劉皇發可以私人去求簽，但為何他可以「為港人求簽」，為何电視台要一窩蜂去報導，又為何八＋後社運人士竟然去求簽，連保护白海豚也要求簽。唉…

I have no problem with individuals seeking fortune-telling, but when a public figure claims to represent others in seeking fortune telling, or when social activists resort to fortune-telling to predict the future of their social cause ……

Even as a publicity strategy, it is a poor strategy, and it damages the social activists’ credibility. If they get a 上簽，does it mean they can take a rest? If they get a 下簽，they turn themselves into a laughing stock. I do have higher expectations for the social activities. They should fight for their cause through persuasion and educate the people by example. If they want publicity, why don’t they choose another activity: 許願：為貧苦大眾許願，為環保未來許願，為社運前程許願……That would have won them more social support.

I don’t have personal grudges against Ma. In fact, if I were a Taiwanese and had had to cast my vote, I would still have voted for Ma. Not because I believed he could bring about significant and meaningful improvement to the people’s lives, but because he was likely to do less harm.

Yes, I’m pessimistic, and apathetic. I find it bewildering whenever I see those TV footages showing thousands of people hysterically cheering and chanting their support for the presidential candidate at election rallies as if they were finally seeing their saviour. And I am not just talking about Taiwan; I’m also referring to the USA, the UK, France, Spain, Germany, Japan, Thailand ….

What puzzles me is that we are living in the 21st Century, and there are still so many people who believe that one good leader can turn the country around.

Look at all the countries I have mentioned. Isn’t the scenario familiar? During the election campaign, candidates make promise after promise. Then someone makes it to presidency. Then initial high hopes from the people. Then promise after promise is broken. Then discontent after discontent from the people.

This is exactly Ma’s story; it is the story of Angela Merkel of Germany; it is the story of Michel Rocard of France; it is the story of Yingluck Shinawatra of Thailand. As for Japan, we can’t even remember the name of their prime minister, who keeps changing every twelve months.

Isn’t the reason obvious? It’s not that these people are not capable. It’s because a big, modernised, country of the 21st century is laden with intricate webs of personal and organisational interests, so that no matter how well-intentioned a national leader may be, there is not much that he or she can accomplish, because any move to ‘improve’ society will encroach upon the interests of certain sectors, and is bound to meet with opposition. And let us not forget that at the same time, in any democracy, there will be politicians who oppose for the sake of opposing, as strategies of political bargaining. Think about Obama. Didn’t he sincerely embrace laudable social ideals? But it does not matter whether he is capable or idealistic or not. No American presidents of the 21st Century will accomplish much during their presidency.

In a small, simple, primitive, village, a good leader will make a difference.

In a 21st-century, large, modernised, country or city, the future lies in every one of us, not some great leader.

Mother Teresa said: We cannot do great things. We can only do small things, with great love.

Don’t expect national leaders to do great things, because they can’t. But WE, through our daily, humble, small, good deeds, will build a better future for humankind.

===

Postscript:

Having said that, I don’t mean we don’t need democracy. Yes, we do. In fact, if one day, we have direct election for the Chief Executive of Hong Kong, I will definitely cast my vote. But I will vote for the person who is likely to do less harm, not the one who makes the grandest promises.

When you finished your talk to the student teachers, and I said you didn’t look like someone who was working for the Government, what I really meant was that it is difficult to find an education worker these days who has worked in the field for some years to still posesses a strong sense of mission. It might be easier for teachers to maintain that sense of mission since they deal with students directly on a daily basis, and can see the outcome of their effort more easily and quickly. It would be much more difficult for other educational professionals who have to grapple with often-tedious paperwork, other unsympathetic adults, and unavoidable organisational politics, day in and day out, to keep up that sense of mission. And you’re definitely an exception.

You might still remember that I had worked as an inspector for the Education Bureau of the Hong Kong government for a while. When I applied to the position, I had taught for 10 years, and I thought that the new position would allow me to make a greater contribution to ELT in Hong Kong. But very soon, I realised that few of my colleagues shared the same mission. In fact with some of them, the longer they had worked as inspectors, the less passion they had about education. Certainly I shouldn’t put all the blame on them, for the culture of the civil service in those days discouraged conscientious work: promotion was dependent on seniority and how well one played the bureaucracy game, not how much contribution an officer had made to the education community.

Of course, that was in the mid-eighties, and today, the Hong Kong government has become more accountable to the needs of the people, and it could be a very different picture working at the Education Bureau today.

Anyway, after some time when it was clear that the work culture I was immersed in wouldn’t change in the forseeable future, I applied to become a lecturer at a college of education to train primary and lower secondary teachers of English. In so doing, I would be able to make a direct impact on the future English teachers of Hong Kong. Indeed, it was a highly rewarding time teaching at the college of education, as the students were energetic young adults who wanted to become good teachers. But after four years, because of changes in the Education Bureau’s manpower needs, I was transferred to another section which had nothing to do with English, the subject which I loved so dearly. Soon, I made a career decision which shocked all my colleagues: I resigned from the Government (meaning that my pension would be gone), and went back to secondary-school teaching. I taught for three years, at three different secondary schools, before joining the CUHK Faculty of Education in 1991.

In retrospect, the three years were of immense value to my own development. At the college of education, I was ‘selling’ the Communicative Approach and various ‘progressive’ teaching methods to the student teachers. So, the three years back in schools allowed me to practise what I preached. But more importantly, because I was experiencing the life of a teacher again, this sojourn reminded me of the many pressures that teachers worked under in real life, so that when I re-joined teacher education in 1991, I beccame more understanding of teachers’ thinking, and more sympathetic when I worked with inservice teachers.

Haha, why am I telling you all this? Your talk confirmed my previous impression that you’re a highly reflective educator, with a strong sense of mission. And if there is anything I can share with you from my almost forty years of work in education, it is that it is important to remain reflective, and definitely worth embracing your passion and sense of mission. Not because this will make you rich and famous, but because it will strengthen your sense of pride, and you will continue to fnd your life meaningful When I think back to some of my colleagues at the Education Bureau in those days (and I have to emphasise in those days), some of them had already stopped living before they entered middle age.

This goal of working for the good of other people, even if it is a very humble goal, will make you feel good and special about yourself, and give you extra energy to face the many challenges ahead.

A thousand thanks for sharing those stories of yours to the student teachers. In our taught courses to the student teachers, we usually focus on technical issues of pedagogy, because there are course contents to complete. Even the student teachers themselves might be obsessed with the assessments and assignments. It is not always possible or easy to address the affective dimension of teacher education, even if we teacher educators want to.  The talk you gave, hence, was most inspiring to them. I was not joking when I said that the messages in those stories had been made more effective because they came from you. This was because you were sharing your personal life with them. If we (their own teachers) had told them the same messages, they might have found us preaching.

And I personally have to thank you again for your sharing, as you have reinforced my faith in teaching from the heart. Yes, we may not be able to see the fruit of our labour immediately, but maybe without own knowing, we have made a small difference in a student’s life. Yes, we will feel good if our students need our teaching, but we should also remember that our ultimate goal should be to help students become independent learners. Yes, we should find from, and give support to, our ‘comrades’. And yes, we should keep a good supply of candy bars for our students, and chocolates for ourselves.

It’s a good fortune of mine to have met you.

===

Note: Hey works at the Teaching and Research Institute of the Guangzhou Education Bureau.

Yesterday I had my last teaching day of the first semester, so today I made up my mind to see the movie. And - it was absolutely worth the three hours. In fact, I should be glad that the film was still on after having been screened for three months.

It  is not difficult to imagine why the film clicked with so many of my former students, many of whom are young teachers. It is about them as young adults who are torn between pursuing their dreams, and succumbing to reality. It is about them as young teachers, who want to educate students, and at the same time have to carry out the many uneducational duties imposed on them by a society that does not really care about the purpose of education.

For me, I thank the producer, the director, the screen play writer, the actors, and all those who contributed to the film, for reminding us how suppressing our education system can be of students’ individuality and talents. It reminds us that if we are not critically reflective enough of our education system and our work as teachers, we could be, without our own knowing, mass-murdering our students, so that they become soul-less products of a global factory.

Today, teachers’ professional development is the buzzword in education. But very often, it is only concerned with how we teachers can technically perform our day to day activities more effectively. But if we are not doing the right thing, then the more effective we are (e.g., teaching to the test), the more souls we kill, and the more passion we suffocate. So, if a school is racking her brains figuring out what topic to cover for the upcoming staff development event, why not simply have the teachers watch excerpts from Three Idiots together, and exchange their thoughts afterwards! This is much more meaningful than, for example, listening to an outside ‘expert’ talk about how to set more effective homework.

Or have we already become too timid to face the questions that really matter?

This afternoon as I was sitting in the auditorium, I recollected those scenarios with Mable in them: the PGDE class sessions (I still remember in one session she was so tired that she couldn’t help dozing off!), the lesson observation, her starting to teach at PolyU, her application to study for a PhD, our lunch at the PolyU staff restaurant, the first time she received the Teaching Excellence award … and how jubilant she looked this afternoon. We didn’t meet very often in the last ten years, as we are both usually very busy. But interestingly, the unspoken connection has always been there. And when Mable knew about her obtaining the award again, she knew that I would be very happy for her and I would put aside everything in order to attend her ceremony.

When I saw her this afternoon, I said: “If you hadn’t invited me to this ceremony, I would have been cross with you.” Of course we both knew that would never happen.

I’ve often preached to teachers about the importance of continuing professional development, and as far as possible I have tried to practise what I preach, by taking part in events that will help enrich my professional repertoire. This upcoming event by CLEAR (the teaching development unit at CUHK) fits into my professional interests, and I’d been reminding myself in the last few days about this workshop, hoping that I would eventually find the time to attend it. But 15 minutes ago, I had to give it up, because there were still so many urgent things I hadn’t finished.

This reminds me of the plight of teachers. I’m sure many teachers are keen about professional development, but in comparison, the other one and thousand one things that they have to do on a daily basis, like marking students’ homework, setting test and exam papers, contacting parents, and planning and organising co-curricular activities, are much more ‘urgent’. As a result, professional development is relegated to a low-priority item.

This is not a desirable situation. But unless all of us involved in education, school administrators, teachers, parents, government education officials, re-establish our priorities, we will only be buried deeper in unreflective busy-ness.

I suddenly felt a strong urge to find out, and I
made a last-minute revision to my plan for the Thursday evening class, by
adding in a last activity which had nothing to do with the topic for that
session.

The next evening, I worked them through my original
plan, at a faster pace, so as to leave the last 15 minutes for my additional
activity. I first asked them to read my previous blog entry, to set the scene.
I then asked them to respond to the following statement on a 7-point scale
(7=agree strongly; 1=disagree strongly), based on their own view:

ELT is a profession. 

Then, I asked them to respond to another statement,
based on their observation and experience at their teaching school:

ELT is practiced professionally in my school.  

I then put them into groups of four. I gave each
group a tasksheet. One side was headed “ELT is a profession”; the other side
was headed “ELT is practiced professionally”. I gave each group a stamper, for
each teacher in a group to indicate their response to the two questions by
stamping both sides of the tasksheet, four times for a 4 response, and so on. I
then gave them 10 minutes to talk freely to elaborate on their responses to the
two questions.

I collected the completed tasksheets from the
various groups, and put them on the board, first showing the stamps for the
Second Statement: ELT is practiced professionally in my school. We counted the
stamps together and arrived at the average rating, which was 3.45. (This was a
7-point scale; the median rating would be 4.)

Then came the exciting moment. Whatever their
evaluation of the ‘reality’, deep down, did they uphold ELT as a profession?

We turned over the tasksheets on the board, counted
the number of stamps for “ELT is a profession”, and worked out the average rating, which was 6.13. (The  highest rating would be 7.)

I breathed a sigh of relief. Although if the second figure was discouraging, I would still respect their opinion. I would only try to find out the reasons behind their lack of confidence in ELT as a profession. But of course, their response was what I had secretly wanted to see.

I wrapped up the session with two remarks, half-jokingly: “The
results show that, A, you folks are still young, and B, there is still hope.”

*****

On my way home that night, my mind kept saying: I’m
so proud of my ‘students’.