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EDUCATION
being equal, teaching and learning would be generally more effective if the medium of instruction were Chinese. In this connection, the policy recommended by the commission of 'positive discrimination' in favour of secondary schools using Chinese as the medium of instruction will be implemented from September 1988. In accordance with this policy, additional teachers of English and additional resources will be provided to strengthen the teaching of English to avert any consequential drop in the standard of English as a result of reduced exposure. To assist secondary schools in deciding on the language mode of instruction, various language-medium models were circulated to schools for consideration and for planning purposes.
A Chinese Textbooks Committee was established in June with the task of assessing the demand for such textbooks, in the light of the policy of encouraging schools to adopt Chinese as the medium of instruction, and to ensure the availability in time for the 1989-90 school year of an adequate supply of textbooks, of good quality and appropriate standard, in Chinese. The committee is composed of government officials and members of the community, and is serviced by the Education Department.
The Institute of Language in Education, founded as a training and research institute with the objective of improving language learning and teaching in Hong Kong, offers full-time refresher courses and occasional seminars and workshops for teachers of English and Chinese in primary and secondary schools. It conducts research into language learning and teaching, provides consultancy services to teachers and language teaching specialists and designs and develops language learning and teaching materials for use in schools. The institute is recognised by the Royal Society of Arts Examinations Board as a centre for courses leading to the Diploma for Overseas Teachers of English.
During the year, the institute organised refresher courses for 1113 primary and secondary school teachers of English and Chinese, a seminar for primary level teachers in Hong Kong Diocesan Schools, two seminars for heads of primary schools and a three-day international conference on in-service language teacher education. Three teachers' guides were written and distributed to schools and a book on future directions in language teacher education was published. The second volume of the institute's professional journal (the ILEJ) was issued in September and made available to teachers and language specialists in Hong Kong and overseas. Institute research activities are being developed in four directions: (a) studies on the theory and practice of language learning and teaching in Hong Kong, (b) studies on particular problems in the teaching of Chinese and English at the primary and secondary levels in Hong Kong, (c) evaluation studies, including situational, needs and task analyses and (d) linguistic and socio-cultural studies of con- temporary forms of Chinese and English. Specific projects completed or underway have focused on the standardisation of commonly-used Chinese characters, needs analyses. of teachers of English in prevocational schools and of institute participants, and an extensive reading scheme. A project related to computer-assisted language learning is in the planning stage. Two exhibitions of language learning and teaching materials were organised during the year.
Education Research
Research into a wide range of educational topics is undertaken by the Educational Research Establishment of the Education Department. The annual monitoring of academic standards at Primary 1 and Primary 4–6 took place in May. Manuals for the standardised Primary 4–6 Chinese and English test were compiled and made available to schools during the year. Screening tests (Chinese and English) for Form 1, and two additional versions of