The teaching of English is not a threat to knowledge of Chinese language, history and culture, as it is perceived to be in some quarters. Nor should it be. China has produced one of the world's most enduring and important civilizations and I, for one, wish to see it continue and be revitalized. Learning English should be a tool to enable students to gain a broader, richer perspective on their own language and culture and not a replacement for it.

There is also a feeling that if students are encouraged to ask questions in an English class, they will expect to do the same in a history class. This is sometimes seen, wrongly, as a threat to the Chinese teacher's authority. English textbooks also often require students to master new study skills and learning strategies. Some FTs are aware of this and consciously try to develop these as well as teaching pure language. Chinese teachers often don't know how to respond to students whose expectations have been changed in this way and their response is too often jealousy or petty obstruction of the FTs. I could give many examples of this but I don't want to point the finger.

In my view there is much that is valuable in Chinese education. Discipline is generally good. Students also frequently have much stronger motivation than I am used to in the United Kingdom. I vividly remember a 7-year-old Chinese boy who had fractured his elbow in a playground accident, and was in agony, refusing to leave my class and go to the hospital because he wanted to learn.

In Nanning, where I live, the many bookshops are always full of children browsing, sitting or standing in the aisles, and reading for pleasure. This kind of thirst for knowledge is unheard of in Britain. So there is much that is right about Chinese education and I am not saying that the Western approach is a panacea.

But whenever I try to discuss cultural differences in educational philosophy with my Chinese colleagues I get nowhere. Even fluent English speakers have no relevant vocabulary. The root of the problem is the teacher training system, which expects teachers to learn how to teach as they were taught in a very mechanistic way. They are never required to ask why they teach in that way or what the alternatives might be.

Chinese teachers need to stop fearing FTs and their methods. Equally FTs need to recognize the dedication and sincerity of most Chinese teachers. Once this happens we can start to develop a common vocabulary, and an approach that incorporates the best of both cultures, in order to improve teaching methods across the curriculum and so encourage students to place a proper value on their own language and history as well as English.

The writer is a British teacher living in Nanning