Chapter 146: What Did Middle School Students Learn in the 19th Century?

Willis brought the textbooks from Morrison School with him on board, and Liang Yao soon received the complete set of textbooks from Morrison School.

The best way to see directly from history textbooks is how much private material is mixed in a set of textbooks.

The history textbook at Morrison School is "Unification of Great Britain" written by Morrison when he was in Malacca (Singapore). However, the book in Liang Yao's hand is not the original version of "Unification of Great Britain" published by Malacca (Singapore) Publishing House. It is the Hong Kong version of "The Unification of Great Britain" that has been edited.

"A missionary is a man who studies documents and teaches people the right way. After studying for several years, he enters the examination and becomes a scholar, a scholar, a scholar, or a scholar. He teaches the people the Dharma, persuades them to be benevolent, and guides them to do good deeds. Abandon evil.

The principle of their teaching is that there is a God in the sky, the Emperor, who is omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent and benevolent, and possesses all virtues. He created heaven, earth and all things, and also made humans the spirits of all things.

The power of man cannot fulfill the nature of the Emperor God. Therefore, the Emperor God revealed: The Emperor God Father, the Emperor God Son, and the Emperor God Holy Spirit.

The duty of man is to respect the name of the Emperor and God, and to set laws and regulations according to God. "

The first thing Liang Yao saw was a passage with Chinese characteristics about Christian doctrine and missionary responsibilities.

Apart from the fact that the vertical version of traditional Chinese characters is a bit unfamiliar, it is easy to understand this text based on Liang Yao's classical Chinese background.

"The Unification of Great Britain" is not long, with only 17,679 words in total. After filtering out the information with strong religious overtones, Liang Yao still obtained a lot of practical information from the book.

Although the whole book "Unification of Great Britain" only contains a few thousand words, it covers quite a lot of content, including British religious customs, physical geography, historical evolution, and political system. However, due to space limitations, many contents are not included in the book. It's all just a taste.

In general, "The Unification of Great Britain" is qualified as an introductory book on British history. At least you can learn some British history from the book and have a general impression of Britain.

As for the remaining history textbooks, they are more religious and historical reading materials than historical textbooks. Even the Bible is included in the history textbooks.

Liang Yao was obviously not satisfied with this kind of history course.

From these history textbooks, students can only learn some sporadic historical knowledge about Britain, which is far from enough.

Liang Yao plans to re-edit three volumes of history textbooks, with himself as editor-in-chief.

One is a Chinese history textbook, one is an American history textbook, and the other is a European history textbook to deepen students' understanding of world history.

The compilation of Chinese history textbooks and European history textbooks is relatively difficult and takes some time.

On the other hand, American history textbooks are easy to compile. As long as there are enough materials, they can be compiled in a day or two.

After all, it has only been more than seventy years since the founding of the United States. If the writing were more refined, it might not be long enough.

Liang Yao obviously had no interest in reading those religious and historical readings and the Bible. Liang Yao put down the "Unification of Great Britain" and skipped the history course directly to check the content of other practical subjects. This part of the content is also what Liang Yao is most concerned about. of.

The contents of these natural sciences include:

Geography, anatomy, arithmetic, algebra, geometry, analytic geometry, trigonometry, surveying, navigation, calculus, water, aerology, optics, heat, electricity, mechanics, steam science, mechanics, printing, meteorology. These are subjects where teaching is more detailed.

Unfortunately, the teaching content is also relatively superficial. Many subjects, such as optics, thermal science, electricity, etc. are not perfect in this era. The relevant knowledge that can be taught to middle school students is naturally very limited.

However, Liang Yao was pleased that the more mature practical subjects such as geography, mathematics, and navigation were taught in more detail.

Of course, in addition to these subjects, subjects such as physiology, zoology, botany, philosophy, model casting, shipbuilding, international law, and official studies (introducing the titles and functions of officials in various countries) are also taught.

The teaching of these subjects is very simple, basically only introducing some industry terms. According to Liang Yao, these cannot be regarded as complete subject education, and at most they can only be regarded as simple subject science popularization.

There was one particular subject that was taught in great detail, and that was theology, since this was a church school after all.

In addition, there are language subjects, which are also key teaching subjects, mainly teaching English, and French, Dutch and Spanish are also available for elective study.

According to Willis, these Morrison schools adopt a model of compulsory subjects + elective subjects to teach these students.

These subjects are quite serious, but the exercises are full of strong church colors.

For example, a geography exercise asks that Priest Morrison set out from Liverpool to preach in Guangzhou, the Qing Dynasty, by sailing ship. When is the best month to start? What major ports will you pass along the way? How long is the total voyage? Assuming that the average speed of the ship is 5 knots per hour, how long does it take to reach Guangzhou?

This exercise appears to be a geography exercise, but it actually contains some knowledge of navigation and mathematics.

For example, the following question is a relatively pure mathematical question. The general idea is to assume that a missionary can develop 100 devout believers in his lifetime. These believers will become new missionaries after the missionary dies. Assume that there are 1000 million (ten billion) population, how many generations of missionary efforts will it take to make people all over the world become devout believers in the Lord?

In general, the knowledge taught in the church school basically met Liang Yao's psychological expectations.

After all, these are students who came here for free, so what else do they need? They can be sent to middle schools in the east to study for one or two years and then take the entrance examination for American universities.

When Liang Yao was reading these textbooks, Pan Zhengwei brought his two grandsons to Tingtao Garden to see Liang Yao.

Liang Yao entrusted Wu Yuanhua to help persuade the old man of the Liang family to send his mother to California.

Wu Yuanhua told him that the Pan family had more face and more channels in the officialdom. It was heard that the Pan family and the old man Liang had a relationship in Beijing, so it was more appropriate for the Pan family to come forward.

Although both the Wu family and the Pan family had served as the general merchants of Guangzhou merchants, the two families took different paths.

The Wu family was the richest among all merchants, while the Pan family was the most powerful among all merchants.

After the Pan family became rich, they quickly transformed themselves. In addition to making friends with the dignitaries of the time, they also let their descendants study hard for the imperial examinations and obtain official titles, completing the transformation from a royal merchant family to an official family.

The descendants of the Pan family were also very competitive, and many of them obtained official titles and embarked on official careers.

The Pan family even considered completely withdrawing from the business team and canceling Tongfuhang, but the Pan family repeatedly submitted memorials to the court, but the court did not allow the Pan family to withdraw, so they had to bite the bullet and continue to operate Tongfuhang.

Perhaps in terms of business, the Pan family is not as good as the Wu family, but in terms of insight into the current situation and connections, the Pan family has more ways than the Wu family.

Historically, Pan Zhengwei's grandson had a close relationship with Sun and even directly funded Sun.

"Liang Yi has already told me about your mother's matter. As a son, it is one's duty to be filial.

Since Mr. Liang has such filial piety, our Pan family has always valued filial piety and human relations. In this matter, the Pan family will definitely help you."

Pan Zhengwei lifted his robe and sat down, taking the tea handed over by Liang Shaoyu.

If it was just for this matter, Pan Zhengwei would not have to bring his two grandsons.

Liang Yao knew that Pan Zhengwei must have other requests for bringing his two grandsons.

"The Pan family is willing to help, Liang is very grateful. If the Pan family needs Liang, Liang will also be obliged." Liang Yao thanked Pan Zhengwei.

"Pan has met your old man several times. In my opinion, the old man of the Liang family is testing you."

Since Liang Yao has already spoken, Pan Zhengwei did not beat around the bush and spoke directly.

"I heard that Mr. Liang is selecting young talents and plans to send them to military academies in the United States for further study?"

After living in San Francisco for a period of time, Pan Zhengwei has gradually become accustomed to life in a foreign country.

He also changed his name for the United States from Citigroup to America. Liang Yao heard that Pan Zhengwei had a good relationship with Robinson recently and invested in the Boston Bank, which was just established by Boston Company.

"Does Yu Ting plan to send the two sons of the Pan family to military academies? Military academies are not like ordinary schools. You have to endure hardships."

Liang Yao looked at Pan Zhengwei's two grandsons. Pan Zhengwei's two grandsons, Pan Baohuang and Pan Baolin, were eighteen and sixteen years old respectively. This age did meet Liang Yao's requirements.

But Pan Zhengwei was willing to let his two precious grandsons suffer in military academies?

"Only those who endure hardships can become superior people. The descendants of the Pan family never know how to write the word "endure hardships." Pan Zhengwei said.

"Mr. Liang, we are not afraid of hardship."

Pan Baohuang and Pan Baolin said to Liang Yao in unison.

"It's just that Pan hopes that after they return from school, they can find a job under Mr. Liang. The Pan family can pay for the tuition." Pan Zhengwei added.

"Yu Ting underestimated Liang's financial resources. Since the two young masters want to find a job under me in the future, the tuition should naturally be borne by Liang." Liang Yao thought for a while and said.

"It's not wise to send both young masters to military academies. There are other good schools in the United States, such as Harvard, Yale, and Pennsylvania."

"Mr. Liang, what do you think? I would like to hear the details. I know very little about the United States. Please tell me clearly." Pan Zhengwei listened carefully to Liang Yao's words, fearing that he would miss the key information.

"My suggestion is to let one of Bao Huang and Bao Lin go to military school, and the other one prepare for the American university, whether it is law, business, or engineering.

California is a newly established state. What it lacks most at the moment is talents with higher education. As long as they return after completing their studies, their future prospects will be limitless. I am now organizing students to prepare for the university entrance examination." Liang Yao said.

"Very good, very good. My idea is to let one of them join the army and the other join politics. As for what to study, please take the trouble to recommend one or two, Mr. Liang." Pan Zhengwei clapped his hands.

"If you insist on joining politics, study law." Liang Yao thought for a while and said.

The proportion of politicians born in the United States who studied law is quite large. The current president Fillmore taught himself law.

German and many congressmen he knows also have a legal background.

And California is indeed in urgent need of legal talents now.

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