ENG-1979 — Page 112

EDUCATION

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secondary schools is updated and issued once a year in November, with a supplementary list in May. In an effort to improve the quality of textbooks, the Textbooks Committee maintains close liaison with two educational publishers' associations the Anglo-Chinese Textbooks Publishers' Organisation Limited and the Hong Kong Educational Publishers' Association Limited.

Teaching Centres

The Advisory Inspectorate runs six centres concerned with the teaching of the Chinese language, English, mathematics, science, social subjects and field studies.

The Field Studies Centre, located at the Sai Kung Outdoor Recreation Centre, was established in 1979 to enable Form/Middle 6 students to undertake practical experiments and studies in the field. Facilities at the centre include a laboratory, reference library, lecture room and exhibition hall. Four-day residential courses on geography or ecology are provided.

During the year, the Chinese Language Teaching Centre organised some 40 refresher courses, seminars, and workshops which were attended by about 1,600 teachers. More than 200 follow-up visits were made to teacher-participants. Schools, both primary and secondary, benefit from the centre's displays, which cover teaching materials, aids and projects, and its free dubbing service for teaching tapes.

The English Language Teaching Centre organised intensive courses on speech improve- ment, workshops, seminars and guest talks for about 1,700 teachers during 1979. Some 760 follow-up visits were made to teacher-participants. About 2,300 language tapes were supplied to 100 schools. The centre has a specialist library, which contains 4,700 books on English-language teaching and linguistics, and it also has English teaching aid displays. The Mathematics Teaching Centre held courses on computer programming and on the effective use of electronic calculators. The courses were a joint effort with the Hong Kong Polytechnic, the Chinese University of Hong Kong and the Mathematics Section of the Advisory Inspectorate. In addition, workshops and seminars on home-made teaching aids for mathematics were held for primary and secondary school teachers. -

The Science Teaching Centre held seminars on the teaching of primary science and workshops on the making of simple teaching aids for teachers from 95 primary schools. To promote the use of simple apparatus for the teaching of integrated science at junior secondary level, 13 workshops were held.

The Social Subjects Teaching Centre provides in-service training for teachers of history, economics, public affairs, geography, health education and social studies. More than 500 teachers from secondary schools attended courses provided by the centre, which has a variety of reference and teaching materials on display.

Visual Education Centre

The Visual Education Centre's audio-visual resources library contains 1,400×16 mm film titles, 3,200 filmstrips and 450×8 mm film loops as well as other audio-visual items which are available for loan to schools. During the year a total of 11,269 film bookings were recorded.

A combined primary and secondary audio-visual resources catalogue was being produced for distribution to schools during 1979. The section also publishes the Audio-Visual News Bulletin, and 3,000 copies of each issue are circulated among schools and other educational institutions. Thirty-six audio-visual instruction courses and workshops were organised for more than 1,000 teachers during the year. A series of seminars for teachers newly-appointed as school audio-visual co-ordinators was also held.