國際學校課程是否較local淺

WYmom

I refer you to read a passage from Sing Tao today as below.  I suggest you do some basic research on different schools, IS, local, DSS, private etc. first.  Different IS schools use different cirriculum, different method, different standard, different quality, different assessments/exams....  suitable for different kids of different characters and different family backgrounds.  After doing the research, I believe you can find answers to your "very" generalised question(s).

報讀國際學校 了解理念防錯配
------家長八達通------

國 際 學 校 是 家 長 的 另 類 選 擇 ， 但 家 長 為 子 女 報 讀 前 ， 應 了 解 有 關 學 校 的 情 況 。  
最近，開始有些K2家長問Elsie揀小學的意見，其中部分就問到揀國際學校要注意的地方，包括教學情況、功課量、中文課的比例等。恰巧老友Patrick最近向Elsie吐苦水，說想為其在國際學校讀書、即將升讀第八班的女兒轉校，可惜她成績太差，報了幾所學校，都不獲取錄，故近來忙於為女兒找學校。

　　Elsie很奇怪，Patrick女兒就讀的國際學校，頗具知名度，不少家長慕名為子女報讀，都因滿額而只能候補，或者要待有學生退學而插班。Patrick女兒在該校讀了七年，為甚麼竟想退學呢？

　　Patrick就話，女兒入讀該校頭幾年，一直覺得教學模式輕鬆、功課少；雖然校方不會公布學生成績名次，但據Patrick向班主任了解，女兒的成績處於中下游位置。「儘管如此，老師也不是太

bighug

WYmom,

Thanks for sharing the passage.

Newton

In terms of academic, I guess even the top notch IS in HK may not catch up with famous local school. It might be confusing that those IS have more students getting into famous universities. The reason is that students from local and IS are taking different exams, one is harder than the others. It literally means that local students take harder entrance exam for mediocre local universities (well even HKU from international standard is only mediocre) while IS students take easier exam for top international universities. If all students from famous local schools take the GCE AL / OL exam, I am not surprise a whole load of 6A / 13A as the outcomes. Then let alone Oxbridge which depend also on interviews, maybe nearly 8 out of 10 can get into LSE that kind of schools. Comparing to GSIS where may be one-fourth of students can make it, famous local school are just miles away.

Having said that, students from top local schools do not perform particularly well after school, at least it is what I can see from where I work. They tend to lack some global vision and social skills. They may be excellent on academic (here I merely mean that getting a high grade in exam) but unless they are working in academia, these are not critical for success in general.

The choice of IS vs local is not a straight forward pursuant of academic excellence. The education as a whole is also not purely academic knowledge reception and presentation. I have seen enough HKCEE straight A students end up living unhappily for pretty much of their after school life as they think their achievement should be higher than the others purely because they clinge themselves too much on their academic excellence. That's in my opinion is the consequence of local style education which target to produce high-grade mediocre.

I personally have no doubt that IS is weaker than local school in academic results but it does not rule out that education from IS is better.

mattsmum

from SCMP:
CAIS: 100% gained the ontario secondary school diploma,

CIS: overall average IB diploma of 35 (IB scale of 24-45), 99% pass rate, one perfect score,

FIS: international section: overall average IB diploma score of 34.5(IB scale of 24-45), , half the students were awarded bilingual diplomas,

GSIS: 100% pass rate at A-level, 53.8% A grades,

HKIS:high school graduation as per US system, over 50% of 2006 class were AP scholars, 25% of whom gained dsitinction,

American IS: 92% grade 12 senior class
graduated with high school diplma,

Califonia school: 80% of S7 students go on to university,

CAPLLau MIS: over the past 5 years, nearly 100% of G12 students earned G12 standing,

YC: one third of IB diploma candindates scored 36 or higher (IB scale of 24-45), of which 40% gained 40. the highest score was 44.

Sear rogers IS: 70% pass rate at A-level and 80% as AS-level and IGCSE,

EFS: there are small differences in results between schools and between subjects, across the foundation, 91.34% of entries for last summer's GCSEs gained grade A* to C, with 49.53% achieving A or A*,

for A level, the pass rate was 98.6% with 42.3% at grade A.

at sha tin college, 25 students achieved 40 points or above in the IB diploma.

ChiChiPaPa

Newton，

很同意你的看法。當年自己讀中六時，有考GCE A-level，

nintendo

國際學校係唔係較本地學校淺？
到中學畢業，國際學校學生學到的，應該比本地學生多 ( 除了中文 )。但學習 "進度" ，本地學校肯定快。舉個例，本地有些幼稚園有教孩子九因歌，國際學校一般要 P3 (即本地學校 P2) 先教乘數。不過，上到中學，差距已不大，我個人覺得，反正 "結果" 都一樣，點解唔慢慢學，先打好基礎？

至於其他方面，我亦唔覺得國際學校淺。

local school 係分科制，甚麼科學，通識，等等，總之書本列明學習重點，老師跟著教，學生跟著學；學科亦有既定範圍，孩子不用學額外的，總之跟著課程走就好了。
國際學校課堂上冇明確分科，學習是一籃子的，例如今次學昆蟲，可能一齊學乘數 x 6，因為昆蟲有都有 6 隻腳。而學科雖然都有範圍，但孩子們都可以隨著喜好，跟老師更深入的討論，國際小學少測驗考試，老師可更充分利用時間教學和討論。

國際學校小學專註訓練孩子大量閱讀和寫作，為中學大學的分科學習鋪路 ( 國際小學一般很少會分科 )。到中學，課程都很 demanding，學生要懂得自學，課堂亦會有大量的討論，學生往往會跟老師傾得面紅耳赤，老師都不覺學生不尊師重道。本地學校，老師都 provide 學生各類的筆記，"精華資料" ，學生乖乖的跟著溫習就好了。

Newton 寫道:
In terms of academic, I guess even the top notch IS in HK may not catch up with famous local school.

高中公開試的成績資料我不清楚，但本地學生考試叻唔係秘密了，各種精讀班，甚麼補習天王都有，而且，本地學生數目，遠高於國際學校學生數目，單單係所謂本地名校的數目，比全部國際中學數目加埋都多。HKCEE 好多人有 10A，但全軍覆沒的都不少，拿 10A 或 9A 的學生，我都深信佢地係叻仔叻女，但大部份中游的學生，佢地係有真功夫，還是靠上精讀班惡補，就真係佢自己先知。其實國際學校都有好多學生 GCE，IGCSE 名列前茅的，IB 學校的成績，亦都不錯，要知道，國際學校考的試是國制性的，能名列前茅都唔叻？可惜國際學校學生始終相對人數少，中文報紙亦唔會有興趣報導，即使報導了，都唔會有人有興趣細看了。

唔好講到 d 大學都咁蠢，有邊間學校會唔收個叻的學生，而收一個差的呢？如果某國際學校學生的確未達標，一定唔會被取錄。據我知，香港各間大學，不單收本地的學生，其他國家的學生都收，大學當然會有一套分辨學生水平的方法喇，點解唔可以接受，人地入到大學，係因為人地有水準呢？

ChiChiPaPa

早前羅定邦中學中五生陳瀚道，可以以非聯招途徑跳級入讀中大，都係因為學校願意幫他報考英國會考及高考。

希望有多些本地學校可以突破學制上的約制，並為學生報考國際的中學及預科考試。

要學生靈活變通，懂得思考，學校要先做個榜樣。

Kycmc

The strength of a curriculum should be judged by its success in educating a person's mind. How much has been covered and how hard the materials are are irrelevant if a child cannot benefit from it.

I personally went through the local system and was a successful example (entering Uni with good results). The A Level at my time was really tough, but looking back I would say it was useless, because it didn't develop me as a thinker.

Newton

Christf,

Hope you realize that you were basically elaborating the arguments that I made and it was really unnecessary to be offensive right from the start of your message added with an exclamation mark.

ChingChingDad

Hi Newton,

I like your analysis, especially the statement:
"Local students take harder entrance exam for mediocre local universities while IS students take easier exam for top international universities."

This is exactly the main reason why I sent my son to IS.


I want to add my own:
"Local students are tortured by mediocre teachers   while IS students are nurtured by excellent teachers. "

WYmom

Agree to all comments here.  Just feel that it is not necessary to compare IS standards with local system all the time.  It is very tiring.  The system is basically very different.  For example, my daughter at Y6 (equals to P.5 of local schools) studied World War II already, she can tell lots of details, events and characters without memorizing hard facts, and learn different perspectives of different countries based on the same event (they have kids from different countries playing different roles, which is really international).  In local school, this chapter is learnt in secondary F.2 or F.3.  So how do you compare the standard?  I would not think that it is appropriate to compare it by level and subjects. I only feel that learning in IS has much more breadth and depth.

Knowledge learning is an endless journey in our lives, once the kids grasp the basic language, reading and communication skills and have the self-motivation and interest, they can learn much much more and accelerate on their own.  So I think developing good and solid foundation is much more important than hurrying to learn a few levels above normal in early stages.

ChiChiPaPa

但我以為大家應該歡迎和面對各類的比較。

知不足，才可有進步。

香港大部份的孩子都是在本地學校受教育。本地學校的教學制度和教學素質對香港的未來最為重要。

我們必須面對及承認它的缺點和不足，並在自己能力的範圍內，幫孩子作出相應的改善。

mattsmum

parents here care about their child and do  a lot of research about schools and education.

it would be good to here both pros and cons.

thank you all. I learn a lot here.

joyfung

"Local students are tortured by mediocre teachers " is not true. Actually, the teachers are tortured by the ED system. We, teachers, cannot change the local education system. We work very hard to help our students. We know they are facing loads of assessments and examinations. It is sad to see our students know nothing except the text books. That is also the reason I send my children to IS.

原文章由 ChingChingDad 於 07-6-26 01:55 發表
Hi Newton,

I like your analysis, especially the statement:
"Local students take harder entrance exam for mediocre local universities while IS students take easier exam for top international u ...