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To raise the quality of teacher education, the part-time in-service course of training in special education was upgraded to a one-year full-time course in 1993. In the same year, following the recommendations of the Education Commission, Government decided that a programme of new practical schools and skill opportunities schools with emphasis on practical subjects or vocational skills should be established in the mainstream education to cater for junior secondary students who are unmotivated by the normal school curriculum or who experience learning difficulties. As Members may recall, a sum of $340 million was subsequently earmarked for the construction of three new practical schools and seven skill opportunities schools in the next four years. Similarly, efforts were re-inforced to assist low achievers in our secondary schools through the provision of school-based curriculum, specially tailored to the needs of these students and the provision of extra graduate teachers. As Members know, the scheme has proved so successful that it is being extended to 70 schools in September 1995.
In striving to assist students at the lower end of the ability spectrum, it is important that we do not overlook the special needs of those at the upper end of that ability spectrum. In 1994, a pilot project started in our primary schools where academically gifted children were identified and given special assistance in terms of curriculum and learning materials. A special training programme for teachers of these children was also started. A site for a new resource centre to help both teachers and children alike was identified. Construction work started in late 1994 and has just been completed. The Centre will be opened for use shortly.
Given these encouraging integrative developments in our mainstream schools and given that today we have enough special school places for all children with a I believe disability 63 special schools with a total provision of 8,638 places
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Members will agree that we have taken major steps in the development of our special education services and have achieved concrete results of which all of us can be proud.