditional music education, designed to help instructors master the theories, skills, knowledge of information technologies, software, and multimedia technologies. The quality of general music education differs in each school across China, and normally depends on the attitude and competence of individual music educators. In addition, the conspicuous regional economic differences across China are another reason for such diverse disparity in general music education. Thus, the research problem is future music teachers’ attitudes towards the general musical education in China; music teachers’ understanding of the general musical education in China; students’ experiences of acquiring music education in China. The subject of the research is the conceptual assumptions and peculiarities of general music education in China. Therefore the aim of the thesis is to explore the conceptual assumptions and peculiarities of general music education in China. The objectives of the research were achieved through the completion of the following objectives: 1. To present a theoretical overview on the issues of general music education in China. 2. To reveal the particularities of music education in China. 3. To investigate the future of music teachers, music teachers and students’ approach to general music education in China.