Learning Study, in the form of action research, provides a platform for school-based teacher professional development in Hong Kong. In each Learning Study, teachers work collaboratively with researchers from the Hong Kong Institute of Education and are actively involved in the planning, teaching and assessing of the research lesson. This presentation describes one English Learning Study conducted on the topic of past tense in a Hong Kong primary school. Findings from students’ interviews, pretest and teachers’ meetings indicated that the students had difficulties in choosing and sequencing lexical and auxiliary verbs when forming yes/no questions and statements (affirmative or negative) in past tense. As such, the Object of Learning in this research lesson is to ‘build up the students’ ability to formulate yes/no questions in past tense and to provide complete answers to the questions”. The presentation outlines the whole process in conducting the Learning Study, and then examines both student learning and teacher learning in the action research.

Learning Study has been used as a teacher professional development programme in the hope of improving classroom teaching and learning in the cities of both Gothenburg and Hong Kong. This case sharing session first presents two English Language Learning Studies focusing on teaching reading comprehension strategies: one is a Primary Six case conducted in Gothenburg and the other a Secondary Two case in Hong Kong. Then comparison is done between the two cases, with their similarities and differences discussed and highlighted. The session is finally concluded with implications drawn on conducting Learning Study and improving the teaching and learning of reading comprehension strategies in English Language.

This study examines the problem of sexism in English language teaching materials used in Hong Kong and Australia. The study investigates the relative frequencies with which females and males are referred to or depicted in verbal and pictorial texts, the order of appearance of males and females, the depiction of their domestic, occupational and social roles, and the use of masculine generic constructions.

This paper describes, analyses and evaluates changes in teaching methodologies of the English curriculum formally proposed for Hong Kong secondary schools from 1975 to 1998. “Formally proposed” means “stated in written documents produced by agencies with official authority”. Aspects of the formal, or planned curriculum in Hong Kong have been stated in written documents produced by agencies such as the Educational Management Board (EMB) and the Curriculum Development Council (CDC). The documents used for this analysis are the 1975 (provisional) Syllabus for English (Forms 1-5) and the 1983 Syllabus for English (Forms 1-5). In additions, since the current research project falls at a time when another major curriculum renewal process is in process, there will be some extrapolation from the 1997 task-based primary English curriculum to the task-based secondary English curriculum planned for the year 2000. The planned curriculum is examined here as the first step in a larger research project which aims to compare the planned and implemented curriculum of the HK Special Administrative Region and Shanghai. The research question relevant to this paper is: “What are the aims, objectives, teaching methodology and assessment of the English curriculum formally proposed in Hong Kong schools?” The planned curriculum is seen as only one aspect of the process which shapes a curriculum. It is acknowledged that a curriculum plan is like a blueprint for a building which may never be constructed, or may not be constructed as planned, or if constructed may not serve its intended functions (Cornbleth, 1990, p.6). The paper focuses on methodology, while other aspects of the planned curriculum are treated in other papers (forthcoming) produced under the auspices of the project.

Immersion education, a variant of content-based instruction, is characterised by the dual curriculum goals of content and language learning. The content and language learning goals become increasingly complex and challenging at the late immersion level. One way to help students achieve these goals is by planning content and language learning objectives that guide the design of content-language integrated learning materials. This article reports how content teachers and an ESL teacher educator in Hong Kong collaborated to design materials to support late immersion students' integrated content-language learning. The learning materials were designed by reference to a pedagogical framework that uses knowledge structures and text structures to link content and language learning objectives. The author presents sample learning materials and explains their design. Student achievements in using the history materials in a collaborative action research project, as well as the students' and the teacher's views of the materials, demonstrate some effectiveness of the design. Challenges to the content-language integration design are discussed.
[Copyright © Wiley-Blackwell Publishing, Inc.].

English is an important language in Hong Kong, an international city located on the southern coast of the People's Republic of China that, for over 150 years to 1997, was a British colony. This paper describes and analyses changes in teaching methodologies in the English language curriculum formally proposed for Hong Kong junior secondary schools from 1975 to the present day, to study how the curriculum developments reflect interrelated social, political, economic, and cultural factors of the period and the ideology in educational circles that was pre-eminent at the time. It finds that, while the rhetoric of the curriculum has changed in accordance with shifts in socio-economic conditions, the curriculum content and pedagogical approaches implemented in the classrooms have proved more constant across time. The paper suggests some explanations for the resultant curricula tensions.
[Copyright © Lulu Press Inc.].

This chapter describes and evaluates the extent to which the aims of the English language curriculum (1975 to 1999) in Hong Kong secondary schools have changed in response to social changes. Hong Kong society has changed from a manufacturing-based society to a financial and commercial based society. Consequently, the English curriculum has moved in three identifiable stages, from an emphasis on minimal English literacy for all (up to the age of 15) to an emphasis on communication in specific social domains and eventually to an emphasis on individuals' competence in a wide range of personally appropriate domains. In evaluating the extent to which curriculum change matches social change, the chapter assesses the extent to which the three syllabi have been/are context-compatible, and then discusses some implications for curriculum planning and teacher education in light of the assessed context-compatibility.
[Copyright © 2000 The Hong Kong Institute of Education.]