Democratic Party's submission on the Consultation Document: Action Plan to Raise Language Standards in Hong Kong (English Summary)

28 Feb 2003

1. Hong Kong is an international city. If we are to successfully meet the challenges of tomorrow, it is vital that we raise the language standards of the community through the concerted efforts of teachers, parents, and the community at large.
2. As we all know, a young learner makes speedy progress in language acquisition. It is not uncommon to find a small child learning Cantonese, English and Putonghua at the same time, often at a rate faster than an adult. Therefore it is of utmost importance for students to achieve basic competencies in languages at schools. Establishing a basic competency level for all, as suggested by the Standing Committee on Language Education and Research, is a way to ensure students meet the basic competency level after nine years of free and compulsory education.
3. Moreover, Democratic Party supports the plan to have a local language testing system instead of relying on the International English Language Testing System (IELTS).
4. Democratic Party is in support of setting up such a basic competency level for all but it must not be associated with any grade level or year level. In other words, we should have the Competency Level of a certain specific student but not the Competency Level of Primary 6 students or students of any other specific grade level. Otherwise, every student will be forced-fed materials up to that particular Basic Competency Level and the already the case now.
5. However, benchmarking and examinations alone cannot stimulate students' interests in learning. A motivating language learning environment is one of the pillars to successful language training.
6. Start with textbooks. It is well known that at present the textbooks for English language learning are not interesting enough to stimulate their interests. The problem of learning English with most Hong Kong people is that they do not have an English speaking context which is close enough to that of native speakers. This is closely related to how textbooks are written. The Education Department should review the curriculum and make it more stimulating and contextualised.
7. Secondly, it is equally important that students are given chances to practice using English. "Spare to speak and spare to speed." In other words, speak more and you make speedy progress. The problem for school children is that they do not have an English speaking environment. The Democratic Party has all along supported the use of mother tongue as the main medium of instruction. However, measures should be taken to promote an English speaking environment. For example, schools can organise events like "English speaking day" or "English speaking week", teachers can ask students to watch a TV programme in English and jot down what the characters said, schoool can organise experiential learning activities such as debates, language camps and drama. Surely this is better than simply teaching them rules in class.
8. Thirdly, it is the quality of teachers teaching language. The quality of teachers is an important factor in making language teaching successful. To enhance the quality of language education, schools should move progressively towards deploying only teachers with a degree in the relevant language subject to teach languages. At present, many language teachers do not hold a degree or a diploma in the relevant language subject. Most teachers who have a degree in a relevant language subject are teaching in secondary schools because of better pay, leading to a shortage of supply of qualified language teachers in the primary level. At present, there are 6,000 language teachers who do not have training in teaching languages. The Standing Committee on Language Education and Research recommended setting up an incentive grant scheme to provide each teacher with a grant covering 50% of course fee to acquire the qualifications necessary for language teaching. We welcome this move to improve the quality of language teaching.
9. Fourthly, we need to address one of the common problems facing language teachers, which is the heavy workload. On average, a primary school teacher has 37 students in a class, and that of a secondary school teacher has 35 to 40 students. Language teachers are particularly overloaded because of the nature of the subject. Take phonetics and pronunciation as an example. Learning to pronounce accurately involves reading the lips of the teacher. The teacher should then give students individual attention and correct their pronunciation individually.
10. The School management should try as far as possible to reduce the non-teaching duties of language teachers. Effective English teaching can only be conducted in small classes. The decline in birthrate has given us a golden opportunity to implement small class teaching. Instead of cutting classes, the Education Department should seize the opportunity to implement small class teaching. This would benefit not only language teaching, but teaching in all subjects. Democratic Party urges the Government to implement small class teaching as soon as possible.
11. In relation to language requirements for university admission, Democratic Party has reservation about setting up a minimum language competency level for university admission. Democratic Party insists that universities should have autonomy in student admission policy. Universities should be allowed to admit students who may not acquire a certain language competency level but are good at other subjects or with other talents. As always the case, if our community puts all attention on English, it will have unintended results. Students may have excellent English competency level but do not have critical and independent thinking.
12. As far as using Putonghua to teach in class, Democratic Party suggests that there should not be a fixed time table for schools by which schools should all use Putonghua to teach. Instead, schools should be allowed to implement the measure when they have adequate resources to do so.
13. With all these comments and recommendations, Democratic Party also urges the Government to devise a working plan to keep track of the language proficiency and ability of our students in a long term manner before and after the implementation of the plan. This is important for our community to study and examine the effectiveness of the plan and to review our future action plan.