The call for professionalism in kindergarten education has been an important educational issue over the past several decades in Hong Kong. Official expectations have been published to guide the services of kindergarten education and to supervise teachers' pedagogical practice. Kindergarten education services that are child centred and play based, and that practise integrated learning to nourish children's holistic and balanced development are advocated. However, Quality Assurance Inspection reports have shown that kindergarten teaching and learning is still teacher directed. Young children are passive recipients of knowledge. The services run counter to the progressive motives of the 2000 Education Reform in nurturing young children to be active and self-motivated life-long learners. Driven by the interest to study the practice-expectation gap, the present study sought to observe kindergarten teachers' classroom practice, investigate their pedagogical decision making, and reveal the complexities underpinning their pedagogical roles which, to an extent, emerged from the practice-expectation gap.
The present study, framed by in a qualitative research design, employed on-site observations and teacher interviews, together with official document analysis and training curriculum document analysis. The wealth of data and information collected revealed that a practice-expectation gap does exist.
The data analysis suggests that the teacher informants' pedagogical decision making and practice were shaped by a number of intervening forces. These forces can be categorised into (a) the personal variables of the teacher informants in terms of their personal beliefs and values towards kindergarten education, (b) the contextual variables of school management structure and administrative arrangements within which the teacher informants delivered their teaching and fostered the children's learning, (c) the societal variables of parental expectations of the kindergarten education

背景：在幼兒課程中，韻律活動 (rhythmic activity) 是音樂和體能活動不可缺少的主要學習經驗，但是從筆者的視導經驗和近期研究結果 (Wong & Chu，2001) 均顯示現在香港的學前韻律活動明顯地缺乏創意感、韻律感和運動感。加上目前香港學前的韻律活動課程的推行受到外在和內在因素的限制，是時候需要將非創意及系統化的韻律活動課程作出改革。
目的或討論焦點：本文旨在與讀者分享「創意韻律教育」(Creative Eurhythmic Education) 的理念、原則和推動方法，讓幼教工作者能夠嘗試採用「創意韻律教育」提升她/他們的教學效能; 設計此創意韻律教育課程模式之目的是改革現在香港的音樂律動課程，將普遍老師們已遺忘的韻律元素再次重述，引起她們的關注。
論點/評論/建議：本文強調，在課程的發展中運用嶄新的幼兒運動-音樂課程模式： 創意(Creativity)、音樂技能與概念 (Musical Skills & Concepts)、運動技能與概念 (Movement Skills & Concepts)、暢態與綜合活動 (Flow-Integration) 等元素，教師能提升兒童自我表達的能力，並能帶領兒童在各方面進行創作; 作者亦確信透過每天有系統的課程安排，兒童在創意韻律教育方面得益甚豐。嶄新的課程模式更強調創意的教育價值，將韻律課程發展於適合學生的能力、興趣、意欲和需要，而主題綜合活動則聯繫各獨特之韻律元素，使它們成為有生機和互動相連的全方位課程。最後，整個音樂律動課程的改革帶給教師們「暢態」的忘我歡暢之意境。
總結：新穎課程能成功的推行有賴教師的投入程度、擁有足夠的運動-音樂專業知識、技能和態度、重視教學的過程和多給予「鷹架作用」刺激兒童挑戰自我極限; 創設適切的運動-音樂學習環境，足夠的教學資源、器材和設施、教學時數和每週次數、專業支援與協助和校本的運動-音樂文化也是推行新穎課程的重要外在因素。
Background: In the preprimary curriculum, rhythmic activity is an essential learning experience in music and movement activity. From the supervision experiences and recent researches of Wong & Chu (2001), it is found that the rhythmic activity conducted in kindergarten is obviously lack of creativity, sense of rhythmic and sense of movement. Moreover, some external and internal factors and have hindered the implementation of rhythmic activity in kindergarten. There is a need to have a change from uncreative and tradition curriculum to an innovative one.
Objectives and Focus: This study aims to share with the readers the philosophy of Creative Eurhythmic Education, its principles and ways of implementation which encourages preprimary teachers and workers to adopt the Creative Eurhythmic Education Model in order to improve their teaching effectiveness. The aims for designing such kind of Creative Eurhythmic Education model are to make changes to Hong Kong music and movement curriculum, and to arouse kindergarten teachers' the concerns to integrate the rhythmic elements during the music movement activity.
Comment/Suggestions:

本研究的目的是透過設計及實踐資訊科技教育活動，了解其教育功能。本個案研究為期一年，共有十位教師及七十五名學生參與。研究成果是三個應用資訊科技主題活動，他們是：(1)製作數碼圖書，(2)製作數碼活動記錄冊，(3)製作數碼短片分享行為表現。研究結果顯示資訊科技創造屬實的學習機會，提供豐富的教學功能及扮演授權賦能的角色。
The aim of the case study is to design thematic learning activities for understanding and analyzing roles of IT for improving Learning & Teaching (L&T) of school education. This research involved 10 teachers and 75 learners in a one-year study. Three thematic activities were designed and implemented. They were: (1) digital book production, (2) digital activity record production, and (3) digital video clip production for sharing behavior of learners. Results of the study indicated that IT could play three roles in education. They are: (1) providing authentic learning opportunities, (2) enhancing teaching capability, and (3) empowering L&T activities.
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In early childhood education (ECE), curriculum encompasses prevailing theories, approaches and models. Curriculum is planned appropriately based on the knowledge of theory and research about how children develop and learn, with special attention given to individual children's needs and interests in relation to program goals. In this paper, focusing on ECE, I discuss the underlying rationale, principles and meaning of developmentally appropriate curriculum (DAC) as developed by the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) in the United States in 1987. Drawing from relevant literature, I discuss issues of relevance, and application related to DAC with specific reference to ECE experience in Hong Kong.
幼兒教育課程包括了不少流行的理論、方法與模式。適切的課程是基於幼兒理論、研究與設計，而課程目標能照顧兒童的身心發展、學習、個別需要和興趣。本文旨在探討由國際幼兒教育協會(NAEYC)所倡議的發展適切幼兒課程之理念、原則和意義。作者探用相關文獻資料，引用香港之事地實例來討論發展適切課程的相關和應用。
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幼兒教育素被視為終身學習與全人發展的一個重要基礎，它的重要性亦在香港的教育改革中被認定。為了確保幼稚園的課程質素，教育局等政府部門印製了不同的文件以供老師參考，這些課程文件反映出政府對幼稚園課程的期望在這些年來是一致的。本文分為兩個部分，並嘗試從三種廣義的課程觀去分析上述文件：第一部分是以經典的泰勒式課程觀去分析；第二部分是以施瓦布的實用性課程觀去討論。最後，我們將從批判的視角出發評論這些文件。
Early childhood education has long been recognised globally and locally as significant in laying the foundations for lifelong learning and all-round personal development. The same recognition is prominent in the education reform proposals of Hong Kong. To facilitate kindergarten teachers to design quality curricula, several government bodies issued curriculum related documents to serve teachers as guidelines. A study of these government-published materials reveals a degree of consistency among them in terms of what the government expects of the kindergarten curriculum, despite the fact that their publication spans the two decades 1984 to 2006. This paper, divided into two parts, attempts to analyse the aforementioned documents from three broad, multiple curriculum perspectives. The first part will cover the categories and questions inherent in a Tylerian perspective. The second part will cover the notion of Schwab's practical perspective and associated curricular "commonplaces" (teacher, student, subject matter and milieus) (Reid, 2006), which address related pedagogical questions such as what, when, how, why, to whom, and by whom (Heydon & Wang, 2006). Finally, we shall offer some comments from critical perspectives.
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