The first institution ever set up in Hong Kong to look after children with special needs was a home for the blind in 1863. It was not until 1935 when the first school for deaf children was formally opened. Both establishments were initiated by the missionary organisations operating in Hong Kong. The Key milestone to earmark the beginning of special education services in Hong Kong was the start up of a Special Schools Section within the Government in 1960. The Section was later responsible for the rapid development of special education services in special and mainstream schools. The speedy growth of special education services was a result of other major changes taking place within the local education system. One of these changes was the enactment of 9 years of compulsory education in 1978. This pattern of development of special education services in Hong Kong beginning with services for the sensory impaired children through to other services in mainstream schools after compulsory education is introduced matches well with the framework suggested by Putnam(1979). One can witness these developments by looking further at the categorical changes in classifying children with learning difficulties and the increasing number of students identified to be with special educational needs in Hong Kong over the years since 1960. While the idealism for integrating students with special needs into mainstream schools has been stressed by various policy documents in Hong Kong, yet more categories of schools are created to cater for the specific needs of these students. Amongst these creations is the establishment of Practical Schools with strong practically oriented curriculum to support ummotivated students. This was a recommendation made by the Education commission in their Report No.4 (Education Commission, 1990) to deal with curriculum and behaviour problems in Hong Kong. In 1960, the same year when the Special Schools Section was established, a new type of school called 'Practical

Integrating students with disabilities in ordinary schools has been a topic of debate in the Iast two decades. Inclusive education, in its broader sense, is still in its infancy in Hong Kong. Educational reforms, such as inclusive schooling, depends on teachers' support in implementing the change. Teachers' attitude towards integration and the changes required in schools and classrooms are crucial to the accomplishment of educational reforms. The purpose of this study was to survey classroom teachers' views toward integrating students with disabilities in Hong Kong. Results indicated that the availability of necessary resources, training of teachers, and the suitability of instruction and services were prime concerns for classroom teachers in providing education for students with disabilities. Recommendations for Hong Kong are proposed on considerations given to the above concerns and on legal mandates in providing education for students with disabilities.
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This paper provides a background to the 2 year Pilot Project on Integration completed by the Hong Kong Government in 1999. It considers the implementation of the Project, the difficulties faced by the Government in recruiting schools and the preparation of the participating schools. The paper describes the aims of the Pilot Project in integrating students with disabilities in primary and secondary schools and outlines the methods used by the research team to evaluate the Project. The paper discusses some of the main findings of the evaluation study and considers the central issues and challenges for Hong Kong set against a back cloth of the political changes surrounding the return of Hong Kong to Chinese sovereignty. A number of recommendations for successful integration strategies for Hong Kong are indicated.
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Education is increasingly driven by the concept of quality assurance. Early indications from a Hong Kong project to integrate children with learning difficulties and disabilities into mainstream schools suggest that integration can have a positive impact, both on pedagogy and on the organizational thinking of mainstream schools, offering opportunities for school improvement and quality development.
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This article, while supporting the notion of inclusive education, urges caution in the rate at which the necessary changes take place. The writer acknowledges the important role played by special schools in meeting the needs of students with moderate to severe disabilities, and suggests that special schools must continue to exist in order to provide the full range of placement options. Some of the difficulties involved in implementing inclusive education are discussed, including the demands made upon the regular class teacher, the problem of class sizes in ordinary schools in Hong Kong, and the need for additional professional training with a focus on mixed-ability teaching.
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This paper aims to review the provision of special education and the need of Integration/ Inclusive Education [I/IE] in the Hong Kong context. The paper begins with the definition of relevant terms and follows it with a brief review of the existing provision of the segregated schooling in Hong Kong. Some preliminary comments on the "Pilot Project on Integration of Children with Special Needs in Ordinary Schools" and experiences from overseas on implementing Integration/ Inclusive Education will be given at the end of the paper.
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The Hong Kong government introduced a scheme to include students with disabilities into mainstream schools in 1997. This can be seen as the beginning of the "inclusion movement". The main problems of inclusion are its "one size fits all" philosophy and the belief that "the least restrictive environment" is exclusively the regular classroom. There are four major obstacles to implementing full inclusion in Hong Kong. (1) The existing teacher to student ratio is already unacceptably high. Putting disabled students into regular classrooms without decreasing the class size will burn-out teachers, without any obvious benefit to the disabled students. (2) Most teachers do not have any training to deal with disabled students. Without a qualified teacher, disabled students are unlikely to be receiving high-quality educational services. (3) Disabled students are put into classes with lower academic performance, a practice which presently compromises the learning potential of all students involved. (4) Hong Kong teachers in general education have inadequate experience in collaborating with other professionals so that providing teacher assistants to deal with special needs students may not be as helpful as it appears. In summary, full inclusion may not be the only answer. It should be recognised that disabled students have their own special needs which the regular classrooms may not be able to meet.
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The purpose of the present study was to explore, from an insider perspective, the work experience of local special school personnel. A qualitative methodological approach was taken and a semi-structured interviewing technique was adopted. An opportunity sample of five Principals, six teachers and three school social workers from six local special schools for students with mild mental handicap participated in this study. Data were analyzed using a constant comparative method and content analysis. The findings seem to suggest that the special school teachers in this study faced the dilemma of having competing roles within the school and that they could function as either caregiver or an educator. The two most pronounced themes that emerged from the data are that the local special school personnel in this study appeared to be isolated in terms of feedback and support and the five Principals were regarded as the only leaders to provide directions for the development of their schools. The results therefore demonstrate the need to develop intra- and inter-school support networks for local special school personnel to become more responsive to the needs of the classroom community. A number of recommendations for improvement in teacher education and in-service training are also discussed.
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