A Study On Singapore’s National Identity Education

Singapore has a complex social structure. It has been a social fact that hugedifferences in race, religion, culture and language groups coexist in Singapore. Butthis did not become a stumbling block for Singapore’s harmonious development. Onthe contrary, the government of Singapore has wisely grasped the balance between thedifference and convergence, and made these different elements melt in harmony.Finally, turned this to the cornerstone in the country’s future development, andprovided a strong guarantee for Singapore’s political, economic transition. Then howdid the governing party control the tension between the convergence and thedifferences, and how did the ruling party make the different races and religionsharmoniously integrate into the social life. Meanwhile make it actively participate inthe country’s economic and political affairs? In essence, it is inseparable with theruling party’s attaching importance to the education of national identity frombeginning to end.The main research object of this paper is the education of national identity inSingapore. Through analyzing the historic stage, the content and the implementationways of Singapore’s national identity education to summarize its successfulexperience and discuss the inspiration for our national identity education.There are five main parts in this thesis:The first part introduces the historical development and the economicdevelopment of Singapore, under which the national identity education is divided intothree parts: initially formed national identity education, accelerated developednational identity education and system optimized and sustainable developmentnational identity education, as well as the national identity education in thepre-independence years in the first part.The second part separately discusses the main contents of Singapore’s nationalidentity education. It contains seven aspects:1.Sense of urgency education;2.Asianvalues education;3.National consciousness education;4.Education of common values;5.Family values education;6.Multicultural understanding education;7. Bilingual education.The third part points out the primary implementation way of Singapore’s nationalidentity education. Because the school education, family education and socialeducation mainly target the local Singapore citizens, the assimilation policy for thenew immigrants is added at the last.The fourth part of the paper summarizes four features of Singapore’s nationalidentity education: the governing party’s height attention, Confucian culture’semphasis, followed up with the times and the guarantee from the authoritarianpolitical.Finally, three inspirations for ourselves national identity education are analyzedand summarized: First, the school curriculum of national identity education should bestrengthened. Second, the social education of citizen’s national identity should beenhanced. The last but not the least, the construction of china’s national spirit in thecontext of globalization should be strengthened.