Dilemmas and Breakthroughs in Non-Core Subject Teaching in Rural Chinese Primary Schools Under the Shadow of Exam-Oriented Education

When examination scores and school rankings dominate educational evaluation, music, art, physical education, science, and ethics and rule of law in rural primary schools are relegated to “minor” or non-core status. Drawing on teaching practicum reports and supplementary interviews in Teaching Practicum Activity Summary: Rural Schools Edition (2019–2020), this study combines literature review, purposive sampling, and thematic analysis to examine the dilemmas of non-core subject teaching under examination pressure and their underlying mechanisms. The analysis identifies five mutually reinforcing problems: displacement of scheduled lessons, specialist teacher shortages and misallocation, idle facilities with inspection-oriented paperwork, rote or unstructured teaching, and low perceived subject value among students and families. They arise not from scarce resources alone but from the interplay of score-based incentives, staffing organized around tested subjects, document-centered governance, internalized curriculum hierarchies, and reliance on short-term teaching placements as substitutes for sustainable provision. Counterexamples involving scientific inquiry, choral singing, textbook-based drama, and physical activities suggest improvement requires guaranteed curriculum implementation, county-level specialist-teacher coordination, low-cost practice-rich pedagogy, performance-based assessment, professional learning communities, and stronger home–school understanding of curriculum value. The paper argues against raising their status through high-stakes examinations; governance should instead center on students’ entitlement to actual lessons and meaningful learning.