"The teaching of phonics in an integrated curriculum" Ms Pau Yuk Fong Ms Chau Ka Ki Ms Wong Pui Mei

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SBP English Language KLA Sharing Session
Date 26th Jan 2002 Venue Tack Ching Primary
School
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Ms Pau Yuk FongMs Chau Ka KiMs Wong Pui
MeiMs Ho Wai YeeTai Po Old Market Public School
(PM)
"The teaching of phonics in an integrated
curriculum"
Summary
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Ms Chiu Yuk KwanOur Lady of China Catholic
Primary School (PM) Ms Cheng Wing SheungTai Po
Methodist Primary School
"Food, Glorious Food" authentic learning and
performance-based assessment
Summary
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Ms Tam Wing KamMs Chan Wing YanMs Ha Yuen
ShanPo Kok Branch School
"Designing assessment papers"
Summary
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Lillian ShumHoly Carpenter Primary School
School-based Curriculum Adaptation
Summary
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Ms Pau Yuk FongMs Chau Ka KiMs Wong Pui
MeiMs Ho Wai YeeTai Po Old Market Public School
(PM)
"The teaching of phonics in an integrated
curriculum"
The teachers learnt from last years teaching
experience that most students were not able to
master the skill of blending. Building on such
experience, the teachers improved their practice
by revisiting individual sounds at the beginning
of each lesson and practising the skill of
blending regularly. They practised blending using
project work and small readers. Even the method
of blending was well thought out. The teachers
found that students learnt blending more easily
when they started with onsets and rimes than with
discrete sounds.
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"Food, Glorious Food" authentic learning and
performance-based assessment
The teachers explained how they made use of
authentic learning experience to arouse their
students' interest in learning English. In Tai Po
Methodist Primary School, the students used the
vocabulary (food) and text- type (recipe) they
learnt in class to work out the steps for making
a sandwich. They then did a demonstration in
front of the whole class. Performance-based
assessment and peer assessment were used to
increase the meta-cognition level of the
students. In Our Lady of China Catholic Primary
School, students set up stalls in a food court.
They created their own menus to attract customers
to their stalls. Students carried out simple
conversations in the authentic learning
situation, and the teacher assessed them as they
performed according to set criteria.
Summary
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Ms Tam Wing KamMs Chan Wing YanMs Ha Yuen
ShanPo Kok Branch School
"Designing assessment papers"
The teachers encouraged their P.2 students to
write more by giving them more chances to do free
writing in class. The students could draw simple
pictures of their own (e.g. a ball) and produced
the target structure or other learnt structure
(e.g. I can see a ball. There is a ball.).
Surprisingly the performance of the students
(high, average low) was much better than
expected. This gave the teachers much confidence
to keep up with the new practice.  
Episode 1
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Lillian ShumHoly Carpenter Primary School
School-based Curriculum Adaptation
The teacher shared with fellow teachers the
experience of curriculum adaptation in her
school. She pointed out that curriculum
development is an on-going and painstaking
process and that there is no single formula to
success, every school has its own development.
She encouraged the audience to work as a team
when they started their own school-based
curriculum.
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Report on the Sharing Session
In the sharing sessions, the teachers were able
to demonstrate that they could use students
performance to inform their teaching. They were
reflective and innovative. The concept of
curriculum development as an on-going process was
well illustrated in all sharing.
From last years experience, teachers of Tai Po
Old Market Public School(PM) discovered that most
students were not able to master the skill of
blending. The teachers improved their practice
by recycling individual sounds with students at
the beginning of each lesson and practicing the
skill of blending regularly.
They practised blending the sounds using project
work and small readers. Even the method of
blending was well thought out. The teachers
found that students learnt blending easier when
they started with onsets and rimes than with
discrete sounds.
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The teachers of Po Kok Branch School studied P. 3
students performance in the Attainment test and
discovered that their students were not able to
express simple ideas in their own language.
They realized that it would not be possible for
their students to reach that standard in one
year. So they decided to bring in early
intervention through introducing free writing in
P.2. They gave students more practices in class
and they included free writing in subsequent
tests. They traced the performance of three
students from the low, average and high ability
group. This provided useful feedback to their
teaching and gave them tremendous confidence to
attempt more in the second term.
The teachers of Our Lady of China Catholic
Primary School and Tai Po Methodist Primary
School tried to use authentic learning materials
to arouse students interest in learning English.
Students learnt about the assessment criteria
before the activity and took an active part in
the assessment.
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Teacher development is an on-going process, the
wisdom teachers gained from last years research
is used to improve their current practice. The
work relationship between teachers and CDOs is a
dynamic and interactive one. The follow up work
committed by the teachers of Tai Po Old Market
Public School (PM) was originated from last
years collaborative action research on phonics
teaching.
CDO brought to the attention of the teachers at
Po Kok Branch School their students learning
problems. The teachers reacted positively and
were willing to try various means to address the
problem. They took the initiative to think
about ways to improve the marking scheme so that
the students performance could be reflected
vividly.
CDO was just like a conductor, she orchestrated
teachers with similar experiences to work
together. This kind of informal sharing enabled
two teachers from Our Lady of China Catholic
Primary School and Tai Po Methodist Primary
School to gather together and to reflect on their
own teaching. The constructive comments given by
them may help illustrate the importance of such
kind of professional sharing.
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THE END