How culture, community, and play transformed Tonga’s education system

Education is in crisis.

教育陷入危机。

Around the world, organizations like UNESCO and the OECD are seeking new models for education as we enter the age of AI.

在世界各地，随着我们进入人工智能时代，联合国教科文组织和经合组织等组织正在寻求新的教育模式。

AI can synthesize information in nanoseconds and offer coherent, though sometimes shallow, arguments that answer basic questions.

人工智能可以在纳秒内合成信息，并提供连贯（尽管有时很肤浅）的论据来回答基本问题。

How can we use the science of learning to prepare learners for this new age?

我们如何利用学习科学让学习者为这个新时代做好准备？

What is lost when human-human portions of education are replaced or supplemented by AI?

当教育中的人与人之间的部分被人工智能取代或补充时，会损失什么？

How can we design systems to retain the most crucial aspects of the learning process?

我们如何设计系统来保留学习过程中最关键的方面？

The science teaches us that human-to-human connections and relationships are at the core of education.

科学告诉我们，人与人之间的联系和关系是教育的核心。

These interactions literally build infant brains .

这些相互作用实际上构建了婴儿的大脑。

And at the start of formal schooling, teacher and peer to peer relationships are central to mastery of outcomes that range from math and literacy to skills like collaboration, critical thinking, and creative innovation.

在正规学校教育开始时，教师和同伴关系对于掌握从数学和读写能力到协作、批判性思维和创造性创新等技能的成果至关重要。

Regardless, U.S. data suggests that little collaborative instruction (not just passive listening) is happening in classrooms, hovering at around only 5% of a student’s class day .

不管怎样，美国的数据表明，课堂上几乎没有进行协作教学（不仅仅是被动倾听），学生每天上课的时间仅占 5% 左右。

Student-to-student engagement is even more scarce, even though both are cornerstones of how children learn.

学生与学生之间的互动更加稀缺，尽管两者都是孩子学习的基石。

The small Pacific island nation of Tonga—a kingdom of just over 100,000 people, with an estimated 8,000 children in early education—decided to wrestle with this gap.

太平洋小岛国汤加这个人口略多于 10 万、估计有 8,000 名儿童接受早期教育的王国决定努力解决这一差距。

Its Ministry of Education and Training (MET) concluded that nesting education in authentic and culturally meaningful relationships was foundational for learning.

其教育和培训部 (MET) 得出的结论是，将教育融入真实且具有文化意义的关系中是学习的基础。

Key for the Ministry was honoring the science of learning and the pivotal role of human connection in that science.

该部的关键是尊重学习科学以及人与人之间的联系在该科学中的关键作用。

When MET set out to redesign its national primary school curriculum, policymakers, curriculum writers, and consultants faced a tension shared by many Pacific island nations: how to prepare children for a rapidly changing world while honoring the cultural values, languages, and identities that define Pasifika life.

当 MET 着手重新设计全国小学课程时，政策制定者、课程编写者和顾问面临着许多太平洋岛国所面临的紧张局势：如何让孩子们为快速变化的世界做好准备，同时尊重定义太平洋岛民生活的文化价值观、语言和身份。

The Pacific Regional Education Framework (PACREF) acknowledges this tension, calling for curriculum that is both Pacific grounded and future focused.

太平洋地区教育框架 (PACREF) 承认这种紧张关系，呼吁制定既立足太平洋又面向未来的课程。

Tonga’s Curriculum Development Unit (CDU) writers sought to represent multiple—sometimes competing—priorities in their curricula:

汤加课程开发部门 (CDU) 的作者力求在其课程中体现多个（有时是相互竞争的）优先事项：

MET’s solution was to work in partnership with consultants to identify robust, research-informed practice that aligned with Tongan cultural and historical values and philosophies.

MET 的解决方案是与顾问合作，确定符合汤加文化和历史价值观和哲学的稳健、以研究为基础的实践。

Studies on Active Playful Learning (APL) provided the pedagogical mechanism to bring this alignment to life.

对主动寓教于乐的学习（APL）的研究提供了将这种一致性变为现实的教学机制。

APL’s focus on guided play , storytelling, hands-on inquiry, and collaborative problem solving offered children ways of learning that resonated with Pacific ways of knowing and being while keeping the focus human-centric.

APL 注重引导游戏、讲故事、动手探究和协作解决问题，为孩子们提供了与太平洋地区的认知和存在方式产生共鸣的学习方式，同时保持以人为本。

It also draws on the science of how children learn and a broad base of foundational skills that include mastery of content but also mastery of collaboration, communication, critical thinking, creative innovation, and confidence (The 6Cs) .

它还借鉴了儿童学习方式的科学和广泛的基础技能，包括对内容的掌握，以及对协作、沟通、批判性思维、创造性创新和信心的掌握（6C）。

A unique, culturally grounded framework, called the “ Vā Framework ,” was constructed to conceptualize learning and teaching in the Tongan context.

构建了一个独特的、基于文化的框架，称为“Vā 框架”，以概念化汤加背景下的学习和教学。

“Vā” translates as “the space between”—not an empty space, but a relational space, actively tended (“tauhi vā”) so that it stays warm in the heart (“māfana”) and alive between teacher and student.

“Vā”翻译为“之间的空间”——不是一个空的空间，而是一个积极照料的关系空间（“tauhi vā”），以便在老师和学生之间保持温暖的心（“māfana”）和活力。

Importantly, the Vā Framework builds upon the influential work of Professor Konai Helu Thaman, a highly respected Tongan academic and Professor of Education who has made significant contributions to Pacific indigenous education and philosophy.

重要的是，Vā 框架建立在科奈·赫鲁·塔曼 (Konai Helu Thaman) 教授颇具影​​响力的工作之上，他是一位备受尊敬的汤加学者和教育学教授，为太平洋土著教育和哲学做出了重大贡献。

Her Kakala Framework —gathering flowers (“toli”), weaving them with judgment (“tui”), and gifting the finished garland (“luva”)—gives Tongan teachers a metaphor for pedagogy: that learning is something gathered, woven with care, and given with love, not simply delivered.

她的卡卡拉框架——采集鲜花（“toli”），用判断力编织它们（“tui”），以及赠送成品花环（“luva”）——为汤加教师提供了一个教育学的隐喻：学习是一种聚集、精心编织、充满爱的付出，而不是简单的传递。

The Vā Framework aligns closely with the Tongan ECE Curriculum Framework , “Learning through Play the Heilala Way,” which focuses on culturally relevant early childhood education.

Vā 框架与汤加 ECE 课程框架“通过 Heilala 方式玩耍学习”紧密结合，重点关注与文化相关的幼儿教育。

In the age of AI, a breadth of skills approach to educating students has become even more important—emphasizing development of “21 st century skills” like critical thinking, problem solving, and creative innovation gives kids the competencies they need to navigate an AI workforce.

在人工智能时代，教育学生的广泛技能方法变得更加重要——强调批判性思维、解决问题和创造性创新等“21世纪技能”的发展，为孩子们提供驾驭人工智能劳动力所需的能力。

Finding places where these skills are already present in a culture-embedded context was vital.

在嵌入文化的环境中找到这些技能已经存在的地方至关重要。

For example, leveraging the Kakala Framework meaning that incorporating critical thinking competency training into Tonga’s education systems was not a Western/Global North import.

例如，利用卡卡拉框架意味着将批判性思维能力培训纳入汤加的教育系统并不是西方/北半球的进口。

The culturally grounded practices of toli, tui, and luva already reflected the processes of collecting ideas and data, selecting, evaluating, and making reasoned choices and judgements.

“toli”、“tui”和“luva”的文化实践已经反映了收集想法和数据、选择、评估以及做出合理选择和判断的过程。

The fundamental and central concept of connecting was chosen to represent both cognitive connections and relational, human ones.

连接的基本和核心概念被选择来代表认知连接和关系性的人类连接。

Uniquely for the Tongan context, the conceptual aspect of the framework also includes the cultural value of respect (“faka’apa’apa”), cited in the Tongan ECE Curriculum as the most important Tongan value to foster in early years settings.

该框架的概念方面对于汤加来说是独一无二的，它还包括尊重的文化价值（“faka’apa’apa”），汤加幼儿教育课程将其视为在早期环境中培养的最重要的汤加价值观。

In Tonga, it is held that effective learning can only take place in a respectful space, with respectful thoughts and actions.

在汤加，人们认为有效的学习只能在尊重的空间、尊重的思想和行动中进行。

Crucially, the Vā Framework needed to be more than words in a policy document—it needed to be embodied and come to life for educators.

至关重要的是，Vā 框架需要的不仅仅是政策文件中的文字，它需要被具体化并为教育工作者实现。

The same active, playful approaches designed for children’s learning turned out to matter just as much for the adults introducing them.

事实证明，为儿童学习而设计的积极、有趣的方法对于成人来说也同样重要。

Ministry officials and teacher-trainers working through the new pedagogical approaches for the first time needed to explore, talk, and play their way into the framework before they could ask children to do the same.

首次采用新教学方法的教育部官员和教师培训师需要探索、交谈和融入框架，然后才能要求孩子们也这样做。

This should not surprise anyone who takes APL seriously: if playful learning is how the brain learns best, that does not stop being true once a person turns eighteen, or once they hold a ministry title.

任何认真对待 APL 的人都不会感到惊讶：如果有趣的学习是大脑最好的学习方式，那么一旦一个人年满 18 岁，或者一旦他们获得了部门头衔，这一点就不会停止。

Officials who experienced the curriculum’s collaborative, hands-on workshop sessions for themselves were the ones who could speak to it with the most conviction in classrooms afterward—a small but telling confirmation that playful learning is not for one stage of life, but learning for life.

亲自体验过该课程的协作式实践研讨会的官员们，是那些事后能够在课堂上以最坚定的信念谈论该课程的人——这虽然很小，但却很能说明问题，即有趣的学习不是为了人生的一个阶段，而是为了一生的学习。

Early signs of change are already visible in classrooms.

变革的早期迹象已经在课堂上显现出来。

In a Class 1 lesson introducing English vocabulary, observed by Ministry and World Bank officials, children were not seated in rows repeating words back to the teacher; they were on their feet, acting, singing, and dancing the new language into memory.

根据教育部和世界银行官员的观察，在一年级介绍英语词汇的课程中，孩子们并没有排成一排，向老师重复单词；他们站起来，表演、唱歌、跳舞，将新语言记入记忆中。

The room was alive with māfana, the warm joy that comes from shared relational energy.

房间里充满了māfana，即来自共享关系能量的温暖喜悦。

Teacher and students laughed together as they learned, and the vocabulary stuck because it was embodied, social, and meaningful.

老师和学生在学习时一起欢笑，词汇被牢牢记住，因为它具有具体性、社会性和意义。

This is tangible evidence of what happens when a system chooses to place human connection at the center of learning.

这是当系统选择将人际关系置于学习中心时会发生什么的切实证据。

Tonga’s adoption of APL is not simply importing a model.

汤加采用APL并不是简单地引进一个模型。

It is a Pacific solution to a Pacific challenge—one that aligns with PACREF, UNESCO’s human flourishing agenda, and Tonga’s national priorities.

这是应对太平洋挑战的太平洋解决方案，与 PACREF、教科文组织人类繁荣议程以及汤加的国家优先事项相一致。

By choosing APL, Tonga is cultivating confident, creative, culturally grounded learners who can navigate the future while remaining anchored in the wisdom, values, and human-to-human relationships that define Tongan life.

通过选择 APL，汤加正在培养自信、有创造力、有文化底蕴的学习者，他们能够驾驭未来，同时保持扎根于定义汤加生活的智慧、价值观和人与人之间的关系。

What makes Tonga’s experience matter beyond its shores is that vā has been intentionally positioned at national scale—embedded within a formal ministry‑led reform rather than confined to isolated pilots in selected classrooms.

汤加的经验之所以在海外具有重要意义，是因为 vā 被有意地定位在国家层面——嵌入到由部委主导的正式改革中，而不是仅限于选定教室的孤立试点。

It is one thing for relationship‑centered pedagogy to emerge where a talented teacher or a well‑resourced school chooses to nurture it.

当一位有才华的教师或一所资源充足的学校选择培养以关系为中心的教育学时，这是一回事。

It is another for an entire curriculum development unit, a ministry, and a nation’s early educators to adopt a shared relational approach—and for that adoption to strengthen the coherence and rigor of the curriculum rather than dilute it.

对于整个课程开发单位、一个部门和一个国家的早期教育工作者来说，采用一种共享的关系方法是另一回事，这种方法的采用是为了加强而不是削弱课程的连贯性和严谨性。

This is evidence that human-centric education systems can address how children will flourish in the age of AI .

这证明以人为本的教育系统可以解决儿童如何在人工智能时代蓬勃发展的问题。

Human relationships, cultural responsiveness, and rigor are not competing priorities to be traded off, but a foundation and a structure that the rest of the world has good reason to learn from today.

人际关系、文化响应性和严谨性并不是需要权衡的相互竞争的优先事项，而是当今世界其他国家有充分理由学习的基础和结构。

Tonga’s experience speaks to this.

汤加的经验说明了这一点。