The medium of instruction in Hong Kong revisited: policy and practice in the reformed Chinese and English streams

Abstract

In September 1998, the Education Department of the fledgling Hong Kong Special Administrative Region implemented a controversial medium‐of‐instruction policy which compelled around three‐quarters of the territory’s hitherto English‐medium secondary schools to switch to Chinese‐medium teaching in Forms 1–3 (years 7–9). Only 112 schools were permitted to remain English‐medium, but only on the condition that their content‐area teachers make consistent use of English as the language of classroom instruction and interaction rather than, as had been the case in the last two decades of colonial rule, a mixture of Cantonese and English. This article presents the findings of a study which sought to determine the extent to which the post‐colonial government’s language policy has been translated into classroom practice in the reformed Chinese and English streams since 1998. The findings were derived from a questionnaire survey of a sample of undergraduates from the first two cohorts to complete their studies in the reformed Chinese and English streams, together with semi‐structured interviews with students and teachers currently studying and teaching in the two streams. The findings indicate that teachers in both the Chinese and English streams have found it difficult to fully implement the new policy in their classrooms.

Keywords:

• bilingual education
• classroom discourse
• Hong Kong
• language policy
• medium of instruction
• secondary education

Acknowledgements

The study reported in this article was made possible by a Polyll Departmental Research Grant (A‐PA45)

Notes

1. UNESCO’s (2003) most recent position paper on language in education reaffirms the value of using the mother tongue as the MOI.

2. The data in Figure 1 are collated from the Education Department’s Annual summaries (1955–1985) and Enrolment surveys (1990–1997).

3. As Figure 1 reveals, the usual MOI at primary level (years 1–6) in Hong Kong has been Chinese. The local education system has therefore placed greater emphasis on mother‐tongue instruction than some former British colonies in Africa, where English‐medium teaching is introduced at primary level. The use of Chinese as the MOI at primary level in Hong Kong has generally been uncontroversial. The use of English at tertiary level is similarly regarded as unproblematic. The key issue since the early 1970s has been when EMI should be introduced at secondary level. The post‐colonial government’s mother‐tongue policy applies to the first three years of secondary school (Forms 1–3). CMI schools are permitted to switch to EMI for the examination‐oriented Forms 4–7.

4. See Poon (2000) for a discussion of the ways in which the Education Department’s (1997) MOI policy diverged from that originally formulated by the outgoing colonial administration (Education Commission 1990). However, the central thrust of the two policy documents was the same; namely, that most students in each age cohort (75–80%) should study through the medium of Chinese, while access to EMI should be limited to those judged to be capable of learning effectively in a second language.

5. The retention (rather than abolition) of the EMI stream was apparently dictated by the English‐language needs of Hong Kong’s thriving business sector (Choi 2003). As the beneficiaries of a ‘genuine’ English‐medium education, the graduates of the reformed EMI stream are expected to possess the high levels of proficiency demanded by the politically influential business and professional communities. The maintenance of the EMI stream might therefore be viewed as economically motivated.

6. The halo and Hawthorne effects refer respectively to subjects’ tendency to supply answers to questions which reflect well on them and to exaggerate responses as a result of being involved in a study. These and other distorting factors, such as respondent fatigue and memory lapse, apply equally to the data in Figures 2–5.