Teachers' awareness of cultural and instructional congruence in science teaching for ethnic minority students: a case study in Hong Kong

Abstract

Instructional congruence (IC) is a conceptual framework which emphasizes that the linguistic and cultural problems of ethnic minority students are to be addressed in order to enhance their learning. IC has been developed and implemented during the most recent two decades, and adopted and recognized for its improvement on student motivation and academic performance in many countries. In Hong Kong, there are designated schools which specifically cater to ethnic minority students. In this study, three science teachers in a designated school have been evaluated on their awareness of IC in teaching ethnic minority students. However, none of the three teachers have received any professional training on teaching ethnic minority students. Through classroom observations and interviews with teacher-respondents, the results show that they have scant knowledge on catering to the different linguistics and culturally diversified problems of ethnic minority students. Although one of the teachers has some knowledge which allowed the consideration of student literacy development and application of cultural relevance in the instructional curriculum, his practices are not systematic and effective, which means that they fall far from the proposed IC practices. Educators and policymakers are strongly recommended to promote and adopt the IC framework in Hong Kong. If the implementation of IC in Hong Kong as a means to address the needs of ethnic minority students is familiarized and acknowledged, IC would very likely improve their academic achievements and provide them with equal opportunities in education.