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What is This?
JA N E C H E U N G
H O N G KO N G I N S T I T U T E O F E D U C AT I O N
sempre :
singing. The music materials for most schools and the three Colleges of
Education were borrowed mainly from English schools until the mid 1900s.
Those schools that used Chinese as the Medium of Instruction (CMI) also
sang English songs, but with Chinese subtitles. Neither the music classroom
nor music activities were mentioned from 1901–40. However, it was recorded
specifically that 133 students passed the Trinity Music Exam in 1939.
Although schools established by the churches normally included music in the
curriculum, CMI schools still confined the curriculum to other academic
subjects. It was in 1935 that the Burney report first suggested that music, art
and physical education (PE) should be in the school curriculum. Until the
mid-1900s, church schools had more music opportunities than government
or subsidized schools. From the 1940s to the 1960s, the government seemed
to put more emphasis on the Schools’ Music Festival programme and the
Royal Schools of Music Examination than on a systematic music curriculum
for schools. The primary school music syllabus was first published in 1968.
Hiebert (1993) gave a brief survey of music education provision in Hong
Kong in the early 1990s, focusing on music and music activities in primary
and secondary schools; music teacher preparation and support from the three
Colleges of Education and other institutions; music training provided by the
Music Office and some private music centres outside school hours; and tertiary
music education provided by Hong Kong University, the Chinese University of
Hong Kong, Hong Kong Baptist University and the Hong Kong Academy for
Performing Arts. He made suggestions about the qualities that a good music
teacher should possess, and urged the government to prepare a policy paper to
address the arts in education, with a focus on school music opportunities in
the universities and possible careers in music and music-related fields.
Lin (1999) discussed several aspects of music education, including provi-
sion in early childhood, and at primary, secondary and tertiary levels, the
formal music curriculum, extra-curricular music activities, teachers’ qualifi-
cations and in-service training, resources, quality assurance and public
examinations. Parents were eager for their young children to learn an instru-
ment, or to join a choir. For example, in 1990 over 35,000 students took
Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music (ABRSM) examinations
(Hiebert, 1993). However, parents were reluctant to continue supporting
their children in learning an instrument because of the heavy school work-
load when they were transferred to upper primary or lower secondary school.
This reflected the pressure of examinations, and the low status of the arts
within schools and society at large, which made it difficult to promote music
in the school context. Music lessons were generally reduced or completely
eliminated in the upper secondary timetable. Lin (1999) recommended
proper provision of music in basic education and at tertiary level.
Brand and Ho (1999) examined Hong Kong’s change of sovereignty from
the United Kingdom to the People’s Republic of China (PRC) in 1997 by
investigating the effects on loyalty to the motherland, western versus Chinese
music and how ‘one country, two systems’ worked. They showed that the PRC
had respected the ‘one country, two systems’ philosophy as demonstrated by
differences between song materials in the PRC and the new Hong Kong
Special Administrative Region (HKSAR). Though revolutionary or commun-
ist content was not evident in the song literature in Hong Kong, content
dealing with democratic ideas or political freedom was not apparent either.
However, there were new efforts to encourage school children to learn
Chinese music. The inclusion of the Chinese national anthem was an impor-
tant change, encouraging students to see themselves as citizens of the
HKSAR under Chinese sovereignty.
Ho (1999) also analysed civic education in Hong Kong’s secondary music
education from the 1980s to the 1990s through a teacher questionnaire
survey. The findings showed that, although the singing of China’s national
anthem was seen as a vehicle for cultivating political and civic values and an
indicator of sociopolitical transition, it did not indicate that music teachers
had developed these social and political values in their teaching. Moreover,
substantial diversity in the education systems between the PRC and HKSAR
was evident. The PRC did not enforce any regulations to promote Chinese
political songs in HKSAR, indicating that the PRC had kept its promise of ‘a
high degree of autonomy’ based on ‘one country, two systems’ (Joint
Publishing [HK] Co. Ltd, 1991).
land (Yu-Wu and Ng, 2000), the constitutional changes of 1997 created an
opportunity to include multicultural music with more emphasis on Chinese
music (Yeh, 1997).
A review of the first two primary music syllabi, 1968 and 1976 (Yu-Wu
and Ng, 2000) showed that, while a balance of musical knowledge and practi-
cal experience was identified in the 1968 syllabus, only a few Chinese songs
were being used. The aims of the 1976 syllabus had addressed children’s inter-
est and enjoyment in music, aesthetic sensitivity, self-expression, daily usage of
music and an integrated programme. The 1968 syllabus was more teacher-
centred than the more child-centred 1976 syllabus, but both lacked clear indi-
cations of how to evaluate the outcomes of teaching and learning. Through
analysing the 1987 primary music syllabus (Curriculum Development Com-
mittee, 1987) and the teachers’ handbook, Leung (2000) stated that primary
music education aimed to have children gain pleasure through various musical
experiences accompanied by a grasp of musical knowledge and skills, with the
ultimate goal of further development in moral, physical, intellectual, aesthetic
and social education. Recognizing that textbooks were generally viewed as
intended curricula for content, materials and teaching procedures, Yip and Lai
(2000) undertook a content analysis of four series of primary textbooks and
concluded that singing as a performing activity and describing music received
the most emphasis, while creating music was the least mentioned. Since
foreign songs were often used with Chinese text, it was recommended that the
cultural heritage should be addressed. This echoed the need for more Chinese
music in the curriculum, as suggested earlier by Ho, Yeh, Yu-Wu and Ng.
So (1999) compared primary education in Hong Kong and Xiamen, China,
through teacher interviews, lesson observation and document reviews. He
found that Hong Kong had an ambitious and rather theoretical syllabus,
while Xiamen had only general curriculum guidelines with a strong empha-
sis on technical skills. Hong Kong had adopted a generalist approach, giving
more flexibility to the teachers over the design and teaching strategies of the
lessons, while China had adopted the specialist approach with centralized
textbooks, teacher handbooks and teaching aids. Comparison of western and
Chinese music was advised in the Hong Kong context.
The secondary music syllabus (Curriculum Development Committee,
1983) was under scrutiny during the recent discussion of education reform
in Hong Kong, for example, both Wong-Yuen (2000) and Yu-Wu and Leung
(2000, 2001) revealed that much emphasis had been laid on singing, while
creating music was neglected and the official document was rather academ-
ically oriented, emphasizing music reading. Leung (1997) claimed that cur-
riculum planners had not given creative activities the emphasis received in
the United Kingdom, the United States and Australia, and that music teachers
focused only on musical knowledge transmission and skills acquisition. Wong
(2002) queried the limited core activities suggested for children’s music mak-
ing and the lack of guidelines to teach Chinese music. Yu-Wu and Leung
local curriculum and learning and teaching styles through comparison with
those of other countries. Brand et al. (2001) investigated the notion of Asian
students being considered as rote learners by comparing the styles of learn-
ing and cognitive strategies of American and Chinese university music
students. The results suggested that both groups of students shared similar
learning and cognitive strategies, as they were comparable in terms of their
depth of involvement and dedication to music and musical achievement.
Contrary to previous assumptions, the American students exhibited more
reliance on rote learning than their Chinese counterparts.
There was general agreement from professional composers and curricu-
lum planners that creative activities could nurture critical and creative think-
ing skills as well as develop students’ overall musicianship (Leung and
McPherson, 2002). However, creative activities in general music classes in
Hong Kong did not receive the emphasis that they did in the United Kingdom,
the United States and Australia (Leung, 1999). A survey of secondary school
music teachers conducted by Leung in 1996 (Leung, 1999) found that
time distributed to singing and instrumental playing in junior and senior
secondary schools was 40.55 percent and 34.93 percent respectively, but the
time for creative music making was only 5.5 percent and 9.33 percent
respectively. In fact time allocated to creative music making was the least
among five areas of music:
1. singing and playing instruments;
2. listening and music appreciation;
3. music theory and literacy;
4. aural training; and
5. creative music making.
In the senior forms, creative music making was ranked fourth, only slightly
better in popularity than aural training, with reasons given including a lack
of teaching time and space, financial resources and staff, large class sizes,
insufficient teacher training and clear guidelines from the official curricu-
lum. Recommendations included a revised music curriculum with modified
aims, teaching content, methods and assessment, teacher preparation with
adequate knowledge, skills and attitudes about composing, arranging and
improvising and re-training opportunities for in-service teachers.
Wong (2002) documented and compared the content and pedagogy of
music lessons in Vancouver and Hong Kong by observing ten cases in both
places. The findings suggested an enjoyment-oriented, child-centred approach
in Vancouver, with teachers nurturing children’s interest and creativity,
while the Hong Kong cases showed an achievement-oriented, teacher-centred
approach, with teachers emphasizing knowledge and skill mastery. It was
recommended that Hong Kong students would benefit from more musical
performance in a more continuous and balanced curriculum, catering for
both students’ knowledge and interests. It was also recommended that music
teachers should use a more student-focused approach catering for their interest
and enjoyment before the mastery of skills and knowledge, and that in-service
training for the teachers’ professional development should be provided.
autonomy over problem solving and provided opportunities for peer learning,
group work and self-learning. With the TBML approach, computers facilitat-
ed composition and arrangement, enhanced sensitivity towards the quality of
sound and promoted critical thinking about the structure of music. CAMI
helped to organize the sequence of teaching strategies, which saved time in
delivering subject knowledge during lessons. Both teachers and students val-
ued its attractive visual presentation, which facilitated learning and enhanced
concept consolidation. However, varying degrees of student participation
with IT, their computer competence, the limited provision of hardware and
software, the small TV monitor and lack of Chinese software all played a part
in influencing student interest in music learning. The case study also
revealed that student interest in learning traditional Chinese music was not
enhanced, even with the new technology.
Yip (2001) acknowledged the effectiveness of IT in a student-centred
approach, flexible learning and life-long learning, while recognizing its ever-
evolving philosophy. She suggested that teacher educators had a professional
responsibility to use IT, both to work with it and to develop a personal philos-
ophy for using it. The craft of IT would become an art when the know-how
became the theoretical understanding. She said that pre- and in-service
teachers should use IT not only for creative music making, but also as an
effective means to teach music. She advocated that sufficient time should be
given to an in-depth study of IT subject matter from both the musical
perspective as well as its method of delivery.
While the HKSAR document’s five-year strategy (Education and
Manpower Bureau, 1998) advocated the use of IT in education and stressed a
student-centred approach, Cheung (2001) conducted an in-depth study of IT
and a student-centred approach to learning. She used Bernstein’s (1971)
concept of strong (teacher-centred) and weak (student-centred) framing to
conceptualize the transaction of teaching and learning, to investigate dif-
ferent levels of framing inherent in the music software and related teaching
strategies and the ways that they affected children’s achievement in compos-
ing in the lower secondary school. Swanwick’s set of eight layers of criteria
was used for assessment (1994). The results showed that children achieved
best using the computer to compose with very weak framing conditions,
i.e. using a very student-centred approach, which suggested that a student-
centred approach facilitated composing and creativity using IT.
Further research
Music education is not strongly established in Hong Kong, despite the fact
that it has been allocated time in the school curriculum since the 1930s with
art and PE. There has not been a culture for music education research,
although this seems to have grown during the last decade. This paper reveals
the need for further research in several urgent areas:
1. There needs to be a better balance between Chinese and western music in
the curriculum in order to develop children’s cultural identity whilst
maintaining their sense of cultural diversity. Effective ways to promote
children’s interest in Chinese traditional music need examination.
2. The notion of developing children’s creativity through music needs to be
more strongly emphasized, particularly ways of nurturing and evaluat-
ing creativity. Careful investigation on how information technology can
enhance children’s motivation and music creativity without sacrificing
their aesthetic sensitivity is necessary.
3. Reform in arts education (Curriculum Development Council, 2000) has
paved new ways for curriculum initiatives and novel challenges. Under
the stimulus of the current enthusiasm for educational reform, further
research can examine separate subject teaching and interdisciplinary
teaching, the effects of an integrated curriculum and the need for less
rigid systems of music transaction using a weaker framing approach to
promote children’s enjoyment in learning music.
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