The quality of a teacher plays one of the most important roles in the achievement of an education system. Teacher training is a multi-dimensional process which comprises the selection of teacher candidates, pre-service training, appointment, in-service training and teaching practices. Therefore, this study focuses on teacher training processes in Singapore, Shanghai-China, Hong Kong-China and Turkey and aims to discover the reasons for success in Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) by relating it with teacher training processes. Singapore, Shanghai-China, Hong Kong-China were chosen to study because their educational systems were ranked among the high-performing educational systems in 2016. This study was a qualitative research and document analysis method was used to collect data about the relevant countries' teacher training processes. The result of the study suggested some practical considerations for teacher training programs in low-performing education systems about the selection of teacher candidates, pre-service training, appointment, in-service training and teaching practices.
[Copyright of Journal of Curriculum and Teaching is the property of Sciedu Press]

International studies of science education, such as the Trends in Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS), have revealed considerable national disparities in students' achievements in science education. The results have prompted many nations to compare their science education systems and practices to those of others, to gain insights for improvement. Teacher training and professional development are key educational components that have not attracted as much attention as they deserve in international comparative studies. This study compares the conceptions and attitudes of pre-service elementary teachers (PSETs) in Hong Kong and the United States with respect to inquiry science learning and teaching at the beginning of the semester before the start of the science methods course. PSETs' conceptions and attitudes in the two countries were compared by means of a questionnaire with both Likert-type and open-ended questions. Quantitative data were analyzed using exploratory factor analysis and inferential statistics, while qualitative data were analyzed through the systematic categorization of PSETs' responses into broad themes and subthemes to reflect patterns in their conceptions of and attitudes toward inquiry science learning and teaching. The results revealed a complex interplay between PSETs' conceptions of and attitudes toward inquiry science learning and teaching. The results shed light on the effects of sociocultural contexts and have important implications for the design of science methods courses.
[Copyright © 2018 Springer Science+Business Media B.V., part of Springer Nature.]

Self-efficacy beliefs regarding the teaching of English language in reading, writing, listening, and speaking were assessed in a sample of 55 prospective Chinese teachers who were trained to teach English as a second language in Hong Kong. These teachers reported that their sense of self-efficacy in teaching speaking and writing seemed to go together, whereas their sense of self-efficacy in teaching reading emerged as relatively distinct. Prospective teachers with teaching-practice experience did report significantly higher scores on self-efficacy in teaching speaking-writing than those without teachingpractice experience. Implications of the findings for efforts to enhance teaching performance through enhancing teaching self-efficacy are discussed. The use of information technology such as blog-based teaching portfolio is suggested to provide an avenue through which prospective teachers' self-efficacy beliefs could be closely examined to provide insights into the changes of self-efficacy in relation to teaching effectiveness. Copyright © 2010 by Nova Science Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved.

This paper presents a mixed-methods study on preservice student teachers' perceived professional competence in the context of a Five-year BEd Programme in Hong Kong. Two rounds of data collection took place. 282 participated in the first survey and 346 participated in the second survey, with 15 student teachers joining semi-structured interview. The quantitative findings showed a significant increase in two competence factors, namely (1) Competence in Classroom Teaching; and (2) Pedagogical and Educational Knowledge after the second block of ITE fieldwork. The qualitative findings showed the characteristics of growing perceived professional competence and the constituting factors, like student teachers' learning from experience in the first block of ITE fieldwork, support from school teachers and feedback from university supervisors. A few student teachers reported negative change in perceived competence in challenging class settings and school contexts. Challenges and constraints encountered by these student teachers were identified to gain a deeper understanding of student teachers' experience. This study affirms the value of ITE fieldwork in contributing to growth in student teachers' professional competence. The deeper understanding of changes in student teachers' self-assessed professional competence provides insights on the relationship between professional competence and teaching contexts. This deeper understanding generates implications for ITE programmes and schools (sites of ITE fieldwork) to provide conditions to enhance student teachers' growth in professional competence. Equally important, student teachers need to be prepared to cope with challenging teaching contexts, including unfamiliar school contexts, schools / teachers with different teaching philosophies, and classes with diverse learning needs.

教育局於 2008/09 學年起開設高級小學學位教師職級，為小學副校長，其職責是要協助校長處理下列四方面工作：課程發展與管理，學與教及學生評估；全校參與的關顧輔導與學生支援；人力資源管理；學校管理、評估及發展。自職位設立後，本地學者和專業團體對副校長的專業成長有更多的關注和研究，基於早年研究發現人力管理是小學副校長常擔當的職責之一；香港初等教育研究學會其後進行小學副校長人事管理的調查，就副校長的職責、人事管理困難和持續發展需要作深入研究。此文將結合該調查數據和文獻資料，分析和討論香港小學副校長在人事管理的專業發展需要，並就相關在職培訓作出建議。

Professional Special Education training in Hong Kong is usually arranged in the lecture format. Furthermore, the provision of such courses for in-service teachers were often limited by the short duration of time. Videos, therefore, show the powerfulness to create learning experience in individual lessons for teacher training, as well as showing how the videos, combined with case studies, to complement the entire course as well as the practicum. Individual interviews were conducted to understand the process of the whole process of video learning. By applying the concept of scaffolding, the influence of videos and case studies on teaching and learning comes from the articulation of the participants, as well as the summative assessments. It is hoped that this article will inform the practitioners or teacher educators who would like to use videos and case studies to help teachers in understanding the needs of students with special needs.

Since 2009, Hong Kong senior school curriculum has been experiencing a shift in teaching and learning which was intended to change the current practice from traditional content-based to generic-skill oriented ones. The challenge for teachers, as highlighted by the Curriculum Development Council (2009), is that "teachers will need to have a wide repertoire of pedagogical strategies to cater for different learning intentions, individual students' needs and learning environments", "apply a pedagogy, old or new, that engages students, supports them to develop thinking and problem-solving skills and enables them to develop life-long learning skills", and "align assessment practice with curriculum change and recognize the wider achievements and abilities of students". In order to understand how beginning teachers perceive this new meaning of pedagogical shift and how they put the concept into practice, the study used case studies to explore the perceptions and actions of pre-service teachers through semi-structured interviews and classroom observations. The results collected were analyzed through the lens of teachers' professional development as highlighted in the literature (Darling-Hammond, 2005; Munby, Russell and Martin, 2001; Shulman and Shulman, 2004). It is expected that the results would help search for teachers' knowledge base of teaching in the new era.

The book aims to explore distributed leadership in developing curriculum innovations in schools with a target of bringing about theoretical underpinnings in the West with the empirical studies and practices in the East. It examines theoretically the roots of the curriculum leadership studies and practically with the empirical data and case studies in Hong Kong which has been considered a melting pot of the Western concepts and innovations in a land of Eastern cultures. The examination is framed within theoretical frameworks of activity theories, discourse analysis and social network systems. The findings will show the impact of the cultural traditions of Eastern countries in the mediation of the direction of the discourses in teacher meetings and the effectiveness of decision making in the processes of developing school based curriculum leadership. The book is theoretically exploratory with practically examined practices for educational leaders like schools headers and department leaders as well as teachers who aim at asserting greater influence in the educational decision making processes. Topics discussed in the book include: • Curriculum leadership functions and patterns of leadership distribution • Engaging teachers in reflective practice: tensions between ideological orientations and pragmatic considerations • Models of distributed leadership: focus, development and future • Initiating, designing and enacting curriculum innovations: procedures and processes This book will appeal to researchers interested in Curriculum Studies, School leadership and comparative education. Those who studies the theory of education and Asian education will also find this book valuable.
[Copyright © 2017 Edmond Hau-fai Law.]

Consequences of competition for global university rankings, such as changes in funding modes, have been extensively discussed in the field of higher education. However, few studies have reviewed its implications on knowledge production. This study provides a contextualised method for theorising the implications of this competition on the development of East Asian higher education, specifically teacher education. It identifies the new forms of knowledge being produced in two teacher education institutions in Hong Kong and Macau by reviewing the publications of new recruits in a five-year period. The study considers the following variables: author(s), date and form of publication, abstract, title, keywords, journal name, language, data source, research context and methods. The findings show that the dominant publication trends are towards quantitative research and multiple authors. Psychological research is the most popular area and studies of other long-term issues in teacher education are being marginalised.
[Copyright © 2017 British Association for International and Comparative Education.]

The number of students with special educational needs (SEN) in mainstream education in Hong Kong has increased, but the lack of professional training for in-service teachers appears to impede the successful implementation of an inclusive education policy. This study aims to evaluate and reflect on the delivery of an in-service inclusive education teacher training course provided by a local teacher training institution. A total of 3,274 teachers took this course between 2007 and 2010. Students' responses to an exit questionnaire were used to assess the course. The attitudes of the respondents towards the aim, content, resources, effect and value of the course and the level of satisfaction were generally positive, and increased as it evolved over time. The practical aspects (e.g., case analysis, classroom level strategies, guest lecturers' sharing and group discussion) were appreciated most by respondents. The implications of the findings and suggestions for further improvement are presented and discussed.