News

We are pleased to share with you that Dr Jan van Aalst, Associate Professor of the Academic Unit of Social Contexts and Policies of Education, has been elected a 2020 Fellow of the ISLS.

The ISLS is a leading professional society for academics, professionals and students seeking to advance the science and practices of learning. It brings together those interested in learning experiences across schools, homes, workplaces and communities who seek to understand how collaboration and learning are enabled by knowledge, tools, networks and social structures.

The ISLS Fellows programme recognises those who have made major contributions to the field of the Learning Sciences. These individuals are each highly accomplished scholars and community members who will continue to serve in critical roles for the society in the future through their continued leadership and mentorship activities.

This honour is in recognition of Dr van Aalst’s substantial contributions to the learning sciences. Please join us in congratulating Dr van Aalst on his achievement!

We are pleased to share that Dr Susan Bridges, Assistant Dean (Learning & Teaching), has been elected Chairperson of the SIG for Problem-Based Education for a two-year term beginning in April 2020.

The SIG for problem-based education is to provide a professional forum and network for those involved in research, theory, teaching and development in problem-based learning for kindergarten through professional school learners.

The AERA is a research society which was founded in 1916. It aims to improve the educational process by encouraging scholarly inquiry related to education and evaluation and by promoting the dissemination and practical application of research results. Its 25,000 members are faculty, researchers, graduate students, and other distinguished professionals with rich and diverse expertise in education research. Nearly 14% of the members represent over 96 countries, making the society international.

For details of the AERA, please visit https://www.aera.net/.

Congratulations to Dr Bridges on her new role!

The Faculty of Education at the University of Hong Kong is fully aware of the impact of the coronavirus outbreak on this year’s Hong Kong Diploma of Secondary Education Examination (HKDSE) candidates, and the amount of support they need. In spite of school closures, the key HKDSE written examinations remain on schedule. This means that the candidates have had to continue examination preparations via online lessons during the school suspension period.

In light of this, Ms Tanya Kempston, Lecturer of the Faculty’s Academic Unit of Teacher Education and Learning Leadership initiated a series of “Top Tips for DSE” videos. She invited Postgraduate Diploma in Education in English (Secondary) students to share their own experiences of how they prepared for the English Paper 1 (Reading), Paper 2 (Writing) and Paper 3 (Listening and Integrated Skills) in three separate videos. The student teachers also shared tips on how to tackle the questions and encouraged the DSE candidates.

The videos are uploaded onto the Faculty’s YouTube channel. Please visit the link below and watch the videos: 
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL0EKcmHAUV3LRO_XwHcr2TtwzjhM-rSas

The Faculty of Education at the University of Hong Kong emphasises and values partnerships with individual schools and school networks. In the current situation, when teaching and learning have to be conducted online, we understand that teachers need additional support in preparing online teaching. The SUP Office is therefore working especially hard to support local teachers at this time.

The SUP Office, together with the Faculty’s teacher education students, has produced several sets of teaching materials for Physics teachers, which are suitable for both face-to-face and online teaching. These materials cover concepts which secondary school students often find difficult to understand. Each set contains a video with bilingual subtitles and a teacher’s manual for easy explanation to students. In addition, bilingual worksheets or handouts for students are provided as part of most of the sets.

Through producing such teaching materials, not only have our students gained hands-on experience for their future career development, but they have also contributed to the overall enhancement of teaching and learning with the help of technology, creating a win-win situation both for society and for our student teachers.

Below is a list of resources prepared by our students from different programmes under the supervision of Ms Promail Leung, Director of the SUP Office and Senior Lecturer in the Academic Unit of Teacher Education and Learning Leadership (TELL):

1. 3D Magnetic Flux Model by Chui Man Hin and Leung Pui Fong [Postgraduate Diploma in Education (PGDE) in Physics (Secondary)]: https://resources.hkedcity.net/resource_detail.php?rid=739675592

2. Fidget Spinner Experiment by Chow Chin Long, Luk Cheuk Hei and Tse Hei Man [Bachelor of Education and Bachelor of Science (BEd&BSc)]: https://resources.hkedcity.net/resource_detail.php?rid=346636743

3. Free-body box by Leung Ka Long, Ho Shing Hei and Yeung Wing Ki [PGDE in Physics (Secondary)]:
https://resources.hkedcity.net/resource_detail.php?rid=755263439

4. Visualisation of Centripetal Acceleration by Luk Cheuk Hei and Poon Ka Yeung (BEd&BSc):
https://resources.hkedcity.net/resource_detail.php?rid=2098757445

5. Investigating Moment of Force by a Ruler by Chow Chin Long (BEd&BSc):
https://resources.hkedcity.net/resource_detail.php?rid=1917567556

6. Random Moving Electrons by Hui Yuet, Kwong Ho Yin and Vijay Kishan Pahilwani [PGDE in Mathematics (Secondary)]:
https://resources.hkedcity.net/resource_detail.php?rid=367067845

7. See the Unseen: Ray Diagram Visualising Model by So Chin Long [PGDE in Physics (Secondary)] and Wan Ching Ho (Bachelor of Science): https://resources.hkedcity.net/resource_detail.php?rid=1915585342

For more details of SUP, please visit https://web.edu.hku.hk/community/school-university-partnerships.

The Faculty of Education at the University of Hong Kong has a longstanding commitment to engaging and serving the community. In light of the outbreak of the novel coronavirus in Hong Kong, it is understandable that the adoption of online teaching has been unexpected and difficult for many teachers. Apart from the technologies involved, how to design an online course is also a major challenge. In light of this, our Faculty members would like to share some helpful tips in online learning design with teachers and the community.

The e-Learning Team of the Faculty operates a blog with our teachers’ regular sharing of their experience in online teaching. In a recent blog post contributed by Professor Nancy Law, Deputy Director of the Centre for Information Technology in Education (CITE) of the Faculty, she has shared how she converted a blended learning design course with intensive group work and interactions into a fully online course, and how teachers might address the challenges they face in the design process.

The course, named Learning Design and Technology, is an elective course in the Master of Science in Information Technology in Education [MSc(ITE)] programme. Students are required to develop a mini-course of three to four sessions, at levels varying from kindergarten to higher education. The mini-course should also involve the use of learning technology. For both the students and the course instructor, it is a precious learning opportunity as they all need to apply what they have learnt to the practical demands of the current situation.

In the blog post, Professor Law introduced the objectives and content of the course, and how the course was transformed from being blended with weekly 3-hour face-to-face sessions to fully online while still remaining highly interactive. Please visit https://elearning.edu.hku.hk/2020/02/26/adapting-learning-design-for-a-learning-design-course/ to read the full blog post and watch the video.

As announced on March 4, 2020, the Faculty of Education at the University of Hong Kong is ranked seventh globally in the latest QS World University Rankings by Subject 2020. The Faculty has been listed in the top ten of the QS rankings by subject for six years in a row.

Four performance indicators were used to assess the universities, with weightings recalibrated for each subject. The indicators and their weightings for the education subject are: 1) academic reputation (50%); 2) employer reputation (10%); 3) citations per paper (20%); and 4) H-index (20%), which measures both the productivity and impact of a scholar’s publications. The Faculty achieved an overall score of 86.1, scoring strongly on all the criteria.

The Faculty has a long history of more than 100 years in preparing teachers, initially as the Department for the Training of Teachers within the Faculty of Arts back in 1917. It has evolved greatly and today serves as the premier teacher education institution in Hong Kong. The Faculty’s exceptionally high quality of research and teaching leads to consistently outstanding performance in various world university rankings. The Faculty is also ranked first in Hong Kong, reaffirming its leading position in education both globally and locally.

Professor A. Lin Goodwin, Dean of the Faculty, remarked, “We are very pleased with the results as they demonstrate that our research and teaching are highly appreciated. This recognition also indicates that we are on the right track in education and teacher training. Our continuing success is thanks to the consistent effort of all the staff members, and our students and alumni who have contributed handsomely to research, learning and teaching as well as knowledge exchange. Even though this academic year has been challenging and full of uncertainties, we are certain about two things: our faculty members are determined to continue striving for excellence, and to be leaders in education. In the coming years, I am confident that the Faculty will be even more successful in improving community life through education, and cultivating competent and dedicated graduates.”

The Faculty has been focusing on enhancing student learning through effective use of technologies. This has become especially important given the outbreak of the novel coronavirus in Hong Kong, as a result of which teaching and learning have to be conducted online. Some of our Faculty members would like to share their skills, knowledge and experience in online teaching and collaboration with teachers and the community.

Resources and Tips on Online Teaching and Collaboration

The e-Learning Team of the Faculty, led by Dr Susan Bridges, our Assistant Dean (Learning & Teaching), have invited several teaching staff members to share their valuable experience in the form of blog posts. These colleagues have introduced many platforms and digital tools for online teaching and student collaboration. More importantly, they have elaborated on their rationales and shared concrete suggestions on how to apply those technologies in the most effective and interactive ways.

Below is a list of blog posts by our faculty colleagues:

How to make online teaching and learning more interactive by Ms Tanya Kempston, Lecturer, Academic Unit of Teacher Education and Learning Leadership (TELL) and Miss Nicole J. Tavares, Senior Lecturer, TELL:
https://elearning.edu.hku.hk/2020/01/31/make-online-teaching-and-learning-more-interactive/

How to make a video for teaching purposes by Dr Tai Chung Pui, Assistant Professor, Academic Unit of Social Contexts and Policies of Education (SCAPE):
https://elearning.edu.hku.hk/2020/02/01/how-to-make-a-video-for-teaching-purposes/

Less is more: Tips for making teaching videos by Professor Steve Walsh, Visiting Professor, TELL: https://elearning.edu.hku.hk/2020/02/04/less-is-more-tips-for-making-teaching-videos/

Facilitating Online Collaboration (Part 1) – Visualisation Tools by Dr Susan Bridges, Assistant Dean (Learning & Teaching): https://elearning.edu.hku.hk/2020/02/17/facilitating-online-collaboration-part-1-visualization-tools/

Facilitating Online Collaboration (Part 2) – A Toolkit for Remote Collaboration in Research and Teaching by Dr Peter Cobb, Assistant Professor, Academic Unit of Human Communication, Development, and Information Sciences (CDIS): https://elearning.edu.hku.hk/2020/02/19/facilitating-online-collaboration-part-2-a-toolkit-for-remote-collaboration-in-research-and-teaching

In addition to the blog posts contributed by the teaching staff, the e-Learning Team have also showcased their projects and included resources for Moodle, the online learning platform used across the University. Please visit their website for more information: https://elearning.edu.hku.hk/

Technology-enhanced Learning (TeL)@HKU

To support teachers and to assist them in creating engaging and interesting online lessons, Dr Cecilia Chan, Associate Professor, Centre for the Enhancement of Teaching and Learning and affiliated with TELL, coordinated a project called TeL@HKU. The project comes with a website which contains useful materials on how to apply technology for the purpose of enhancing teaching and learning. There are practical “how-to” guides on adopting specific TeL approaches (e.g. online discussion, podcast), as well as a list of technological tools and explanations of how they are used. In addition, a set of short animations and videos are being produced to guide teachers in their instructional design and to showcase good practices from teachers in HKU.

Please visit the project website for useful resources: https://www.cetl.hku.hk/tel/
A short introduction video of the project: https://youtu.be/xKqipm9fFE8

We are very pleased to announce that Dr Benjamin L. Moorhouse (Academic Unit of Teacher Education and Learning Leadership) has been awarded an Early Career Teaching Award in this year’s University Teaching Excellence Awards. 
The Selection Panel was deeply impressed with the awardee’s dedication to teaching, his tireless and creative efforts to make learning enjoyable and challenging, and the impact that he has made on students’ learning.  
Please join us in congratulating Dr Moorhouse for receiving this award!

We are thrilled and proud to share with you the news that the Faculty EL Team comprising Dr Gary Harfitt, Associate Dean (Learning & Teaching); Ms Jessie Chow, Lecturer, Academic Unit of Teacher Education and Learning Leadership; and Ms Ivy Chung, Executive Officer, has won the Gold Award 2020 in the Presence Learning and Teaching Category at the QS Reimagine Education Awards: known as the “Oscars” of Education.  The Team won the award for the project “Nurturing a twenty-first century teaching force through community-based experiential education”.  They were the only teacher education team to pick up an award, competing against universities, tech and start-up groups from all over the world. Award applications go through five rigorous rounds of evaluation and moderation, before being considered by a Grand Jury of 15 representatives from some of the world’s top universities, world-famous technology companies, highly-innovative online education providers, and educational think-tanks.
 
The QS Reimagine Education Awards are co-organised by QS Quacquarelli Symonds, compilers of the QS World University Rankings, and The Wharton School (University of Pennsylvania) – Learning Lab.  The Awards are designed to reward institutions of higher education that have created and implemented outstanding new approaches to teaching and learning, particularly those that can demonstrate the uniqueness, innovation, and efficacy of their pedagogy.

Many congratulations to the Team for such a noteworthy achievement! We’re very proud of you!

Dr Vincent Wong, Senior Lecturer in the Faculty’s Social Contexts and Policies of Education Unit (SCAPE), has just been elected Chairman of the Resolution Committee, Eastern Regional Organization for Public Administration (EROPA). EROPA is an international organisation for the leadership of public administration, administrative systems and governance, formed under international treaty in 1960, with representatives from 15 state-members including current and former top government officials, diplomats, policy-makers, and government policy practitioners. EROPA is also a partner of the United Nations Public Administration Network (UNPAN) possessing special consultative status with the United Nations Economic and Social Council (UNESC).  

At the same time, Dr Wong has also been appointed Special Researcher (Expert Consultancy Committee) of the Human Resources Research Center (HRRC) of the Chinese Academy of Personnel Science (CAPS) under the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, the Government of the People's Republic of China (GPRC). The HRRC of CAPS is established to formulate strategies and provide advice concerning the administrative, organisational and legal management of the human resources policy of national labour and civil servants for the consideration of the State Council of the GPRC.

For details of the EROPA, please visit: https://www.eropa.co/