研究故事

The Faculty of Education develops a programme to help local schools cope with government's Medium of Instruction policy.

Two years ago, the Government implemented what it termed a 'fine-tuning' of its Medium of Instruction (MOI) policy, giving individual schools increased autonomy regarding decisions on the MOI adopted within each school. Many schools wanted to seize the opportunity to increase students' exposure to English Medium Instruction (EMI). However, it was not simply a question of switching languages – it soon became evident that while the 'fine-tuning' shift represented an opportunity to schools, it also represented a major challenge.

"The challenge is to switch MOI without undermining students' successful learning of subjects," explains Professor Stephen Andrews, Dean of the Faculty of Education. "Since many students struggle with subjects like maths and science even in their first language, asking them to study those subjects in a second language, English – which they also may be finding difficult to learn – could have disastrous results."

The problem may be further exacerbated if teachers of those subjects have little or no experience of EMI teaching. "In short, it can result in the worst of both worlds," says Professor Andrews. "Despite increased exposure to English, students' English proficiency shows no improvement, while the teaching of the content subject becomes impoverished, with teachers focusing on transmitting knowledge in the second language (spoon-feeding to try to ensure comprehension) rather than providing the intellectually rich and challenging learning experience that students might have enjoyed in the first language."

"Persuading teachers is my number one job... I have to convince them of the need for professional development across the curriculum."

Professor Angel Lin

The full version of this article was originally published in Bulletin. Please click here to view this HKU publication.