A Review On The Departmental Instruction Reform In Chinese Language Arts In 1956

A nation-wide reform of Chinese language arts curriculum started in 1950s, initiated by the Ministry of Education, which aimed at dividing the Chinese language arts into two parts. It was as a creative reform in modern Chinese education history. Based on the review of the firsthand literatures, this study tries to describe the setting, the causes, the process and the expiration of reform in details to demonstrate that this reform is reasonable.With the upsurge of following up the Russia mode, the central government initiated the departmental reform to improve the quality of Chinese education. It was terminated because of political consideration despite of its positive effect. As a curriculum reform, the basic orientation of departmental instruction is advisable despite of many problems.Chinese language education can not only develop the language ability, but also cultivate the flexible thinking method and the ethos of the student. Literature education is one of the important ways to develop the student's aesthetic judgment. The learner will be able to get more basic knowledge of literature theory than ever. And also, Literature education can cultivate the healthy personality, gracious sentiment and right life philosophy of the student. Chinese language teaching and literature teaching have different functions, meanings, contents, and teaching methods due to their own character. It may lead to an internecine situation if Chinese language teaching and literature teaching were interblend into one subject. In the process of the reform, Chinese subject was divided into Chinese language and literature. They separately set up the language teaching syllabus and the literary teaching syllabus, and compiled the textbooks of each. It had got some meaningful experiences in teaching practice. There were also some problems of departmental instruction reform itself. However, it cannot be considered as the main causes of expiration of departmental instruction.It is expected that this study would have implication on the issue of departmental instruction. More exploration is necessary in the future.