Schools place importance to fostering students’ virtues and positive values. In alignment with the major concerns and development foci and with reference to the students’ development needs identified through teachers’ observation and students’
reflection, most designated groups are able to lead different student support groups to formulate major concerns and development foci, plan and implement relevant measures and activities. Schools are determined to foster students’ positive values and good virtues as well as help them develop healthy living habits.
In the 2016/17 school year, care for others, responsibility and commitment are popular development foci found in most schools. Working in close collaboration, subject panels/committees are able to integrate assemblies and cross-subject activities, etc., with the school-based curriculum. The comprehensive coverage of themes, such as Moral and Civic Education, life education, anti-drug education and national education, strengthens the connections between each domain of values education, fostering students’ whole-person development.
In response to societal influences in recent years, schools have been committed to promoting life education by incorporating elements of life education into ethic and religious studies or personal growth education lessons. Starting with fostering
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students’ positive thinking, some schools devise a systematic curriculum plan for life education, covering time management, emotion management, resilience, etc., nurturing in students the positive attitudes for facing adversity and cultivating in them the values of treasuring lives through exploring social issues and experiential learning. With reference to the schools’ yearly themes, some schools continue to refine the school-based life education curriculum. They guide students to explore issues related to life from different perspectives, arrange field trips for them to have hands-on contact with nature to develop in them the attitudes of having respect for lives and being responsible. Students are encouraged to share and reflect on their learning and experience with the aim of nurturing their resilient and optimistic attitudes, enabling them to face stress and frustration. Targeting at strengthening students’ resilience, some schools infuse various positive education elements, such as accepting one-self, gratitude and appreciating others, into relevant topics of subjects, with a view to helping students transform knowledge gained into abilities and apply them in daily lives. Leadership training is organised to strengthen students’ abilities to cope with changes through engaging them in problem-solving activities. Besides, external resources are aptly tapped to promote life education.
Some schools participate actively in workshops offered by the EDB to familiarise themselves with the relevant teaching strategies and skills. Based on the central life education curriculum developed by their school sponsoring bodies, individual schools refine their life education curriculum, strategically connecting or re-arranging relevant activities in order to guide students to deeply reflect on the meaning of life and develop an optimistic attitude towards life.
In promoting national education, as usual, relevant elements are infused in General Studies, Chinese Language, Chinese History, History or Life and Society and promoted through lessons and an array of life-wide learning activities, such as flag raising ceremony, talks on contemporary situations of the nation and tours to the Mainland, to deepen students’ understanding of the history, culture and society of the country and, thereby, heighten their sense of belonging towards the country.
Some schools attach much importance to Basic Law education. They deliberately incorporate elements of Basic Law into school-based assignments. Questions and tasks set are closely related to life events. Through exploring and analysing cases and commenting on social issues, students deepen their understanding of Basic Law and are enabled to link Basic Law to their daily lives. In some schools, Basic Law education is introduced in Humanities subjects. Adopting school-based materials or materials available in the market, students are guided to discuss life events and topics, through which they grasp the concepts and content of Basic Law and enhance their sense of national identity. Some schools develop students’ learning interest through organising activities, such as theme-based exhibitions, competitions,
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debates and visits. Some schools make good use of the Basic Law learning package,
“Understanding the Law, Access to Justice”, or educational TV programmes developed by the EDB to supplement the teaching of Basic Law.
Secondary schools, in general, set life planning education as one of the development foci, aiming at fostering students’ abilities in self-understanding, making personal plans, setting goals and conducting reflection. Some schools incorporate elements of life planning education into values education. Introduced through school-based moral and civic education lessons, personal growth education lessons and class teacher periods, themes are set for each year level to help students understand themselves, set goals and self-regulate. Through individual and group guidance, students are encouraged to reflect on their aptitudes and abilities, strive for achieving their goals and develop positive learning and working attitudes.
Furthermore, some schools take active steps to establish connection with tertiary institutes as well as industrial and commercial organisations, and arrange visits, experiential work and internship to equip senior secondary students with sufficient knowledge of multiple pathways for further studies or future career. Through sharing and self-reflection, the above practices deepen students’ understanding of their abilities, interests and aspirations and foster in students a positive attitude towards life.
Schools, in general, are able to gain support and trust from parents and work closely with the community and external organisations to provide students with varied support services that aptly address their needs. In schools with better performance, different groups and committees fulfill their functions and work in close collaboration with other groups and subject panels to organise cross-subject activities. Schools timely monitor the progress and make use of evaluation information to analyse and review the effectiveness of work to identify students’
needs and feed back to the holistic planning of student support.
Schools review the implementation of work at the end of the school year through teachers’ observation, surveys and “Assessment Program for Affective and Social Outcomes” (APASO), etc. Individual schools that perform well in evaluation of work strategically make use of varied data in an integrated manner to refine the planning of school-based curriculum and relevant work during collaborative lesson preparation. They also review meticulously students’ behavioural performance with reference to their development needs. Some schools, however, are unable to evaluate the effectiveness of work against the objectives. Suggestions for improvement concern mainly administrative arrangement instead of students’ behaviour and performance. Schools should make effective use of evaluation data to inform
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planning.
Exemplars
Strategically infusing elements of values education into the curriculum The school appropriately links up subject panels and strategically incorporates the elements of values education into the curriculum. For example, in alignment with the development foci of the year – “integrity” and “collaboration”, the Mathematics panel instils in students the virtues of honesty and team spirit through learning activities such as buying and selling games and measuring activities. The panel also systematically incorporates into the curriculum learning elements, such as environmental education, recognition of national identity and care for others. For example, in the unit “three-dimensional shape”, Primary One students are required to collect discarded packages to put together a three-dimensional shape so that students can experience reusing or upcycling waste. In the unit “Kilometre” in Primary Three curriculum, students are asked to find out the routes of the Mainland Section of Express Rail Link or the distance between provinces so as to strengthen their geographic knowledge of the country. Besides, in the unit “Percentage”, Primary Six students need to make good use of the information collected to compare discounts offered by different shops, through which students are instilled with the virtue of frugality. Values education is thoroughly infused into the curriculum.
Incorporating elements of life planning education into life education to facilitate students’ self-understanding and future planning
To facilitate the implementation of life education, the school continuously refines values education curriculum, re-arranges personal growth education periods, assemblies and life-wide learning activities, infusing values education into the curricular of some subjects and devising school-based life education curriculum that suitably addresses students’ development and learning needs at different learning stages. Various domains of values education, such as spiritual education, Moral and Civic Education, education for sustainable development, national education, health education and life planning education, are integrated into life education to develop students’ good character and foster their whole-person development.
The school infuses life-planning education into school-based life education curriculum to help students progressively make plans for their future in accordance with their interests, abilities and aptitudes throughout the six years at school. At the
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junior secondary level, the emphasis is put on helping students understand themselves and offering guidance on the selection of senior secondary electives. At the senior secondary level, all students are put in groups and each group is assigned a teacher to offer coherent guidance on life planning. Care, support and encouragement are offered to students to help them set goals for their lives and get prepared for it. The school also invites the school alumni to share their learning experiences and achievements with students. On the whole, the relevant programmes are in line with the school’s direction of nurturing students. Apart from sharing information and knowledge to facilitate students’ multiple development, the school provides students with care and inspiration to help them grow.
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