This article describes the introduction of creative movement activity in three Hong Kong kindergartens to promote children's creativity. The purposes of the study were to examine the effectiveness of creative movement activity in promoting children's creativity and teachers' perceptions of the activities. The movement activities were designed based on four aspects: (1) introduce the theme; (2) acquire and explore of movement skills; (3) creation and expression; and (4) performance and appreciation. The participants were 12 children and three class teachers. Torrance's test of creative thinking including fluency, flexibility, originality and elaboration was employed to measure children's creativity and teachers' perceptions of creative movement activity provided insights into factors that influenced children's creativity. Results showed that children's movement responses became more varied and always gave surprise to the teachers but limited knowledge, skills and experiences of teachers seemed to be a challenge of Hong Kong kindergarten teachers to foster children's creativity.
[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/10.1080/03004430801931196]

This article reports the adaptation and analysis of Pintrich's Motivated Strategies for Learning Questionnaire (MSLQ) in Hong Kong. First, this study examined the psychometric qualities of the existing Chinese version of MSLQ (MSLQ-CV). Based on this examination, this study developed a revised Chinese version of MSLQ (MSLQ-RCV) for junior secondary students in Hong Kong. Confirmatory factor analysis and Graded Response Model (GRM) were used to examine the internal consistency, construct validity, differential item functioning (DIF), and differential test functioning (DTF) of the revised instrument, which contains six factors and 50 items. Compared with the existing MSLQ-CV, the factor structure of MSLQ-RCV was expanded to incorporate two new factors: extrinsic value and peer learning. The reasons for these amendments and implications of the findings are discussed.
[Copyright of International Journal of Testing is the property of Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/15305050903534670]

Recent education reform in Hong Kong has been largely based on the premise that the motivation of many secondary school students is lacking. However, the empirical base underlying this premise is weak. This study explored the development of students' academic motivation in secondary schools. It improved on the previous Hong Kong research in terms of the representativeness of sample and depth of enquiry. Mastery, performance-approach, social status, social approval, social affiliation, social concern, extrinsic, and prospects goals were examined. They were measured by a Chinese version of Inventory of School Motivation Revised. The participants were initially 354 S1 and 343 S3 students from three secondary schools with ability bands ranging from 1 to 3. A year later, 176 S6 students of the schools were also included in the sample. The one-year longitudinal changes (for the then S2 and S4 students) and grade-level differences (between the S2, S4, and S6 students) in goal orientations were examined. Multiple regression analysis was used to explore the relative strength of the goals in predicting a range of educational outcomes: general motivation, academic self-esteem, academic achievement, and use of surface, deep, and achieving learning strategies. The development of these educational outcomes was also examined. Also, 36 participants attended individual interviews. These explored their purposes of schooling, conceptions of ability, and attribution of school performance. Overall, the longitudinal and cross-sectional studies showed that the goal orientations and educational outcomes were fairly stable with medium to high mean scores. This finding is not in line with those of U.S. studies which indicate a general decline in students’ motivation during middle and high school years. Relatively speaking, there is a lack of non-Western research on the development of school motivation. Policy-makers in Hong Kong or elsewhere should not assume U.S. research applies in their context

The overarching aim of this research is to find out empirically about perceptions and experiences in self-directed language learning (SDLL) among university EFL students in two different social contexts: Mainland China and Hong Kong, and to provide empirical grounding for the potential attitudinal / behavioral differences in SDLL between successful and less successful language learners. The research is composed of a quantitative survey and two qualitative case studies. The survey study aimed at discovering and comparing the overall patterns of SDLL attitudes, strategies and motivation among university EFL students in Mainland China and Hong Kong, as well as the potential interrelationships between these variables. To this end, a questionnaire was designed based a combination of theoretical input in the literature and students' initial responses in a pilot study. The case studies were designed to complement, verify and expand the findings from the survey study by focusing on examining the potential differences between successful and less successful EFL students with regard to SDLL attitudes, strategies and motivation. The survey study identified significant differences concerning the overall patterns of SDLL attitudes, strategies and motivation between mainland Chinese and Hong Kong students. With regard to SDLL attitudes, the mainland students appeared to hold a significantly stronger orientation towards learner independence in English learning, a significantly more robust sense of confidence and abilities in carrying out SDLL, and to be significantly less supportive of teacher direction in language learning. With regard to SDLL strategies, the mainland students reported a significantly greater use of metacognitive and cognitive learning strategies, whereas the Hong Kong students reported an overall significantly higher use of functional practice strategies. The two groups, however, reported generally the same low levels of social and affective strategies. With regard

The perceptions and beliefs about study strategies of Hong Kong university students in a self-access language centre were examined in this study. Twenty undergraduate students at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University were the main study participants. These students were interviewed in the investigation of how their perceptions and beliefs influenced their study strategies. Data were analysed using a qualitative approach. The emergent themes derived from the data show the study strategies employed by the students as in their different grouping orientations (individual learners versus group learners), their use of materials and tutor support. The findings give evidence that the majority of the students had a preference for group-learning activities. The results also show that group learners took the initiative in accessing tutor support while individual learners seemed reluctant. Interestingly, individual learners tended to use more materials, which perhaps reflects that they were more comfortable in using material support in substitution for peer/tutor support. Findings indicate a need to provide students with a learner-training programme so they can have a knowledge-base related to their self-access study. Providing such training may require more self-access trained tutors to better cater for the needs of students. There is also a need to change the physical design of a self-access centre, which is originally designed for individual-based learning, to better cater for both individual learning and group learning needs. Also, the notion of study strategies in the self-access contexts needs to be further explored.