Chapter 24 Thousand Character Classic

  Uncle's words, Yang Heng naturally couldn't ignore, and these uncles were quite close to his father, so it was even more impossible to refuse. He had no choice but to agree, and he could also take a look at those younger siblings to see if they had any talent that could be nurtured, so that in the future he would have some helpers.

  What's the point of teaching this, San Zi Jing? This won't do, it's too sharp and will attract a lot of attention. One should know their own abilities themselves, and when it comes to technology, one can deceive many people, but when it comes to writing, one cannot deceive others. As for Shi Jing, let's not mention it, I don't even understand it myself. Although the excuse is that I learned from Xiucai in secret, in reality, I didn't learn anything in school.

  If I had known that I would travel through time, I would have studied classical Chinese literature. There's no regret medicine to take, is there? Ah, yes! The Thousand Character Classic, the Three Hundred Tang Poems... these are the best books for educating children in later generations. The Thousand Character Classic already exists in this era. As for the Three Hundred Tang Poems, there's also the Disciple Rules and the Primer. These five books were the primary texts used by most families to educate their children. If some parents of the new generation can't even recite them, they're really... out of touch. Many parents have memorized these books themselves, but their own children can barely remember the first line of each one. Yang Heng is just one such person, and now he's making use of this knowledge.

  Three Character Classic, and Hundred Family Surnames, or maybe later on there will be choices given out, but Thousand Character Classic, that's a different story, it can be used directly without saying anything. This can be applied to the case of that scholar, just by listening to it, it sounds smooth, so it's easy to remember, and some simple characters inside can be taught, while those complex ones don't need to be mentioned. Simplified Yang Heng is not worth mentioning, but in this era, who dares to write simplified characters? So it's better to be honest and not teach them well, but how to distinguish which one is simplified? Isn't there a book called "Qimin Yaoshu" that can recognize the characters inside, and also has some stories related to Thousand Character Classic that can be told to children? Although recognizing characters may not require much teaching, the entire Thousand Character Classic must be memorized by every child, even some of the stories involved can be told to them.

  Not bad, not bad, so choose the Thousand Character Classic as a primer for children. Since we've chosen the Thousand Character Classic, why not adopt a grading system now? The grading system is based on five points, and Yang Heng can't be an exception. Let's give the kids five points to remember. However, Yang Heng's grading system is a bit different. He plans to use the "Heaven, Earth, Mystery, Yellow, and Wilderness" levels, with Heaven being the highest level. Yang Heng estimates that in this era, there hasn't been anyone who can reach his heart's desire for the Heaven level. The Earth level is actually the highest level in this world. Some great writers, such as Confucius, Kong Yingda, Li Gang, Chu Suiliang, and Yu Shinnan, are considered by Yang Heng to be at the Earth level of cultural achievement. As for the Mystery level, there are too many people who can reach it. The Yellow level is where Yang Heng defines himself, and even some successful scholars should be considered as being at the Yellow level. The Wilderness level refers to those who can barely recognize a few characters but don't understand their meaning, only able to recite them by rote. This is what Yang Heng defines as the Wilderness level. Apart from these five levels, there's also the "No Level" category, which includes children who are just starting to learn and haven't yet learned to read, but can only recite books by heart.

  Yang Heng's division is similar to the modern-day distinction between elementary, middle and high school. If we think about it more carefully, this way of speaking isn't very scientific either. It should be like the levels in martial arts or the ranks in mythological legends. The heavenly rank didn't exist in later generations, nor did it exist in Yang Heng's mind. I don't know why, but Yang Heng thought that way.

  It's possible that at the same stage, there will be a natural division into first, second, third, and fourth places, which would be equivalent to grades A, B, C, D, and E. Or, you could say that this is what monthly or yearly exam scores are for. Yang Heng just happened to think of it this way at the time, but he didn't want to give these kids exams. Maybe in the near future, in order to motivate them to study hard, they will adopt a grading system with levels like A, B, C, and D, while "Tian Di Xuan Huang" would just be a measure of what level you've reached. Yang Heng doesn't require them to reach any particular standard; he himself is only at the yellow level.

  "Brother, brother, I can do it too! The sky is annoyed and yellow, the five continents are red squares. Look, I'm really good at it!"

  "No, little sister, it's not 'the sky is annoyed and yellow', but 'the sky is mysterious and yellow, the universe is vast and desolate'."

  Egg egg corrected Little Niang on the side, "Right, right! It's actually 'the sky is generally yellow, the five continents are red squares', I can also recite 'the sun and moon are full of thieves, the stars are arranged in a row'."

  "Little girl, it's already the 28th of the month and I still haven't memorized it yet. You're really impressive, little girl." Niu Zi said dejectedly, she was several years older than Little Girl, but hadn't memorized as much as her. Although Little Girl's pronunciation wasn't clear, she had actually remembered one more sentence than herself, and she had only remembered one more sentence than the other children.

  These soldiers were not taught by Professor Yang Heng, but rather a passage that Yang Heng casually recited when he was grading. Yang Heng took a look and became interested, this little girl is obviously smarter than the other children, even better than Niu Zi, "Come, little girl, Niu Zi, tell me, what else do you remember?"

  "There's more, there's more, like jiǎ yǐ bǐng and so on, that's all I've heard from my brother." "It's jiǎ yǐ bǐng dīng wù, little sister." "Looks like after little sister reminded her, the girl remembered this phrase, while other kids are still confused."

  "Alright, alright, uncles, I'll take these students in, but there must be Niu Zi and Xiao Niang among them. If they're not here, then I won't teach the others either." Yang Heng noticed that Xiao Niang was still young and didn't show much, but Niu Zi's hands were much rougher than the other children's, which clearly indicated that she had been helping with household chores at home. It wasn't that her parents liked making her do chores, but rather that Niu Zi was sensible and had to use doing chores to please her parents, as they didn't treat her well. This was also a clear manifestation of the traditional preference for sons over daughters. Among them, only Xiao Shu had no son, only a daughter, so perhaps he wasn't particularly opposed to Niu Zi in his heart. However, not having a son was still a source of discontent, especially since Niu Zi was already so big and there was still no second child, which made him even more anxious. This was also the most traditional idea that had been passed down from ancient times in China: only sons were truly one's own, and only they could carry on one's legacy.