Welcome to the web page of the Centre for Language in Education. The Centre was established in the Hong Kong Institute of Education (HKIEd) in September 1997. In the period since our first establishment our staff has grown from just 3 people in 1997 to over 30 now. In addition to our own full-time staff, we enjoy the support of the entire community at HKIEd and have extremely close relationships with the Departments of English and Chinese.

The main functions of the Centre are to advance and support the language proficiency of all student teachers and in-service course participants through a comprehensive framework of language enhancement programmes in English and Chinese and Putonghua. This web page provides a vehicle for delivering part of this enhancement as you will discover if you click on the Language Enhancement icon. Here you will find Language Enhancement activities in English and Chinese as well as links to other websites with similar resources. In addition, the CLE is required to play an active role in language research, publication and policy development within the HKIEd.

The CLE also operates the English Learning Centre and the Arthur Samy Chinese Language Learning Centre. These Centres provide a range of language-related self-access resources, self-learning packages, independent learning areas and multi-media facilities which staff, students and inservice participants can use. Academic staff of the CLE also conduct a range of language support activities within the Centres. These include, individual and small group language counselling via language help desks, conversation classes, and informal language-related classes on topics related to academic study and personal language use.

All staff of the CLE are committed to developing a discussion of language issues and the support and advancement of individual language proficiency. We support the vision of the HKIEd through language enhancement activities and programmes that nurture knowledgeable, caring and responsible educators.

In all students and participants we seek to develop multilingualism, to encourage flexibility of mind and a commitment to lifelong language learning, and professionalism.

I hope you find our web page interesting and informative. Please let us have your comments by email at cle@ied.edu.hk.

Dr. Jane Lockwood