This study probes into how pre-service and in-services teachers of various disciplines responded to media-based educational triggers, and their attitudes to the potential technological development in fostering student-centred learning in general and Problem-based Learning (PBL) in particular, with the ultimate goal of enhancing and improving the quality of teacher training. This paper will, therefore, analyze user attitudes to the five newly developed video triggers on PBL, which were developed by the education professionals at the Hong Kong Institute of Education to serve as exemplars for the staff and students who are not familiar with the problem-based approach. The particular standing of this sole teacher-education institute in Hong Kong and the mixed Western and Chinese cultures in the region make this case study unique. The results show that cultural values can exert a significant influence on the adoption of PBL by the Chinese teachers and students. The implications and recommendations arising from the findings obtained in this research project will provide teacher educators, locally as well as elsewhere, with some initial insights when using similar media–based products in teacher education in Hong Kong.

One of the aims for the Department of Physical Education and Sports Science (PESS) at the Hong Kong Institute of Education is to influence the physical development of Hong Kong children. This can be accomplished by ensuring that student teachers of physical education receive a strong training program based on scientific concepts of exercise, thus promoting excellence in teaching physical activity and health in primary and secondary schools in Hong Kong. A problem-based learning (PBL) approach was used as a new mode of instruction in a health-related fitness module. PBL is a teaching-learning method which encourages students to engage in active participation through solving physical activity, sports, and health problems that occur in real life situations. The purpose of using PBL was to enhance teaching and learning through the development of critical thinking skills with the support of web-based resource materials. Two health-related fitness cases were developed and implemented in a health-related fitness module taught to 27 second year physical education students enrolled on a four year BEd secondary program over one semester. Based on students' comments, PBL provided an opportunity to make connections between their school and life experiences, what they had learned from textbooks and practical experiences in the Human Performance Laboratory, and their own experience teaching sports and physical activity in schools. Students were also engaged in meaningful problem-centred learning activities where the effective sharing of information and decision making was imperative to solving problems of the cases.