The enactment of the revised School Places Allocation Systems at the compulsory stage in 2004 had the aim of desegregating Hong Kong's non-Chinese linguistic minority (NCLM) students by including them into ethnic Chinese-dominated mainstream primary and secondary schools. Because of the presumed cause-consequence relationship between desegregated school participation and academic achievement, in specific second language Chinese (CSL) acquisition, the challenges that such students face in participating in mainstream education and learning Chinese, no doubt, deserve to be examined. This qualitative study conducted in-depth interviews with 18 secondary students of South Asian/Southeast Asian minority backgrounds enrolled in mainstream schools. Drawing on both cultural and institutional paradigms of explanation for educational achievement, we argue that the reasons inhibiting the minority students' academic involvement are not simply their linguistic challenges but also the institutional constraints in the mainstream education system unique to this population. This study calls for a shift in school desegregation arrangement from one focusing narrowly on physical desegregation to a more comprehensive set of policies that embrace the institutional factors including teacher expectation, resource availability, and bilingual support, crucial to reduce racial differences in achievement.

e-Portfolios are a form of authentic assessment with formative functions that include showcasing and sharing learning artifacts, documenting reflective learning processes, connecting learning across various stages and enabling frequent feedback for improvements. This paper examines how e-portfolios take up these formative roles to support productive learning. Qualitative findings from interviews with selected first-year undergraduate students at a higher education institution in Hong Kong are reported concerning students' experiences of constructing e-portfolios as assessment tasks. As part of an institutional teaching and learning initiative, e-portfolios were incorporated into three core courses for first-year students. The findings reveal that several conditions necessary to foster productive learning were missing in students' experiences: strengthened formative role of e-portfolios through coherent assessment design; encouragement for students' pursuit of authentic tasks to develop learning interests; engagement of students in reflective and self-regulative learning as an essential learning process; provision of constructive feedback for sustained learning support; and support for students' autonomy through facilitation of collaborative knowledge building. By explicating how the lack of these conditions impeded students' active involvement in e-portfolio tasks and suggesting relevant strategies for teachers at the institution in question, this paper offers implications for harnessing information and communication technology (ICT) to support students' productive learning.

This paper evaluates the exceptionally forceful "mother-tongue" (MT) education policy in force in Hong Kong from 1998 to 2010, where instruction, print materials and assessments were required to be done in students' first language, Chinese. Apart from relevant literature, a number of sources are searched, including the quantitative data obtained from the Hong Kong Examination and Assessment Authority (HKEAA), qualitative data of surveys, and the official documents commissioned by the Education Bureau (EDB) within the period. While MT education has arguably minimized mixed-code teaching in content subjects, there is clear evidence that it failed to raise L2 standard through specialized teaching as promised. Much more students off the top tier being denied for admission to university, the principle of equality of educational participation is violated. A postmortem analysis, drawing on the more recent findings from the field of applied linguistics, shows that the adoption of bifurcation medium of instruction model and the ineffective L2 exposure are the culprits. All this, together with the lack of monitoring of the policy in its initial stage, are speculated as the major causes of its failure.

This paper discusses the pedagogical strategies of blended learning to teach Hong Kong school teachers mixed methods research. The authors examine the implications of blending traditional teaching and more updated learning strategies with e-Learning, small group work, peer interaction, and role plays, to increase student comprehension and execution of mixed methods research. The authors utilise a case study to illustrate the blended approach in teaching mixed methods research.

This chapter examines eduplay, an educational form of play with Chinese characteristics, as a means of promoting social competence and play-based counselling in early childhood. Although the policies of the Hong Kong government increasingly require a play-based curriculum, many teachers and parents believe that play will detract from academics. However, the term "eduplay" was first introduced in Rao's article (2009), a form of play-based education with "Chinese characteristics" which captures the beliefs of teachers and parents about what should happen and occurs in Chinese early childhood settings (Rao & Li, 2009). Eduplay is a method of learning by playing, an approach that may be more acceptable to teachers and parents in Hong Kong. Results from an experimental study of preschools are presented, showing that eduplay was successful in reducing two problem behaviours, namely clinging and demanding attention. These results have implications for incorporating meaningful play into a play-based curriculum.
[Copyright © 2016 Taylor and Francis.]

This case study examines how blended learning professional development for teaching staff is driven and implemented in the Faculty of Education and Human Development (FEHD) at The Education University of Hong Kong (EdUHK). Professional development at EdUHK was first implemented by equipping teaching staff with the technical knowhow to incorporate blended learning into their teaching practices. This Institute-based attempt resulted in a growing number of teaching staff using blended learning. The technology-driven professional development approach was rethought to encourage more teaching staff to adopt blended learning in their courses. Based on strategies identified from the literature, a faculty-driven approach for professional development was developed in the FEHD. This approach included pedagogically focused capacity building strategies that aimed to enhance learning engagement and outcomes and scale up blended learning practices in the faculty. Concerted efforts have also been made at both the institutional and faculty levels to create an environment conducive to supporting blended learning. Based on the challenges identified, future directions are discussed in this paper.
[Copyright © 2016 UNESCO.]

The book "ICT in Primary Education" within the IITE Analytical Surveys series has been out of print. This is the first publication in the framework of the UNESCO IITE three-year project "ICTs in primary education". It explores the origins, settings and initiatives of effective integration of up-to-date innovative technologies in primary school and accumulates the best practices of ICT incorporation gathered from the project sample primary schools across the globe. The analytical study was elaborated by a team of experts built by IITE from different institutions, networks and representing various regions of the world (Chile, Hong Kong, Hungary, Slovak Republic, South Africa, Russia, UAE and UK). The book contains a research literature review, a brief overview of the nine sample primary schools, an international review of ICTs in primary strategies, as well as the international collection of inspiring projects and initiatives. The publication is designed for teachers, educators, headmasters, school policy decision-makers, parents and everybody who cares about modern education for primary stage children.
[Copyright © 2012 UNESCO.]

The rapid advancement of technologies and their ubiquitous use in our daily lives have dramatically changed the way knowledge is created and disseminated. As a technology-enhanced pedagogical approach, blended learning – the deliberate combination of online learning with face-to-face classroom-based learning – provides higher education institutions (HEIs) with the opportunities to enhance the quality of teaching and learning. While many of these opportunities have been well-documented in the literature, implementing and scaling up blended learning courses pose enormous challenges for HEIs in the Asia-Pacific region. To address these challenges, UNESCO Bangkok in partnership with The Education University of Hong Kong (EdUHK) launched a two-year project to build the capacity of HEIs for blended learning. One of the outcomes of the project was this book by a team of blended learning experts and leaders in the region. Blended Learning for Quality Higher Education presents a framework and self-assessment tool developed from a holistic view of building institutional capacity to drive, sustain, and scale up blended learning. It incorporates case studies from experienced HEIs in the region to demonstrate how the framework and its dimensions could be operationalised, and how the gaps identified in the self-assessment exercise could be addressed.
[Copyright © 2016 UNESCO.]

The paper aims to gain better understandings of preservice teachers’ social media integrations with various pedagogic strategies towards constructivist orientation for teaching practicum. A qualitative study of a group of preservice teachers integrating the social media for teaching in early childhood, primary and secondary schools in Hong Kong was conducted. A framework of pedagogy was integrated in the literature for exploration of preservice teachers’ teaching practices. The results reveal that YouTube social media was regarded as preservice teachers’ (1) common practices as part of initial pedagogic development; (2) social media integrations of various pedagogic strategies mainly towards didactic-oriented teaching instead of constructive-oriented one; and (3) preparedness in constructivist-oriented teaching with the YouTube social media integrations is needed. Implications for teacher educators and schools are discussed.
[Copyright © 2016 The Turkish Online Journal of Educational Technology.]

Based on the recognized status of the Hong Kong school system indicated in international studies, facilitating students with quality Integrated Learning (IL) is the crucial pedagogy for a new subject entitled Liberal Studies (LS) which has been implemented in secondary education in Hong Kong since 2009. This study uses case studies and semi-structured interviews of novice and experienced teachers to investigate the concerns and work of teachers in Small-Class Teaching (SCT) for IL in LS and explores how teacher leadership may help in terms of classroom context, learning community, improved practice, and outcome achievement. The findings reveal the common and diversified ideas and practices regarding SCT for IL in LS, which may provide valuable insights into teacher leadership for teachers and policy makers across the world.
[Copyright © 2016 SCHOLINK INC.]