Student teachers are concerned with discipline as in-service teachers do. The study aims to explore their knowledge of classroom discipline. The study is qualitative, descriptive and narrative in nature. The research method of unstructured interviews was employed to capture their professional knowledge of classroom discipline. Ten student teachers from Hong Kong were involved. Throughout the two-month period of their teaching practicum in Hong Kong secondary schools, three interviews for each participant were conducted. The study illuminates the classroom experience of student teachers and reveals that they found difficult to transfer concepts and skills mastered during their training to the classroom. Further, with the exploration of the convictions and meanings that have arisen from their experience, the initial findings enhance our understanding of their needs regarding classroom discipline. The implications to the professional development, future studies into discipline, and the promotion of positive classroom discipline strategies will be given.

This article discusses how school management can facilitate effective learning in schools for young children. First, it briefly reviews the concepts of curriculum, pedagogy and effective learning. Then, the current state of early childhood education in Hong Kong is examined. With reference to schools for young children in Hong Kong, the article then explores how school management can improve and maintain effective learning through curriculum and pedagogy.
[Copyright © 2001 Alberta Teachers' Association.]

This paper illustrates how classroom small talk between a teacher and students constitutes a distinct interaction pattern which varies significantly from pedagogical discourse of an institutional nature such as the initiation/response/feedback (IRF) pattern described in previous literature (Mehan, 1979 ; Sinclair & Coulthard, 1975). By presenting a piece of extended small talk in an ESL secondary classroom in Hong Kong and contrasting it with a piece of typical teacher-orchestrated institutional classroom talk, I show how the teacher and students demonstrate more dynamic and less asymmetrical roles during small talk with clear evidence of active contributions to the exchange by the students in terms of topic setting, turn initiation, turn development, and negotiation of meaning. Features of the small talk resemble everyday social discourse. Implications of this kind of classroom talk on the learners’ L2 language development are explored.
[Copyright © 2003 University of California, Los Angeles.]

Classroom management is recognized as an essential component of effective teaching. However, there is little information about how physical education student teachers manage their class during their practicum. The purpose of the study was to describe the class management practices of Hong Kong physical education student teachers. Twenty local primary pre-service student teachers were videotaped teaching two ball games lessons in the allocated schools during their final practicum. Each videotaped lesson was coded using the Physical Education Teacher Assessment Instrument (PETAI). Quantitative data generated by the PETAI indicated that the pre-service group spent similiar percentages of time in overall class management to other studies. Three pre-service student teachers were randomly selected to participate in the second phase of the study. Students were observed teaching two ball games lessons and were invited to take part in two pre-lesson interviews and two post-lesson stimulated recall sessions. Qualitative data were collected through lesson observations and interviews. Constant comparison and analytic induction were used to organize and categorize the data. Results showed that there were common managing behaviours and strategies exhibited by the pre-service student teachers during teaching. Pedagogical setting for learning and organization were the identical managing behaviours observed, whilst the preventive management, equipment management, and interactive management were the common class managing strategies identified. Findings of the present study hold implications for the preparation of physical education teachers.

Classrooms nowadays are exemplified by student diversity. Students may differ in, for example, motivation, learning style, aptitude, cultural background, social economic states, and past learning experience. As students’ learning needs are becoming increasingly diverse, a new challenge is to look for ways that address their needs. Assessment is one useful way to help teachers deal with classroom diversity. Teachers can use assessment strategies to identify different learning needs and to improve teaching and learning. This subsequently leads to a consideration of two critical issues with the first one being how teachers can plausibly identify classroom diversity and the second being how useful are the assessment strategies they use to cater for the identified diversity. This paper presents and discusses the findings of an investigation into the assessment strategies that teachers used to identify classroom diversity and the assessment strategies teachers used to deal with the identified diversity. About one hundred Hong Kong teachers were interviewed, revealing that the teachers used a number of assessment strategies to assist them in understanding students’ diverse needs and that the teachers seemed to be more interested in identifying those students who needed help academically rather than in their needs in the social and affective domains.

The Hong Kong Education Reform, which calls for a realignment of assessment practices, addresses the assessment theories of the early 21st century and tries to move Hong Kong from an educational culture of “Assessment of Learning (AoL)” to a culture of “Assessment for Learning (AfL)”. This paradigmatic shift of culture, addresses the assessment theories formulated during the past decade that call for assessment practices which should drive both teaching and learning (Biggs and Watkins, 1999). However, most Hong Kong classrooms currently still use assessment as a tool for measuring learning instead of a mean for facilitating learning (Berry 2005). In view of this, an investigation was initiated in the purpose of achieving a better understanding of the assessment actions in the classroom. The investigation included twenty-seven teachers from nine secondary and primary Hong Kong schools which focused on assessment used in the classroom as seen from lesson observations of the participating teachers. The data collected was analyzed by using Torrance & Prior’s divergent (AfL) and convergent assessment (AoL) framework (1998). It was found that there were key tensions and important opportunities in the assessment and learning processes in the classrooms. The paper will first give some background information about the paradigm shift of assessment culture, followed by a presentation of the findings of the investigation and a discussion on the key tensions and important opportunities in the assessment and learning processes in the classroom.