The Development Of Elder Education In America And Enlightenment

With the increasing pressure of global aging population, countries take various measures to cope with the challenge of aging and the elder education gradually becomes the focus people pay attention to. Elder education is an important part of adult education and also the last stage of lifelong education. The development of elder education is not only beneficial to improve lifelong education system, but also is necessary to train the old people who can adapt to the new era to construct a learning-style society. The United States, which has been in a positive attitude to meet the challenge of aging, is one of the countries which accessed to the aging population in the world, and its elder education started early and developed relatively advanced. Paying close attention to the development of American elder education and seeking its developing experience and enlightenment, it will be significantly meaningful to provide reference for the perfection of elder education in China.This paper first introduces the reason of selecting the topic, the meaning of research, the situation of domestic and foreign research, the main method of research,the innovative points and shortcomings, and also defines the conception of elders and elder education referred in this article. Then, from the beginning of American elder education rising, the paper summarizes four stages of the development of American elder education, namely its budding stage, developing stage, thriving stage and innovating stage. Based on clearing its developing course of American elder education, the paper gives the details of the institution and its curriculum of elder education in the United States, such as the curriculum provided by the common higher education institutions, the curriculum by the Senior Center, Elder Hotel and intergeneration education program, and the curriculum by library and AARP. Based on the above analysis, this paper summarizes the following basic experience of the development of American elder education: the perfect law and policy guarantee its development of American elder education; the various educational institutions and abundant course meet needs of different senior students; the form of American elder education is flexible and varied; the elders in America more actively participate in the social activities; the America attaches importance to the research of elder education theory.Relative to the development of American elder education, the elder education in China starts late and it is in its early stage, so there are some problems to be solved, the following : the development of elder education in China is lack of safeguard mechanism, such as legal safeguard mechanism, funding safeguard mechanism, quality safeguard mechanism, etc; the overall development level of elder education in China is low, such as: elders less actively participates in elder education, the contents of elder education are lack of richness and the form of elder education is lack of diversity; the basic theory research of elder education in China is not enough. In order to overcome the above questions, combining with the actual situation of elder education in China and referring to the developing basic experience of American elder education, the paper puts forward five suggestions: perfecting the legal system of elder education and carrying out the development of elder education in accordance with the law; raising awareness, changing ideas and establishing correct outlook of elder education; integrating education resources and realizing the sharing of resources; promoting its diversified development of elder education; strengthening the basic theory research of elder education. Finally, the author looks forward to the prospect of the elder education in China and hope it will become more and more prosperous with each passing day.