Zhu Bangfen: The "burden reduction" misunderstanding and challenges facing scientific education in my country

Zhu Bangfen: Physicist, Academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Professor of the Department of Physics, Tsinghua University Higher Research Center, Tsinghua University Higher Research Institute, and Tsinghua University.

At present, my country's education is facing two highlights: one is that the school cannot cultivate the world -class outstanding talents, that is, the so -called "Qian Xuesen asked" that the opposition and field are concerned about; In this regard, our education department has taken many targeted measures. For the cultivation of first -class talents, the education department has launched a variety of talent training programs and independent enrollment measures; and for reducing the burden of students, its basic ideas are to streamline the content of the courses for students to study, reduce curriculum requirements, reform examination content and methods, etc. Essence This article will not involve the issue of first -class talent training, but focus on discussing the burden reduction measures adopted by the education department and its impact on my country's scientific education.

Since the promulgation of the documents of the original State Education Commission (formerly the former Ministry of Education) "Several Provisions on Eliminating Elementary School Students' Curbs", for nearly 30 years, the educational leadership department has launched many measures to reduce burdens, such as the liberal arts and sciences of middle schools. Various holidays and new curriculum standards (referred to as "new curriculum standards") for various courses in middle schools until the recent college entrance examination reform. The responsible comrades of the education department believed that after reducing the curriculum requirements, students would have more time to develop, which not only reduced the burden on students, but also improved the comprehensive quality. However, from the perspective of the implementation effect, we must face up to a fact: as the training requirements of many basic knowledge and abilities in the school teaching content have fallen, the enrollment examinations are becoming simpler and more and higher. The burden of primary school students has not been alleviated so far, but has become heavier. This is mainly reflected in the following three aspects. (1) "Board" in advance. Students' competition in "not losing on the starting line" is getting stronger and earlier. From the competition of entering key high schools to the competition from the prestigious junior high school, to the early enrollment of the good primary school, and even the application for high -quality kindergartens, the sky -high records of the "school district house" have been refreshed again and again, which is a proof. (2) The actual time of the students' actual spending in learning does not decrease every day, despite the decrease in class in class. As many schools have banned re -classes, they do not leave or leave less homework, and many training institutions and intermediary companies have involved in the education industry. This not only leads to the increase in the economic burden of students and the increase in students' learning burden, but also makes the social classes more curing early. (3) With the decline of the difficulty and challenge of the curriculum, as the distinction of the college entrance examination is reduced, it is not good for creative students. A lot of time is spent on "brushing questions", that is, repeatedly do various types of simulation test questions until they are skilled, more "dead memories". Especially the review and simulation test for a whole year of high school has made many students who really like science and talent, and their interest and enthusiasm have been exhausted. , Graduate, and even researchers, this has a long -term negative impact on the development of Chinese students' creativity and imagination.

Now, it is time for us to review, analyze and seriously think about the "burden reduction" education policy!

First of all, we must soberly understand the current situation of Chinese primary and secondary education, including its strengths and weaknesses. Mr. Yang Zhenning, Professor Qian Yingyi of the School of Economics and Management of Tsinghua University, and I have discussed Chinese education issues many times. Mr. Yang has repeatedly pointed out that Chinese education is more suitable for students with 70-80 points, and it is not suitable for students with more than 90 points. Is it appropriate for students with less than 60 points? Mr. Yang did not say that according to my opinion, it was not appropriate. He was too tired and self -confident and was hit. Perhaps it was better than the American sheep -style education. In the speech, Professor Qian used two average and two standard deviation statistics to evaluate Chinese education. He pointed out that Chinese education is relatively high and "standard deviation" in large -scale basic knowledge and skills. "specialty. This is true. For example, the "International Student Evaluation Project" (PISA) is an 15 -year -old student reading, mathematical, and scientific ability evaluation research project organized and conducted by the Economic Cooperation and Development Organization (OECD). Every three years, nearly 70 countries and regions participate Essence Since the official participation in 2009, the middle school students in Shanghai (5000-6000 random samples per year participated, and the degree is uneven. First. This clearly shows that the average level of Chinese students in this area is relatively high. However, there are still "small standard deviations" at the same time as "high mean", that is, the outstanding talents of Chinese students are relatively scarce, and there are relatively few people who have learned poorly. The phenomenon of "high average value and small standard difference" of this kind of knowledge is closely related to the "big unification" and "one -size -fits -all" model in our education. Education "one -size -fits -all" is the double -edged sword: the unified standard gives students the opportunity to receive a relatively solid basic education, so as to cultivate a large number of technical talents with high quality; and convergence education has caused many students to have a heavy burden. It is also very unfavorable to stand out. On the other hand, as Professor Qian pointed out, Chinese students also present the characteristics of "low average" and "large standard differences" in terms of basic literacy and moral values ​​of people. "Low the average value" means that the average level of human quality is relatively low, and the "standard difference" indicates that the problem of Chinese education is not just the problem of not being able to cultivate outstanding talents. The people on the bottom line have become increasingly highlighted. The responsibility of education in this area is great, but it is also ridiculous to blame education. Secondly, on the basis of understanding my country's education strengths and weaknesses, we need to study what weaken and enhance education in education. In my opinion, the problem of solving basic quality "low average, high balance difference" is the primary problem that we need to solve. The basic qualities here include humanistic quality, scientific quality, and moral cultivation; "It is another problem we want to solve. To this end, on the one hand, we should comprehensively enhance the basic quality education of people, on the other hand, the space for students to learn and think appropriately, and reduce a large number of "brushing" training and excessive "dead memories" that are linked to the test. back". I think that the current "one -size -fits -all" burden reduction policy in our education department is to reduce the average value in teaching knowledge and reduce the "equity difference". There is also a backward backward. To some extent, it is running counter to the end.

Third, it is different from person to person to understand whether the burden is. Students are not an exactly the same product on the assembly line. There are no backgrounds, intelligence, and abilities in the world. The same studies, the burden of different students feel different. For some people, the courses in middle schools are too easy and there is no challenge at all; for some people, even if it is further reduced to the current course, they still feel too difficult. In addition, the scientific foundation of students and different majors at different levels is also very different. Therefore, we need to teach according to their aptitude. Although the burden of "one -size -fits -all" type is easy to implement, it is very unreasonable.

Fourth, the pressure and burden of students must be "divided into two". Life can always be used to grow up after "several times". As long as the psychological pressure continues too long, the pressure may not be harmful to the growth of the child. Our media reports have many one -sidedness, always saying that American middle school students are easier than us. In fact, one of the best middle school students in the United States is very hard and worked twelve. Compared with China's best middle school students, the pressure and burden of the best students in the United States may be heavier. The difference is that their pressure and burden are largely found, and many of our students are arranged by parents or teachers.

Fifth, the root cause of the ineffective "burden reduction" of one -size -fits knife lies in the culture, history and social traditions of our country, and the contemporary evolution has evolved into people's strong pursuit of "knowledge changing destiny". In addition, the successful implementation of the basic national policy of the only child over the past 30 years and the improvement of people's living standards have made the only children receive the focus of education as much as possible. The mentality is very different. In this context, the contradiction between the people's strong needs for high -quality educational resources and the shortage of high -quality educational resources will exist for a long time; and for a longer period of time, the college entrance examination is a period of time. Main channel. Under the constraints here, if you cannot solve the "college entrance examination alone wooden bridge", the "360 lines, the champion" cannot be achieved. It is also difficult to obtain substantial great reduction (up to upon the burden caused by the law of inactivation of teaching, reducing the additional burden brought by a large number of questions). In the context of the "one -size -fits -all" education model and the leading background of the college entrance examination, blindly reducing the requirements of the academic academic uniformly, but only reduces the average knowledge level of students, but it cannot reduce the burden on students or improve the comprehensive quality of students, because entering a prestigious school (Ten Ten (Ten The fierce competition of many years ago) was basically determined by the relative selection of the college entrance examination. The misunderstanding of our education department not only has not caused a reduction in student burden, but also leads to many adverse consequences. As a physics teacher, I am worried that the weakening of scientific education in Chinese middle school students, especially the weakening of physics education. In the minds of these educational managers, the concepts, ideas, and methods of physics are the most difficult to learn. They should be the first choice of burden. The series of measures they take are being brought to serious problems to our scientific education. The long -term development of our country will harm it. Let me explain two examples below.

"One example is the new curriculum standard for high school physics promulgated by the Ministry of Education. The new high school physics new courses are composed of a total of 12 modules in the common compulsory and elective series, of which 10 elective modules are divided into 3 series. Students can be able to According to the "personal interest, development potential, and future occupational needs", it is actually designed separately for science students, technical school employees and science students. Students only need to finish two compulsory modules (mainly mechanical knowledge) and an elective elective. The module has a total of 6 credits, even if the high school physics course is qualified. The new curriculum standards are desirable. On the surface, the new curriculum standards reduce the total amount of physical knowledge that students must master, and it seems to give students more freedom. In fact, students' choice of elective modules still obey the college entrance examination baton and obey the college entrance examination plan decided by the education departments of various provinces and municipalities. According to the new curriculum standard, the physical knowledge learned by middle school students is quite inadequate and incomplete For compulsory, other parts, including electromagnetics, optics, thermalology, modern physics, etc., are all electives, especially the main part of the electromagnetics are not included in the compulsory content), which leads to the "fragmentation" of the high school physics discipline system and the school physics subjects of middle schools. The structure of knowledge is lacking. In addition, the teaching content arrangement has also been separated from the process of people's cognition. For example, in the compulsory module, based on the only law of Newton's law, the concept of quantitative childization in the time and space of relativity and micro -world, not only students not only students It is difficult to understand, it is also difficult for teachers to teach, and the actual effect is not good. According to our survey, after the implementation of the new curriculum standards, the students' enthusiasm for learning physics and the foundation of physics have declined significantly. Due to the localities of various places The different requirements of the new course selection module also lead to an increase in the difficulty of the college entrance examination proposition, which makes it fair. "

"Another example is the recent college entrance examination reform plan that Zhejiang and Shanghai are in Zhejiang Province. According to the requirements of the college and their own specialties, the candidates are independently selected in the ideological politics, history, geography, physics, chemistry, and creatures (Zhejiang also have a technology). On the front, but from the existing pilot programs in Zhejiang and Shanghai, scientific teaching such as physics has a trend of further weakening. A student applying for college, assuming that the major of the university applied for the college does not have the requirements for physics, many people will not be on Selecting physics, because the uniqueness of physical thinking makes many middle school students feel difficult to get high scores, and the grades are still relatively scores (Shanghai Physics college entrance examination maximum 70 points, minimum 40 points, 3 points per grade, a total of 11 levels; Zhejiang's highest 100 level 100; Zhejiang's maximum 100 100; Points, the lowest 40 points, 3 points per grade, a total of 21), the score is also dependent on the level of the person who takes the person together, often sorting it with many students who have selected physical and well learned; The university's professional requirement must be examined physics. For students who have good physics and the grades of foreign languages, it is difficult to be admitted, because the contribution of physical results to the total scores of the college entrance examination has been completely marginalized (physical results of the total scores of the college entrance examination for the college entrance examination scores The contribution rate is only 60/750 = 8%of the Zhejiang plan, and the weight of foreign languages ​​is 150/750 = 20%. Compared with the contribution of the language, number, and the outside of the door 150/660 = 22.5%. Only 30/660 = 4.5%, that is, the contribution of a foreign language test score to the advancement is equal to 5 physics, far exceeding the sum of 3 scientific courses including physics, chemistry, and life). In this regard, I have the following points. Comment. "First of all, we must be clear that the main purpose of the physical education of middle school is not to cultivate physicists. For physics students, this physical knowledge of middle schools can be supplemented at university. Many first -class physicists such as Yang Zhenning and Zhou Guangzhao. I haven't learned physics in middle school. The most important role of physical education and scientific education in middle schools is to improve the scientific quality of the people. Physics is the foundation of high -tech. Learning physics is one of the most important ways to raise the spirit of science. In the past three decades, the Chinese economy has been closely related to the education of middle school students and college students with relatively high scientific qualities in my country in the past few decades. The so -called "demographic dividend" is essentially "education dividend". Many problems in my country, especially in lack of innovation, are also related to the cultivation of scientific literacy. In fact, a large number of people in my country (including middle school graduates from universal universities, students of university liberal arts, and some college students), their scientific foundation is mainly related to the physics they learned in high school. In the current new physics curriculum standards, electromagnetics, optics, and modern physics knowledge are not compulsory, and they lack the cultivation of basic quality of scientific spirit and physical thinking in the process of teaching physical knowledge. Under the commanding stick of the college entrance examination, the significant decline in the proportion of physics in the college entrance examination reform plan in Shanghai and Zhejiang will further weaken the enthusiasm of students to learn science. This will cause many qualified high school graduates in China to be "blind", which will be very unfavorable to improve the national scientific spirit and scientific quality of our country. In the long run, it will weaken my country's core competitiveness. If China's future leaders, civil servants at all levels, sociologists, economists, media practitioners, technical workers, and the general people are mostly "science blind" and lack of scientific spirit, China will not be a great country.

Second, do physical teaching need to reduce burden? How to reduce the burden? I think that physical teaching in middle schools needs to be reforming, and it needs to be reduced. For most high school students, the most important thing for the teaching of high school physics class is not to do some physical problems, but to have a correct understanding of the knowledge and concepts of the main areas of physics. Methods, empirical methods of experimental inspection theory, thinking about using mathematical computing and logical reasoning methods, etc.), understand the history of physics and interaction between physics and high -tech innovation. Here, I want to recommend two books written by Richard A Muller, "Physics for FuturePresidents", "Energy for Future Presidents". According to me, our high school graduates should have the physical knowledge introduced by these two books, as well as the thinking, logic and philosophy of physicists.

Third, since each student's foundation, intelligence and ability are different, how can we teach according to their aptitude? How to make our next generation of outstanding students who are interested in mathematics and science and talent to learn more appropriately? How to make students who are not interested in science, the burden will not be too heavy? I think that the new school in the middle school physics currently implemented is aligning with American middle schools. However, although the requirements for physics teaching in the general school in the United States are not high, it is not as "one -size -fits -all" as us. It does not set a maximum limit for the best students. The evaluation is also multi -channel and diversified, creating a good space. I think, can we introduce some of our outstanding students to the university pre -repair courses (AP courses) similar to the United States, which is beneficial to the training of talents throughout the country. The MOOC course currently being implemented should be said to create conditions for this. On the other hand, appropriately reduce the difficulty of exercises, reduce the requirements of quantitative calculations, supplement to increase physical experiments and increase understanding of physical concepts, which may make some students who learn physics difficult to enhance confidence and reduce the burden. Successful teaching reform should significantly improve the comprehensive quality of people. In terms of teaching knowledge, we must improve the average quality (average) and appropriately increase the standard deviation. If we can reduce the competition among students at the stage of compulsory education (primary school and junior high school), can reduce the different differences in teaching resources in various middle schools during high school, strengthen general education instead of deliberately reduced the teaching of science disciplines, pay attention to understanding rather than doing instead of doing instead of doing it. Title, so that the curriculum has different levels and depth to adapt to students of different levels, and selects the qualified standards for high school graduation near (average-standard deviation). Too heavy. On the other hand, the college entrance examination science test papers should have a large degree of distinction, which must effectively test the excellent level of science and engineering science students, but also substantially distinguish between liberal arts candidates. In addition, the less the number of college entrance examination examinations, the better, the appropriate test can reduce the probability of students' accident errors, and may be more able to comprehensively measure a student. In short, the teaching reform of primary and secondary schools in my country is far away. Physicists and physicists in our university should increase their attention to the physics curriculum of middle schools and regard improving the scientific quality of our people as their own responsibilities.

(This article is published in the "Physics and Engineering" journal No. 4, 2016)

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