Curriculum Reforms and Instructional Improvement in Asia

Abstract

Asia is characterised more by diversity than uniformity and this diversity itself is multifaceted. Political structures include varying forms of democracy (Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Taiwan, Japan, Thailand, South Korea and India as well as nations in transition in Central Asia), communism (China, Vietnam), dictatorships, military or otherwise (Burma, Pakistan and North Korea) and monarchies of different kinds (Nepal, Thailand, Japan). Cultural overlays in the region include Confucianism, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism and Christianity that continue to exert an effect on education even in the most modernized societies. Economically, there are the “tigers” of East and South East Asia, the growing economic giants of China and India alongside Japan, emerging economies in Vietnam and Indonesia, the transition economies in Central Asia and a host of other countries at different stages of development. The key issue for this paper is to consider how amidst this diversity, curriculum and instructional reform has emerged, in what forms and with what effects. Despite the diversities referred to above, a common feature across much of the region has been curriculum and instructional reform. Table 1 is an attempt to show just how pervasive the whole issue of education reform has been across the region: Yet, just as there are diversities of a political, cultural and economic nature across the region, so too there is diversity of educational provision. For example as shown in Table 2 the combined gross enrolment ratio for primary, secondary and tertiary education in the region ranges from 35% for Pakistan to 93% for Korea (United Nations Development Program, 2005). The Education Index ranges from 0.44 for Pakistan to 0.94 for Japan and Kazakhstan (United Nations Development Program, 2005). The Technology Achievement Index ranges from 0.17 for Pakistan to 0.69 Japan (United Nations Development Program, 2001). What is more, development contexts also differ across the region so that only five societies in the region have been classified as having a high level of development1 – Korea, Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore and