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The literature suggests that the value of play in early childhood education has been prevalent in European cultural settings. However, compared to the central tenet of play promoting children’s learning, a different notion of play is presented in the Chinese context. Influenced

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by the traditional Confucianism, Chinese tend to hold the opinion that play is a kind of barrier to children’s formal learning. Play is seen as opposite to work. It is an activity which takes place for its own sake, without external constraint (Lau & Cheng, 2010).

The general idea of Confucianism

In order to explore how play is perceived in Chinese perspectives and the attitudes Chinese hold towards play, it is necessary to look into the culture that Chinese live within, for “culture influences the assumptions and expectations held by members of particular cultural groups” (David & Powell, 2005, p.242). Although Chinese culture is considered as a mixture of various elements from different cultures, philosophies and religions, such as Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism, Confucianism has been identified as the most influential philosophy in China (Hsu, 2003, p.63). It has formed the core value of Chinese culture, and it continues to exert a powerful influence on the mind of Chinese (Tan, 2008). Confucianism was proposed by Confucius who is recognized as the most influential philosopher and educationist in Chinese history. He suggested a series of thoughts which cover extensive fields of education, moral, social, politic and philosophy. The philosophy of Confucius has been developed by his followers and formed the main part of Chinese culture. However, due to his ideas covering such a wide range, it is impossible to deal with them all in this thesis. Therefore, only a few of the most important points are presented here.

In general, the main philosophy of Confucius revolved around the concepts of social relations, codes of behaviour, social peace and harmony. His primary goal is to build an ‘ideal society’ which is based on the virtuous rule of the ruler and the harmonious relations of the human. To realize this goal, Confucius argued, ‘humanity (Ren)’ and ‘ritual (Li)’ are essential. The former kind of virtue refers to the love, true feelings and empathy one has towards others while the latter refers to an ideal form of social norms which guides the pattern of proper and acceptable behaviours.

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into categories and assigned a place in the social hierarchical relationships which he called ‘three bonds’---ruler to minister, father to son, husband to wife. In this hierarchy of social relations, each role has clearly defined duties, ministers should be submissive to the king, children should be submissive to fathers, and wives should be submissive to husbands. Every individual should understand his or her place in the social order, and fulfill his or her part well. In this way, “a state of harmony which result from good social orderliness and customs can be attained” (Slingerland, 2008, p.119).

Confucianism and play

Confucian philosophy attaches great importance to education which is regarded as “guidance in the pursuit and realization of universal harmony and peace, including human harmony with the nature, society, others and oneself, and the harmony between different nations and cultures” (Jin & Dan, 2004, p.576). According to Confucianism, the purpose of education is to cultivate ‘Junzi (gentlemen)’ which refers to men with perfect moral virtues and behaviors, and this is also one of the ways to achieve social harmony. Confucius proposed the educational content called ‘Six Arts’---ritual, music, archery, charioteering, calligraphy, and arithmetic through which men can be educated properly. The six arts are considered as the significant part of serious Confucian learning whereas play is regarded as relaxation and entertainment beyond serious learning (see Record of Ritual• Xue Ji, WGCPEH, 1989).

In line with Confucian value, self-cultivation is essential for becoming a ‘Junzi (gentlemen)’, and ‘Jing’ (quietness or meditation) is required in self-cultivation, therefore, “an ideal child is expected to have a sedate appearance and to have the characteristic of ‘Jing’---the opposite of playful” (Bai, 2005). In other words, the image of an ideal child in Confucianism is a child who is quiet and dislikes play (Pan, 1994; Bai, 2005). This image is expressed as ‘shao nian lao cheng’ (young but mature). As Bai (2005) indicated, the characteristic of ‘shao nian lao cheng’ is “a quality that was highly respected in the Confucian images of a proper child” (p.10). In China, this image of child is highly advocated for Confucian believed that there is “an interconnection between a ‘little adult’ in childhood and a great scholar in adulthood”

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(ibid). As a result, most exemplary children presented in Chinese primers produced from the Song dynasty and throughout the 19th century showed little trace of childish behaviors (ibid). A traditional Chinese literature “San zi jing” said that ‘勤有功，戏无益，戒之哉，宜勉力’ which means industrious learning leads to success, playing is not beneficial. All should take this as an admonition, all should be encouraged to exert thyself (WGCPEH, 1989). The characteristic of dislike of play has become a norm to guide children’s behavior through education and it has prevailed in early Chinese society even persisted into the modern times (Bai, 2005).

Furthermore, according to Confucianism, ‘a man who excels in study can follow an official career’ (Analects • Zi Zhang, WGCPEH, 1989) which means “success in education can lead to self-actualization and one can have the wisdom to become a sage in order to serve the public, which will in turn lead to personal fame and family wealth” (Wang, 2007, p.66). It suggested that children should engage in such pursuits, making this as one of the goals for their study, rather than ‘wan wu sang zhi’ (indulge in play and lose one’s ambitions) as this purpose could only be achieved by diligent effort, hard work, and practice. One of the main effective learning methods that Confucian advocated is memorization. He believed that this approach is very important especially in the early years study when the goal is simply to learn large portions of the inherited cultural traditions. As a result, rote learning is highly valued by him, rather than play (Wang & Mao, 1996).

As Li (2004) indicated, contemporary Chinese beliefs about learning and the education of children are profoundly influenced by Confucian views, which emphasize academic achievements and the traditional views of play and learning have a profound and sustained influence on Chinese early childhood education in the modern time (Bai, 2005). Researchers confirmed that most Confucian educators worried that play and a playful environment would distract children’s mind from formal learning (Huang & Qing, 2006; Bai, 2005). Contemporarily, play has been recognized related to physical development but separated from intellectual development (Sha, 1998). Pan (1994) also showed that affected by Confucianism, “physical activities and play were depreciated in favor of a strict curriculum

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that valued a rigorous examination system…the mainstream of Chinese culture viewed play as the antithesis of work” (p. 36). This idea was echoed by Shen’s research (2008), she indicated that in traditional Chinese culture, play and learning are separated and play has no significance for learning. Therefore, play is not encouraged in Chinese cultural value (Huang & Qing, 2006) and the theory of ‘learning through play’ is often alien to a Chinese educational culture (Cheng, 2004). As Pang and Richey (2007) pointed out, some Chinese parents are confused about whether play is really a way to learn. Many parents are therefore less likely to appreciate that children can learn through play. Rather, they believe that children are motivated to learn the basic knowledge and skills they will need for success later in school learning. David and Powell (2005) says, in their study that as Chinese people consider play as non-intellectual, parents believe that teacher-directed formal activities are better for children’s learning than play.

The impact of Western views of play on Chinese perspectives of play

As “cultural contexts are dynamic and changing, thus, the ways in which a cultural group understands the place of young children and their play and decides how to provide for them changed over time” (David & Powell, 2005, p.243). The Chinese perspectives of play are the case in point, especially when Western educational theories including play theories were introduced into China. By reviewing the kindergarten educational reform in the past two decades in mainland China, Liu and Feng (2005) pointed out that the status of play in preschool education has been changed. A Soviet Union early childhood educational approach, which stresses subject-centred and teacher-directed teaching, was substituted by a child-centred approach and the ideas of “respecting children”, “active learning” and “play-based teaching and learning” were widely circulated. Now, play is increasingly recognized as “a vital component of developmentally appropriate approach in kindergarten” (p.96).

From the literature, it seems that traditionally, the Chinese were not firmly convinced by the idea that play is closely related to learning and children can learn through play as

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Confucianism is deeply embedded in the Chinese value system. Rather, play was regarded as the opposite of work, and was undertaken only when work is completed (Pan, 1994). Adults have more power to decide whether children should play, when to intervene in their play, and which toy or material children should play with (Huang & Qing, 2006).

From the literature, it is not difficult to find a debate between the intrinsic value of play and play as a vehicle for learning. Some researchers argued that play has intrinsic value which is stressed in the early childhood curriculum (Wood, 2013). Other researchers, on the other hand, who saw play as a route through which areas of learning are delivered argued that play should be emphasized within a discourse of educational effectiveness in educational settings (Sylva et al. 2010). Although controversy continues between the intrinsic and instrumental value of play, there are some similarities and differences between the nature of instrumentalism in children’s play in Chinese and Western contexts. Both similarities and differences lie in the relationship between play and work. In both the Chinese and Western contexts, traditionally, play was positioned in opposition to its counterpart, work. The division between play and work was seen in both cultures. However, what makes play in Chinese culture different from that in Western culture is that in a Chinese context, play is not only viewed as a reward for work, in terms of leisure, fun and relaxation, more importantly, play is also viewed as a barrier to work which needs to be controlled.

However, it seems that influenced by Western ideas of play during the process of early childhood educational reforms, the Chinese perceptions of play has gradually changed. Western early childhood educational ideology has impacted upon the traditional Chinese educational beliefs while still some of the “distinctive Chinese characteristics” has remained (Rao & Li, 2009, p.100). As researchers indicated that Chinese early childhood education has reflected a hybrid of three culture threads: traditional Chinese, Western, and Communist cultures (Wang & Spodek, 2000; Zhu & Wang 2005; Zhu & Zhang, 2008). Under these circumstances, both similarities and differences seem to exist in the nature of instrumental view of play. The Chinese and Western views both position play as essential to children’s learning, as a developmentally appropriate practice and an important part of the learning

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process. However, the Western perspectives of play highlight that play and learning are integrated. This view emphasizes an instrumental view of play as a means to cognitive, social, physical and emotional development. Compared to the Western views of play, the Chinese perspectives tend to see play as a means to reach a defined goal or learning result rather than valuing play as a learning means. From this viewpoint, play is explicitly educational as it is emphasized as leading towards the learning goals or outcomes in the curriculum.