Early childhood education has already become an accepted Chinese culture in Hong Kong. Nowadays, most parents send their children to a preschool at the age of three. To a certain extent, they understand the significant values of pre-primary education to the total development of young children. However, due to the unhealthy and keen academic pressure in primary education , both parents and teachers always emphasize children's cognitive development and neglect children's physical, social and emotional development in early childhood. In fact, the ultimate goals of preschool education are to educate young children wholly through various plays and stimulating activities in the formal and informal curriculum; and to offer comprehensive care to young children in a preschool. Movement (physical play / physical education) is the essence of young children's lives. It influences and is influenced by all aspects of development, consisting of physical, cognitive and affective domains of children behaviors. In Hong Kong, preschool curriculum has integrated movement in the form of structured physical education, unstructured physical education / physical free play, spontaneous physical activities and rhythmic movement. No doubt, apart from the daily movement programs, it is crucial to create a stimulating learning environment including play-areas and learning corner to arouse children's interest for self-discovery and individual learning. Therefore, the main purpose of this paper is to introduce a Physical Education and Health Learning Corner in preschools with special focus on the rationale, objectives, contents and equipment. In this paper, a strategic implementation plan is recommended to preschool educators too. It is hoped that the set up of this newly introduced learning corner will provide an attractive, interesting and useful learning opportunity to all preschool children through pleasurable experience.

The optimal period which can be significantly influencing the establishment of young children's cognitive, social, emotional and psychological learning activities, and positive attitudes and appreciation of participation in regular health-related physical activities has been recognized as Early Childhood (3-8 year-olds). Since movement is the very center of young children's lives, it is the primary vehicle to assist children's total learning. Most nurseries / child care centers and some kindergartens in Hong Kong, movement, physical plays, physical activities under the umbrella of preschool physical education (P.E.) have been arranged in daily time-table of the "Whole Child Curriculum". Recent research studies have strongly indicated that the development of preschool physical education curriculum has been hindered due to some major factors namely: the internal (inside the preschool), external (outside the preschool), and human (child care workers & parents etc.) factors. The ultimate purpose of the study is to collect concrete field data at a nursery in Hong Kong by a case study method with the employment of participation observation (one month), class observation (6 P.E. lessons) and interviews (6 interviewees, 15-20 minutes for each) about the problems / difficulties encountered by the child care workers (CCWs) in the development of preschool physical education curriculum in the preschool in order to investigate: what the problems are; what the causes of the problems encountered are; what the influences are; and what the remedies/solutions are. According to the results of the class observations (6 CCWs & 6 P.E. lessons, with a duration of 30 minutes per lesson) CCWs have encountered major problems in the following areas: teaching approach & stages; teaching skills in observation; demonstration and arrangement of group work; safety and health measures. All these areas are related to the professional practical knowledge and skills. The results of the interviews have

The purpose of this study was to examine the potential influential factors of secondary students’ attitudes toward physical education in Hong Kong. The Physical Education Questionnaire was completed by 1172 students which measured how physical education is perceived concerning the values, the status, the atmosphere, the experiences, the social aspects, the teaching method and the PE teachers. Mean ratings on these aspects from 3.43 to 3.92 on a 5-point scale, indicating that the students generally liked physical education, but they liked some aspects more that others. Employing analysis of variance techniques revealed that school year, gender and perceived skill competence were significant factors influencing students’ attitudes. These findings have pedagogical implications for the teaching strategies of physical education.

Ever since Physical Education (PE) became one of electives in the Teacher Education (TE) programme in 1947, it has gradually developed from a practical and professional oriented subject to a theoretical and academic based discipline in the tertiary institutes in Hong Kong. This paper described the 'selected' historical incidents of the development of PETE in Hong Kong. PETE becomes hegemonic towards scientific bias, health-dominated, technocratic and utilitarian-oriented nowadays. It creates tensions of dichotomised issues between PE and sports science; PE and medical science; theoretical and pedagogical orientation; research and practical basis; scholarly and professional discipline; and technocratic and inquiry focus etc. Its development illustrates the differences in directions, status, functions and practices. It intents to identify problems of the present practices and initiate discussion on alternative directions of the PETE in the coming future.
[Copyright of Journal of Physical Education & Recreation (Hong Kong) is the property of Hong Kong Baptist University.]

Background: Schools present venues for physical activity promotion among youth, with physical education (PE) considered the primary vehicle responsible for increasing activity levels. Yet students are not very physically active during typical school PE classes. With the aim to engage Hong Kong students in more moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA) during PE, a fitness infusion intervention using rope skipping was designed, and its effectiveness will be examined. Rope skipping was chosen because a) it provides moderate-to-high intensity physical activity; b) is inexpensive; c) students find it enjoyable; and d) is feasible in typical environments in Hong Kong, where PE classes are large in size (up to 40 students) and space available for physical activity is usually limited. Methods/Design: A matched-pair cluster randomized controlled trial was designed. Secondary school students from 24 classes (from 12 schools) will be recruited to participate in the trial. Students' baseline MVPA will be measured during school PE. Classes will be matched according to baseline variables and one class from each pair will be randomized into the experimental group. Teachers in the experimental group will be invited to attend a teacher workshop, and will insert a 15-minute rope skipping activity in four consecutive PE lessons. Motivational factors based on self-determination theory will also be measured as secondary outcomes. The effectiveness of the intervention will be evaluated by comparing changes in the proportion of lesson time spent in MVPA from baseline to follow-up across the experimental and control groups. Discussion: Physical activity levels in PE are often very low and there is a need to identify feasible low-cost interventions that can be easily disseminated. If the results of the study suggest the intervention to be effective, it could be implemented to schools throughout Hong Kong and other cities where space is limited.
[Copyright of Bmc Public Health is the

The purpose of the study was to identify if performance of speech-language pathology students in problem-based learning (PBL) tutorials could predict subsequent clinical performance evaluated through (a) a non-standardized, custom clinical evaluation form (HKU form) and (b) a standardized competency assessment for speech pathology developed in Australia (COMPASS (R)). Students' scores from PBL tutorial performance were correlated with scores in clinical placement on both the HKU form and the COMPASS. Significant correlations were found between students' PBL tutorial performance (reflective journals and participation in the tutorial process) and their clinical performance (treatment and interpersonal skills) on the HKU clinical evaluation form. Significant correlations were also found between (a) PBL tutorial performance (participation in the tutorial process) and their clinical performance (all generic and occupational competencies, and the overall score) on the COMPASS, (b) PBL tutorial performance (reading forms) and two occupational competencies on the COMPASS, (c) PBL tutorial performance (reflective journals) and four occupational competencies and the overall score on the COMPASS. The results highlighted the need for validating the assessment for the learning process in PBL tutorials with empirical evidence and the advantage of assessing clinical performance through COMPASS in Hong Kong. Tutors, clinical supervisors and students should be given clear behavioral descriptors for expected performance in PBL tutorials and clinical practice at different year levels.
[Copyright of Clinical Linguistics & Phonetics is the property of Informa Healthcare. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.3109/02699206.2013.812146]