The sound of students reading aloud at near dawn has echoed through Chinese schools for generations, but not anymore.
Schools are now scrapping those early morning sessions and letting kids sleep in.
Supporters call it a win for rest and focus.
Critics, though, fear grades could suffer.
Does earlier actually mean better?
Coming to you live from our studios in Beijing, this is Roundtable.
I'm Steve.
Thank you very much for joining us today.
And for the show, I'm with Yushan and Xinyun.
First up, for decades and decades, one sound defined the Chinese school morning.
Students reading aloud, often in unison in the classrooms.
But this spring that sound is fading.
Across the country, schools are gradually canceling mandatory morning reading sessions, probably to the delight of many students, and starting the day a little bit later.
While some see this as a positive step towards protecting students sleep and improving learning efficiency, others remain cautious, worried that maybe its impact And we're going to get into it.
But I guess I can see both sides.
The side that would say, oh, yeah.
No more morning reading sessions at school.
And the side two that would say but wait a minute.
Those reading sessions are a great benefit to the students.
Yes, I guess morning readings.
Yeah, they are part of my middle school life back like two decades ago, maybe.
And I think the tradition of morning reading can be traced back to like ancient China, because in traditional private schools and academies these early mornings have already existed.
I think you should.
Maybe you have seen some of these historical dramas where there's, in this private school and society, kids.
They were reciting the text and they're moving their head in circles and the teacher will be hearing maybe the poems or whatever they are reciting.
Well, for those who don't know, paint us a picture here.
So the typical class.
I guess it's different from school to school or region to region, but class typically starts at, let's say, 8 am.
?
Okay, so reading time would start at 730, around 730.
And for I said in the beginning decades and decades, but by the sounds of things it's much longer than that.
We might be saying centuries and centuries.
Basically, let's say the first class starts at 8 o'clock, or mostly I think 9 o'clock, and then schools will require students to be at school, maybe around 7.30 to 8, and then during that period of time, students or teachers are requiring students to read something, mostly english or chinese poems or um like recite some vocabulary or something like that oh so it's a little bit different every day maybe yeah uh it will have kind of a schedule um when Maybe it is important exam time for English subject or then Chinese.
So, and also it is, as you said, is a kind of a tradition that has been there for a while, with that kind of mindset of having the you know the based on, like that kind of wisdom that
Chinese saying 一日之际在于晨, which means the whole day's work depends on a good start in the morning.
Okay.
It's probably.
I think that makes sense because you have a better memory when you are doing reciting uh in the morning.
So it is students in unison, right?
So there will be.
It's not mostly.
Yeah, it's not sitting in silence and reading whatever novel it is you like to read.
It's not that it's something from the coursework and the students will all read out loud together.
Yeah, usually it's reading a lot together and in some cases, Sometimes the louder the better.
And some schools will even have competitions, like supervisors will all walk along the aisle and to see which classroom reads the loudest and they will have a ranking.
That was hilarious.
Oh, so somebody walks around and gives a score.
Whoever's the loudest wins.
That's fun.
All right.
So now that we know exactly how this happens, let's find out how it is disappearing.
What's going on?
What's changing here?
Starting from this spring semester, many primary and secondary schools across China have officially canceled these mandatory unified morning reading sessions, and they have also delayed school start times.
For example, in Chengdu, which is a city in southwest China's Sichuan province, There's a middle school called Lie Wu.
So that middle school canceled morning reading for three junior high grades.
Grade seven, grade eight, grade nine.
So the whole school.
Yeah.
And so students now arrive no earlier than 7.50 a.m. for an.
8 a.m. start.
Just 10 minutes before classes start.
Yes.
And yeah, that also applies to other cities like Ningbo in East China's Zhejiang province and also Guangdong province, also Nanjing and Nantong in East China's Jiangsu province as well.
What's the reason?
I mean, this has been around for a very, very, very, very, very long time.
Starting from.
You said middle school and you just mentioned a couple of middle schools Xinyu, but does it start as early as elementary school, or even before?
Yeah, if the elementary school has this kind of morning reading session, which mostly have that and actually this policy, it's been there for a while.
And these kind of changes are kind of a direct response to the Ministry of Education's policies aimed at protecting students' health and also ensuring
Effective studying, because a 2021 notice actually established that primary schools should generally not start classes before 820 am, and middle schools
Before 8 a.m.
And then there is a update in 2025 furthering reinforce that schools must not require students to arrive earlier for organized teaching activities, such as these kind of unison morning reading sessions, and should ensure sufficient lunch break time, while possible.
And there's research to back up the reasons for this move.
Adequate sleep, they say, is vital for brain development or physical recovery, and it enhances memory and learning efficiency.
And then many students previously arrived at school in a state of zombie panic.
I'm guessing because, you know, they'll stay up late at night playing their games or whatever it is.
Or finishing their homework.
Yeah, or finishing their homework.
Right.
And they call it this.
This leads to kind of this zombie state in the morning, where long hours of study or whatever it is that they were doing before the night of the night before results in pretty low efficiency.
And maybe not so effective when it comes to the absorption of knowledge at 7.30 a.m.
Yes, especially for these primary and secondary school students, they need time to sleep.
I mean, sufficient sleep.
So by delaying the start time of the class students and also the time to arrive at school, students can have, I guess, more sleep.
And also, I think that the long hours of study doesn't necessarily equate efficiencies.
Study efficiency.
So that's why I think the schools are launching this measure to advocate and also improve students' study efficiency.
This isn't actually totally brand new because Shanghai, as kind of a reform pioneer, if you will, they introduced delayed school arrivals as early as 2007.
That's almost 20 years ago.
And at that time it was to require primary schools to start collective activities after 815 am and middle schools after 8 am, similar to what we're talking about here in 2026.
And at that time, it was done for the same reasons now, to better protect students' sleep.
Yeah, as I said, this is not something really that new, because similar guidelines existed previously.
And they are now being more strictly enforced, with some kind of constraints, including incorporating sleep management into school evaluations, to prevent schools from using like these kind of tactics to bypass regulations.
Because Shanghai is an example.
They they, they have doing these kind of pioneering things.
And I've also seen some of the parents from Shanghai saying that my child has to go to school at around 610 am.
6.10?
Yes, as early as 6.10.
Even in some regions I've seen, because this is a kind of a big news right and some parents are commenting online giving out different views.
So One example is Shanghai 610 am and some high schools in Henan even require arrival as early as 545 am.
What?
No way.
I think they treat the kind of morning reading session really, really importantly.
And others like similar situation also exist in other regions like Hubei, Jiangsu, Zhejiang.
So you cannot see a pattern, no matter it's.
Henan is a province that is really focusing on, I think, academic study.
You think?
They're known for that uh, nationally but, and and other regions like zhejiang jiangsu shanghai, they are also, but they're not that they're laid back.
Yeah, you can tell through some of the like impressions, But still like they have that kind of same situation in the sense of going to school.
OK, so we know that it's not a nationwide thing or it wasn't a nationwide thing.
Right.
This depends on the school or the district or the region within the country.
Some students, unfortunately, had to go to school at 545 a.m.
I cannot for the life of me.
Figure out why that early, but it did exist.
Others, you go to 2007, Shanghai made some changes.
But it sounds like from maybe 2007 up until now, you mentioned the word loopholes.
Now, loophole in this context, I think would mean...
Well, it could mean many different things, but getting the students to come to the school early, before the classes actually begin.
And one of those loopholes I read might be well, you don't have to come for the morning reading session.
It's not mandatory.
But then there's that pressure.
Right.
Because, you know, right.
Because you know some students are going to go when it's not mandatory and then that puts pressure on the other students to go.
So that's the kind of loophole apparently that some schools would use.
They're not strictly.
They weren't strictly enforcing the reading session or other morning activities, but they kind of were if, if.
If you know what I mean public opinion, let's talk about that.
You said there's a lot of comments online, a lot of parents sharing their opinions exactly yeah, parents are yeah, probably the most divided group regarding this cancellation of this unified morning reading.
Of course there are some parents.
They are really supporting this measure.
So many parents, they have expressed their immense relief.
Finally, their kids can have enough sleep.
And also some parents report that their children no longer have to fight a battle or to struggle every morning to only to get out of bed to go to school at that early of time in the day.
And their kids can now enjoy a proper, relaxed breakfast and get nearly an extra hour of sleep.
And many of these parents also observe that when these children they are better rested, they have better sleep and then they are more refreshed.
And they also show significantly higher concentration during these class hours.
So they're able to maybe sit longer during the day, because for these students they have to from probably 8 in the morning to like 5 pm in the afternoon.
They are sitting a long time during the day.
So that kind of sufficient rest can ensure that they have better concentration and focus on study.
Okay, I want to hear your thoughts about the support side of this.
The parents who say, It's extra rest for the students.
Their concentration levels seem to be increased.
Their tolerance for studying long hours, long consecutive hours has increased.
And maybe just a spiritual boost as well.
Maybe just a little bit happier overall.
What are your thoughts about that?
I completely agree.
Yeah, I'm 100 like pro and support of this measure myself, because I was one of those students like getting up really early in the morning and I had to go to school and join other students for this morning reading.
We recite text, we memorize vocabulary.
And is this something really good for every student?
I mean many of those students.
They're sitting there but they are daydreaming.
They didn't have much sleep.
So that long hours doesn't necessarily mean they are like getting a high grade for these tests or whatever.
So probably maybe these students' health and well-being comes first.
And then the students like scores.
Just because they're sitting in the chair in the classroom taking part in the activity doesn't mean they are present.
Yeah.
Right.
So if that's the case, what's the point of the activity?
OK, what do you think you should about the support side?
Understand it because, as you said, even maybe spiritually, students feel that I can go to school later and that will make students actually happy and then maybe have a better mood, have a better condition, mental condition, to actually in like joining the first class, even better.
So I think yeah, that makes sense And but I also need to say that from another perspective, when parents are thinking the measures are changing, they will also believe that having a kind of unified morning reading session helps their like children or students get into that kind of learning mindset and we also reinforce their memory.
Or they worry that canceling it might conflict with their own work schedules.
That also makes sense because you have that kind of period of time to make yourself.
Even though you're not reading, you are trying to remind yourself I am going to study.
Okay, so let's switch now to the other side of the coin, the parents who are against this.
You mentioned that they might be worried that The students are losing an opportunity to learn something.
The morning reading session is about 20 minutes.
Is that accurate?
Yeah, almost 20 to 30 minutes.
Okay, but they're arguing that if that disappears, then that opportunity disappears.
I think another argument would be that even though it's only 20 or 30 minutes in the morning, let's say it's English vocabulary time, for example.
That's maybe the only opportunity during the day that many students might have to practice or learn their English vocabulary.
Or if you want to talk about reciting ancient Chinese poetry or whatever, which is important, right?
That's an important thing in school.
If they don't do it then...
Then when are they going to do it?
Then when are they going to have an opportunity?
Because their evening schedule, their afternoon schedule, is too jam-packed and they're not going to do this before they go to bed at night.
I know my kid, they just won't.
So what's the big deal?
I'm arguing from this parent's point of view.
What's the big deal if you show up 30 minutes earlier in the morning for a passive activity, right?
You're just kind of reading aloud with the 30 other students in the classroom.
Well, what's the big deal about keeping this?
What do you think about that?
I think there's definitely anxious parents out there who might think that if we cut that 30 minutes of recitation and memorization in the morning, then Then what if my child falls behind?
I mean, 30 minutes a day.
But if we look at the whole semester, the whole year, then how much of knowledge absorption we have missed right?
How many hours is that over the course of a year?
Yes, but that's the perspective of an adult.
Have you ever considered about your child? his or her own feelings about studying.
Is he or she really, they want it?
Do they want it?
But what if?
Let's say just what, if they want it, they need that half an hour to maybe memorize a little bit more from maybe yesterday or, like me, I need that 30 minutes to finish my homework in the morning.
Don't learn from me.
But anyway.
That period of time allows you to get into class and maybe have a little warm up on the content that you're going to study.
But as anxious parents I mean you are passing that anxiety to your children because every time you are telling your child to get up early in the morning and you have to go to school to start your morning reading to recite the text.
That means your child has to follow what you said, and that anxiety is passed down onto him or her.
Okay, but that anxiety and again I'm playing devil's advocate here that anxiety might have a justified root.
Because let's say that your kid...
Doesn't take extra tutoring classes.
They don't go to an academy.
The only, and we'll stick with English, but it could be anything.
The only English they learn is from the English in schools.
Now what if the child sitting next to them does go to an academy, does have a private tutor outside of the school?
Then your fear and your anxiety as a parent is justified, because your child is going to fall behind in their minds.
Further and further and further every day.
Yeah, I've also seen comments online from some of these parents saying that if you want to sleeping, if you want more sleep time okay, you can.
You can choose not to go, but you should not just require all students to lose sleep, the opportunity to make use of the reading, morning reading.
Yeah, and that's what you meant, i guess, when you said.
What about the students who actually like this?
Yeah, it's probably a pretty small percentage, but still it's almost like punishing them in a way.
At least you could perceive it that way.
Or does it have to be a school?
I mean at your home.
If you, as a kid, you like study, you can study, whatever you are.
Thank you for the transition because that's what I want to talk about next.
I want to talk about the families.
There are a lot. of dual income families.
And what that means is the parents are both out of, it's a pretty strict schedule in the morning.
Kid gets up at this time, parents get up at this time make breakfast.
Time is from this time to this time.
Everybody gets out of the house, phew, go.
Now 30 minutes is a big adjustment if a parent needs to be at the office themselves or if they need to beat rush hour traffic.
Is there any angle here?
Is that what parents are talking about?
Of course.
I think it's challenging for these dual income families, for these parents you have to drop off your children at the school.
So if we like delayed school starts time, then it means for these parents they have to juggle their schedule as well, because You have to like sending your children to school and then after make it to your work, to your office on time.
So that means another challenge.
And also um, maybe in the morning, because that would mean your increased like morning child care for your children, so that also some add some burden on these parents.
Our school gates open regardless.
I mean for the parents who, if they needed to take their kid to school at the same time, not later, then even though there's no morning reading sessions anymore, would the school gates still be open for the schools to uh or for the students to to enter.
There is a like earliest time that the school gate is opened.
It's actually managed by some security guard of the school.
But they will be really, really early around, I think, 6.
But there is a limit of time because, for safety concern, most of the primary and middle schools will be closed when students don't need to go.
I see.
Okay.
Now...
That's the parents.
Let's talk about the schools.
What about their perspective?
How have they responded to this?
I think for these schools.
Yeah, they're also like some of the division here because they are definitely some teachers.
They still believe that this type of morning reading has cognitive benefits.
Like we've talked about, the morning is considered the best time for memorization and contemplation.
And also for these languages, especially like Chinese and English.
They think it's the best time for them to develop their skills, to develop a sense of language.
So I was curious about that.
And I went to the Association for Psychological Science to see what they had to say.
This is it.
Quote While the morning can be a peak time for certain cognitive functions, the relationship between time of day and mental performance is far more complex.
The best time depends on the specific task the individual's internal clock and other factors.
The scientific consensus points to a phenomenon known as the synchrony effect, meaning That's not necessarily true that the morning time is the best time for your brain to absorb tons of information.
It depends on the student.
It depends on what the student is doing at that particular time.
According to the Association for Psychological Science,
Maybe that's the psychological effect, because I really think that is very effective.
And maybe it's because we all, I have that kind of mindset of that deep tradition of the morning is the best time, and then I will Have the comforting mindset of this is the time that I should do the reciting.
Also, another time is before bed.
So before bed and also after getting up in the morning, these are the best time that you can recite and memorize things.
And during this period of time, the brain will give me a signal that it is the most efficient time that you can do it.
And then I may be really being very efficient.
But you're saying is that it's not scientifically proven.
But when you are told that the morning is the best time to recite, then you believe that that is the truth.
And then that ultimately... Yes, I do.
That's why I said it's probably psychological effect.
Okay.
Because my brain is telling me it's probably true.
Yeah, and if you believe it, there could be a placebo there, right?
Okay.
Students are... Sorry, schools are also saying this, or at least some educators.
They're saying that they shouldn't use what they called a simple and crude deletion method to solve the problem.
Instead, they're advocating for something different, turning the time into a five-minute interest-based warm-up.
Or watching current affairs news, like the morning news, to spark interest rather than forcing some sort of memorization.
What do you think about that?
Turn on the morning news in the classroom and just sit there and watch the news.
Yeah, I was just putting myself in the shoes of these young students when, in the class, the morning news is being played on TV.
Would I be that interested in watching the news or not?
I don't know from adults' perspective it can be a process for these young students to form a certain habit of like have this basic access to news and to keep up with the news every single day.
But I don't know if for these children, they might be interested.
I think they will be more than pleased because first of all, they don't need to read.
And then they have they got TV to watch.
That's the I think the single or simple reason that they can follow.
And another one is that.
We are creating a channel for them to, of course, forcing them to watch the news.
But still, even though I don't want to, I have that at least a channel to know what is happening every day.
Yeah, I've taught high school students before.
Let me tell you, ain't nobody watching the news at 730 in the morning.
Now I think we're kind of skipping over the main point here, going back to the Ministry of Education, because they're not denying the value of morning reading.
The ministry is not saying it's completely useless, therefore we're getting rid of it.
They're not saying that at all.
What they are saying is schools need to prioritize the health issues and mental well-being and emotional well-being of their students and they need to improve overall teaching efficiency.
That is what the ministry of education is saying.
So I think that kind of gets lost a little bit, with parents maybe online making their arguments for or making their arguments against.
I think they're missing the point a little bit that the ministry isn't saying this is totally useless.
They're just saying maybe this isn't the best thing for the students in the morning.
The argument, in my opinion...
The argument of removing the morning reading time will allow the students more sleep in the morning.
Maybe.
But if I'm a 14-year-old kid and I know I can wake up 45 minutes later tomorrow morning, that means I can sleep 45 minutes later at night.
True.
Right?
So on paper...
These arguments for and arguments against are quite strong.
In practicality, I'm not exactly sure how this is going to play out.
But it seems like a more flexible educational model is what everyone's looking for here.
Hmm.
Yes, I totally agree that there's no one-size-fits-all solution for these education models.
For instance, like the Chengdu Liyue Middle School that I mentioned before, it opens its gates at 7 am for these early birds who want to engage in these voluntary reading or self-study sessions under teacher supervision, but their class will not begin until 8 am.
So I think, for these schools also, they are trying to search for a measure for all of these students, not mandatory but voluntary, to find a way that suits every kid as a person.
And also I think it is also reflecting that now parents and maybe educators' concerns show that The academic pressure hasn't just gone away, because even though you cancel that, some people will think I lost the time or opportunity of study early.
So as long as exam focused systems remain or that kind of rigid mindset is there, reducing study time can still spark fears and also falling behind.
So success depends not just on shorter schedules but on, I think, better teaching and more efficient learning.
Yeah, and by the sounds of things, Xinyu, you are in support of removing this 1,000%.
Yes, definitely.
And I'm sensing you should.
You're actually not in support of this removal.
You kind of got me.
Why?
Maybe it's because I didn't suffer from that kind of morning reading session.
One thing is that I can't finish my homework.
Another thing is that maybe I just...
I got used to getting up early when I was in middle school, and I can actually use that time to maybe not only reciting but also checking out some of the subject.
I don't want to sound really bad, but... I know what you mean.
Yeah, just use it wisely.
Yeah, it allows for a.
You know, if you show up to the school at 750 am and your classes start at 8, then there's no time to kind of slowly unfold into your day.
Yeah yeah, but if you're there at 7 30, you have a half an hour to do to prepare yeah, or yesterday's homework or whatever.
Or at least let your brain wake up.
Um yeah, so i see both sides.
Yeah, but i like the message that's been um out there from the, the nation.
I mean, a student's campus life cannot solely focus on scores or tests.
It should be a well-rounded development.
We should care about their holistic growth.
Yeah, and I actually looked this up too because I was thinking this is kind of like vitamin c to me in a day.
You know if if you take too much vitamin c.
If you take a certain amount of vitamin c, it's good for your body.
If you take too much, it can be bad for you.
It can be bad for your kidneys and other things.
I was kind of thinking of that because If you just put a student in a chair in the morning and say here, absorb this knowledge.
It won't work.
It doesn't necessarily work.
And you're just making them more tired and more stressed and more anxious.
Yeah, I don't know.
I don't know.
I guess it's not a simple solution.
But looking ahead.
It does seem like there is a potential transition in China's education system from an emphasis on perhaps, time investment at least, to a little bit more focus on learning efficiency, to the introduction of more adaptive models.
You gave a couple of examples of what schools are doing.
And I guess we're just in a feel-out stage right now.
We'll see how we go with this for a little while.
And who knows?
Maybe it'll be brought back in 12 months' time.
