Wang Huan, the headmistress of Shijia Education Group in Beijing, recalled how one day, one of her students quarreled with his mother partly due to his low mood but also her obsessive cellphone use.

However, to Wang's surprise, instead of continuing to argue with his mother, the young boy examined himself to discover personal faults that led him to apologize to his parent. Soon, his duty-bound introspection helped the family return to peace and harmony.

According to Wang, the boy was like many his contemporaries in primary schools affiliated to the group where education is being transformed from a test-driven approach to all-directional development of which morality plays a critical role.

"I hope the children in our country can be strong in belief, patriotic, upright, lofty and persevering. They should adhere to great mental aspirations and grow in a way governed by the merit of magnanimity, because the immense interests of learning have never been driven by single-minded pursuit of personal gains, but rather by the internal force for achievements that benefit others," Wang said.

She was speaking in an open class held on Nov. 13 at the Soong Ching Ling Science and Culture Center for Young People in Beijing.

Born in the early 1960s, Wang started her career as a Chinese teacher who was later recognized as an extremely outstanding educator before being promoted to a headmistress. In her tenure, the city's top-ranking Shijia Primary School has extended its partnership with several other primary schools open to children from migrant families.

"No matter how different the schools are, my requirement is that every single pupil and every individual teacher in our group should be as energetic as they can be, to demonstrate the positive side of life. I have told them that each time they take classes or exercises, they should perform with great confidence and with great concentration," she explained.

As an educator with 40 years of experience, she believes education in China has undergone a dramatic transformation from which the conventional approaches overwhelmed by a test-driven evaluation are being phased out.

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