The society of Hong Kong objected strongly when the government instructed schools to change their medium of instruction from English to Chinese at the junior secondary level soon after Hong Kong was reunited with the People's Republic of China in 1997. This paper tries to make sense of the objection to this piece of politically correct and pedagogically sound policy. It analyses the situation from Bourdieu's ideas of habitus and various types of capitals. The paper argues that the government's effort to persuade Hong Kong society to accept mother-tongue education on pedagogical grounds alone was to no avail because the English language has not only become a habitus of society; it also serves to distinguish Hong Kong people from mainland Chinese. The failure of the government was partly due to its insensitivity to the nature and social functions of language.
[Copyright of British Journal of Sociology of Education is the property of Routledge . Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01425690220137756]

The debates I explore in this article were prompted by conversations I had with a Government Education Inspector who accompanied me on a visit to a primary school and participated in a series of workshops I organised while I was on a fellowship at Hong Kong University. May Lee's challenge to me that a non-selective education system was a luxury only the First World could afford provoked me into acknowledging a whole new dimension for our discussions of the function of segregated education for groups excluded from the mainstream. I begin by introducing the education system in Hong Kong as it was in the early 1990s. Then I go on, and discuss the activities and conversations I shared with May Lee. Patterns of inclusion and exclusion in Hong Kong reflect a deeply-respected concept of a `good school'; special schools and classes are the only settings for the provision of additional learning support. I discuss examples of each. Finally, I discuss inclusion in education in the context of a developing country, drawing on the work of Chinese, Indian and Western writers to assess May Lee's claim. Opinion is divided. I conclude that the force of an international rhetoric of inclusion obscures the continuing operation of a cultural commitment to selection.
[Copyright of Disability & Society is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09687599826948 ]

This paper attempts to discuss the Chinese cultural implications of the recently proposed document: 'Global Qualifying Standards for Social Work Education' by the IASSW and IFSW. It seems that this document still embraces an ideology of western social work imperialism in perceiving the development of social work in other countries. With reference to Chinese culture and social work education in Hong Kong and in mainland China, the writer advocates that responsibility and rights, stability and changes, social norms and equality, as well as empowerment and relation, should be fully articulated in the definition, ethical principles, and core purpose of social work practice as well as in the mission and curriculum in social work education within Chinese communities.
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http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0261547042000252316]

It is argued that language learning ought to be interactive. The traditional language classroom provides a favourable interactive situation for language learners. By contrast, the distance education mode is limited in some ways regarding language learning. Necessarily, distance education involves, primarily, self-learning. Face-to-face learning opportunities are scant compared with traditional classroom-based learning. It is, therefore, a challenge for language professionals to explore new ways of teaching language, the speaking skills in particular, within the constraints of the distance education mode. Being able to master English -- an increasingly important international language -- provides a key to information and learning societies in the 21[&SUP] stcentury. In this paper, I will suggest some ways of maximizing the amount of interactive activities in English language distance learning, based on my work-based experience as a course developer of a new English enhancement course offered by the Open University of Hong Kong. I will focus on the development of listening and speaking skills, which are in fact the most problematic areas -- the speaking skill, in particular, involves two-way communication. I will consider the issue from the perspectives of learners' motivation, peer support and technological support. Finally, I will present findings of a survey on the learners and tutors' feedback on the teaching materials of this new English language enhancement course.
[Copyright of Open Learning is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02680510307413 ]