Only two students received 6As results in this year's HKAL

Only two students scored perfect 6 straight A passes in this year's Hong Kong Advanced Level Examination (HKAL), local media reported on Monday.

Both of the students attend the Hang Seng School of Commerce at Sha Tin.

Yuen Yip-kan who scored 6As at HKAL examination and 5As at HKCEE, said he felt surprised and happy when he received his results.

He said he hoped to enter the University of Hong Kong's Bachelor of Business Administration (BBA) department. The other top student, Yuen Si-wai said she was very pleased with the results and intends go to either the University of Hong Kong or the Chinese University's BBA department. She said the reason for her good results was paying attention in class and preparation.

Of the other five students who scored 5As in the HKAL examination, three of them came from St Rose of Lima's College, one student came from St Paul's Co-educational College and one from Carmel Pak U Secondary School in Tai Po, respectively.

Of the 37,000 students who attended this year's HKAL examination, the results of 16,000 students met the minimum university entry requirements.

Students in Hong Kong who sit these exams are unusually aged 18- 20 years. The exams, which are regarded as being tough by international standards, allow students to matriculate to university.

SCMP. Jun 30, 2008.

More teaching in English on the agenda

Education chief may further relax policy on language of instruction

Further relaxation of the policy on language of instruction in schools could be in store after the government said it was willing to consider allowing secondary schools to teach a quarter of their subjects in English regardless of their students' competence in the language.

The suggestion was raised at a meeting between Secretary for Education Michael Suen Ming-yeung yesterday and secondary schools representatives as part of a consultation on the medium of instruction policy.

Yip Chee-tim, chairman of the Association of Chinese Middle Schools, said the meeting had set out a "very positive direction" that would result in greater diversity of language.

"Schools could be given space to set their own language policy for 25 per cent of classroom time," Mr Yip said, adding that this would not be limited by students' academic ability. "Certain subjects could be taught entirely in English in all schools."

Mr Yip said the Education Bureau had stressed there needed to be an accountable mechanism for determining this language policy, but he understood that to mean there would need to be agreement between a school's parent association and board.

"Each school would need to decide what its particular language plan would be," he said. "As there will be more school places available than students to take them, parents will be able to vote with their feet for which they feel is the most appropriate mode."

Mr Suen is investigating ways to fine-tune the medium of instruction policy ahead of new rules due to come into force next year, with a view to removing the rigid divide between schools that teach in English and those that teach in Chinese.

A final report is due to be released in the next few weeks, but Mr Suen has previously given tacit backing to allowing schools to stream students into English- or Chinese-medium classes by ability.

As they stand, the rules will require schools to have 85 per cent of their Form One intake in the top 40 per cent academically - the segment the bureau deems capable of learning in English - if they are to teach in English.

Mr Suen has said he is open to this rule being applied to individual classes rather than the whole school.

But in a statement released after yesterday's meeting, the bureau appeared to have relaxed its stance even further.

The statement said the bureau had "further explored" with schools "their suggestion that, on top of the recommendations, all schools should be allowed to adopt the English medium for individual subjects".

Allowing students to study "one to two subjects in English and so increase their exposure to the language" could be a "positive driving force in their learning", it said.

However, it added that a "credible quality assurance mechanism" would be needed to "ensure that students' learning effectiveness will not be jeopardised".

A bureau spokeswoman said one option would be to have schools' language policies vetted by a three-member team from the bureau, the school's management and an independent academic.

Education legislator Professional Teachers' Union president Cheung Man-kwong warned that falling student enrolments meant schools' priorities would be skewed by "the need to fight for survival".

Democratic Party vice-chairman Tik Chi-yuen said schools needed to be trusted to make the right decision for their students' best interests.

SCMP. Jun 26, 2008.

Tutorial centre accused of trying to 'con' exam students

The exams authority reported a tutorial centre to "a law enforcement agency" yesterday over allegations that the centre tried to "con" students after gaining improper access to an English-language exam paper last week.

The development came as the tutorial centre alleged by Chinese-language media to be involved, Xiandai College, denied any connection to the case but suspended all classes taught by the celebrity tutor accused of being at the centre of the claims.

The allegations centre around complaints that a tutorial centre had offered an "extended learning" mobile phone service related to the Certificate of Education Examinations English language paper 1A - a test of students' reading ability.

The alleged service involved sending students text messages explaining the content of the exam after it had finished, claiming it would "help candidates gain a deeper understanding of paper 1B", the writing paper. The two exams were held on Friday, with a 45-minute break between the two.

The Hong Kong Examinations and Assessment Authority first confirmed it was looking into the case in a statement posted on its website late on Tuesday night.

"The incident could indicate that the related organisation got hold of a copy of the question paper through an improper channel before the exam was over and used this to profit from and cheat students," it said.

According to the authority's regulations, students and exam supervisors are banned from removing question papers from exam halls until the exam is over. However, the statement added that although the topics of the two papers were "similar", the second was not directly related to the first and "candidates would not gain any advantage because of this service". A spokeswoman confirmed yesterday the matter was now in the hands of the authorities, but declined to confirm whether it was being dealt with by the police or the Independent Commission Against Corruption, and refused to name the tutorial centre.

"As this case has been passed to a law enforcement agency, we will not make further comment," she said. "We wish to have a clear investigation of this case and so feel it would be more appropriate for them [the law enforcement agency] to investigate this than for us to look into it."

Xiandai College, meanwhile, held a press conference yesterday to deny any involvement.

Although the tutoring chain said it would "initially trust" the tutor at the centre of the row - Karson Oten Fan Kar-no - it had temporarily suspended its working relations with him until he could provide an explanation.

Lee Wai-lok, executive director of the chain, said the school had not terminated Mr Fan's contract and explained the temporary suspension was just to avoid the public losing confidence in Xiandai due to the controversy.

"Because the Form Five and Form Seven courses are finished, the number of students involved is not so much," Mr Lee said.

Mr Fan did not attend the press conference, but the centre issued a short statement on his behalf. The statement stressed Xiandai College was not involved. It claimed media reports had not represented the "whole truth", but did not elaborate.

SCMP. May 8, 2008

Cross students give exam authority a ticking-off

The examinations authority has come under fire for "unfair treatment" of candidates in a major English listening exam this month.

Students have complained of unclear instructions in one question in the Hong Kong Advanced level Use of English listening paper on April 5. The paper was worth 18 per cent of total marks for the subject.

In the question, candidates were given a taped conversation between the host of a survivor contest and competitors, and asked to "put ticks or crosses" to identify which of 11 items the competitors were allowed to use in the contest. The Hong Kong Examinations and Assessment Authority said candidates were required to "tick" items allowed and "cross" items not allowed.

But candidates later complained that they did not put crosses for items not allowed because the instruction was unclear, the authority said. After a markers' meeting, the authority agreed there were candidates who had misunderstood the instructions and decided that they be given the benefit of the doubt.

"If candidates used ticks only to indicate items allowed, blank boxes would be treated as indication of items not allowed. If they used both ticks and crosses, then blanks would be treated as omissions and not awarded any marks," a spokeswoman said. "An initial study showed that the majority of candidates used ticks to indicate items allowed and crosses to indicate items not allowed. Only a minority of candidates failed to use crosses to indicate items that were not allowed."

However, the decision to give certain students the benefit of the doubt has angered other candidates.

"Following instructions is a basic thing to do for people sitting exams. It would be unfair to give marks to those who failed to do so," said student Corah Chiu Yuk-yun.

A group named "Against giving benefit of the doubt to people who don't read instructions" has been opened on the social networking website Facebook. It has 348 members and 30 messages criticising the Hong Kong Examinations and Assessment Authority about its marking decision.

A message posted by the group read: "Candidates failed to put crosses probably because they had problems comprehending the question or they did not know the answer. The HKEAA decision allows for the luck factor, a departure from the aim of the listening exam."

The authority spokeswoman said marking of the papers had begun, but she could not say how many complaints about the question had been received.

SCMP. Apr. 29, 2008.

Is mother-tongue education a failure?

School policy is not a failure, seven-year study shows, but it has let down students seeking university places

The mother-tongue education policy is not helping students gain entrance to university, the author of a seven-year tracking study said yesterday.

Tsang Wing-kwong said his studies on the school careers of the first two years of students affected by the policy showed that English had become the "educationally profitable linguistic capital". He is a Chinese University professor of education and associate director of the Institute of Educational Research.

As students needed to pass the English A-level to qualify for university, those who did not study other subjects in the language were at a distinct advantage, with those who studied in Chinese up to the end of secondary school only around 30 per cent as likely to qualify.

"I wouldn't say [mother-tongue education] has failed," Professor Tsang said. "But my conclusion is that if gaining access to university education is one of the primary objectives of secondary education, then [it] has proved to be not serving the best interests of its clients."

Although Professor Tsang officially released his results from the third round of the study yesterday, the main findings had been extensively leaked and widely reported several weeks in advance.

The study followed the performance of 37,277 students who entered Form One in 1998 and 1999 until they completed A-levels in 2005 and 2006. The latest results compare the students' A-level scores, taking into account the effect of their gender, prior achievement level, socio-economic background, and the average academic performance and social background of other students in their schools.

Although students in Chinese-medium schools performed better in some areas, particularly earlier in school, it was "an uneven trade-off" that was outweighed by poorer English, Professor Tsang said. "You lose more in the use of English A-level but gain less than that in Chinese-language and culture. The trade off in performance is about half."

Students who studied in Chinese-medium schools throughout secondary almost did not display any advantage at all. The only exception was geography, in which students continued to outperform their English medium counterparts right through to the A-levels.

And although those who switched to using English during their secondary school careers fared better, the ones who did so earlier were also at an advantage. "And you can say that changing [to English] at Form Six is basically a disaster," Professor Tsang said. "The indicators are all negative."

The Education Bureau is consulting secondary schools to look at ways to "fine tune" the medium of instruction policy - apparently to blur the clear-cut distinction between English and Chinese-medium schools. The results are expected to be released before the summer break.

The bureau said it welcomed the results from Professor Tsang's study, but it was not appropriate to comment without studying the content and recommendations.

However, it added that the number of students from Chinese-medium schools gaining passes in at least five subjects, including Chinese and English, in last year's HKCEEs was 10.6 per cent higher than in 2002 and up 1.9 per cent on 2006.

SCMP. Mar 15, 2008

Schools may get to choose which language to use

Secondary schools could be given freedom to choose whether to teach in English or Chinese, the education secretary said yesterday.

Paving the way for an apparent policy shift, Michael Suen Ming-yeung said the Education Bureau was currently considering options on how to give schools more flexibility in implementing the medium-of- instruction policy.

Mr Suen said school groups had been petitioning for a wide range of measures, including having different language streams within a school, either on a subject-by-subject basis or by splitting students into English or Chinese classes according to ability.

But he insisted that schools would not be given carte blanche; rather, the bureau would implement an "objective, transparent" mechanism to determine how schools could set their language of instruction policy.

He gave no details of what form that mechanism might take.

Mr Suen said the bureau aimed for 60 per cent of secondary school leavers to be capable of learning in English by the time the new six-year secondary curriculum was fully implemented in 2012. Now, only the top 40 per cent of Primary Six graduates is deemed able to learn in English.

There have been persistent rumours of a significant policy shift since November, when Mr Suen announced a review to "fine-tune" a new set of rules on medium of instruction due to come into effect in 2010. Those rules, set down in 2005 after an extensive consultation process, had been in favour of maintaining the rigid divide between English- and Chinese-medium secondary schools and categorically ruled out language streaming within schools.

Mr Suen's comments yesterday were broadly welcomed by the education sector - on the condition that the change would not result in a return to the situation prior to the introduction of the mother-tongue education policy in 1998.

At that time, schools had complete autonomy over their medium of instruction, with many opting to teach in English regardless of whether teachers were competent in the language or students were able to learn effectively. The mother-tongue policy banned all but 112 secondary schools from teaching in English.

Professional Teachers' Union president Cheung Man-kwong said it was important to ensure students were capable of learning in English and the labelling effect of Chinese-medium schools was minimised. "The most important thing Mr Suen said was there will be a clear mechanism for inspecting and making sure schools maintain standards."

Dominic Chu Fu-yau, former chairman of the Subsidised Secondary Schools Council, said allowing schools to choose which classes to teach in English or Chinese was better than "simply splitting schools between winners and losers".

"Frontline teachers are the optimum judge of whether their students would learn best in English or Chinese," Mr Chu said.

Michael Tien Puk-sun, chairman of the 2005 policy working group, said he did not believe the government was going to change the core findings of his team's report - that schools should only be allowed to teach in English if they could meet set criteria, including students' language ability, teacher quality and support measures within the schools.

"Initially, we had been in favour of allowing language streaming within schools, as we felt that was a more idealistic solution," Mr Tien said. "But in the end we decided there were too many practical concerns."

These included the drain on resources due to the need to inspect quality "class by class" and the increase in teacher workload from having classes in two languages. "The key is, there needs to be a system of quantifiable ways to uphold conditions to allow students to learn effectively."

Students may get to see marked public exam papers

The exams authority is considering the unorthodox move of allowing students to view their own question papers once they have been marked, the board's outgoing secretary-general has revealed.

Peter Hill, who retired yesterday, said the introduction of on-screen marking for all subjects in the first round of the new diploma in 2012 would mean the authority would have the capacity for the first time to give students access to digital versions of marked scripts.

"We are looking at introducing this for the Hong Kong Diploma of Secondary Education," Dr Hill said, referring to the new set of exams due to be sat by students in Form Two.

But he also had a warning: "People might go to a professor and say, `Mark my paper. Did I get an A?' " he said. "You know that some of that is going to happen, but we need to have confidence that our markers are well-trained: they are following marking guides that external people don't have access to; they are being monitored on a regular basis; and the reliability of marking is very high."

However, he said there was no question of giving candidates hard copies or allowing them to access the files online.

"It would be in a designated place at designated times," he said, adding the authority would probably allow students to view the papers at one of the new regional on-screen marking centres, accompanied by an adult.

A US school provides 1,000 wireless laptops that will fit on students' desktops

Kid-size computers

For nearly a year, Fresno Unified school officials searched for a laptop that wouldn't clutter a student's desk.

Thursday, school officials said they purchased 1,000 wireless laptops that fit on a desk alongside textbooks and notebooks, as well as give students the opportunity to build a digital portfolio of essays, drawings and other creations.

"This is cool," said Chris Mitchell, a student at Bullard High School, where school officials unveiled the 7-inch wireless laptops.

Fresno Unified hopes the laptops will help students increase test scores through the ability to research information on the Internet, as well as halt five years of declining enrollment by enticing parents to send their children to the district's schools.

Currently, the district has about 69,000 students.

"Anything we can do as a district to engage students in learning and keep them here is a good thing," Superintendent Michael Hanson said at a news conference that drew about 50 people.

In the next few weeks, the laptops will be in about 60 classrooms at 16 other schools. They will be shared by students and will remain in the classrooms.

But not every educator is thrilled with the $650,000 investment.

Larry Moore, president of the Fresno Teachers Association, said new computers are useful tools, but a majority of teachers and students will not have access to the tiny laptop. He said the district should have spent the money on fixing broken computers in many classrooms.

There are also mixed feelings among educators. Stephen Lewis, a geology professor at California State University, Fresno, thinks laptops are a useful tool, but they can also hinder the teaching process -- he often sees students with their heads buried in their laptops instead of paying attention to a lecture.

"Teaching and learning is a person-to-person business. Are we moving toward a remote-control classroom?" Lewis said.

Roy Bohlin, an education technology professor at Fresno State, however, said laptops can motivate students to solve problems that affect their friends or community or the world.

"Problems in textbooks are sometimes boring," Bohlin said. "Laptops can increase critical thinking because students will have access to resources on the Internet."

Kurt Madden, the district's chief technology officer, said he has heard the debate before. In his final analysis, he said: "Teachers will always be a critical part of the classroom."

Fresno Unified's endeavor is the first of its kind in the nation because the laptop maker, ASUS, unveiled the 7-inch creation just last week. What makes the ASUS laptop unique is its built-in keyboard, said ASUS project manager David Leung. Other small laptops have touch-screen keyboards, he said.

Fresno Unified was the first school district to purchase ASUS' 7-inch laptop, Leung said.

In addition, Fresno Unified might be the only school district experimenting with giving every student a digital portfolio, Madden said.

In the old days, a student's portfolio included drawings, essays and poems written on paper, and art creations such as ceramic sculptures. Parents often saved their child's work in a folder or large envelope, causing the larger creations to get folded or ruined.

With this technology, Madden said, a student's portfolio will include everything a student writes and saves in the district's computer network from kindergarten to 12th grade. Because the laptop has a camera, students can take a photograph of their artwork or make a video of their school project.

"Kindergartners can take pictures of finger-paint drawings that can embarrass them the rest of their lives," Madden joked at a news conference.

Students will have their own identification code and password to protect their portfolios from intruders. Only school officials and parents will have access to the portfolios, Madden said.

Though he found the small keyboard a bit difficult at first, Mitchell, a Bullard junior, gave the 7-inch laptop a passing grade. "They call us the Y generation and sometimes the Internet generation. It's confusing what to call our generation. All I know is that technology has been part of my world."

Cantonese must be preserved: academic

An academic has defended Cantonese as a medium of instruction after a government advisory body this week backed a HK$200 million scheme to help schools use Putonghua to teach Chinese language.

The Standing Committee on Language Education and Research (Scolar) gave the go-ahead for the scheme to be implemented in 160 schools as part of a so-called "three-year tracking study".

But Pamela Leung Pui-wan, associate professor in the department of Chinese at the Hong Kong Institute of Education, said the proposal should not signal a move away from using Cantonese.

"It is a national trend to adopt Putonghua as the medium of instruction, but we can't let children miss out on the opportunity to be educated in their own dialect," Dr Leung said.

"Spoken Putonghua is similar to written Chinese and a closer medium for learning modern Chinese language, but it doesn't mean Cantonese is inferior."

"If students miss out on learning via Cantonese, it will be a real shame. Cantonese should be accurately preserved as it is a way of tracking human civilisation in the southern China region."

Although Dr Leung acknowledged the benefits of learning modern Chinese language in Putonghua, she said Cantonese made the study of ancient poetry more accurate because its pronunciation was similar to language used during the Tang and Qin dynasties.

Scolar chairman Michael Tien Pak-san said the purpose of the tracking study was to produce evidence to support using Putonghua to teach Chinese language and to raise the standards of Chinese language as part of a long-term strategy spelled out in a reform proposal published by the Curriculum Development Council.

The scheme would accept 30 primary schools and 10 secondary schools every year, with each school subsidised to hire a supplementary teacher.

Mainland consultants would also be brought in to offer advice.

Cheung Man-kwong, the lawmaker representing the education sector, said if Putonghua was not taught properly it could cause learning problems.

"This would outweigh the benefits of learning Chinese using Putonghua," he said.

Mr Cheung said he suspected there were patriotic and political rather than educational motives behind the move.

Mr Tien denied this. "We have never discussed patriotism and it will not involve political factors," he said.

Tam Yiu-chung, chairman of the pro-Beijing Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong, welcomed the scheme.

"I think this is a very good policy but it requires the correct implementation, such as teacher training and an appropriate time for the policy to mature," he said.

"The key problem for students and teachers is that there aren't many opportunities for them to actually speak the language."

Tin Shui Wai school overcomes hurdles

Xianggang Putonghua Yanxishe Primary School of Science and Creativity has been using Putonghua as a medium of instruction for all subjects except English since it opened in 2001. Principal Tong Pui-chi said her school, which uses Putonghua to teach Primary One to Six pupils subjects ranging from music to maths, struggled for the first year.

"The first year was the toughest for us because most kids didn’t understand much Putonghua,"€ Ms Tong said.

After that the Tin Shui Wai school introduced summer holiday Putonghua bridging courses, teaching pupils the basic language, common sentences and simple Pinyin (phonetics for Putonghua).

"Primary One is a transitional period for the pupils. We teach them how to use a dictionary to find out accurate pronunciation. Most are adapting well,"€ she said.

Using Putonghua as an instruction medium had proven effective in improving pupils'€™ writing ability, she said. "€œAlthough they can understand perfectly, a few shy students don'€™t like to speak in Putonghua,"€ Ms Tong said. But she added the problem could be overcome by using the right teaching methods.

70pc encounter school bullying, survey finds

Schools have been urged to step up anti-bullying measures after a survey found that 70 per cent of primary and secondary school students had encountered bullying.

The Society of Rehabilitation and Crime Prevention surveyed more than 6,600 students between Primary Three and Secondary Three from 72 schools between January and September this year.

Nearly 70 per cent of respondents said they had encountered bullying, of which 10 per cent said such incidents happened at least once a week on average.

Nearly 60 per cent of the bullying involved physical violence while 71 per cent involved verbal threats and teasing. Twenty-three per cent involved social isolation and 15 per cent were related to internet bullying.

Asked what role the students thought they might play if bullying occurred, about 20 per cent said they would probably be the victims while 10 per cent said they would be the bullies.

About 25 per cent said they would be bystanders while the remainder were unsure. The society estimated that the unsure ones would probably be bystanders as well.

"We are quite worried about the large number of students tending to be bystanders," society research and development officer Ivy Chow Pui-sze said. "They might underestimate the seriousness of bullying and think it is a game only. They do not know how to seek proper help or stop the event. Worse still, they might turn into bullies themselves one day."

In the survey, about one-third of the students thought bullying was inevitable and another one-third thought people who interfered risked their own safety.

Secondary school students tended to seek help from friends when they were bullied, while primary school students tended to seek help from parents.

"The survey has shown that bullying is common among youngsters, but many relate to it incorrectly," society planning and development business director Anthea Lee Shuk-wai said. "Schools should offer more life education to students. We encourage bystanders to try and stop bullies. Otherwise, they, and also victims, should report to their teachers and parents." Parents and teachers should talk more with children about their school life, and police should strengthen crime prevention measures on campus, she said.

$8,500 per class in grants for IT equipment

The government plans to give a one-off cash injection of HK$200 million for schools to upgrade information technology in their classrooms.

The proposal was yesterday welcomed by educators, but they urged the government to allow the schools flexibility in how they spent the money.

In a consultation paper on utilising information technology, the Education Bureau proposed granting the money to about 1,000 government-owned or government-subsidised primary and secondary schools to purchase computers and other equipment.

Senior curriculum development officer Ching Kwok-chu said the money would be commensurate with the number of classes in each school.

"We estimate each class will get about HK$8,500," he said. "We will stick to this rule even if there are only two classes in a school. We won't set a minimum amount."

He expected schools would use up the money in about three years.

Edith Tse Lai-man, headmistress of the Jordan Road Government Primary School, said the grant would be "just barely enough".

"I hope the government will lift restrictions on how to spend the money," she said.

Ms Tse's school has 18 classes and would likely get a grant of HK$153,000 under the proposal.

Besides buying more computers and visualisers - electronic imaging tools for displaying 3-D objects, artwork, printed material or live subjects - Ms Tse said she hoped to use the money to hire another IT technician, which was not allowed under the proposal.

Li Chi-shing, IT teacher at Po Leung Kuk Chee Jing Yin Primary School, welcomed the plan, but also called on the government to let schools decide how to use the money.

Education Bureau principal assistant secretary Eddie Cheung Kwok-choi said the scheme would be made as flexible as possible and schools' suggestions would be considered.

Under the Composite Information Technology Grant, a secondary school with 25 to 30 classes can get HK$294,499 a year for IT expenses, while a whole-day primary school receives HK$279,366 a year.

The government also plans to spend HK$25 million to develop an online database of teaching materials organised according to the school curriculum.

Parents will also benefit, with the government proposing to spend HK$1 million commissioning NGOs to develop resources and programmes to raise parents' computer literacy. A HK$5 million grant will be given to maintain the ITeHelp hotline, which provides technical support for schools.

Mr Cheung said the government would also scrap the IT matching-fund scheme, which has long been criticised by educators who said it had widened the gap between the haves and the have-nots.

The dollar-for-dollar plan was introduced in 2004 to improve IT infrastructure in schools. Schools must raise donations, which the bureau matches.

The public can give feedback to the Education Bureau until November 28. The government will also hold five consultation sessions for school management committee members, school heads, teachers and parents next month. The plans are to be confirmed by next January.

The time has come to act on class sizes

The education community should reject the chief executive's policy address if it does not include a commitment to reducing class sizes, a leading principal told an education forum this week.

"If the policy address does not say when small-class teaching can be implemented, I think we should not accept [the chief executive's] homework," said Tsoi Kai-chun, chairman of the Subsidised Primary Schools' Council.

Speaking at a forum on small-class teaching at Hong Kong Institute of Education on Thursday, he urged the government to begin reducing class sizes from next September.

Mr Tsoi said the chief executive should turn "adversity into an opportunity" in dealing with the declining student population.

"A third of primary schools are already being forced to teach small classes due to falling enrolments," Mr Tsoi said. "We are ready for this change. We are just waiting for this one thing: for the chief executive to give the go-ahead."

There have been reports Chief Executive Donald Tsang Yam-kuen is likely to unveil plans to extend free education to senior secondary from 2009, coinciding with the implementation of the "3+3+4" reforms.

But although speakers said it would send a positive message, some criticised the move as a political one that would have a minimal effect on the quality of education.

"This is unrelated to the quality of education," said Choi Kwok-kwong, chairman of Education Convergence. "It is not an educational question, it is a political one." The small-class issue was also political. "Once there is a loud enough call from society, it will happen," Mr Choi said.

Principal Assistant Secretary for Education Ip Ling-bik appeared to indicate the government could be willing to alter its "wait-and-see" approach to the issue. She said although the pilot study into small-class teaching in 37 primary schools would not be released until late next year, early results appeared to show benefits.

"Teachers recognise they need to change from their traditional role," Ms Ip said. "When they do . . . there is a better relationship between teachers and students."

School leadership was an important factor in how well teachers adapted to the change. "Some of the principals in the pilot scheme are able to do something to enable the school to make big changes."

Ip Kin-yuen, principal of HKICC Lee Shau Kee School of Creativity and a former lecturer at HKIEd, said it was not necessary to wait until teachers had been prepared for that change before reducing class sizes.

"I hope we can give our teachers an opportunity to learn this at the same time as they are teaching smaller classes," he said.

However, Alex Cheung Chi-hung, chairman of the Aided Primary School Heads' Council, questioned whether it would be practical to reduce class sizes across the school system starting next September.

"Schools are already crying out for help due to difficulties finding qualified English teachers."

Lai Kwok-chan, head of the HKIEd's Centre for Development and Research in Small Class Teaching, the forum organiser, said it was impossible to predict Wednesday's speech.

"We don't know what will be in the policy address as the education sector has heard nothing from the government," Dr Lai said. "We hope to hear some good news."

Consider your present situation, do you wish to have a smaller class size? Is it going to improve your learning experience?