314
COLONIAL SECRETARY'S OFFICE,
HONGKONG, 9th February, 1901.
SIR,--We have the honour to present, for the information of the Governing Body, our report on the Upper School of Queen's College.
2. We have examined 250 boys of whom only a few have shown any grasp of the subjects in which they were examined.
3. Reading. On re-considering the mark-sheets, we are of opinion that the marks awarded were in general far too high. As, however, the examination in this subject was necessarily oral, we have not been able to modify the marks originally awarded. It was obvious that in many cases the boys, while reproducing the sounds correctly, had no comprehension of what they were reading, while in other cases the enunciation was so defective, that, though we were able to understand the boy, so long as we followed his reading with our eyes on the book, without this aid what he read conveyed no meaning to us.
4. Conversation.--In this subject as well as in reading we can only endorse the remarks made by the examiners appointed by the Governing Body for 1897. We would recommend that in future the oral examination should not be held till after the examiners have had the opportunity of seeing the written work of the candidates. This is the universal custom in examinations both in English schools and universities and is necessary as a guide to the examiners in forming a just estimate of a boy's ability. The mark sheets as they now stand do not represent our final judgment on the conversational powers of the candidates; but again it has been impossible to revise them. Such fragmentary conver- sation as we were able to elicit was stilted and stereotyped; little knowledge of English idiom was evinced.
5. Dictation. In this subject all the Chinese forms with the exception of III A., and III B., which ́obtained respectively 60% and 51% of passes, were disgraceful. The top form I A.B. obtained 30%
of
passes; no boy in the class obtained full marks, while 13 out of 20 obtained no marks at all. The next form II A. obtained 38% of passes. In this form 3 boys out of 56 obtained full marks, and 6 boys no marks. The third form II B. only obtained 20% of passes, 16 boys out of 26 obtaining no marks, whereas one boy was awarded full marks. The subject for dictation in this form was Fuller's definition of the true gentleman as personified in Admiral Sir FRANCIS DRAKE. One boy has rendered the opening words as follows "The quaint old bullock sums up in a few words the character of the true gentleman in the descripsing that of a great animal Sir FRANCIS DRAKE." This may be taken as typical of the performances of this form. Of the 2 forms whose percentage of passes just exceeded that of failure, III A. shows 19 zeros among 53 boys. It is worth mention that 5 boys out of 27 in III A. obtained full marks. The Non-Chinese were generally good.
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Arithmetic. Of the Chinese forms not one gains a percentage of passes; II A., with a percentage of 43, being the best, and III B., with a percentage of 11, the worst. This cannot be considered satis- factory, even in view of the fact that the paper which was set to the top form was distinctly difficult. The work of Ho SHAI WING in I A.B., and of TSANG KWAN WA in II B., was especially noticeable, while in II A., four boys obtained 90 marks or over. Many of the failures were due to carelessness on the part of the boys in taking down the questions wrongly.
Of the Non-Chinese forms all except N. 2, whose performance was far from good, produced cre- ditable work. In N. 1 ISMAIL's paper was excellent, and 2 boys in N. 3 were awarded full marks,
Translation (a) English to Chinese.-Three classes-I A.B., II A., and III.A.-show percentages of passes, but in general the work was slovenly and small attention was given to detail or shades of expression. The work, however, of 2 boys-HUNG HING KAM in I A.B., and LAU TSUI LAN in II B.- -was admirable not merely by contrast.
(b) Chinese to English.—Examination in this subject was inade ridiculous by the fact that the boy's merely reproduced a crib-translation. Mistakes, and they were many, were due to failure of memory, or to unintelligent reading of the crib, and there was therefore no real test of the boy's ability to translate Chinese into English. Our opinion on this brauch of study is rather contained in our report on the special translations, which formed a new feature in this examination.
Special Translation—(a) Chinese into English.This subject is not in the ordinary curriculuin, but at the suggestion of the Inspector of Schools a paper was set to all the Chinese boys in the Upper School with a view of testing their ability as interpreters. We, therefore, intentionally set stiff papers. The results were disappointing. In translating Chinese into English the percentage of passes was 29 %, 4%, nil, 8 %, and nil in the forms I A.B., II A., II B., III A., and III B., respectively.