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Hong Kong politics
CommentHong Kong
Kerry Kennedy
Kerry Kennedy

Opinion | How will national education be implemented in Hong Kong? Teacher training, student learning need more reflection

  • Teachers need time and support to get to grips with national education subjects and put together new lessons and materials
  • Metrics must also be agreed on for assessing exactly what students are taking away from these lessons, and whether changes need to be made

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Illustration: Stephen Case
Kerry Kennedy
In a recent editorial, the Post argued that “teachers need clear guidance to deliver on national education”. The article highlighted the need to provide teachers with support and relevant resources. This was a timely intervention.
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It raised the question of how Hong Kong’s education authority can best prepare schools and teachers to implement a curriculum that was first signalled around 2010, then highly contested in 2012, leading to the shelving of the proposed new subject, moral and national education. The need to support teachers in the current environment is an important call and so is the issue of finding space in an increasingly crowded school curriculum.

Yet more reflection is needed, especially on how national education is to be implemented and what students are expected to learn. There are several issues to be addressed, including how different education initiatives can work together, how further curriculum development can support national education and how feedback can be obtained on the development of students’ knowledge, skills and attitudes.

There are currently two core initiatives that make up national education, supplemented by the infusion of relevant content into selected school subjects. One concerns the Chinese constitution and the Basic Law. Initiated in 2017 following the chief executive’s policy address, it requires 51 hours of instruction, with the bulk of that time devoted to “Chinese history” and “life and society”. If schools do not teach these two subjects, a module can be specifically developed with relevant content.

The second core initiative relates to the new requirements of the national security law and has a broader scope, as pointed out by the Education Bureau: “the fundamentals of National Security Education are to develop in students a sense of belonging to the country, an affection for the Chinese people, a sense of national identity, as well as an awareness of and a sense of responsibility for safeguarding national security”.
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