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The Education Department today (Wednesday) issued the draft of the first edition of performance indicators applicable to kindergartens for public consultation.
"The indicators aim to provide a framework of reference for kindergartens and the Education Department (ED) for the purposes of self-evaluation and inspection," a spokesman for the Education Department said.
The indicators serve as a tool for kindergartens to identify their strengths and areas for improvement; and a guideline for the ED to evaluate the performance of kindergartens during inspection visits.
Reports of the visits will be made accessible to the public. "The public could refer to the performance indicators to identify the standards of quality early childhood education," the spokesman said.
The scope for evaluation is established upon four domains of work in kindergartens, namely Management and Organization, Teaching and Learning, Support to Children and School Ethos, and Children's Development.
"The focus is to evaluate whether a kindergarten can provide an appropriate teaching environment, good provision of resources and suitable structuring of the teaching/learning environment," he said
"It is hoped that through achieving the performance indicators, an all-round development of children could be enhanced and an ideal effect in education be induced," he added.
Copies of the draft performance indicators were issued to all kindergartens today.
The ED will conduct three half-day seminars for early childhood education personnel to exchange views on the draft performance indicators.
The seminars will be held on March 11 (Saturday) and March 14 (Tuesday) at Lecture Hall, Hong Kong Science Museum, 2 Science Museum Road, Tsim Sha Tsui.
The draft edition will be put on the homepage of the Education Department at http://www.info.gov.hk/ed for public reference.
A two-month consultation period on the draft performance indicators will commence from today until April 15, 2000.
Any views on the draft could be forwarded to the Education Department on or before 15 April 2000. All correspondence should be directed to the Kindergarten Section, Education Department by mail to Room 1216, Wu Chung House, 213 Queen's Road East, Wanchai, Hong Kong or by fax at 2573 2805 or 2834 7810.
Comments on the draft performance indicators will be carefully examined. It is expected that the first edition of the performance indicators will be issued to kindergartens in this July.
Ends/Wednesday, February 16, 2000
Issued at HKT 18:18
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