Comparison between HK and Singapore,
In this session, we learned 3 master plans of HK, Singapore and USA. HK and Singapore share a lot of similarities in terms of economic level, population, etc. As Fan and Ho(2012) stated" Both cities were former British colonies, with a population of comparable size and race, using English and Chinese as the major language in the society, etc".Singapore formally began their development of ICT in education in 1997, Hong Kong in 1998. However, ICT integration in Singapore is advanced than Hong Kong. Singapore put more fundings in Education. Comparison: Curriculum. Way of implementation. Hong Kong Hong Kong adopts a dual path model, EDB takes the curriculum leading role while school-based curriculum are actively encouraged. The aim is to let students become habitual IT users to learn in schools and use in jobs in their future workplace,... to develop in our students the attitude and capability for independent lifelong learning (EdB, 2009a). Singapore Singapore mainly uses a top down model, the Ministry of Education (MOE) decides and schools follow. After the first two stages of Master plan for ICT in education, one important lesson they learned was the value of autonomy instead of top down control. There are more school based projects similar to Hong Kong in recent years (MOE, 2008). Integration of IT with teaching. Use of computers for instructional purposes in non-computing subjects was rare before 1998. The target for the development of ICT in education of EMB in the first stage was to ask individual schools in Hong Kong to decide freely for at least 25% of their own teaching to integrate with IT. This finding indicated that in terms of classroom adoption, the Hong Kong government strategies had achieved noticeable success (Law, Pelgrum and Plomp, 2008). In 2007, there were more than 50% of teachers frequently using IT in their teaching. Education resource. Hong Kong from 1998 to 2003, the Hong Kong EdB focused on providing schools with IT equipment, connecting them to the Internet, and the development of digital learning resources (EdB, 2007, p.9) At present, the EdB is moving in the direction to provide practical advice and appropriate digital resources, such as teaching modules that should enhance teachers’ confidence and reduce their burden in integrating IT into the learning and teaching process. Singapore MOE developed the first digital repository project for teachers to share their lesson plans with other teachers in 2006. She supports the establishment of a network of educational labs, where innovations can be prototyped and tested. Good practices and successful innovations can then be quickly disseminated to the wider community (MOE, 2008). Human resource management. Hong Kong In 2003, all the teachers in Hong Kong (about 50,600) completed the basic IT training, 77% passed the intermediate level, 27% got to the upper intermediate level, and 6% reached the advanced level (EMB, 2004, p.1). The IT professional development framework for teachers was revamped with the new framework emphasized professional development needs in four dimensions, viz. technical knowledge, pedagogical integration, managing and leading IT, and socio-cultural awareness in using IT (Fitzgerald, 2004). In 2005, the focus of training shifted to e-leadership for school heads. In 2007, all teachers were required to have grasped the basic skills of using IT to teach while some venture with more sophisticated tasks such as real-time activities with English-speaking students in other areas of the world via the Internet. The EdB continues to offer refresher courses, seminars and workshop to keep teachers updated with skills on using the latest technologies to enhance learning and teaching activities (EdB, 2007). Singapore During the initial period 1997-2002, Singapore MOE adopted a different approach to train teachers. Sixty senior ICT instructors from schools, educators who shared the goals of the benefits of ICT and were role models themselves were grouped into teams. These teams of instructors were sent to each school to do training. In this way, the entire school moved as a whole, infused with a culture of using ICT, learning from each other, and learning to use ICT in the context of teaching. Each teacher received at least 30 hours of training. Since then, teachers in general have the passion, commitment and willingness to learn new skills and employ ICT to improve learning outcomes (MOE, 2008). References:
The investment of Singapore has been much larger than Hong Kong. |