Research On The School-running Practice Of Xiamen Loktek Girls’ School In The Period From1921to1951

Following the Opium War in1840, China became a semi-colonial and semi-feudal society, and the society was forced to undergo tremendous changes. Xiamen was one of the earliest trading ports in modern China, which attracted a large number of western missionaries. In order to meet the demands of the missionary, they started schools there, and Loktek Girls’ School, located at Gulang Island, was one of the typical representatives among them. After the development for half a century, Loktek Girls’ School which was just a "women’s bible class" at the beginning, had become a secondary education institution in the early1920s.The paper focuses on the school-running practice of Loktek Girls’ School in a period of30years, from1921to1951. Firstly, it collates the several stages of the school’s running process vertically, and shows the fate of the school, which is closely related to the historical environment, from the beginning to the end, from glory to decline. Secondly, this paper describes the features of the management of this Girls’ School. In the administrative management, it implements "the President Responsibility, Board oversight and Staff participation" system. In the management of the teachers and students, the school authorities attached great importance to both the course teaching and everyday behavior. Thirdly, the author goes deep into discussing the situation of five kinds of education of Loktek Girls’ School, which include Religious Education, Women’s Education, Music Education, English Education and Mandarin Education, from three aspects:the education background, the education content and the evaluation of the education. In Religious Education, the school thought highly of the combination of inside and outside class; In Women’s Education, the school paid attention to the introduction of the concept of independence and social participation; Music Education in the school not only had a relation to fostering music talents, but also closely associated with the Musical atmosphere in Gulang Island. In English education, it followed the principle of gradual improvement and created an English language environment actively. While the Mandarin Education of Loktek Girls’ School, which laid stress on teaching and daily talking using mandarin Chinese, was an innovation in that linguistic context of Xiamen area.The study starts from the reality, basing on historical materials and the exciting achievements, and presents the true situation of the school-running practice of Loktek Girls’ School. Furthermore, because Loktek Girls’ School was a catholic school in modern China, the study of its school-running practice also shows general status of catholic education at that time in China.