Founded in the Autumn of 1999, Capital Normal University’s College of Elementary Education is a college featuring elementary school teacher education. It began originally as Beijing Tongzhou Normal School in 1905 and as Beijing No. 3 Normal School in 1958. At present, this college has 105 full-time teachers specializing in more than 20 academic disciplines. And among them, 67% are professors or associate professors, and 42% possess doctoral degrees. There are 1674 undergraduate students and nearly 300 graduate students in our college now. More than 6000 graduates have become exemplary elementary school teachers, contributing greatly to the development of basic education in Beijing.

　　The CNU College of Elementary Education offers the most complete fields of studies among all the elementary educational institutions of higher education in China. It offers four undergraduate programs with nine fields of study, namely Elementary Education (Chinese, mathematics, science, English, information technology, and moral education), musicology (elementary education) and fine arts (elementary education) and calligraphy(elementary education). Undergraduate students in our college are also required to choose one of the following 14 extra areas of studies as their secondary intending teaching fields: comprehensive practice activity, elementary school calligraphy, pupils’ psychological consultation, elementary school moral education and young pioneer education, Chinese classics education, life education and class teacher’s work, and elementary education studies.

　　In 2003, College of Elementary Education introduced its master’s degree programs majoring in curriculum and teaching methodology focusing on elementary school course teaching. Since the year 2011, we have been authorized to confer the degrees of Ed. D specializing in elementary school education and school psychology, as well as the degrees of M. Ed specializing in children & youngsters organization and ideological education, elementary school education, and science & technology education.

　　While embracing elementary school oriented policies and following the principles of “international vision, native pragmatism, grounded in history, oriented towards the future”, we are exploring constantly “children oriented” excellent teachers education model based on the already formed development programs for pre-service elementary school teachers encompassing “comprehensive cultivation, specialty development, research emphasis, and whole-course practice.” That means we will emphasize cultivating pre-service teachers’ five types of educational abilities including understanding children, moral education, teaching, researching and experimenting.

　　College of Elementary Education boasts 150 elementary schools as its teaching practice centers and one university-level “elementary education experimental teaching center” consisting of four experimental platforms including education, humanity, arts and science & technology covering more than 50 labs. Besides, we have been working hard to promote international academic communication. Till now our college has established international cooperation and communication with the U.S.A., Switzerland, Germany, Japan, Korea, Australia, Finland, Norway and other countries. We have also carried out deep cooperative projects collaboratively with universities in Taiwan, Hongkong and Macao on talent development.

　　With 20 years of continued pursuit of educational excellence, Capital Normal University’s College of Elementary Education has established a good foundation for the professional development of elementary education, as well as its own characteristics and talent development model. This has helped us produce a series of landmark achievements and exert broad varieties of social influence. It is our proud boast to be on the top of China’s national elementary education programs of higher education while having garnered a number of accolades, including being named National Distinctive Program, Excellent Elementary School Teacher Education Institute (Conferred by Ministry of Education of China), and Beijing Top Program.