The family education is significant, so no matter in China or abroad, from ancient to modern times, lots of researches have been done. There are a great many of books and articles researching family education, which accumulate a wealth of experience both in domestic and overseas. But in domestic, those theses and books about the comparative studies of family education between America and China are quite rarer.

       In western countries, the research of family education has a long history. In 19th century, it has undergone a new development, emerging a group of famous educators, such as Fredrich Froebel, Rousseau, and Sukhomlynsky. Many works of family education were published. French educator Rousseau once said in his book Emile,ou De Leducation: “Nature hope that children are like children before they becoming adults. If disrupting this order, we will make some children become pubescent who look neither rich nor sweet and will soon rot. We may bring up some young Doctors and doddering children” (123). Sukhomlynsky is a great educator of the former Soviet Union, pointing out that “Parents need to constantly enhance their own ability of education, and only in this way can they cultivate their children’s sense of responsibility much better” (233). Herbert Spencer, a well-known educator in British, emphasized that “learning should be fun and if the children were surrounded by the unhappy mood, their intelligence and potency would largely be reduced, and yelling and criticism would not bring any good results” (145). American educational psychologist Howard Gardner once put forward a new intelligence theory—Multiple Intelligence. He believes that “The purpose of education is to explore every child’s multi-intelligences” (323). With the development of science and technology, the foreign theory of family education has a more perfect development.源Z自)吹冰+文`论,文]网[www.chuibin.com

In China, many scholars have defined the concept of family education in their works. For example, Luo Feng extends the connotation of family education in his books, and considers that “Family education concerns the whole society and can contribute to the family members’ physical and mental health and integrated development” (432).

In regard to the aims of family education, Huang Heqing points out that “Family education and school education are two interrelated and separated parts of the whole education system in his book named The Comparative Study of the Family Education and the School Education” (256).

About the contents of family education, Zhao Zhongxin holds that “It should contain family moral education, intellectual education, aesthetic education, and physical education” (25). Chen Fengqin states that “Tasks and contents of family education are to train children to form good learning habits” (78). 

Some papers make comparisons of Chinese and American family education from different angles. Chen Fengqin points out the different aims, contents, and outcomes of Chinese and American family education, and attributes them to the distinct factors and provides suggestions (1991). Hu Qingfang compares the results of the family education and the process of the two sections and exploits the causes and strategies to deal with problems in China (2007).

Zhang Yangmei argues problems of Chinese and American family education respectively and makes comparisons of the distinct result of the two countries’ family education (2012). Zhang believes that in updating family education concepts American families do well, attaching significant importance to overall development and independent thinking capacities by contrasting family education aims, contents,  methods, and outcomes briefly (2012).

Generally speaking, the researches of family education at home and aboard are abundant. Some of them expound notions and illustrate respective cases; some are reference books; some use survey method, literature study and case analysis. As for these studies, they do not compare Chinese and American family education. They either compare Chinese traditional and modern cases or only emphasize some methods of family education. However, the comparative study is not sufficient of Chinese and American family education. Thus through comparing and analyzing Chinese and American family education cases, this thesis obtains some practical and adoptable experience which is more operable for Chinese parents.