Research On Qian Jibo’s Educational Thought & Practice

Mr. Qian Jibo is not only a master of National studies, but also a thoughtful Educator. In his 44 years of front-line teaching career, he always adhered to the social, academic, moral, and teacher-centered principles in order to fulfill the goal of cultivating "the Chinese citizens of the modern world。" With humanism being the core of education, and the Chinese culture being major arena, Qian was dedicating himself to carrying out the ancient phylosphy and methods of education in the modern context, training for the nation many "seeds of intellectuals", which is a certainly precious cultural legacy to the later generations.This dissertation, from a cultural perspective, applying the historical materialism as a guide, uses the literature, interviews, comparative and cross-disciplinary research methods. The dissertation analyses the existing literatures including the works of Qian and his academic achievements, attempting to fully explain the personal background and the main sources of the educational thought of Qian’s, as well as trying to review the major educational practice of Qian, which, in turn, severs as a base to analyze the value orientation of Qian’s educational thought, and educational objectives, and explore the characteristics and quality of contemporary humanities education.The dissertation is divided into seven parts:The Introduction sets out the reason and meaning of the topic, having a comprehensive review about the literature of Qian’s educational thought studies, pointing out that the studies of Qian still needs to be strengthened in many aspects, and showing the main research methods.The first chapter introduces Mr. Qian Jibo’s educational background, which mainly includes three aspects, namely, the rich educational atmosphere in south of the lower reaches of the Changjiang River the typical family school education and, the enlightenment of the neodoxy.The second chapter analyzes the main sources of Qian’s educational thought. It is divided into theoretical source and real source. The theoretical sources include Confucius and Mencius; capitalist’s educational thought in Ming and Qing Dynasties and the Western learnings. The real sources include external stimulation, internal requirements and the reality premise.The third chapter reviews the major educational practice of Qian, including his experiences as a teacher in the Third Jiangsu Provincial Normal School, Guanghua University, Wuxi College, the National Teachers College, Huazhong University, with a focus on his teaching, administration, research and other aspects of practice.The fourth chapter analyzes the values of Qian’s educational thought, mainly embodied in the "four centers", that is to say, community-centered, academic-centered, morality-centered, and teacher-centered, and points out that the choices of these values are directly or indirectly affected by the philosophy of traditional Chinese culture.The fifth Chapter analyzes the purpose and goals of Qian’s educational thought. This dissertation contends that Mr. Qian Jibo’s purpose of education is:to use modern psychology to understand the spirit of the ancient Chinese, finding a new spring in the spirit of ancient Chinese culture, and producing a modern Chinese education, in order to fulfill the entire nation’s solidarity and unity. His educational goal is to create "the Chinese citizens of modern world."Chapter VI summarizes the characteristics of Qian’s Educational Thought and Practice, pointing out its inspiration to the contemporary humanistic education. The thesis contends that an insatiable hunger for academic pursuits provides Qian’s Educational Thought and Practice with endless source, and a spirit of typical Chinese scholar in nature is the motivation for Qian’s Educational Thought and Practice.Today, to improve humanistic education needs three "selves" at least, namely, the consciousness of the national situation, the consciousness of the national nature and the consciousness of the teaching philosophy.To systematically and objectively evaluate Mr. Qian Jibo’s educational thought not only helps expand the research of historical figures in the period of the Republic of China, enriching the content of the history of Chinese education, but also have an important reference to reverse today’s problem of the absence of humanistic education.