A Discussion on the Reform of Elementary School Social Teaching Materials from the Angle of Gender Analysis

Abstract

Social gender analysis is a unique field of research in the domain of social sciences research. Examining China's education from the perspective of gender, as well as being a new field of educational research, is also a new line of thinking and method for educational research. The social course is an important course for education on general social knowledge imparted to elementary school students during the nine-year compulsory education phase. Social course teaching materials unavoidably touch upon many different people, and inevitably reflect their social gender characteristics. The social course also has the task of cultivating correct attitudes and abilities in students with regard to observing and understanding society. Its way of selecting, organizing, and presenting teaching content has an enormous influence on the angles and methods by which students understand and deal with social issues. This study is aimed at conducting an analysis of the male and female images presented in current elementary school social course teaching materials and at exploring whether or not such teaching materials contain outmoded gender conventions that might adversely affect the students' understanding of social genders, with the object of making certain suggestions for improving social course teaching materials. Content analysis is the main method used in this study to analyze the illustrations and textual contents of volumes one to six of the six-year elementary school Society teaching materials, printed from 1994 to 1998 by the People's Education Publishing House for the nine-year compulsory school system. The results show that, of the 175 images analyzed, the number of images of males and females did not exceed the requirements of the traditional social sex roles; female roles were restricted to a very small number of vocations and social domains, and the position and effect of females in historical events were practically invisible.