So that is what we are doing wrong?

I am not accustomed to teaching classes of 40 or 50 students but every once in a while I have the opportunity.  I have done so with a little success.  My method  with these large groups is to talk to individual students throughout the  class.  Talking to a Chinese primary school teacher today (we didn't talk about Tibet), I was told that they as teachers would never do that.  They talk to the class as a whole and never ask an individual student a question;  they expect the students to answer in unison while looking for the ones who don't join in.  The students, they tell me, will not pay attention if only one student is asked to speak. 

It makes for a long and dull class to teach like that.  But my method among the young primary school students sees discipline problems.