Study On The Academic Paradigm Of Comparative Educationist In Modern China

As the cradle of modern comparative educational theory,Teachers College of Columbia University had affected the academic research of China's modern comparative educationalists profoundly.In the period from 1920 s to 1930 s,these educationalists returned home from abroad successively.With the help of the educational theories they learned in America,they jointly devoted themselves to the localization transformation of the path of comparative education.Meanwhile,it presented three different academic orientations and practical approaches,including the �national reconstruction paradigm� of Zhuang Zexuan,�educational system improvement paradigm� of Chang Daozhi,and �school reform paradigm� of Luo Tingguang,which were the three typical cases.Focusing on the internal relation between China's economic and social condition and the development of new education,Zhuang Zexuan systematically put forward the theory of �the sinicization of new education� at the earliest.In order to seek the path of the sinicization of new education,he considered national character as the core content of comparative education research.By means of the methods of history and literature,Zhuang Zexuan uncovered the national characters of various countries and further discussed the mutual relation between national character and educational system.Based on that,he attempted to build an interpenetrating network of relationships between various factors such as natural environment,national character,economic force,social organization and education,with which he tried to search the power outside school influencing education.Zhuang Zexuan's educational practice was deeply influenced by his highly valuing of the issue of national character.With the view to the improvement of China's national character,he participated in the debate on �problem of language and words�,the popularization of public education,and the examination and practice of frontier and overseas Chinese education.Taking the advantages of his abundant educational experiences,Chang Daozhi had an immediate apprehension about the actual situation of China's modern educational system.He visited Europe and America,devoted to comparative education,and investigated schools of all levels in European and American.He took educational systems of various countries as the center of his research with the purpose of allowing Chinese people to understand western educational systems systematically.On the analysis of the educational systems of various countries,he strived to make researches more objective,and advocated to embed historical and cultural factors into educational system to avoid excessively subjective analysis.Over lifetime of Chang Daozhi,educational system was regarded as an ideal tool to save the country.All his educational practices,such as compilation of materials of educational systems of various countries,deep involvement into educational reform,and promotion of the democratization and rationalization of educational system,were carried out around the field of educational system.Equipped with the front-line experience in educational practice,Luo Tingguang firmly convinced that �educational scientification� was playing a positive role in the development of teachers and students.In the process of constructing research system of �educational scientification�,he integrated historical,philosophical,scientific and comparative research methods.With accordance on �educational scientification�,Luo Tingguang's comparative education research also included his conception of scientification,taking problem as entry point,combining fator analysis on policy,economy and culture,and evaluating the advantages and disadvantages of educational systems of various countries.The problem and value pursuit of research to which he payed attentions run through his educational practice,namely,application of comparative perspective and scientific methods to school managing,teaching and learning,and disciplining.In the aspect of academic paradigms of comparative education,all the three modern comparative educationalists considered the sinicization of education as orientation, placed particular emphasis on foreign educational system researching,and employed history-factor analysis as core method.However,influenced by growth environment,duration of studying abroad and mentoring relationship,they had a great divergence for academic and practical approaches.And they carried out various academic explorations in the field of education.It couldn't be ignored that Zhuang Zexuan and others had made a great contribution to comparative education and even the development of the whole China's modern educational discipline in the aspects of the construction of theoretical system and the institutionalization of disciplines.