Family life education in China

Abstract

Education about families in China has evolved in essence from ancient family rules for maintaining its members’ roles and responsibilities based on Confucius philosophy, parenting and parent education, to the recent emergence of relational skill training. This chapter aims to first illuminate the evolutional processes of family life education (FLE) and the FLE in the social, economic, historical, and cultural context of Chinese families today. The chapter specifically focuses on stresses and challenges that families face during Chinese economic and social reforms and the FLE development in both practice and theory that intend to address these stresses. China has introduced policies to promote healthy relationship, increase awareness of child and woman abuse, and protect the elderly through education. Chinese FLE has challenges in development and limitations in implementation. Lessons may be learned from Hong Kong’s successes. Chinese FLE programs have been created, mainly with focus on early childhood education and parenting. The chapter concludes that systematic family life education will eventually emerge as a professional field.