Excellent teaching strategies, setting up innovative English courses, and creating an international citizenship perspective

Holy Trinity Primary School The school has a long history and celebrates its 70th anniversary. Looking back, the school has been inheriting the educational philosophy of the Hong Kong Anglican Church since its founding, cultivating people with moral integrity, planting peaches and plums, and is committed to promoting Christian holistic education and fulfilling the proverb: teach children to follow the right path, and they will never forget it throughout their lives. The school takes students as its development priority and has led the teaching team in reform and innovation for many years. Although the school implements local curricula, in order to expand students' international horizons and equip them for future education needs, it has gradually added elements of international curricula, including hiring additional native English-speaking teachers, replacing traditional English courses with special English book teaching, and establishing international culture subjects and English drama subjects to integrate subject knowledge into life and establish a diverse campus context.

International Culture Department: Broaden international horizons

The school firmly believes that happy learning can stimulate students' curiosity, induce them to independently explore learning content, establish in-depth learning experience, gain confidence and satisfaction from it, and establish a good learning attitude. The epidemic has led to the need for online learning, and broadening students' international horizons is the current teaching trend. Therefore, the school has added an international cultural subject to vividly teach the customs, unique local products and famous architecture of different countries, so as to experience the richness of international culture and broaden their international horizons. The school once used Australian culture as its theme. Foreign teachers not only taught through book reading and online multimedia materials, but also invited guests from Australia to come to the school to share their experiences. They also experienced Australians’ favorite sport, rugby, on the playground, connecting English learning with life.

In 2010, the school took the lead in introducing English drama subjects into the regular curriculum, designing a school-based curriculum that not only performs performances, but also guides students to write scripts, master the creative skills of "starting, continuing, transferring, and combining", apply the grammatical vocabulary and sentence structures learned in English classes, and build stage confidence and challenge themselves during the performance.

Holy Trinity Primary SchoolThe independent learning atmosphere has a profound impact on students. Alumnus Ryan is the top scorer in IB. He thanks the school for giving him the opportunity to study English drama so that he can learn team spirit and be able to speak English confidently in public. After receiving the results, Ryan's mother did not forget to thank the school, saying that Holy Trinity Primary School is a very loving family, which allowed her son to learn a lot and benefit from it throughout his life. Another alumnus, Eric, also thanked his alma mater for providing him with an independent learning environment, so that after he entered middle school, he would still take the initiative to learn and develop his own strengths.

Today, these two alumni are studying abroad, looking at the world, and meeting more friends from different countries. This positive attitude towards others is based on the independent and innovative English curriculum of the primary school.

As a teacher, Ms Sabah appreciates Holy Trinity Primary School students’ efforts and enthusiasm in class. Even if English is not the students’ mother tongue and they encounter difficulties in learning, they will always face them.

Promote English-taught courses to connect with English secondary school courses

Learning English cannot just rely on "rote memorization". If you want to master fluent English expression, you need to learn to think in English first. For example, during lunch period, foreign teachers will conduct "English ChitChat" with students. Through different activities, students can communicate with others in English in a natural environment. In order to create more opportunities for English interaction, the school has adjusted the teaching language. Mathematics and some general knowledge subjects use English teaching materials. Being exposed to relevant topics from an early age will be of great benefit in bridging the curriculum of English middle schools and international schools in the future.

English book teaching replaces traditional English courses

First-grade English teaching will shift from traditional textbooks to thematic teaching of English story books, supplemented by systematic English grammar learning. Through extensive reading, students can not only learn more vocabulary and grammatical structures, but also learn positive education from books, such as interpersonal relationships, handling emotions, environmental issues, etc., thus inspiring their interest in learning English and gradually laying a good foundation in English.

Principal Ruan pointed out: "Reading is not only an important medium for language learning, but it can also lead students to temporarily leave reality and go to the imaginary and boundless world of words, so as to build good imagination and start innovative thinking." The school has rebuilt the library and provided multiple reading areas to facilitate students to pick up books and read them on the spot. The school has also purchased a large number of books to encourage students to immerse themselves in books. Every Monday and Wednesday, the school implements "March 1 Morning Reading Class". Students can read books and articles of different contents, languages ​​and types on their own to increase their knowledge in different areas and establish good reading habits.

The teaching team also introduced a large number of online reading learning platforms, such as "Raz Kids" and "i-Learner" for English subjects, and "Koobits" for mathematics subjects. Through the English online self-study platform, students are encouraged to make good use of online resources.

Excellent student performance in self-assessment of English proficiency in international examinations

In addition to encouraging students to take the Cambridge English Test KET and PET and TOEFL Junior and other international English proficiency assessments, the school obtains public recognition. Students have outstanding achievements, and some students have won TOEFL Primary and TOEFL Junior Best of the Best Awards, as well as gold and silver certificates in TOEFL Junior. Among them, Hoo went beyond the challenge and took the more difficult TOEFL ITP exam, and achieved excellent results equivalent to level 5 of the Hong Kong Diploma of Secondary Education Examination. Hoo’s mother said that she did not enroll in additional courses to help him take the ITP exam, but mainly relied on his usual English ability, his confidence in himself and the teacher’s encouragement, which fully reflected the school’s English teaching.

Holy Trinity Primary School values ​​the uniqueness of students and encourages students to constantly challenge themselves and strive for excellence through the school-based activity "Strive for the Top". The campus atmosphere is harmonious, teachers care about students, school development is close to students' needs, home-school communication is close, and we operate as a "Trinity Family". Students grow up in a loving environment and are confident and friendly; coupled with systematic subject teaching, which is in line with the curriculum of English middle schools or international schools, we truly achieve Christian holistic education.