TRADITIONAL EDUCATIONAL METHODS
[Cai Yuanpei, "Recollections of My Old-Fashioned Education," 1934]

When I was six years old (according to the lunar calendar; using the new way, I was only slightly over four), I entered the family school, and read the Book of the Hundred Surnames, the Thousand Character Primer, and Poems by Precocious Children. Some beginning students read the Three Character Classic, or Poems by a Thousand Authors, or even started with the Book of Songs, but I didn’t read these. After finishing these three "Little Books," I read the Four Books, and after that, the Five Classics. When I was reading the Little Books and the Four Books, the teacher didn’t explain them, but he did start to explain a little when I got to the Five Classics. However, I had to nwmonze them and recite them aloud; regardless of whether or not I understood the books I read, after reading them over numerous times, I was able to recite them by heart.

Besides reading, there was studying characters, calligraphy, and pairing phrases, the beginning of my understanding of the meanings of words. The study of characters was taught with characters printed on small, square paper. We had to be able not only to pronounce each character correctly, but to tell its meaning as well. This method is still used in elementary schools, but now pictures have been added—progress over the old way.

Pairing phrases is a way of constructing phrases, starting with one character and going on to four.... In this method, not only do nouns, verbs, and adjectives have to be precisely paired, but moreover, among nouns, animal, vegetable and mineral, as well as implements, buildings, and so forth, must all be paired according to the same kind. The same is true for adjectives, such as colors, characteristics, numbers, and so forth. For example, if the teacher gives "white horse," and the students pair it with "yellow ox," "gray fox," and so forth, that is good; but if they pair it with "yellow gold," or "sly fox," then that would not be so good.If the teacher gives "climb up the high mountain," and the students pair it with "gaze at the distant sea," "look at the still water," and so forth, that is good; but it would not be so good to pair it with "till the green field," or "reach the four seas," because a color or number should not be paired with a characteristic. You can surmise the rest from these few examples. One more point: when pairing phrases, we also practiced the differences in the four tones. For example, although it is not absolutely impermissible to pair level tone characters with other level tone characters, or deflected tones with other deflected tones, the normal way is to pair level tones with deflected tones. And furthermore, when we were practicing, the teacher not only made us learn the level and deflected tones, but from time to time also reminded us of the difference between the third, fourth, and entering tones among the deflected tones.

After I had attained a certain degree of proficiency in pairing phrases, the teacher taught me how to write eight-legged essays.... Although they are usually called "eight-legged," by the time I was studying them, the six-legged form had become the most common. Before the six legs is the first part, the "leading into the topic," meaning "opening section," which cites the topic; and after the six legs is the conclusion. So you can see that from leading into the topic to conclusion makes one whole piece. But preceding "leading into the topic" there is the "introductory discourse" (sometimes called "minor discourse"), about ten phrases or so, a hundred or more characters in length. And before that comes the "taking up the topic" of four or five phrases, twenty or more characters in length. Before the "taking up the topic" comes "broaching the topic," merely two phrases, ten or more characters. Now what is this if not repetition on top of repetition? I never could quite understand it, but now I finally do. It’s a kind of excercise: first you break one phrase of the topic into two phrases (you can also shorten several phrases of the topic into two phrases, but this is done only by those who can write a complete piece); then you go a step further and extend it into four phrases, then another step, extending it to ten or more phrases, ‘until finally you extend it into a complete piece. If you go by the basic meaning of the terms, if there is a "taking up the topic," then there is no further need for a "broaching the topic"; if there is an "introductory discourse," then there is no further need for a "broaching the topic" and "taking up the topic." And if you have a complete piece, then there is no further need for broaching, taking up, and introductory discourse. I don’t know when it happened that some eight-legged gentleman [first] piled one thing on top of another, placing this excercise procedure on the very top, but I have not hesitated to write it all out in bothersome detail for the information of those who have never composed eight-legged essays.

From the time I was 17, I began to read books on textual research, fancy literary style, and such things on my own, and stopped practicing eight-legged essays.

[MASON GENTZLER, J (1977) Changing China, Nova York, Praeger, pp. 180-181]