[Archive] Effectiveness of Education Television programmes

LEGCO QUESTION No. 16(WRITTEN REPLY)

Date of Meeting: 10 January 2001

Asked by : Hon YEUNG Yiu-chung

Replied by : SEM

Question :

Regarding educational television ("ETV"), will the Government inform this Council:

of the production costs for ETV programmes in each of the past three years;
of the percentage of schools which currently broadcast ETV programmes in class, and the average number of classes per week in which these programmes are broadcast;
whether it has conducted any survey to ascertain if the contents of these programmes are well-received by students; if it has, of the details; if not, the reasons for that;
of the criteria adopted for assessing the benefits of these programmes to students; and
of the measures in place to promote the future development of ETV?

Reply:

Madam President,

Education television (ETV) programmes are jointly produced by the Education Department (ED) and the Radio Television Hong Kong (RTHK). The total expenditure on ETV programmes in the 1997-98, 1998-99 and 1999-2000 financial years were $51.6M, $56.4M and $71.5M respectively.

According to a survey conducted by ED in September 2000, about 97% of primary schools and 91% of secondary schools showed ETV programmes (including broadcast and pre-recorded programmes) in class in the 1999/2000 school year. On average, ETV programmes are shown in 1.5 periods per week for a primary class, and 1.2 periods per week for a junior secondary class. Senior secondary students rely less on ETV programmes as a complementary learning tool. On average, ETV programmes are shown every six to seven weeks.

RTHK conducts surveys from time to time to gauge the popularity of ETV programmes amongst students. According to the latest survey conducted in June 1999, 88% of respondents at primary levels and 55% of respondents at secondary levels indicated that they liked watching ETV programmes. These students considered that ETV programmes helped widen their perspectives, assisted them in acquiring knowledge beyond textbooks, and facilitated their learning process through a more lively approach.

At present, schools are asked to evaluate the teaching and learning effectiveness of every new ETV programme by completing a Programme Evaluation Form. Areas for evaluation include whether the programme covers key points of teaching and learning, whether it can achieve the aims of teaching, whether it can assist teachers to teach and students to learn, and whether it can stimulate students' thinking process. On the basis of schools' feedback, ED and RTHK assess the benefits which ETV programmes can bring to students. The feedback collected will also be used as the basis for improvement of ETV programmes.

Various measures have been/will be launched to enhance the ETV service:

In view of the survey results mentioned in part (c) above, ED and RTHK will review the existing ETV programmes for secondary students and will consider how best to make use of latest technological developments to enhance learning through television or other media.
On top of subject-based programmes, ED and RTHK have produced a number of thematic cross-curricular series, for example, "China Land Series" ????????and "History of Science and Technology Development in China"?????????, to make learning more interesting and in context. More thematic programmes will be produced in future.
To expand the target audience, ED and RTHK have been producing special programmes for teachers and parents. One example is the 10-episode "Curriculum Pioneer Series"????????on new approaches in teaching and learning which has been broadcast during the ETV air-time since September 2000.
Some ETV programmes have been recorded as VCDs and CD-ROMs for use by schools.
RTHK has been showing real-time ETV programmes on its own web page since January 2001. Many ETV programmes are also available on the HKeducationCITY.net on a video-on-demand basis. By end 2001, all ETV programmes will be available for viewing on the web on a video-on-demand basis.

As a new initiative to support student learning, RTHK plans to launch a web programme which offers advice on homework starting from the next school year.