Treasure Hunts

 

Post-Mao China

Introduction

With Mao?s death, and the deaths of the other two revolutionary leaders?Chou En Lai and Zhu De?Deng Xiao Peng took over the leadership of China. Deng led China down new paths, relying much less on communist ideological "correctness" and far more on technological skills and expertise, in order to modernize China and allow it to compete with the advanced industrial societies such as the United States, Japan, and Western Europe. Deng died in 1998 (?) but his legacy continues with the present-day leadership of Ziang Zemin.

Questions

  1. What were Deng's "Four Modernizations," and how successful have they been?


China and the Four Modernizations, 1979-82.

China and the Four Modernizations, 1979-82

  1. What percent of China's population now makes its living by farming? In urban industry? In rural industry? In other areas?


China: Migration

  1. What areas of the present-day Chinese economy make the most profit?


The Chinese Economy

  1. Has China's political structure changed as much as its economy? Explain.


Politics and Economy

  1. Who are China's most important leaders today and what positions of authority or power do they hold?
  2. What percent of Chinese students get through middle school? High school? College?
  3. What percent of China's population lived in poverty when Mao died in 1976? What percent live in poverty now?


Education

  1. What percent of China's population can read and write Chinese fairly fluently?
  2. How has china's standard of living of China improved over the past 25 years?


Standard of Living

  1. What does "socialism" and/or "communism" mean to China's present leaders?

Project Extensions

1. Make a timeline of events since Mao?s death.
2. Choose an ordinary citizen of China and interview him or her about how his or her life has changed over the past 25 years.
3. Draw a diagram or chart of China?s educational system, including qualifications to get into a university.
4. Make a chart of the highest-paying occupations in China today.
5. Make a collection of 5 currently popular Chinese rock songs and reflect briefly on why you think they are popular.
6. Write an essay giving your opinions on whether China is becoming a society with greater freedom than it used to have.
7. Write a bibliography of 10 books on China which have been written during the last 5 years.
8. Pretend that you are either a very old person or a very young person, and write a poem about what you expect China to become during the next generation.
9. Create a Venn diagram in which you show how China and the United States agree and disagree about different issues.
10. Take a trip to China, climb the Great Wall, view the Ming Tombs, swim the Li River, sample all the various cuisines and do all of this on a school teacher's salary.


Dennis Gregg, Teacher, and Jackson Wai, AP student, collaborated to develop this web hunt.

Checked by Cheuk Leung

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