published_or_final_version / Education / Master / Master of Education

published_or_final_version / Education / Master / Master of Education

published_or_final_version / Applied English Studies / Master / Master of Arts in Applied Linguistics

published_or_final_version / Applied English Studies / Master / Master of Arts in Applied Linguistics

published_or_final_version / Education / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

published_or_final_version / Education / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

published_or_final_version / Education / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

The “Questioning-Exploration-Experience” (QEE), a teaching and learning method underpinned by constructivist theory, was developed by Cheng and further refined by Cheng and Chan in 2001. This thesis documents and evaluates the effectiveness of five- to six-year-old children’s learning when a teacher used this method to promote children’s understanding of the concept of (air) motion. The evaluation was conducted in a preschool operated by a tertiary institution in Hong Kong, and a teacher who was experienced in using the QEE method and her 14 students participated in the study. They were observed for six days over a period of one month when children were working on a task of making a wind bell. Under the QEE method, the children began the inquiry process by posing questions about constructing the wind bell. They then formulated hypotheses, tested them through exploration, and refined their questions repeatedly. The children reflected on their learning experiences in order to generate new questions. Teacher questioning was also a critical aspect of this process. The children and teacher spent a total of 323 minutes on the task and the sessions were videotaped. There was a total of 2,927 utterances in 863 conversational turns, and these were analyzed to examine the relationship between the levels of teacher questioning and the children’s responses to reflect the levels of children thinking. There were five of these levels identified. The first three are considered to involve lower-order thinking: level 1 ("yes/no"); level 2 ("what"); and level 3 (“elaborate") questions and responses. The next two can be considered as higher-order thinking: level 4 (“logical”) and level 5 ("critical") questions and responses. The results indicated that the teacher dominated the interactions and spoke 43% of the time, while children spoke for the remaining time (57%). Of the 139 minutes during which the teacher talked, she spent 97 minutes (70% of the time) posing 887 questions: level 1 was used the most often accounting for 41% of the interactions, followed by level 5 (17%), level 2 (16%), level 3 (14%), and level 4 (12%). The total time for which the children spoke was 184 minutes with 1653 responses. Children gave level 3 responses (28%) most frequently, followed by levels 2 (27%), 1 (26%), 5 (12%), and 4 (7 %), respectively. The relationship between the teacher’s questions and children’s responses was analyzed. An exact correspondence between the level of teacher thinking and children’s responses occurred 46% of the time (398 turns). Simply put, when the teacher asked a question requiring a “what” response, the child typically gave “what” information. Within the 398 turns, 41% of this direct correspondence occurred at level 1, followed by 20% at level 2, 17% at level 5, 13% at level 3, and 9% at level 4. The greatest number of correspondences occurred with questions that required “yes/no” responses, and the least with “logical” questions. In the QEE inquiry process, the teacher’s questioning had a strong influence on the children’s scientific thinking and played a critical role in promoting children’s knowledge construction. The teacher used questioning to define an area of inquiry, specify a problem to be solved, lead children to test hypotheses, evaluate their results and determine their understanding at various points during the process. Questioning, by both the teacher and the children, was critical in promoting the children’s scientific understanding. The impact of QEE in fostering conceptual change in knowledge construction was traced along three paths. The first path in the questioning defined the central question of inquiry. The second path, exploration, was concerned with identifying the information needed to solve the problem. The third path, experience, involved restructuring the concepts of the central question to apply the new understanding in a new situation. Findings also suggest that children’s knowledge construction is signified by the achievement of four elements: identification of a central question for inquiry, evaluation of the question about learning, provision of ways in which to answer the question, and critical reasoning. / published_or_final_version / Education / Doctoral / Doctor of Education

In lay terms, Chinese people often refer to the term “wu 悟” (enlightenment) during learning, but it is not clear what kinds of learning are involved. Reviewing the very long historical development of learning theories, traces of learning pertinent to “enlightenment” are but rare. The Buddhist scriptures contain vast amounts of information showing that enlightenment happens in daily life, but mostly it is interpreted as a very profound state of experience. The subject of Buddhist Studies has been taught in secondary schools in Hong Kong for almost 50 years but rigorous evaluation about the curriculum is not found. Some Buddhist concepts involving a process of enlightenment are taught. This provides an ideal platform to study how students learn these concepts, to uncover an alternative type of learning and also its connection with contemporary learning theories. Rigorous qualitative research was conducted in a case school. A total of 42 Form 5 students, four teachers, and a textbook author were interviewed. Both individual and group semi-structured interviews were employed. In a pilot study, nirv??a was chosen as a key Buddhist concept because the criteria of maximum data complexity, multiple data analysis and involvement of a process of enlightenment were fulfilled. The perceptions of students about the three levels of nirv??a, namely, conceptual, living, and final nirv??a were recorded. The analysis of perceptions includes classification of data, and identification of patterns by tracing teachers’ opinions and the content of textbooks. This leads, eventually, to a search for matched learning theory(ies) to capture the patterns. The findings reveal that most students learn nirv??a by way of constructivist learning. They can understand conceptual nirv??a, but fail to distinguish living nirv??a and final nirv??a and other relevant Buddhist concepts in another way, which coincides with enlightenment learning, as formulated from Buddhist scriptures. Thus this indicates that students learn Buddhist concepts by means of two types of learning: constructivist learning and enlightenment learning. The two types of learning are discussed by referring to Buddhist and learning literature, and the students’ data. The results indicate that they are connected and in sequence, first constructivist learning and then enlightenment learning. The contributions encompass: successfully opening a new window for multi-disciplinary studies of learning; broadening the scope of Buddhist studies; and contributing to affective learning theories. This study also has implications for the reform of Buddhist education in school. In conclusion, students learn Buddhist concepts in two ways: constructivist learning and enlightenment learning, which are connected and in sequence. / published_or_final_version / Buddhist Studies / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

Students nowadays are relatively confident in directly applying geometrical theorems and theories. Nevertheless, it has been a common phenomenon that students are not confident in constructing geometric proofs. They lack the confidence and sufficient experience and knowledge in conducting deductive geometrical proofs. To some students, they treat proofs simply as another type of examination questions which they can tackle by repeated drillings. Students make use of straightedges and compasses to construct different geometry figures in geometric constructions. Through geometric constructions, we can train our prediction and logical thinking skills when investigating the properties of geometric figures. Geometric constructions provide students with hands-on experience to geometry learning which requires students to have more in-depth thinking. This is an empirical study on the implementation of geometric construction workshops among junior secondary students in Hong Kong. Results have shown that students enjoyed the construction tasks during the workshops. Analysis has implied that geometric constructions help improve students’ ability in constructing geometric proofs and to raise their interests in geometry learning. / published_or_final_version / Education / Master / Master of Education