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Re: 反思教改
Some teachers had commited suicide because of Education Reform. What are the reasons for the students to commit suicide since long long time ago. Has Mr Cheung Man Kwong done something for the students?
SCMP Saturday, January 14, 2006
WHAT WE SAY
Why not try working smarter not harder?
KATHERINE FORESTIER, Education Editor
Suicide experts are always cautious about making swift judgments about the reasons why people take their own lives. When students take such tragic action - as about eight have this academic year - there is a reluctance among educators to blame the school or the education system for the pressure that may have contributed.
This is even the case when children run out of classrooms and throw themselves off school balconies, as has happened at least twice in the past two years.
Students have no voice to raise their concerns. But when two teachers die, the teachers' union is very quick to lay the blame on pressure of work.
Whatever the causes, the past week was a watershed, with education reforms facing their fiercest criticism.
The reforms should not be scuppered as they represent Hong Kong's most concerted effort to modernise its education system, in the interests of students.
After years of consultation in the late 1990s, the Education Commission had concluded that if its lofty goals were to be achieved, sweeping change was needed, from curriculum and assessment to school management. Many reflect best international practice and work elsewhere quite smoothly. But they were bound to be a challenge.
The problem is that innovative ideas are being grafted on to a system that remains deeply hierarchical and inflexible. This applies at every level, from petty demands made in new quality assurance requirements for schools and teachers, to petty demands by principals of their staff - sitting through hours of staff meetings, sometimes amounting to nothing more than a principal's monologue, being one example.
What is needed is a greater collegial culture. And there is also the need for a new respect for people's time. Working teachers into the ground is counter-productive. They will not be able to deliver the inspired lessons many hope for. They need reasonable working hours, decent holidays and, when burnout threatens, even the option to take sabbatical leave.
But spare a thought also for students. The form-filling teachers do is matched by dull, excessive exercise-book filling by students. And like teachers, their holidays are unnecessarily encroached upon. Very few will have spent the recent Christmas holidays without wading through tedious holiday workbooks.
All this is against the spirit of the reforms if the aim really is to harness best international practice.
There are many indicators that both teachers and students are overworked and stressed. Few initiatives can do anything about this, unless attitudes change and all parties in education treat each other in a more modern, democratic way, coupled with the realisation that support is needed to help them work smarter, not harder - and have fun while they're about it. |
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發表於 06-1-20 12:01
