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The following is issued on behalf of the Board of Education:

Members of the Board of Education (BoE) today (Thursday) visited Ning Po College.

On arrival, they were greeted and briefed by the school principal, Mr Wong Wing-tim, on the school history.

The school has started to adopt Chinese as the medium of instruction in Secondary One since this (1998/99) school year.

Under the Enhanced Native English-speaking Teacher Scheme, Ms Jacinta Battista was recruited from Australia.

Members were told that some 30 more English remedial classes had been arranged since this September to provide students with opportunities of learning English.

In addition, an English Corner has been established to build up the atmosphere of English reading.

Meanwhile, by the end of this month, two members of the school English Club will act as "Disco Jockey" to broadcast English songs during recess in order to arouse students' interest in the learning of English by different dimension.

The Director of Education, Mrs Fanny Law, and the Chairman of the BoE, Mr Moses Cheng Mo-chi, observed a class of Secondary One students attending an Economic and Public Affairs lesson conducted in Chinese.

After the lesson, the members, the school principal and teachers, including Ms Battista, discussed the effectiveness of learning and teaching by using Chinese as the medium of instruction and the English language enhancement projects adopted by the school to maintain students' proficiency of English.

They agreed that the use of Chinese as the medium of instruction helps students to have a better understanding of the lesson and hence, showing positive response and active participation in the discussion.

Before rounding off the visit, the members toured around the school hall, the art room and the computer room of the school.

End/Thursday, November 19, 1998

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