At the turn of the millennium, the term 'spiritual' began to gain more prominence in the educational discourse in Hong Kong, both in official policy documents and in religious schools' descriptions of their own mission. Addressing each of these two cases in turn, a description of the context in which the increased use of the term has occurred leads on to the question of the extent to which this increased rhetorical emphasis on the spiritual is matched by the actual substance of education policy and the reality of religious education. It is found that the match is much less than perfect, and the reasons for this are explored.
[Copyright of International Journal of Children's Spirituality is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13644360500347359]

The authors examined the confidence of teachers from Germany, Hong Kong, Italy, and the United States (N = 1,375) to address civic topics with their students. The authors also used differential item functioning models to examine responses to items from the Teacher Confidence Scale of the International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement's Civic Education Study (J. Torney-Purta, R. Lehmann, H. Oswald, & W. Schulz, 2001; J. Torney-Purta, J. Schwille, & J. Amadeo, 1999). National case-study data explained findings within each context. Results revealed that the confidence of teachers varied when they addressed civic topics. Furthermore, teacher confidence varied as a function of country of residence. Case studies supported quantitative findings. Society-based factors, school-based factors, and public discourse illuminated effects of national context on teacher confidence.
[Copyright of Journal of Educational Research is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.3200/JOER.101.3.177-188 ]

Self-access centres are a popular type of language support offered by an increasing number of schools and universities around the world. Assessment of the learning that takes place in such centres is seen as both crucial and problematic. Many barriers to successful assessment appear to exist, but these have not been comprehensively documented, making it difficult to develop systematic solutions. This article presents the results of a study of 46 self-access centres in five countries (Germany, Hong Kong, Spain, Switzerland and New Zealand), investigating current assessment practice. In-depth strength-weakness analyses were conducted with the managers of each of the participating centres. These revealed a complex interaction between pedagogical and practical challenges to assessment. They also showed an emphasis on the developmental role of assessment for learner autonomy and the importance of assessing both language gains and learning skills.
[Copyright of Language Learning Journal is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09571730801988439]

In the post-9/11 era, growing scholarly literature and social concern have focused on Islamic education in Muslim-majority countries and for Muslim minorities in the West. However, public attention and academic research concerning the teaching of Islam as a world religion and a commonly shared human civilization, are barely understood in secular contexts and in public education. This issue requires more attention, especially in Asia. For the sake of future dialogue and further discussion, this paper is a tentative attempt at initiating this understudied issue of teaching Islam as multicultural literacy. It inquires about the pedagogy of teaching Islam in an East Asian context by first briefly reflecting on the dilemmas of introducing Islam to the West and its implications for the university curriculum. Departing from the experience in North America and European societies, this article then attempts to explore alternative pedagogical discourse in teaching Islam to Chinese students in the East Asian context by considering its specific geographical position in global politics and the recent development of Hong Kong. This article finally foresees the developing pedagogy of Islamic teaching that challenges students to break away from the media cliche and apathy towards human suffering, leading them to understand that they themselves are the potential peacemakers of a future global multiethnic and multicultural society.
[Copyright of Asian Ethnicity is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14631360802041893]