However, in the opinions of some UK educational professionals, the Chinese method might not be adaptable to British pupils. James Dathan, the head of math at Neston High School in Cheshire, told BBC that the Chinese method of "learning by rote" would not help children engage with the subject. "Math is something that should be inspired and passionate and showing them where it is in the real world," Dathan said.

Vivian Ma, a math teacher at a Beijing-based international school, told Beijing Review she is not surprised that Shanghai students beat their British peers in math.

"In the UK and other European countries, elite education prevails. Unlike our compulsory education, only the best students will go on to further study math in the UK. Though not all students excel at math, those at the top tend to command positions in math research globally. The model of higher education in Western countries is worth learning from," Ma said.

Education reform

Apart from hard work, there is a strong reason Shanghai students perform best in the PISA.

Zhang Minxuan, President of Shanghai Normal University, said to China Daily that the performance of Shanghai's students in the PISA report reflected the achievement of education reform in Shanghai in recent years.

Zhang is also the leader of the Shanghai PISA program. "The PISA assesses students near the end of their compulsory education in knowledge and skills that are essential for every student in modern society," said Zhang.

"It is not for what they know, but for what they can do with what they know. In this regard, it has more positive meaning and influence in education. We are glad to see Shanghai has received such good results," Zhang said.

Zhang said the PISA results showed that the city has managed to maintain a relative balance in terms of the quality of education, as the gap between students of low and high proficiency was very small.

Some Western experts argued that as the richest city in the Chinese mainland, Shanghai is able to devote ample funds to education. While that may be true, the compulsory education in Shanghai—just as in all of China—is geared to equip all children with skills in a variety of subjects, unlike the more specified education system in the UK, Zhang pointed out.

"The PISA results remind countries that if they want to be competitive in the future, the elite education geared to only a small number of people is far from adequate. I believe this is one of the major reasons why the UK education minister is so interested in Shanghai's education," said Zhang.

Moreover, Shanghai has long been at the forefront of educational reform in China. Education equality is an important goal of Shanghai's reform measures.

In Shanghai, there are a great number of children who come to the city with their migrant worker parents. Due to poor economic conditions and residency limits, most migrant children have to enter into suburban schools that cannot compete with prestigious schools in terms of facilities and quality of teachers.

To improve education equality, between 2006 and 2010, Shanghai invested nearly 10 billion yuan ($1.64 billion) in school infrastructure in the suburbs to meet the increasing demand of children from migrant and relocated families, according to a report released by the Shanghai Education Commission recently.

The report stated there were 1.19 million primary, middle and high school students in the suburbs in 2010, accounting for 70.4 percent of the city's total number.

Infrastructure is not everything, however. Students' scores are largely related to the quality of teachers and school management. For this reason, Shanghai has taken a series of measures to sharpen the teaching quality of suburban schools.

Since 2007, all prestigious schools in Shanghai have been ordered to help build and manage schools in rural areas in order to narrow the gap in education. The expertise of suburban schools has made a difference in recent years. For example, 51 percent of schools in rural areas of Shanghai have attained high marks during the latest assessment by local education authorities.

Shanghai also encourages prestigious schools to build branch schools in suburban or industrial zones where migrant and rural children account for the majority. In this way, children of poor families can share in the equal opportunity of quality teaching resources.

Furthermore, Shanghai gives priority to recruiting teachers of excellent standing. By the end of 2010, more than half of the primary schools teachers and 93.2 percent of middle school teachers in Shanghai had a bachelor's degree or above.

Email us at: baishi@bjreview.com