Students' learning in a secondary school in Hong Kong: a case study

Abstract

In recent years, the Invitational Education (IE) philosophy and its application into schools have been spreading from the West to East. Many schools at different levels: kindergarten, primary and secondary schools, are gradually adapting this philosophy together with their own curriculum to enhance students’ learning. This philosophy is believed that human potential can best be realized to invite development, and by people who are intentionally inviting with themselves and others.

Being the secondary school that is of the same sponsoring body of the pioneer primary school for introducing Invitational Education to Hong Kong, the school possesses great potential to be developed as a truly inviting school. However, at the same time, as a new school, many ideas were needed to be developed including policies, student activities, and new ideas for the curriculum, developing programs for different stakeholders and establishing networks with other schools.

Therefore, the purpose of this research is to know how the implementation of IE philosophy affects on students’ learning in a Hong Kong secondary school – case study. There are 3 main questions: (1) How is teaching and learning is shaped or affected by IE? (2) What are the factors affecting the success or applicability of IE in the school? (3) Is IE applicable in the school under study? This study adopts a mixed approach in its method of inquiry because of its descriptive and exploratory nature.

The outcome shows that the staff is pleased to have Invitational Education philosophy adopted in the case school. It could help the teachers to shape their way of teaching with invitational education qualities but this needs further research. There is a lot of room for improvement as there are factors that affect the success or application of IE in the school.