Who is Resisting Change: The Problems with Effectively Adapting Primary Classrooms in Hong Kong
This 10-page undergraduate essay expresses an opinion about the statement “Primary school teachers in Hong Kong resist change”. Using general theoretical works about teachers and change, as well as specific works about Hong Kong primary teachers, this essay notes that primary school teachers in Hong Kong are discouraged from making classroom changes. This essay notes that changes in attitudes and lives of children, too-large classroom sizes, the quality of teacher education, and lack of outside support prevent teachers from making effective changes. Further, this essay notes that the greatest obstacle to classroom change is the Hong Kong school system itself. The system places impetus and power for making changes in the hands of educational leaders and school principals, rather than in the hands of the teachers. The curriculum for primary schools is based upon evaluations, quotas, groupings, and academic discipline, making it especially rigid. Although many experts claim that Hong Kong schools - as well as primary schools in other places - should stress a whole learning approach, individual attention, and creativity, among other things, teachers are not given the ability to make such systematic changes in their own classrooms. This essay includes quotations from teachers who wish to make changes in their classrooms, but are unable to do so because of classroom environment or because they lack the permission to do so.
