Research On Current Status And Strategies Of Lesson Study In China

“Lesson Study”,originated from Japan,is a kind of circular inquiry activity center on the "research course",which is organized and implemented by the teachers to tell the story of teaching.Due to its important role in promoting teaching,students’ learning effect and teachers’ professional development,it has gradually attracted extensive attention.Along with the advancement of the eighth basic education curriculum reform,and the implement of “create based on the school teaching system construction base” project,school-based teaching and research become an important part of primary and secondary school in our country.Lesson Study as the main form of school-based teaching and research,have developed rapidly.However,the achievements in the field of Lesson Study in China were mainly concentrated on the theoretical aspect such as characteristics,values and supporting conditions,while the achievements in the practical aspect were few such as teaching and school running.Therefore,it is of great significance to explore the current status of Lesson Study in primary school by empirical research method,so as to improve the quality of Lesson Study and the curriculum reform of basic education.This study selected G primary school in H city,a third-tier city in eastern China,as the sample and analyzed the current status of Lesson Study by using qualitative research method.It is found that the G primary school conscientiously implement the Lesson Study,but the classroom teaching still present some characteristics of traditional classroom teaching,such as pay attention to achieve the goals of knowledge,emphasize textbook knowledge and lack of targeted evaluation.However,Lesson Study has received extensive attention at and become an important mean to promote the basic education reform is precisely because its value of “student-centered”is consistent with the philosophy of basic education reform.Therefore,Lesson Study pays attention to the effect of traditional knowledge mastery at the practical level,which deviates from the basic value of “student-centered” and the philosophy of basic education reform.In other words,there is an implicit mechanism of contraction between ideality and teaching practice of Lesson Study in China.Lesson Study has not become an effective way to improve the quality of teaching and promote the reform of basic education,but transformed into a way to strengthen traditional education.To investigate the reason could think from the following aspects: the systems of the government and schools are not perfect,the problem of large class size is serious and the lack of guidance from experts result in the ineffectiveness of Lesson Study;teachers’ weak reflective ability,job burnout and the “face” culture lead to the lack of positive attitude when they participating in Lesson Study.Therefore,this paper puts forward four improvement strategies: improve the relevant system and solve the problem of large class size;Guarantee the funding for teacher learning and improve the quality of teacher training;combine guidance and coercion to remission teachers’ job burnout;improve teachers’ reflective ability and build a cooperative teacher culture.