TNAG-2119-FCO40-3025-Future-of-Hong-Kong-general-1990 — Page 142

7

(c)

as

regards strengthening the teaching of English in

schools which use Chinese as the medium of

instruction : research findings have substantiated

and teaching would generally be more

effective if the medium of instruction were the

mother tongue and

consequential loss of

exposure to English would result in a fall in the

that learning

standard of English.

80 secondary schools

medium of instruction

classes

the

Since September 1988, about

which use Chinese as their

for more than 25% of their

have been provided with additional

strengthen the teaching of English.

the provision of additional teachers additional equipment such as moveable

partitions for split classes and a second wire-free

induction loop system and a one-off library grant;

resources to

These include

of English,

and

6.2.3

(a)

as regards

now

assisting schools

to decide on the

medium of instruction : in April 1986, guidelines

in the form of sample language medium models were

sent to secondary schools.

With the help of a

teacher handbook published in 1988, teachers may

interpret their students' scores in the HKAT in

English for the purpose of grouping students,

should they SO wish. In September 1988, the new

English syllabus (Secondary 1 to Secondary 5) was

implemented while the new Chinese language syllabus

will be implemented in 1991-92. Nearly 70 sets of

Chinese textbooks covering 19 general subjects have

been made available since September 1989 with more

coming on stream covering practical subjects in

September 1991.

In ECR 2, published in August 1986, we made three

more recommendations relating to language in education. These

were that

90