English as a working language
What if we learned from Singapore? This is the question that often comes up in discussions about Hong Kong's allegedly declining English standards. It is often asked by foreigners who are impressed that the Chinese they meet in Singapore speak and write much better English than the Chinese they encounter in Hong Kong.
Although that big gap pre-dated Hong Kong's return to China, casual observers have often wrongly blamed its 'emergence' on the city's drive to promote Chinese at the expense of English for political reasons after 1997. In fact, if they looked deeper, they would find that the language scenes in the two cities are very different.
A report published last year by the Singapore Ministry of Education on the teaching of Chinese is useful for those who want to have a better understanding of the Singaporean situation. The main theme of the report of the Chinese Language Curriculum and Pedagogy Review Committee is that schools must respond to 'a clear generational shift in language use at home' in favour of English.
The report says: 'The number of Chinese students entering primary one who speak predominantly English language at home has risen from 36 per cent in 1994 to 50 per cent in 2004. In particular, parents with higher education are more likely to use English language at home with their children. This trend of primary one children having little exposure to Chinese language in the home will continue. It is also reflected in the declining use of Chinese language of younger students when they speak with their siblings and friends or classmates.'
Put simply, English has become the 'mother tongue' of more and more Singaporean Chinese, with Chinese becoming a 'second' or even 'foreign' tongue. This is not so in Hong Kong, where the Chinese language remains the real mother tongue for Chinese.
Whereas Singapore has to arrest the further decline of the Chinese language among the younger generation, the battle that confronts Hong Kong is encouraging young people to use English. With English having become the first language in Singapore, the committee is resigned to the fact that 'it is not possible to expect most of our students to be equally competent in both English language and mother-tongue languages.' It also notes: 'International studies show that while some individuals can achieve equal fluency in two languages, the norm is for individuals to be dominant in one language.'
The committee has, therefore, decided to customise Chinese language learning for students entering school with different home language backgrounds. While efforts should be taken to interest all students in learning the Chinese language, the emphasis 'for the majority' would be on 'effective oral communication and reading'.
Fluency in the language should be the objective 'for students with ability and interest', and only 'a core group of students in each cohort' is expected to achieve 'high proficiency in the four language skills (listening, speaking, reading and writing), and a confident and intuitive understanding of history, culture and contemporary developments in China'.
If there is one thing that Hong Kong could learn from the Singaporean report, it would be to adopt the same approach in teaching a second language - Chinese for Singapore and English for Hong Kong. Rather than expecting all Hong Kong Chinese to be highly proficient in English, we should recognise that the majority hardly encounter English in their daily lives, but need it in many contexts in the workplace.
The past practice of teaching all academic subjects through English to most students has failed to develop superior skills in the language for the majority. A differentiated and more vocational approach might be in order.
C. K. Lau is the Post's executive editor, policy
