‘Early Education Professional Development Advanced Course: Early Literacy Support (2020-2021)’ (Unit 2: Teaching in Support Program – Teaching Strategies, Class A)
'Early Education Professional Development Advanced Course: Early Literacy Support (2020-2021)’ (Unit 2: Teaching in Support Program – Teaching Strategies, Class A)
17
Jul
17/07/2021
DLCRE partnership project ‘GEG Chinese Literacy Education and Research Project’ co-organised the Teacher Training Program ‘Early Education Professional Development Advanced Course: Early Literacy Support (2020-2021)’ (Unit 2: Teaching in Support Program – Teaching Strategies, Class A).
On 17th July, 2021, GEG Chinese Literacy Education and Research Project (GEGCLEAR) and DSEDJ’s (Education and Youth Development Bureau) Division of Teacher and Research Staff Development co-hosted the ‘Early Education Professional Development Advanced Course: Early Literacy Support (2020-2021)’ (Unit 2: Teaching in Support Program – Teaching Strategies, Class A). The session was held at the Dom Bosco Auditorium at the Ilha Verde Campus of the University of Saint Joseph.
Teachers from the four participating schools in the project attended this Class A training course, all of whom have completed the Unit 1 ‘Initiating the Support Program Step-by-Step’ course in May 2021. A total of 62 kindergarten teachers from Colégio Santa Rosa de Lima (Chinese Section), Lou Hau High School Affiliated Kindergarten, Fu Luen School and Our Lady of Fatima Girls’ School (listed in no particular order) attended the class in hybrid mode with speakers from Hong Kong and Macau delivering the training via Zoom and on-site instructions and sharing.
There are two sessions in the Unit 2 training which focuses on introducing the content, features, teaching resources and methods of instruction in the GEGCLEAR support group program. As the support program would be initiated in all project schools in the upcoming school year, the two sessions aim to enhance teachers’ understanding of the program in terms of teaching and to prepare them for teaching in the support groups. Three speakers from the GEGCLEAR Hong Kong team, including the project’s director Professor Cheng Pui-Wan and Associate Directors Terry Tse and Gloria Ho first discussed about the support program’s teaching environment settings and materials using the actual recordings and teaching environment settings from existing support groups for demonstration. They then illustrated the three teaching domains in the support program, namely, ‘Language Comprehension’, ‘Prerequisite of Text Coding’ and ‘Text Coding’, respectively, unfolding the language elements and recommended corresponding teaching materials in each domain.
After the instructions of each domain, participating teachers designed and demonstrated their teaching activities to the whole class by adopting the teaching materials and resources provided by GEGCLEAR. Participating teachers got into groups and role-played as teachers and kindergarteners to demonstrate the actual teaching process. They combined their self-designed materials together with the provided resources to facilitate their teaching, their teaching activities were prepared and conducted vividly which engaged the other teacher-audiences. After each group’s demonstration, audiences in other groups offered their feedback and suggestions to the demonstrating group. This facilitated stimulation and exchanges among teachers and encouraged learning from each other. Two Macau speakers, Professor Miranda Mak from the University of Macau and Amanda Lei, director of Colégio Santa Rosa de Lima Kindergarten (Chinese Section), also shared their comments and suggestions in optimising the quality of the teaching. Participating teachers reflected that the demonstrations have enhanced their teaching skills in providing support for kindergarteners’ Chinese literacy.
Subsequent sessions of the course would be held in the upcoming months. Class B of Unit 2 will be held on 28th August, and the two sessions of Unit 3 ‘Accommodation in Support Program’ are expected to be held in September, 2021.
