Hong Kong is a predominantly Chinese society but just over 6 percent of the population is made up of ethnic minorities. This composition flows into schools where teachers in selected schools need to cater for a diverse school population. The purpose of the present study was to investigate whether assessment environments in Hong Kong schools are able to cater for the learning motivation of ethnic minority students as well as their Chinese peers. Students were surveyed to gain an understanding of the assessment practices they experienced as well as their own learning motivation goals. The results indicated that both Chinese and ethnic minority students experienced teacher-dominated assessment environments most often, and each group strongly endorsed learning motivation goals that stressed academic development and competence. Both groups of students provided moderate support for social learning goals, with somewhat stronger support coming from ethnic minority students. Teachers can build on ethnic minority students' strong learning orientation by providing high-quality feedback even in a teacher-dominated assessment environment. A more interactive classroom characterised by feedback may provide teachers with a better idea of the learning needs of all students.
[Copyright © 2015 NZCER Press.]

Many Hong Kong schools are concerned with the growing number of enrolment of ethnic minority students. This article examines ethnic minority teachers’ cross-cultural experience and their view of the diverse needs of ethnic minority students and how these needs were fulfilled. Qualitative data were collected from unstructured interviews, where the views of fifteen teachers of Pakistani, Indian, Canadian, Pilipino, from three primary and three secondary schools, were explored. This finding was illuminated by the interview study, showing that the diverse learning needs of ethnic minority students and their classroom behavior were culturally different from the majority of Hong Kong Chinese students. To manage the classroom diversity and promote cultural responsiveness, the teachers struggle for conceptualizing a new rationale for cultural responsiveness to diversity, developing a sense of inter-cultural sensitivity and promoting cultural responsiveness to diversity. This paper argues that like students, teachers simultaneously engage in a crossculture process through which they learn the culture of ethnic minority students, re-learn the culture of their own and re-think about the relevant rationale underlying cultural responsiveness. For ethnic minority group of school practitioners, there was a need to give them hope as a way to get them motivated to learn, face new challenges and explore the new opportunities. At last, the implication of the creation of a culturally responsive classroom will be given.

Hong Kong secondary schools are concerned about the prevalence of student misbehavior. This paper reports the finding of a study investigating the characteristics of a resilient school and how resiliency was developed. Case studies of four secondary schools were conducted using interviews and textual analysis. Teacher and student discourses on discipline and resiliency were explored from the perspective of social constructivism. The narrative approach will also be employed (Clandinin & Connelly, 1995). The similarities and differences between school features were identified. Qualitative data from interviews and school texts, i.e., data concerning the school ethos, school rules, policy on behavior management, and the handbook for the school guidance team and school discipline team, were collected. Themes generated from the data were analysed, with the use of Grounded Theory Approach (Glaser & Strauss, 1967). The findings have shown that the narratives of school participants revealed the features of school resiliency, which could be built up with the dynamics of school, home, police force and social workers. Implications for the development of guidance and discipline policies and that of resiliency programme will be given. There will also be policy implications for the enrichment of teacher training programs.

Teachers in Hong Kong as elsewhere express deep concern about classroom discipline. This paper looks at this area and reports the findings of a qualitative study into teachers’ and students’ social constructions of classroom behavior in six Hong Kong secondary schools. From the perspectives of interactionism and social constructivism, the study investigated their constructions of good behavior and indiscipline, and those classroom rules and practices that teachers currently used to manage indiscipline incidents. The research methods of classroom observation, focused-group interviews and unstructured interviews were employed. Eighteen classrooms were observed. Sixty teachers were interviewed. Eighteen focused group interviews for sixty students were conducted. The data were categorized and contrasted with the use of method adopted for grounded theory. Main themes generated from the data illuminated the social construction of classroom discipline, and confirmed the centrality and importance of the issue not only in the classroom but also in other contexts of schooling. The key finding has suggested that the classroom behavior cannot be separated from the school context where they are performed and have a close connection with the discipline at school-wide level. Implications for the promotion of positive discipline, the development of teacher training programmes and the curriculum design and teaching strategies will also be given.