2.3.1 Introduction
Putonghua is becoming more and more important in Hong Kong. Since 1998, Putonghua has become one of the core subjects in Hong Kong Primary and Secondary schools. In the year 2000, Putonghua became one of the examination subjects in the HKCEE. On top of all these developments, entrants to the teaching profession who wish to teach Putonghua will need, from September 2000, to demonstrate achievement of the Putonghua Benchmark standard set by Government. This means that graduates of the HKIEd from this academic year onwards have to pass the Putonghua Benchmark Test within their Certificate or degree programmes. Exceptionally in the 1999-2000 academic year students will have a year after graduation to achieve the standard. From 2000 on they need to attain the standard within their programmes of study before they can become qualified Putonghua teachers. These changes have led to a growing demand for well-qualified Putonghua teachers to enter the profession from the teacher education programmes. In addition to these professional preparation needs, there is also a need for general education to ensure that prospective teachers will be able to demonstrate the trilingual competence expected of a professional teacher in Hong Kong.
2.3.2 Aims of the Putonghua Enhancement Programme
The Putonghua Enhancement Programme (PEP) aims to support the existing mainstream programmes. In order to assist pre-service and in-service teachers to achieve the required language proficiency level, a series of progressive modules complementary to the mainstream programme modules is provided for Putonghua elective students. In order to provide opportunities for all students to develop their Putonghua competence to meet their general social needs in using the language, modules are designed to strengthen their Putonghua foundations.
2.3.3 Putonghua Enhancement Programme Complementary to Mainstream Programme
The PEP consists of pre-service and in-service enhancement courses. Pre-service courses comprise the Certificate in Education (CE), Bachelor in Primary Education (BEd(P)) and Postgraduate Diploma of Education in Primary Education (PGDE(P)) courses. CE courses include Certificate in Secondary Education (CE(S)), Certificate in Primary Education (CE(P)) and Certificate in Kindergarten Education (CE(KG)) courses. In-service Enhancement courses comprise the Putonghua Language Course (PLC I and II), Putonghua Methodology Course (PMC), 16-week block release course for Teachers of Putonghua in Primary schools (PP), and 16-week block release course for Teachers of Putonghua in Secondary schools (PS).
2.3.4 Modules Offered in 1999-2000
Modules Offered from July to August 1999
Courses offered in the summer were mainly for two categories of students:
1. Final year CE(P) and CE(S) students who cannot obtain Grade 2B or above in the State Putonghua Proficiency Test are encouraged to take a module on "Correction of Pronunciation" and "Speech Training" as a final brush up of their Putonghua proficiency before they join the teaching profession.
2. Non-Putonghua elective students who have finished the compulsory General Education module "Basic Putonghua" in the mainstream CE programmes.
Modules and student enrolment figures in the summer of 1999 are shown in the following table:
Modules Offered in Semesters 1&2 (September 1999 – June 2000)
The PEP provided courses for Putonghua elective students as well as non-Putonghua elective students in the 1st semester. The result of Putonghua exit test administered in 1999-2000 revealed that students are quite weak in Listening Comprehension. Thus, the module on "Listening Training" was offered in the 2nd semester. Moreover, with the Putonghua Benchmark requirement in mind, the module on "Putonghua Classroom Language "was offered in order to facilitate our students attainment of the required Putonghua Benchmark level. The following tables summarise the courses provided in semesters 1 and 2:
2.3.5 Individual Remedial Tutorials
Students who fail in Putonghua teaching in Teaching Practice (TP) are referred by their TP supervisor to PEP tutors to take individual remedial tutorials to improve their Putonghua proficiency before supplementary TP is arranged. The target students will be given a maximum of 60 hours’ remedial tutorials according to their individual needs.
2.3.6 The Putonghua Clinic
The Putonghua Clinic aims to provide individual assistance to all full-time and part-time students in all aspects of Putonghua learning which includes correction of pronunciation, speech training, Putonghua recitation, etc.
The Clinic was opened two hours a day during weekdays for eight weeks in the summer of 1999. The number of student consultations (limited to fifteen minutes each) was 110. The total consultation time was 27.5 hours. The usage rate was 34%. The Clinic was opened three hours a day during weekdays for eighteen weeks in the 1st and 2nd semesters. The Clinic was opened for 261 hours and the total consultation time was 202 hours in the 1st semester. The number of student consultation was 807. The usage rate was 77%. The Clinic was opened for 258 hours and the total consultation time was 170 hours in the 2nd semester. The number of student consultations was 679. The usage rate was 66%.
The number of consultation rose to 58 per week during the peak period. The usage rate rose to 96.7%. During the peak period, such as the time when the State Putonghua Proficiency Test was approaching, a booking limitation of 45 minutes per week was imposed on every student. The number of student consultations dropped during the period of examination and teaching practice.
In order to assure the quality of the service, instructors are required to record the details of each visit and students are encouraged to evaluate the service after each consultation. 99% of our students ticked the column ‘Good’. Moreover, a Feedback Mailbox has been set up to collect students’ overall opinions on the Clinic service. Seven items were of mail were collected (100%) expressing positive feedback and asking for extension of consultation hours.
Putonghua Classroom（Individual Consultation）
With the demand for extension of individual consultation time and the flexibility of the consultation time, a Putonghua classroom consultation service was provided on top of Putonghua Clinic. Under this service students can have individual consultation with an enhancement tutor by arranging an appointment time with the tutors directly. The number of consultation time, the number of consultations and usage rate for the 1st and the 2nd semesters are listed below:
According to 135 questionnaires collected, 42% of the assistance given related to “Correction of Pronunciation”, 36% to “Putonghua Recitation” and 22% to “Teaching Methodology”. 100% of students agreed that the tutors’ advice was very useful, practical and that they would recommend the “Putonghua Classroom” to their classmates.
2.3.7 Admission System
The target students for Putonghua Language Enhancement are both in-service teachers and pre-service students. Pre-service students are divided into Putonghua elective and non-elective streams. For Putonghua electives in the Certificate, PGDE(P) and BEd(P) programmes who cannot achieve “B” grade or above in the mainstream programme, the courses are compulsory. Students who have achieved grade “B” or above can take the modules voluntarily.
Non-elective pre-service Certificate students are encouraged to sign up for various modules specially designed for them to enhance their Putonghua communicative ability.
Putonghua elective in-service teachers such as PLC, PMC, CE(KG), PP and PS participants are also encouraged to sign up for the relevant modules according to their learning needs and weaknesses.
2.3.8 Quality Assurance
The following Quality Assurance mechanisms have been put into place:
2.3.9 Review of Effectiveness
End of Term Module and Teaching Evaluation
Quantitative responses are collected by asking students to respond to a series of statements regarding the content and delivery of the course. Responses are summarised below which indicate that the majority of our course participants were satisfied with the modules offered by the PEP:
Qualitative responses are collected by asking students to write down their personal remarks and suggestions which indicated that the effectiveness of the course and the good performance of the instructors were acknowledged. Some students requested the extension of teaching hours.
End of Term Assessment
The aim of the PEP is to help the students with Putonghua level below grade “B” to attain grade “B” or above. In order to have an objective indicator of the effectiveness of PEP courses, a pre-test and a post-test for various modules such as “Hanyu Pinyin”, “Correction of Pronunciation”, “Speech Training I” and “Speech Training II” have been devised in this academic year.
In the first semester, 71% of our students attained grade “B” or above. The percentage of Putonghua elective students attaining grade “B” or above (87%) is higher than the non-elective students (55%) due to the low entry level of non-Putonghua elective students. Putonghua elective students performed extraordinarily well in the module “Correction of Pronunciation” for which 100% students attained grade “B” or above. Non-Putonghua elective students performed well in the module “Putonghua Recitation Training”. The overall improvement of students was 91%. The improvement in the written test (241%) was far more than that in oral the test (125%).
Improvement among non-elective students was much higher than for elective students due to the near zero entry level of non-Putonghua elective students. For elective students, more impressive results are seen in “Hanyu Pinyin II” (47% improvement) than in “Correction of Pronunciation and Speech Training” (17% improvement shown). For non-elective students, improvement in “Hanyu Pinyin” (224%) was higher than that for “Learning Putonghua through Songs” (128%) and “Putonghua Recitation Training” (119%).
Test Evaluation: Semester 1
In the second semester, 96% of students attained grade “B” or above. 100% of students attained grade “B” or above for “Hanyu Pinyin”, “Speech Training I”, “Speech Training II” and “Listening Training”. Students also performed quite well in “Classroom Language” (96%) and “Correction of Pronunciation” (81%).
Comparing the post-test and pre-test results, the overall improvement was 22%. The improvement in the written test (27.5%) was also far more than that in the oral test (9%). The improvement in “Listening Training” is the highest (33%). Students also improved well on “Correction of Pronunciation” (26%) and “Speech Training I” modules (26%).
Test Evaluation: Semester 2
2.3.10 Putonghua Seminars and Guest Speakers
In March 2000, the PEP and CEP invited Prof. Chew Cheng Hai to evaluate the PEP and give two seminars which were on ‘The training of pre-service Putonghua language teachers’ and ‘The training of in-service Putonghua language teachers’. The seminars were very successful and fruitful and Professor Chew’s feedback on the Enhancement programmes was highly constructive and valuable.
2.3.11 Self-access Learning Materials
In order to promote self-learning, the PEP instructors are devising self-access learning materials tailored to students’ needs. “Hanyu Pinyin” and “Learning Putonghua through Songs” self-learning packages have been completed and put in the Chinese Learning Centre and Main Library for students’ easy access.
In order to enable students to learn without the limitation of time and place, web-based teaching and learning materials for various modules such as “Hanyu Pinyin”, “Listening Training”, “Speech Training”, “Correction of Pronunciation” and “Learning Putonghua through Songs” have been designed and put on the web site of CLE for students to access at any time.
2.3.12 Putonghua Exit Standard Test
In order to help our students to familiarise themselves with the content, form, difficulty level and question type of the external Putonghua Benchmark Examination devised by HKEA, the PEP has conducted the 3rd Putonghua Exit Standard Test in collaboration with the Chinese Department in March 2000. Following the design of the sample Benchmark test paper issued by the Advisory Committee on Teacher Education and Qualification (ACTEQ), the test includes four papers: Paper 1: Listening Comprehension, Paper 2: Hanyu Pinyin, Paper 3: Speaking, and Paper 4: Classroom Language. The number of participants this year has risen (158) compared with that of last year (125). Among 158 participants, 31 are PP students who attended the test voluntarily in their study period. The number of participants for various courses is shown below
:
Since pre-service students are the main target students for the PEP, test results for the pre-service teachers and in-service teachers have been analysed separately in order to gain some indication of the effectiveness of the enhancement course for pre-service students:
The difficulty of the papers this year is slightly higher than last year. But pre-service teachers still performed well in the four papers. Students performed extraordinarily well in Paper II and Paper IV. Compared with the less satisfactory result of the in-service teachers who have not benefited from a Enhancement course, the results of the pre-service students reflect that the PEP complements the mainstream programme positively and effectively.
Result slips with a detailed record of performance results on the four papers have been distributed to participants for their reference and future improvement. Moreover, two Benchmark Test Enhancement Classes have been arranged in the summer to help those students who have not attained satisfactory results to attain the required Putonghua standard according to their various needs and weaknesses.
2.3.13 Future Development
Publication of Learning Materials
The PEP has successfully applied for the Institute’s financial support for the publication of six books on Putonghua learning. They are:
1. Putonghua Recitation Training 普通話朗誦訓練
2. Practical Putonghua Speech Training 實用普通話說話訓練
3. Hanyu Pinyin Self Learning Package漢語拼音自學教材
4. Commonly used Homophones and Polyphones in Putonghua常用多音字同音字手冊
5. Putonghua Speech Training普通話說話訓練
6. Learning Putonghua through Songs Self Learning Package說說唱唱普通話自學教材
Publications on other topics in accordance with the needs of the students will be developed in due course.