THE IMPLEMENTATION OF GLOBAL CITIZENSHIP EDUCATION AT JUNIOR SECONDARY SECTOR IN HONG KONG SECONDARY SCHOOLS – THE TEACHERS’ PERCEPTIONS Thesis submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at the University of Leicester by CHEUNG Chiu-man Jordan MEd (Bristol) School of Education University of Leicester November 2009 ABSTRACT An abstract of the thesis of CHEUNG Chiu-man Jordan for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Title: The Implementation of Global Citizenship Education at Junior Secondary Sector in Hong Kong Secondary Schools – The Teachers’ Perceptions Civic education has regained momentum over the past one to two decades when more and more governments in various jurisdictions are awakened by a greater need for allegiance, responsible behaviours, and participation from their citizens. With the escalating impacts of globalization, the conventional notion of civic education founded on nation-states has been subject to rigorous challenges. Critics keep questioning whether contemporary citizens need to play a more active role in the global milieu. People in Hong Kong who live in an international cosmopolitan are for sure no exception. The global development trend in civic education is thereby unstoppable. It is a pity that global citizenship education has drawn the attention of local school educators and researchers not until the end of the last millennium. Hitherto, not so many relevant research reports have been published locally. Of the limited amount of research studies, none is related to the understanding and explanation of teachers’ global perception of civic education within a particular context. The study in this thesis is an attempt to bridge this gap. This thesis concludes the significance of global citizenship education in civic education of Hong Kong. It also examines the influential factors for the formation of the perception of teachers of global citizenship education, who teach the independent civic education curriculum at the junior secondary sector in Hong Kong. The factors are extracted from the socio-political, personal, educational, curricular and school contexts. Data are collected through a mixed method approach comprising a questionnaire survey and a follow-up interview. The data analysis is based on a conceptual model developed from the Cultural Historical Activity Theory. In brief, the key findings are that most of the abovementioned contextual factors, except collectivism and the Confucian value of education in the socio-cultural domain, are found influential in shaping the studied civic educators’ global perception of civic education. Positive correlations are also found between most of the contextual factors, ii except collectivism and the Confucian value of education, and the teachers’ global view towards civic education. The study results have implications for policy and practice of preparing competent school civic educators under the new global era of civic education. In practice, pre-service and in-service teacher education programmes in Hong Kong should be better designed to suit the contextual needs and global development as identified in the study. On the policy side, education policy makers are expected to work hand in hand with all the stakeholders such as teachers, school leaders and teacher educators to ensure a sufficient and adequate provision of teacher education opportunities for civic education teachers in Hong Kong. iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to express my deeply-felt gratitude to my respectable thesis supervisor, Professor Paul Cooper, whose expertise, understanding, and patience, rendered considerably to my doctoral studies. His warm encouragement and thoughtful guidance were of tremendous value for me to muddle through the difficult learning process, especially when the studies were pursued part-time. I am also happy to acknowledge my debt to Professor Ken Fogelman who offered a lot of inspiring advice during the initial stage of the thesis. My heartfelt thanks go out to those teachers who agreed to take part as subjects for the study in this thesis. Without their generous participations the completion of this thesis would not have been possible. Finally, and most importantly, I would like to express my sincerest thanks to my wife, Dera, for her unreserved support she provided me throughout my entire life. Without her love, encouragement and endurance, I would not have finished this thesis. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS ______________________________________________________________________ Chapter Contents Page Abstract ii Acknowledgements iv Table of contents v List of figures ix List of tables x List of appendices xii One Introduction…………………………………………………………. 1 1.1 Why civic education is relevant? 1 The growing importance of civic education 1 The case of Hong Kong 4 Expansion of civic education 8 1.2 Problems for research 10 1.3 Organization of the thesis 14 Two Review of the Literature…………………………………………….. 15 2.1 An overview of the chapter 15 2.2 The quest for the meaning of civic education 16 2.3 Reasons for elusive and irreconcilable notions of civic education 20 2.4 Controversies in civic education 26 2.5 Evolution of the new meaning of civic education 29 The meaning of global citizenship education 39 2.6 Connotation of civic education for Hong Kong 48 2.7 Civic education development in Hong Kong 56 2.8 The development of civic education curriculum in Hong Kong 58 2.9 Emergence of civic education as an independent subject 60 2.10 Recent research studies in civic education and global citizenship education in Hong Kong 69 2.11 Current Teacher Training Opportunities in Hong Kong with regard to Civic Education or Global Citizenship Education 76 2.12 Civic education in context and activity theory 80 The socio-cultural theory 81 Activity theory 83 v Application of activity theory in education 87 Weaknesses of activity theory 88 2.13 Influence of globalization on civic education teachers 90 2.14 Challenges for civic education teachers in Hong Kong 92 2.15 Factors affecting civic education teachers’ perception of civic education 97 Personal, educational, professional, and school factors 97 Socio-cultural factors 100 2.16 Summary of the chapter 103 Three Conceptual Framework……………………………………………… 104 3.1 Overview of the Chapter 104 3.2 Conceptual discussion 104 3.3 Activities, artifacts, concepts, community, rules, and division of labour in the study 106 3.4 Diagrammatic presentation of the conceptual framework 109 3.5 Conceptual framework in practice 110 3.6 Contextual factors influencing the teachers’ mind 110 3.7 Summary of the chapter 111 Four The Study…………………………………………………………… 112 4.1 Purpose of the study 112 4.2 Design of the study 115 Determination of research paradigm 115 Construction of research instruments and their administration 120 Construction of the questionnaire and its administration 120 Construction of the interview protocol and its administration 123 Pilot study 125 4.3 Sampling strategy 126 4.4 Validity and reliability 128 4.5 Research ethics 131 4.6 Limitation of the study 132 4.7 Summary of the chapter 133 Five Findings……………………………………………………………... 134 5.1 Introduction 134 5.2 The questionnaire survey 135 Response rate 135 vi Demographic information of the respondents 136 Gender 136 Age 136 Year of teaching experience 136 Teaching of civic education or related subjects in school 137 Year of experience in teaching civic education related subjects in junior secondary 138 Possession of formal degree level education related to civic education 138 Participation in professional development activities or training related to civic education 139 5.3 The interview 139 Response rate 139 Demographic information of the interviewees 140 5.4 Perception of the significance of global citizenship education for civic education in Hong Kong 141 The significance of global citizenship education (questionnaire data) 141 The significance of global citizenship education (interview data) 142 5.5 The way global citizenship education features the respondents’ thinking about civic education 144 The socio-cultural factors (questionnaire data) 144 The socio-cultural factors (interview data) 146 The curricular and professional factors (questionnaire data) 150 The curricular and professional factors (interview data) 152 The school factors (questionnaire data) 153 The school factors (interview data) 155 The factors outside school (questionnaire data) 156 The factors outside school (interview data) 158 5.6 Correlation between the significance of global citizenship education and various factors in the questionnaire 159 The socio-cultural factors 159 The curricular and professional factors 160 The school factors 161 The outside school factors 161 vii 5.7 Areas for improvement on the implementation of global citizenship education in school 162 The questionnaire survey results 162 The interview results 163 5.8 Summary of the chapter 164 Six Analysis and Discussion…………………………………………….. 165 6.1 Introduction 165 6.2 Data analysis and discussion against the research questions 165 Research question one 165 Research question two 181 Research questions three and four 186 The global level 187 The national level 191 The local level 196 6.3 Summary of the chapter 220 Seven Conclusions and Implications ………………………………………. 221 Appendices………………………………………………………….. 233 References…………………………………………………………... 275 viii LIST OF FIGURES Page Figure 1: The basic triangular representation of mediation 83 Figure 2: The general schema of components and units of analysis in 85 activity theory Figure 3: The structure of a human activity