By Jason Huang Less than two years ago, a new term appeared on the NTU campus: “deep-bowl” courses (深碗通識) as opposed to “shallow-dish” courses (淺碟通識).[1] The deep-bowl course is a new concept for general education at the university, but it remains controversial.
General education, or liberal education, is practiced in many universities throughout the world. In Taiwan, the concept of general education was begun in the 1980s by the then-president of NTU, as a way of emphasizing interaction between different fields and encouraging life-long learning. But problems soon arose from differences between Taiwanese education and the situation at foreign universities. Students in other countries were overwhelmed by only eight credits of general education, while Taiwanese students felt none of that pressure even though they had to earn more than double that amount. The Chief of Academic Affairs at NTU pointed out that the main reason behind this phenomenon was the lack of class requirements, resulting in rather superficial learning. Measures were taken to make general education classes more profound. Deep-bowl courses were invented, having longer hours with correspondingly more credits. Extra reading assignments were given and reports were intensified to stimulate a more active learning attitude. Discussion classes were incorporated and students were required to give short presentations. The head of the General Education Center pointed out that the idea was to ensure that students learned something, and that they didn’t just sit there learning passively. Discussion classes require students to divide into groups, and the lectures become topics for discussion. Teaching assistants are in charge of conducting these discussions, but the biggest problem is that the topics for discussion are often too difficult. According to one TA in a class called “The Exploration of Life,” the students didn’t have enough background information or knowledge. The number of students in a discussion class also matters. Small groups are easier for conversation, while large groups produce fewer interactions. However, the limited number of TAs makes it impossible for smaller groups. Taiwanese students are also reluctant to express their opinions orally, and this makes the discussion classes even more difficult. According to Professor Tsai Chen Gia (蔡振嘉), who has taught “Expressions of Love in Music,” in other countries discussion classes are generally heated and vigorous, but even then many students speak only for the sake of speaking, and in fact few profound ideas are proposed. Professor Tsai tried using online discussions via an internet teaching platform instead of discussion sections. This produced lots of student participation, but since students were unlikely to read through the numerous replies from others, the result was not really a very good discussion either. From students’ point of view, too, discussion sections don’t always work well. First, a successful discussion depends greatly on the TA in charge. Some discussion topics were determined by the lecturer in advance, but others are decided by the TAs themselves and things won’t go well if they choose a bad topic. Some classes are also more difficult to adapt to this format, such as science-related courses, where there is not much room for discussion of scientific facts or rules. Second, the students hardly pay attention to general education classes and rarely do the assigned reading. Thus it is difficult to initiate a good discussion. The result is that students don’t talk and the TA must do something to fill the class, resulting in another lecture. But the attitude of students toward general education classes is deeply ingrained in our educational system. Students don’t have enough time to work on assignments because they are taking too many credits. Study time is devoted to students’ major subjects rather than to general education courses, and thus increasing the workload by introducing deep-bowl courses doesn’t help the situation. The deep-bowl course is designed to help students learn more in their general education courses, but it only serves as a superficial solution. Maybe the university should reconsider the purpose of general education courses themselves. Or does the whole education system need to be modified? According to Professor Tsai, Taiwan has really long semesters, and students become very tired by the end of the term. Is student reluctance really the heart of the problem? There might be other underlying issues as well. [1] There are no formal English names for these types of courses. The translation only corresponds to the Chinese names; bowls and dishes are metaphors based on the course load, the number of hours, and, hopefully, the depth of things that students will learn. a
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May 2024
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