By Nation and Culture
The system is widely practiced in schools across Brazil, which Richard Feynman sharply criticized, China, India, Pakistan, Malaysia, Singapore, Japan, Romania, Italy, Turkey, Malta, and Greece. Some of these nations are admired for their high test scores in international comparisons while some of these nations regularly rank near the bottom on international tests. Xiaping Li (2006) has studied the effects of rote learning in second language learning in Taiwan. He notes Chinese learners hold high the tradition of rote learning as being an integral part of their culture.
In Singapore, with the introduction of the Integrated Programme, the government is making attempts to move away from rote learning, at least for the more able students.
Read more about this topic: Rote Learning
Famous quotes containing the words nation and/or culture:
“There never was and is not likely soon to be a nation of philosophers, nor am I certain it is desirable that there should be.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“A culture may be conceived as a network of beliefs and purposes in which any string in the net pulls and is pulled by the others, thus perpetually changing the configuration of the whole. If the cultural element called morals takes on a new shape, we must ask what other strings have pulled it out of line. It cannot be one solitary string, nor even the strings nearby, for the network is three-dimensional at least.”
—Jacques Barzun (b. 1907)