This article contributes to the critical policy studies of educational governance and its crisis, through canvassing Basil Bernstein's concept of the 'totally pedagogised society' (TPS). The TPS witnesses not only the growth of transnational private actors, but also the disjuncture between global and national agendas of reform, on the governance…

Content-based education programmes, in which a second/foreign language (L2) is used as the medium of instruction when teaching non-language content subjects, aim at both content and L2 learning. With such dual goal in mind, and with the rapid expansion of the programmes to contexts where students might have only basic L2 proficiency, there have…

Civic education is considered as a way to nurture good citizens who work to develop the polity. However, in real politics, education often mirrors instead of shaping the political development. Reviewing civic education of Hong Kong from a historical development perspective, this article explains that civic education has for long been used a tool…

This study investigates how genre can be used as an organisational principle to interweave teaching and assessment in the L2 school context. Relying on data from interviews and lesson observations gathered from two Secondary 1 (that is, Grade 7) Hong Kong classrooms, the study sought to discover how teachers implemented genre-based teaching and…

A study investigated the relevance and usefulness of inservice teacher training courses once the teacher returned to the classroom. Subjects were 207 participants in a course for secondary school teachers of English as a Second Language in Hong Kong. The course has two emphases: language proficiency improvement and curriculum development. Subjects…