2018 Sino-USA Education Forum Session 1: Mentougou Yuyuan Primary school

On November 13, 2018, the first session of the 2018 Sino-USA Education Forum hosted by BTC took place in Yuyuan Primary School in Mentougou District, Beijing.

This forum was hosted by BTC to invite education experts from Illinois, USA, to conduct in-depth exchanges with Chinese school teachers about themed activities in Chinese classrooms. The forum conduct zero-distance exchanges, classroom interactions and discussions between Chinese and American education, In the form of specific lessons, cases and case-like sharing, seminars, forums, experiences and analysis, etc.. In terms of curriculum construction and teacher leadership, we will discover and understand the differences and complementarities between Chinese and American education, and absorb each other's outstanding educational concepts and methods.

After a brief welcome ceremony, teachers immediately started today's teaching seminar.

Firstly, teacher Li Hongjuan of Yuyuan Primary School led today's teaching theme "Engineering Problems" on the issue of school campus beautification. Because their daily life is involved, the students participated actively.

Then on the same engineering problem, the American expert Professor Kamiee   had another class. First of all, she sent a note to each group, each of which wrote a different number of meters of road to be repaired. After discussion, each team chose a team leader to explain its calculation process and results. The students were distressed that the result was not whole days . Some students suggested that "the last part must be repaired no matter how small it is", which made us admire children’s sharp thinking.

Teacher Kamie entered the second part of teaching, the practical application part. Because of time constraint and not knowing of the students ’level of learning, Teacher Kamie only demonstrated part of their teaching in the United States, which is encouraging students to make their own cars using a few provided items. Teacher Kamie explained that this is a fragment of their teaching. The rest of the course is: after the production was completed, the solution of the above engineering problems will be used to allow students to actually operate the trolley they made to find out how far they can travel, how much can be transported, and how long does it take to transport a certain amount of items, etc., so as to derive other learning content. The students are very interested in this learning method, and the discussion is full of enthusiasm. Many teachers in the classroom were also infected by the atmosphere at the scene and joined in the study to listen to the whimsy of the students.

The class time ended unknowingly, and the students were still trying to carry on. They really hoped to continue. Some students said to the teacher after class that it would be most interesting to play in leaning and to learn in playing.

The second class is the first-grade science class "Measurement by Hand", which is first taught by Chinese teacher Liu Ying.

Mr. Liu completely aroused the enthusiasm of the students in class by means of projection, teaching by the small teachers, and whether the students agreed.

The first grade children are not very expressive, and their comprehension is not particularly outstanding, but they learn to measure the desk step by step under the guidance of the teacher. They are really satisfied.

The same content was taught by an expert teacher from US, but she taught in storytelling way. In that story, the king needed the help of children to make a memorable birthday gift for the queen. The children even forgot that they were in a class. They contemplated about how to do it to help the king make a bed which is three feet long and two feet wide , and discussed enthusiastically.

In the end, there are last two outstanding works: a bed made exactly according to the requirements, and the other is that the students cut the "bed foot" according to their own thinking and then glued it. Although they were not completed, they left a deep impression to the American teacher.

In the afternoon discussion session, the two teachers who taught in the morning summed up their teaching concepts and process. Then President Julie Fanne and Professor Kamie explained their STEM teaching philosophy and answered the teacher's questions.

Teachers discussed actively, asking questions and sharing their feedback.

American professor’s idea of "educate people with love" and "guide students to ask questions and think all the time" happened to coincide with educational concepts of "Educate love with love" and "Teachers should let go and get involved   in time" which is advocated by Yuyuan Primary School. Teachers discussed the similarities between Chinese and American teaching. Chinese teachers also asked foreign teachers questions about the STEAM teaching concept.

In order to let the teachers deeply understand the happiness of students studying by their own , American professors designed two games for Chinese teachers to participate.

Tower made of spaghetti and marshmallow

Transport a balloon from point A to point B

The often serious teachers showed childlike smiles one after another, screaming, clapping and cheering for their achievements.

The common love and affection for education has allowed American experts and   teachers using different teaching method in the same class to appreciate each other, and even seize the gap between the discussions to conducted in-depth exchanges and communication on various aspects of teaching methods. The exchanges made them form a deep friendship.

Finally, Yuyuan Elementary School gave the foreign teachers their own calligraphy characters "cloud sea" and "essence, energy, spirit", depositing the feelings of "confidantes in the sea" , "all are brothers within the four seas", and encouraged the teachers to keep the most need the "essence, energy, spirit".

At last, teachers of both countries took pictures together.