Shanghai lessons for UK's math problem

60 instructors from top-performing Shanghai schools will teach at 30 hubs across the country

A report several years ago found that Britons are not shy about admitting that they are bad at math. While being semiliterate is considered shameful, it appears there isn't the same type of stigma for math ability.

Now, however, the British government is making a push to change that, a key part of which will begin in autumn. Motivation for the push was provided by a series of international mathematics tests in 2012 that showed British teens registering only average scores while Chinese kids landed at the top.

The tests also provided an idea for solving the problem: Inviting teachers from China to introduce Chinese teaching methods to Britain in the hope of raising performance levels.

In September, about 60 teachers from schools in Shanghai's Changning district will fly to the UK to teach in 30 "math hubs" across the country.

"This program is about setting up a network in schools across the country that other local schools can use, so that they become centers of best practice, and we want that to be a semi-permanent fixture in British education," says Elizabeth Truss, who was parliamentary undersecretary of state for education and childcare from 2012 to 2014. She was appointed to a top environmental and rural affairs post on July 15.

What's essential, Truss says, is for teachers involved with the hubs to be inspired by them and provide leadership.

"There has been huge interest from schools, with hundreds of applications from the top schools in the country. With these innovative hubs, we want to improve the quality of math teaching across the country, to transform the way math is taught by learning from the very best around the world, and to dramatically increase the number of young people continuing to study math beyond 16," she says.

Starting in September, two UK teachers from each hub, starting with primary schools, will spend time in Shanghai schools observing their techniques first hand.

These hubs will open in September, and every school in England will have access to a local hub for advice and expertise.

"There is undoubtedly value in programs that allow talented teachers from two educational systems to compare the challenges that they face and the strategies that they use to address them. For this reason alone, a program of exchanges between Shanghai and England is welcome," says Kenneth Ruthven, professor of Education from the University of Cambridge.

"Hopefully, this program will enable the participants to see beyond some of the simplistic, and often stereotypical, portrayals and evaluations of the two systems so as to better appreciate what they have in common and what differentiates them," Ruthven says.

Early this year, Truss led a delegation to China to observe math classes there.

"We have some brilliant math teachers in this country, but what I saw in Shanghai, and other Chinese cities, has only strengthened my belief that we can learn from them," says Truss.

She visited five schools in Shanghai and four schools in other Chinese cities. "I was struck by the expectations and high standards that we saw in every classroom. Shanghai has set the bar for us."

Professor Chris Husbands, director of the Institute of Education at the University of London, also says he was impressed by what he saw.

"The amount of regular feedback given to students by teachers in Shanghai was phenomenal. I was struck by how quickly they gave feedback and how quickly they give them the chance to move forward in math," Husbands says.

Shanghai was picked as the primary city for the visit because its students often land at the top of the Program for International Student Assessment, a set of exams organized by the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development.

The assessment indicated that children from working-class families in Shanghai are better at math on average than middle class students from the UK.

Fan Lianghuo, professor of education and head of the Mathematics and Science Education Research Centre at the University of Southampton, should know. Fan received a postgraduate certificate in mathematics education from East China Normal University in Shanghai.

He says the British government attaches great importance to the improvement of their math teaching quality.

"This program enables British teachers to widen their eyes about another world and enables the teachers from both sides to learn from each other," Fan says.

Ruthven says that as to why Shanghai students do so well in math, "many factors have been suggested to explain this.

"These include not just the greater emphasis on mathematics in Shanghai schools, their use of specialist teachers, and the quality of their mathematics teaching, but the favorable conditions under which Shanghai teachers work and being able to devote more hours to professional development and lesson preparation because they have fewer hours of teaching contact."

He says commentators also have noted the high levels of supplementary study by Shanghai pupils outside school, strong family support for success in school and the social exclusivity of Shanghai schools.

In the UK, some wonder whether advanced teaching methods really are what boosted Shanghai, or whether it is mainly the extra time that the students spend studying on their own.

Others ponder whether Shanghai might be only an exception because of conditions there, which might mean it is not representative of math instruction and results in the rest of China.

"The suggestion that all of China's students perform well in mathematics is a myth. The government's evidence for this comes from the PISA findings of 2012, data which is based on the results of one particular city of China: Shanghai. This is home to the wealthiest and most highly educated Chinese citizens," says Christine Blower, leader of the National Union of Teachers.

But Ruthven says that as long as the program is open to wide-ranging discussion around such issues, it is likely to be successful in identifying opportunities for each system to learn from the other.

Fan adds: "No matter whether the British are learning from Shanghai or the other way around, the local environments and cultures are totally different. So just fully adopting the same methods from Shanghai might not work for Britain. However, this should not become one of the excuses of refusing to learn from each other."

Experts often say that changing the attitude of British students toward math is one of the first things that should be done.

"According to PISA, British children spend much less time in mathematics than Shanghai students. They don't get additional practice, which would contribute to poor abilities in math. So I think they should spend more time with math. It doesn't have to be as much time as Shanghai students spend, but at least they should try to do so," says Fan.

The quality of teachers in the UK also is critical to improvement in math, Fan adds.

"Teachers from Shanghai attend more academic seminars every week compared to the ones from Britain, who barely attend any seminars at all. That is something they should learn from Shanghai.

"Only a small number of math teachers in Britain majored in mathematics, with the rest having majored in other subjects, which reveals a huge gap between the countries because most math teachers in Shanghai were math graduates," says Fan.

"Britain should train more math specialist teachers for students. I know they are now tempting math graduates from the UK to join teaching teams through financial rewards."

Fan explains that most math teachers in the UK are relatively less efficient in teaching their students because they also have to discipline students in class, which takes a lot of classroom time.

"British students learn a lot but they don't dig much, compared with Shanghai students, who learn to dig more on specific matters," says Fan. "Also, math textbooks are not frequently and fully used for teaching, which can also be a contributing factor."

Math homework and self-study should not be underemphasized, Fan says. Without that, improvement will be difficult.

"They should not fully copy what Shanghai does. However, they should be enlightened by it. I stay positive overall about this, but the way they adopt the methodologies still needs to be polished," says Fan.

Truss, the former education official, says, "For the math help program, we will see how the first year of the program works and then how we will proceed".

Zhou Heran contributed to this story.

zhangchunyan@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily European Weekly 07/18/2014 page29)