世界上最聰明的孩子是如何煉成的？

By Jacki Lyden

根據一項研究表明，在全球教育排行中，芬蘭和韓國分別占據第一和第二位，而美國僅排在第17位。究竟是什么使芬蘭和韓國的教育能夠出類拔萃呢？政府的財政支持、濃厚的教育文化、高素質的教師隊伍是其中不可或缺的重要因素。美國作家Amanda Ripley為此作了調查，并完成新作《The Smartest Kids in the World and How They Got That Way》，其中以芬蘭和韓國為典型國家，探究他們獲得成功的法寶以及希望以此對美國和其他國家提供經驗。

世界上最聰明的孩子是如何煉成的呢？下面就讓我們一起來了解一二吧。

Jacki Lyden （Host）： Its often said that great teachers should be paid more than great athletes. But do highly-paid teachers really make kids smarter？ Author Amanda Ripley 1）crisscrossed the world to find out. In her new book， “The Smartest Kids in the World and How They Got That Way，”she 2）tags along with American school kids who left home on exchange programs and landed in classrooms from South Korea to Finland. And she joins us to share whats working and whats not in classrooms around the world. Amanda Ripley， thank you for coming in.

Amanda Ripley： Thanks for having me.

Lyden： To begin， why dont you remind us where American kids stand with respect to kids in all other parts of the world in terms of how well educated we are？

Ripley： American 15-year-olds perform about 26th in the world in a test of critical thinking in math， 17th in science and 12th in reading. And our high school graduation rate is now below that of about 20 other nations.

Lyden： So it means its something that we need to address， obviously.

Ripley： Yeah. And I think weve tried to address it， in our defense. So many years weve tried and tried， and it starts to feel hopeless. But whats exciting is if you look around the world， you see wild improvement and change. And so we havent really changed much， but other countries have changed a lot.

Lyden： You went around the world to look at how well kids were doing. Tell me a little bit about the 3）premise of this. What were you looking for？

Ripley： I kept hearing about these countries， you know， that you hear about on the headlines—Finland， Korea—they were outperforming us in education year after year. But I couldnt quite imagine what it was like to be a kid there. What is it actually like， and how do these countries get that way？

Lyden： Lets start with Korea. You followed a young man to Korea， and you say there were two models that you were looking at. One was the 4）enlightenment model， but Korea was the model of what is 5）grueling.

Ripley： Right. Thats exactly right. Its kind of an extreme version of the pressure cooker model of education that you see all over Asia where kids go to school all day long， and then they go to tutoring academies all night long， and they study so many hours that theyre exhausted when they get to class again in the morning. That is one way to get to the top of the world. I dont think anyone， including everyone I met in Korea， would argue that its the best way. Eric. Eric had gone from Minnesota， which is one of the highestperforming states in the U.S.， to Busan， South Korea. So he thought he knew what pressure and high-stakes testing were， but he did not know， he realized， that there was a whole other league. And it was shocking， really， how hard these kids were working.

Lyden： What is the hagwon？

Ripley： Hagwons are the Korean word for after-school tutoring academy. Tutoring is actually， I think， understating it because it sounds kind of homespun. In fact， this industry is bigger than the public school industry in Korea. It is huge. It is traded on the stock exchange. Theres[sic] investments for major American banks in this industry because 70% of Korean teenagers participate in this world in some manner.

Lyden： And you focus in your book on a teacher there called Kim Ki-hoon. Tell us more about him.

Ripley： This was unlike any teacher Id ever interviewed in the U.S. First of all， his office was in a luxury sky-highrise in Seoul， and he had 30 employees. And he makes about $4 million a year. The way hes making that money is through this hagwon industry. He gives a few in-person lectures and then puts them on the Internet and kids pay， like， $4 an hour to see his lectures online. And thats how hes making this money. And he himself is critical of this because it requires some amount of money in order to participate， unlike public school.

Lyden： Lets contrast that with other kids that you followed. One of them， Kim， from Oklahoma， decides to go to Finland. Why did the Oklahoman want to go there？

Ripley： She wanted to see the world. She was curious. Shed never left the United States. She had a single mother who was a teacher in rural Oklahoma where she was born. And she read that Finland had the smartest kids in the world and that they liked heavy metal music and strong coffee and had a good sense of humor. And she said： I want to go there because...

Lyden： She was 15 at the time.

Ripley： She was 15 at the time. She gets placed in rural Finland and ends up in high school there living in—with a host family for one year.

Lyden： How good were her teachers？

Ripley： There were some who were stronger than others. But all of them， she felt like， really wanted to be there. In Finland， getting into teacher training college is as hard as getting into MIT here. Its literally the top 10% of applicants are even accepted to begin the process， which is a really critical piece of this. I think the key to Finlands success is that they really went long on quality over quantity. So we educate twice as many teachers as we need. Finland， in the late 1960s， shut down all of its varying quality teacher colleges and moved them into the most elite universities. So right from the beginning， you had the best educated people becoming teachers， which led to all these other great things that we dont always even think about， notably the signal it sent to kids.

Lyden： What else can we 6）emulate from these examples that would make the American experience better and also make us not 26th in math， 17th in science and 12th in everything else？

Ripley： You know， I think its actually not that complicated， believe it or not. What we want to do is fewer things better. So fewer tests that are smarter， less homework that is more challenging makes kids have to think， even less parental involvement thats more targeted at things that actually lead to learning. I mean， American parents actually do a lot compared to parents in other countries. But those things that they do and the things， by the way， that schools ask them to do are typically not strongly related to raising a kid whos able to think critically and solve problems and make an argument. So you do see that parents are a piece of the solution here， and it doesnt often get talked about. We just say， oh， our parents arent involved. Well， I think theyre involved， just in ways that arent particularly 7）impactful.

杰基·來登（主持人）：常言道，好的教師應該得到比好的運動員更高的報酬。但是報酬高的教師真的能培養出更聰明的孩子嗎？作家阿曼達·里普利在全世界走南闖北以求找到答案。在她的新作《世界上最聰明的孩子何以淪落至此》一書中，她跟蹤調查了幾個美國學生，他們因交換生計劃而離家到韓國、芬蘭學習。她參與到我們的節目中，分享世界各地的學校是如何有所為、有所不為的。阿曼達·里普利，感謝你的加入。

阿曼達·里普利：謝謝你們邀請我。

來登：首先，為什么不稍稍提下，從教育質量高低來說，美國的孩子在世界各地的孩子中處于一個什么位置？

里普利：美國15歲的孩子們在數學批判思考測試中排名約第26位，科學排第17位，閱讀排在第12位。我們的高中畢業率現在低于其他大概20個國家。

來登：所以這很顯然意味著我們需要應對這個問題了。

里普利：是的。我認為出于自身考慮，我們嘗試過應對這個問題。所以多年來，我們不斷地嘗試，又開始感覺沒有希望。但是令人興奮的是，如果你放眼全球，你會看到巨大的進步和改變。所以我們并沒有真正改變多少，但是別的國家改變了很多。

來登：你游歷全球，看看各國的孩子做得有多好。能告訴我你這樣做的目的是什么嗎？你想要尋求什么答案？里普利：我總聽說這些國家的事，你知道的，在頭條新聞所聽到的——芬蘭、韓國——他們一年接著一年比我們在教育上做得更優秀。但是我還不是很能想象那兒的孩子是怎么樣的，事實上是怎么樣的，還有這些國家是如何做到的？

來登：讓我們從韓國說起吧。你跟隨一個年輕人去了韓國，你說在那兒，你觀察了兩種模式，一種是啟蒙教育模式，但是韓國在這方面是（讓孩子）精疲力竭的那種教育模式。

里普利：沒錯，確實沒錯。那是一種高壓鍋式的極端教育模式，正如你所見，整個亞洲的孩子整日都去上學，然后整夜都去補習班，他們長時間地學習，筋疲力盡，第二天早上又繼續去上學。那就是晉升世界頂尖學生之列的一個方法。我認為沒有任何人，包括我在韓國遇到的所有人，會不同意這是最好的方法。埃里克。埃里克來自明尼蘇達州，這個州在全美享有較高的教學聲譽，他來到韓國釜山，所以他原以為自己知道什么是壓力和高強度的測試，但其實他始料不及，（來了之后）他才意識到，這完全是另一個檔次，這真的讓人感到震驚，這些孩子們是多么刻苦地學習。

來登：“hagwon”是什么？

里普利：“hagwon”是一個韓語詞，意思是校外補習班。事實上，我覺得補習班可以輕描淡寫帶過，因為這聽起來就像是家庭產物。但實際上，在韓國，補習班比公立學校更大型，它是個龐大的產業，還上市交易了。美國主流銀行在這個產業有所投資是因為70%的韓國青少年在一定程度上參與到這個世界中。

來登：你在書中突出描述了那兒一位名叫金基勛的教師，告訴我們多一些關于他的事吧。

里普利：他與我在美國采訪過的教師都不一樣。首先，他的辦公室在首爾奢華的摩天大樓里，他有30名員工，每年大約賺400萬美元，他就是通過補習產業盈利的。他親自上幾堂課，然后把講課視頻放到網上，孩子們以每小時4美元的價格在線收看他的講課視頻，這就是他賺錢的方式。他本人對此感到不滿，因為這需要大量資金投入來運營，不像公立學校。

來登：讓我們將這與你跟蹤調查的其他孩子作個對比。他們之中的一個，來自俄克拉荷馬州的金，決定去芬蘭。為什么這個俄克拉荷馬州人想要去那兒？

里普利：她想要去看看這個世界，她充滿了好奇心，之前從未離開過美國。她的單親媽媽是俄克拉荷馬州鄉村的一名教師，她就是在那兒出生的。她了解到芬蘭有全世界最聰明的孩子，他們喜歡重金屬音樂、濃咖啡，很有幽默感。她說：“我想要去那兒，因為……”

來登：那時候她15歲。

里普利：那時候她15歲。她（以交換生身份）到芬蘭鄉村上學，直到高中，在當地的寄宿家庭生活了一年。來登：她的老師們有多好？

里普利：有一些教師較之其他更為突出，但是她感覺他們中的所有人，他們真的很想在那兒（教書）。在芬蘭，進入師范學院就和在美國這兒上麻省理工學院一樣難，真的只有10%最拔尖的申請者才會被錄取，這真的很嚴格。我認為，芬蘭成功的關鍵是他們真的想要以質量取勝數量。所以我們培養了兩倍于我們真正需要的教師數量，而芬蘭在20世紀60年代末，關閉了所有教學質量參差不齊的師范學院，整合成最精英的大學。因此從一開始，你就有了受過最優秀教育的人成為教師，這就使那些我們甚至想都沒想過的很棒的想法產生，最明顯的是給孩子們所傳遞的信息。

來登：我們從這些范例中還能仿效些什么，使美國的教學質量更好，同時也使我們不再數學排26位、科學排17位、其他排12位嗎？

里普利：你知道，事實上我認為沒必要那么復雜，信不信由你。我們要做的就是做得越少越好。因此，少些測驗更明智；少些作業更有挑戰性，更能培養孩子們思考的能力；甚至少些父母參與，目標明確，更能引導孩子們學習。我的意思是，美國的父母們事實上比其他國家的父母們在教育孩子上做得更多，但是那些他們做的事情，順便提一下，還有學校要求他們做的事情通常與培養一個孩子學會批判性思考、解決問題和展開論證沒有多大的聯系。所以你看到的是，父母們只會提供解決方案，而不會經常談論這些。我們只是說，噢，我們的父母沒有參與其中。嗯，我想他們參與了，只是以不特別有影響力的方式參與罷了。