Dear Editor,
Reading the articles "Happiness vs. Competitiveness--Has School Become Any Less Stressful?" and "Between Localization and Internationalization--Primary Education in Modern Taiwan" in the April edition of Sinorama got me thinking on a number of issues. Some of these thoughts I really need to get off my chest.
As parents, who amongst us doesn't hope that our children can grow up to be competitive whilst still having a happy childhood? Finding the balance is a delicate issue.
Children possess different ability levels, have different economic backgrounds, and are raised by parents with different notions about childrearing. Naturally, every child is a bit different as a result. Everybody is quick to dismiss the accomplishments of the children of affluent parents, ascribing their success to the parents' willingness to spend in order to cultivate their children's ability. In truth, though, achieving such results isn't just a matter of throwing money around. There is also parental care and the diligence of their children, both of which are aspects that people shouldn't be so eager to write off.
In "Between Localization and Internationalization," the author illustrated how today's young study their mother tongue and English at the same time. As the mother of an elementary school-aged child, I deeply sympathize with the author's lament that the courses teaching our mother tongues have neither received their due attention from parents nor achieved adequate results with our children. But as to the espousal of the notions that studying English doesn't equate with internationalization, and that spending more time on English than Chinese will cause our children's creativity and competitiveness to diminish, I could only feel a tremendous sense of shock.
Isn't it best to begin studying languages from an early age? Doesn't fluent English make us more competitive? With these ideas in mind, I set out to develop my son's English ability early on: I enrolled him at an all-English kindergarten, took him to study abroad, and hired a private home tutor. Today, not only is his English fluent, but his Chinese has not suffered as a consequence, nor have the two languages ever interfered with another. How can it be, then, that this will cause him to lose any degree of creativity or competitiveness?
There isn't a parent anywhere who doesn't wish their children a happy childhood. Yet at the same time, in order to prepare for the future, it's imperative that children spend time on their studies; otherwise, after their "happy" childhoods are over, what will their futures hold in store? There's no place for children who refuse to grow up. Of course, I'm also hopeful that the orientation of our education policies will become clearer, or else both parents and children alike will be left in the dark.
