Previous research has rarely examined teachers' perceptions of school culture (perceived school culture) and well-being in Hong Kong's non-profit-making (NPM) and profit-making (PM) kindergartens. Thus, the purpose of this study was twofold: first, it examined the relationships between Hong Kong kindergarten teachers' perceived school culture and well-being. Second, it compared NPM and PM kindergartens in terms of teachers' perceived school culture, job satisfaction and mental health complaints. Kindergarten teachers were invited to complete a set of questionnaires including a School Culture Survey, Job Satisfaction Survey and General Health Questionnaire. Results showed that teachers' perceived school culture correlated positively with their job satisfaction but negatively with mental health complaints. Interestingly, teachers in NPM kindergartens had higher job satisfaction and fewer mental health complaints than those working in PM kindergartens. The implications of promoting kindergartens' school culture and teachers' well-being are discussed.
[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/10.1080/03004430701769019]

In the recent years, students' engagement has been the focus of concern in the US. Various studies have found that students' academic performances were directly affected by students' engagement. In Hong Kong, research on this topic has not yet been found. This research aimed to find out how the behaviors of three primary school English teachers' affect their students' engagements. The teachers were observed on how they presented their lessons on one of the units of the textbooks. Each teacher chose three students as samples of this research. Ways of data collection included: lesson observation, video-taping of classroom teaching, in-class tape-recording of the sample students, and interviewing the teachers and sample students.
The findings of this research perceived the following six behaviors that were of vital importance to students' engagement: (1) Providing learning opportunities for students, (2) Roles of teachers, (3) Student-teacher dialogue, (4) Teachers' demand on students' understanding of what they have been taught, (5) Teachers' self-reflection while teaching, and (6) Teachers' expectations on students.
There are three aspects of engagements: affective engagement, behavioral engagement and cognitive engagement. Students display different levels of engagements due to their teachers' behaviors while teaching. This research found that students' behavioral engagement is associated with superficial affective engagement but does not necessarily correlate with cognitive engagement. On the other hand, cognitive engagement is closely associated with profound affective engagement. It was also found that students' engagement is influenced by the following psychological factors: (1) autonomy, competence and relatedness of the Self Determination Theory, (2) self-efficacy, and (3) students' learning goal orientation. In order to elevate students' engagement, teachers have to provide learning opportunities at a suitable level of difficulties for the students and

The expectations of school administrators, teachers, parents and students on form teachers at secondary 1 to 3 levels, the feelings and opinions of form teachers, and their roles and duties in a local subsidized secondary school were studied intensively by interviews and questionnaires as a pilot. It was found that the roles of junior form teachers were important and their responsibilities were ever increasing. Duties of form teachers could be grouped into four areas: Daily Classroom Duties, Class Club Duties, Student Counselling and Communication with Parents. Students expected their form teachers to care for them and help them learn and grow. Parents appreciated the bridging role of form teachers. School administrators recognized the importance of effective form teachers to the good management of a school. Form teachers themselves wanted an effective and fair Form Teacher System and to spend more time on educational issues.
After the pilot, 1007 teachers from 85 schools were studied by referring to the questionnaire on the roles and duties of form teachers in junior forms. The data were then analyzed and some suggestions were proposed focusing on the problems found.
本研究透過詳細測試一所標準津貼中學的學校行政人員、初中班主任、資深老師、學生及家長進行訪問及問卷調查，研究他們對班主任角色及職責的看法，發現初中班主任之角色甚為重要及職責日益繁重。班主任的工作有四大範疇，包括處理日常班務、班會事宜、學生輔導及家長聯繫。訪問中也發現學生期望班主任能照顧他們的學習及幫助他們成長。家長感謝班主任能作溝通的橋樑。行政人員確認了高效能的班主任對學校的管理甚為重要。而班主任自己卻期望能較專注於教育性質的事務上並且在任教的學校裏有一個公平有效的班主任制度。
測試後，筆者進行一個較大型的研究，有85 所中學參與，共1007 位老師接受了問卷調查。資料收集後，經數據分析，筆者嘗試針對問題作出一些討論及建議。
[Copyright of New Horizons: The Journal of Education, Hong Kong Teachers' Associationl is the property of Hong Kong Teachers' Association at http://www.hkta1934.org.hk/]