A Comparison Study On Calculus Based On The Chinese And British High School Mathematics Textbooks

With the advance of the new curriculum reform, China throws a growing emphasis on the development and research of teaching materials(course books). Today, the international comparative research has become a hot spot in the field of educational research. In addition, curriculum criteria and course books comparative study have also become a hot topic of scholars. In the field of comparative study of international education, more Chinese scholars research on Sino-US education, while less focus on Sino-British education. As we all know, the UK leads the world in its high level of education, and the A-Level course of the UK is hailed in the international educational field as the "golden" educational program and “golden” global university entrance standard. Furthermore, educational research of mathematics in this system is quite in-depth and fruitful. In order to learn from other countries and absorb excellent educational experience to develop and improve our nation’s education, this article gives a comparative study on Calculus in the two countries’ high school mathematics course books.Calculus is an important part in mathematics education, and it plays an important role in high school education in Western countries. However, there are still huge differences in this regard between Chinese and British high school mathematics course books. In this paper, literature review, comparative research, statistical analysis and other methods are conducted, which are based on Professor Shi Ningzhong’s textbook difficulty model. And the conclusion is drawn from the breadth and depth of the textbook knowledge group and the comprehensive difficulties of the exercises: The difficulty level of Calculus in Chinese high school mathematics textbook is lower than that of the UK. Chinese textbooks are weaker than its British counterparts in terms of breadth and exercises, while are stronger in depth. Therefore, the main cause of overall lower difficulty level lies in the exercises. However, the nature and the background of Chinese high school mathematics textbook exercises are better than that of the UK, particularly in the context of the exercises, in this regard, students can feel mathematics is from life, but still Chinese calculus teaching in high school shows insufficient capacity in the exercises.On the basis of this comparative study, this paper discusses the causes of difficulty differences of the two nations’ high school mathematics textbooks and moreover some personal recommendations are proposed for the course book designing of the Calculus part in high school mathematics textbooks.