This paper focuses on peer feedback in relation to assessment processes. It examines the rationale for peer feedback, emphasizing its potential for enhanced student learning. We draw on relevant literature to argue that the dominance of peer assessment processes using grades can undermine the potential of peer feedback for improving student learning. The paper throws further light on the issue by drawing on a large-scale questionnaire survey of tertiary students (1740) and academics (460) in Hong Kong, supplemented by interview data. The findings indicate that a significant number of academics and students resist peer assessment using grades and that the majority report that students never or rarely grade each other in assessment activities. This paper explores why there is resistance, in particular, by academics to peer assessment and argues the case for a peer feedback process as an end in itself or as a precursor to peer assessment insolving the awarding of marks, It also recommends some strategies for promoting peer feedback, through engaging students with criteria and for embedding peer involvement within normal course processes.
[Copyright of Teaching in Higher Education is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13562510600680582]

The hypothesis in this study was that different types of multiple-goal learners would have different patterns of learning. A sample of 797 adult distance learners enrolled in different programs offered by a distance learning university in Hong Kong completed a questionnaire assessing their goals, use of strategies, motivational beliefs, and attitudes towards the course they were doing. Two-stage cluster analyses found a group of single-goal learners (mastery focused) and three groups of multiple-goal learners with different focuses in their goal profiles: performance focus, work focus, and multiple focuses. These four clusters of learners differed in terms of use of learning strategies, regulatory strategies, motivational beliefs, and attitudes towards the course. Learners focusing on work-related goals or performance goals achieved better examination results than did those focusing on multiple goals or solely on mastery goals.
[Copyright of Educational Psychology is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01443410701739470]

In the so-called 'global age', the issue of how children learn to locate themselves in the world is an important one. Working from a foundation of theories related to globalisation, identity development and citizenship education, this paper describes the findings of a research project which explored elementary school children's geographical and affective location of the self in Japan, Macau and Hong Kong. Analysis and discussion of Japanese education policy is then presented in an attempt to explain the finding that Japanese children are far less likely than their counterparts in Hong Kong and Macau to locate themselves in an international sphere.
[Copyright of Compare: A Journal of Comparative Education is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03057920050034084]

In this age of advanced technology, the pervasive influences of the media on pupils has aroused widespread concern among educators in general and religious educators in particular. This article argues for the teaching of religion through media education. It first discusses the interest of religious groups in media education and how media education might make an important contribution to the teaching of religion. Then it provides data from two schools who have adopted media education in the teaching of religious education to see how teachers and pupils have responded to this initiative.
[Copyright of Religious Education is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00344080600956723]

Researchers (A. C. Amason, 1996; D. H. Gruenfeld, 1995; K. A. Jehn, 1995, 1997; M. A. Rahim, 1989; M. A. Rahim & A. A. Blum, 1994; D. M. Schweiger, W. R. Sandberg, & P. L. Rechner, 1989; P. E. Tetlock, D. Armor, & R. S. Peterson, 1994) have documented the value of conflictual discussions for solving problems, but few have explored the conditions under which people are motivated to engage in controversy (K. A. Jehn, C. Chadwick, & S. M. B. Thatcher, 1997). Some (M. Van Berklom & D. Tjosvold, 1981) have hypothesized that high expertise and a competitive social context arouse concerns about defending one's position and challenging the opposing one. In the present study, Chinese university students in Hong Kong who expected to disagree with an expert, compared with those who did not expect to disagree with an expert, had less confidence, felt less knowledgeable about their position, and selected an agreeable discussant. Consistent with the idea of maintaining distance from those in power, the participants were reluctant to disagree directly with someone with greater expertise.
[Copyright of Journal of Social Psychology is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00224540109600557]

This article presents the findings of a study hypothesizing that school discipline problems are a maladaptive response to the demand of the school environment as a result of deficits in the area of locus of control and attributional style. The findings indicate that an external orientation of locus of control and a passive pattern of attribution remain significant predictors of discipline problems when other factors are held constant. The findings lend support to the idea of establishing programmes that "induce appropriate attributions" in children and train teachers to become aware of the attributional process in order to effectively deal with discipline problems in school. Cognitive re-structuring is suggested as an effective means of intervention aimed at disputing the irrational beliefs, which leads to positive effects and consequences. This study was conducted on a sample of three hundred and eighty-four students recruited from the junior forms of four secondary schools in Hong Kong.
[Copyright of Early Child Development and Care is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0300443032000088203]

In recent years, there have been considerable changes to the Hong Kong education system, some of which directly influence the management of tertiary education. At the same time, the Department of Land Surveying and Geo-informatics of the Hong Kong Polytechnic University has also gone through stages of restructuring. These changes were necessary to adjust to the global broadening of the profession of land surveying to geomatics, and also to respond to the changing philosophy in university education. In order to promote effective geomatics education, a project is being conducted to analyse if these changes are beneficial to our graduates and employers in industry, based on the survey results performed on our graduates. First, patterns of changes in the Hong Kong secondary school education system, in the geomatics courses of the university, and in career requirements of the geomatics profession are identified. Second, a complete student profile, including details of entrance qualifications, attainments upon graduation, on-going careers and/or continuing post-graduate education, is analysed. The overall aims are to identify the preferred qualities of candidates to be admitted to our department, the preferred qualities of our graduates, and whether our curriculum has successfully transformed preferred candidates to preferred graduates.
[Copyright of International Research in Geographical and Environmental Education is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10382040108667448 ]

This paper presents the findings from a longitudinal study of teachers learning to teach English in Hong Kong secondary schools who were enrolled on the BA course in Teaching English as a Second Language (BATESL) at the City University of Hong Kong. The purpose of the study is to try to determine the extent to which the beliefs and knowledge of pre-service English teachers change between leaving secondary school and entering the teaching profession. A detailed questionnaire was completed by a cohort of student teachers as they began the course in 1994 and again upon graduation from it in 1997. The results of the comparison between the two administrations reveal that pre-service teachers' beliefs and knowledge are based on their experiences as students within the education system; are strongly influenced by their time in classrooms during practice teaching; but are changed relatively less by the training that they receive in their BA course.
[Copyright of Language and Education is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09500780308666843 ]