I was given a copy of this book by Harper Collins in exchange for an honest review.
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Little Soldiers: An American Boy, a Chinese School, and the Global Race to Achieve by Lenora Chu. It is 368 pages long and is published by Harper Collins. The cover is white with sharpened pencils on it. The intended reader is someone who is interested education and the differences between China and other parts of the world. There is no foul language, no sex, and no violence in this book. There Be Spoilers Ahead.
From the back of the book- In the spirit of Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother, Bringing up Bébé, and The Smartest Kids in the World, a hard-hitting exploration of China’s widely acclaimed yet insular education system—held up as a model of academic and behavioral excellence—that raises important questions for the future of American parenting and education.
When American mom Lenora Chu moved to China with her little boy, she faced a tough decision. China produced some of the world’s top academic achievers, and just down the street from her home in Shanghai was THE school, as far as elite Chinese were concerned. Should Lenora entrust her rambunctious young son to the system?
So began Rainey’s immersion in one of the most radical school systems on the planet. Almost immediately, the three-year-old began to develop surprising powers of concentration, became proficient in early math, and learned to obey his teachers’ every command. Yet Lenora also noticed disturbing new behaviors: Where he used to scribble and explore, Rainey grew obsessed with staying inside the lines. He became fearful of authority figures, and also developed a habit of obeisance outside of school. “If you want me to do it, I’ll do it,” he told a stranger who’d asked whether he liked to sing.
What was happening behind closed classroom doors? Driven by parental anxiety, Lenora embarked on a journalistic mission to discover: What price do the Chinese pay to produce their “smart” kids? How hard should the rest of us work to stay ahead of the global curve? And, ultimately, is China’s school system one the West should emulate?
She pulls the curtain back on a military-like education system, in which even the youngest kids submit to high-stakes tests, and parents are crippled by the pressure to compete (and sometimes to pay bribes). Yet, as mother-and-son reach new milestones, Lenora uncovers surprising nuggets of wisdom, such as the upside of student shame, how competition can motivate achievement, and why a cultural belief in hard work over innate talent gives the Chinese an advantage.
Lively and intimate, beautifully written and reported, Little Soldiers challenges our assumptions and asks us to reconsider the true value and purpose of education.
Review- A very interesting read about education and what that means in different parts of the world. Chu is a second generation American and her parents raised her with a blend of American and Chinese style. But because Chu and her husband are living in China they wanted their son to have a once in a lifetime experience of Chinese education and hopefully he would get the famous Chinese discipline too. When Chu sees some changes in her son that make her uncomfortable, she decides that she wants to understand what is the Chinese education system. Chu travels all over China, interviews students at different ages and social classes, and she discovers some very interesting things. Everything from a young patriot who has great plans for himself in the party to a young man who has been lost in the system and it failed him. She interviews teachers and does her best to discuss the successes and the failures of the system but it was not easy. I think that Chu did a good job with her task and it was very eye opening about the disciple that the children learn to have and how they learn it. I would be very curious about her son is going to grow with this Chinese foundation.
I give this book a Four out of Five stars.
