An information literacy (IL) framework has been proposed for Hong Kong students to adapt to the emergence of the knowledge-based society, digital culture and globalisation. The aims of the study reported herein were to validate the proposed IL model and collect the views of practitioners and representative stakeholders on the possibility of its successful implementation. The findings of a survey, focus group discussions and in-depth interviews indicate that the aims and scope of the IL model were recognised as being relevant. Three key issues of professional development in the IL education--the realisation of capacity building, obtaining the consensus and support of school principals and teachers, and allowing practitioners the flexibility to organise their own development--were identified from amongst the concerns of practitioners and representative stakeholders. Nine modules for teacher professional development are proposed here to address these issues.
[Copyright of Technology, Pedagogy and Education is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14759390601168031]

This article addresses the cross-cultural generalization of the pentagonal implicit theory of giftedness (Sternberg & Zhang, 1995) as well as differential expectations regarding excellence for girls versus boys. First, we used an instrument based on the pentagonal theory with a sample of in-service and pre-service teachers at the University of Hong Kong. Second, we administered a questionnaire designed to assess conceptions of “excellence,” one of the attributes for giftedness described in the pentagonal model, to a different sample of in-service and pre-service teachers at the same university. We found a good fit of the pentagonal model to the data collected, paralleling results obtained in the U.S. We also found, however, that in Hong Kong, however, unlike in the U.S., participants had higher expectations of excellence for boys than for girls. These outcomes have implications for identification, instruction, and programming for the gifted.
[Copyright of Roeper Review is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02783199809553949]

This article details a large-scale study of vice-principals in Hong Kong secondary schools. The study aimed to examine the core competency areas that pertain to the work of vice-principals and the way in which vice-principals perceive these areas to relate to school success. It also examined the factors that affect their level of job satisfaction, and differentiated these factors according to whether they did or did not aspire to principalship. The findings indicate that competency gaps, if large enough, can affect the level of job satisfaction of vice-principals and that the impact of these gaps varies according to career orientation. The results show that vice-principals who aspire to be a principal are more satisfied in their jobs than their less ambitious colleagues; and that the effect of these gaps on job satisfaction differs between the two groups. The implications of the findings for the future supply of principals and leader development are expounded.
[Copyright of School Effectiveness and School Improvement is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09243450701856549]

The study investigates a relationship between what is looked up about new words when different kinds of information are available and how well these words are remembered. The dictionary information has been incorporated into a CALL programme which was comprised of a text, highlighted low-frequency words, and access to different lexical information about these words (explanation in English, translation into L1, sound, root, and "extra" information).
The subjects were English as a Foreign Language (EFL) university learners in Hong Kong and Israel. The target words examined for incidental learning were 12 low frequency words. Pre-tests showed that they were unfamiliar to most subjects. The subjects were asked to read the text on the screen and understand it so that they could take a comprehension test after reading it. Unknown words could be looked up in the CALL dictionary built into the programme. During the task, log files registered every selection of dictionary information. After task completion, subjects were unexpectedly tested on meaning recall of the target words.
Recall data were analysed (ANOVAs, repeated measures, and correlations) to establish possible connections between retention and lookup behaviour (type of information selected, and number of lookups for each word). Results suggest that different people have different lookup preferences and that the use of multiple dictionary information seems to reinforce retention. The teaching implication is, therefore, to provide a variety of lookup options catering to different lookup preferences in paper or CALL dictionaries when assigning tasks that involve reading comprehension and understanding of unfamiliar words.
[Copyright of Language Learning & Technology is the property of Heinrich-Heine-University in Düsseldorf.
Access via Directory of Open Access Journals: http://llt.msu.edu/]

This study had two goals. The first was to validate further Sternberg's theory of mental self-government in a cross-cultural setting. The second was to investigate the relationship between thinking styles and teachers' characteristics. Research participants were one hundred ninety-three (65 male and 128 female) in-service teachers studying in the Bachelor of Education degree program and the Postgraduate Certificate in Education program at the University of Hong Kong. The participants responded to the Chinese version of the Thinking Styles Questionnaire for Teachers (TSQT) that has its theoretical foundation in Sternberg's theory of mental self-government. They also provided a range of demographic information such as age, gender, family income, and duration of their teaching experience. Furthermore, they rated themselves on a 5-point Likert scale about their teaching practices and about their perceptions of their school environment. The results of the study showed that the TSQT is a reliable and valid inventory for assessing the thinking styles of primary and secondary school in-service teachers in Hong Kong. Cronbach's alphas ranged from .58 to .75, with a mean of .68 and a median of .66. A principal-axis factor analysis followed by an oblique rotation resulted in two factors that accounted for 73.8% of the variance in the data. Moreover, results from stepwise multiple-regression procedures indicated that six characteristics of teachers were significantly correlated with the thinking styles specified by the theory of mental self-government. These teacher characteristics are gender, professional work experience outside school settings, the degree of enjoying adopting new teaching materials, a tendency for using group projects in assessing student achievement, perceived autonomy for determining their teaching contents, and their rating of the quality of their students. We discussed seven possibilities for using the knowledge about thinking styles to facilitate an enhancement

The relationship between explanatory style and self-perceived posttraumatic growth was examined among 105 undergraduates in Hong Kong who had experienced bereavement in the past 6 years. Individuals who tended to attribute positive events to internal, global, and stable factors reported more posttraumatic growth than individuals who tended to attribute positive events to external, specific, and unstable factors. The explanatory style for positive events might affect later cognitive processing, such as meaning making after bereavement, which will affect self-perceived posttraumatic growth. One's explanatory style for negative events is not related to posttraumatic growth after bereavement. Directions for future study are described.
[Copyright of Death studies is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/07481180801974760]