Ensuring Success in English ‧ Steer Our Way Upstream

Quality Input:

How we set up success in the classroom

Catering for Learner Diversity

Our entire curriculum and examination scope is centered around being able to support those who need it most, but also to challenge our most able students to bring out their very best.

The importance of reading

We believe that sparking interest and a passion for reading is vital. A range of fiction and non-fiction texts are hand-picked by teachers for each class, to ensure suitability, as well as the challenge necessary for so many students. Examples of texts studied in Junior Forms include classics like Roald Dahl and Shakespeare. We guide our Senior Forms to discover the biographies of inspirational figures throughout history.

Building students' vocabulary

Our entire English Department contributes to our ‘Vocabulary Recognition Tasks’, a series of activities to assist our students in the construction and memorisation of this essential, bountiful vocabulary. Each task is created by a different teacher, tailor-made for the unit and year-group; this provides students with varied, challenging and fun methods of constructing a wealthy vocabulary.

Creative Writing Tasks

Building from our class readings and vocabulary work, we then move through intense grammar study until students are ready to be guided to write fully, from sentence level to a paragraph level and beyond, eventually creating entire, well-structured texts suited to genre, audience and purpose. As well as this, we believe in the power of creativity at our school, and so students are encouraged to think 'outside the box' and express originality and imagination throughout the planning and writing process.

Speaking Lessons and Drama Activities

We strive to instill our students' sense of self-belief in what they are capable of. We balance intense phonics work and holistic presenting and discussing skills in our speaking lessons. Students are given time to practise before each lesson in a 'flipped classroom' setting, giving them the opportunity to prepare at home before more intense study at school.

As well as this, our engaging, enjoyable drama activities bring out the best in our students, and allow them a sense of self-expression on stage, whilst practicing and honing their English skills at the same time. We believe that what makes learning English at PESS so effective is this balance of concentrated phonics work, along with more relaxed, enjoyable applications of spoken language.

Quality Output:

Using English outside the classroom

Other than English work inside the classroom, we also endeavour to provide students with ample opportunity to engage with and use English in a natural, extra-curricular setting.

Independent Learning

We provide independent learning opportunities for all year groups, which can take a number of forms. Newspapers, useful online videos and other multimodal texts are brought together to provide students with the tools to explore and improve their English in a way which interests them.

Minute English

Based on the popular BBC program 'Six Minute English', our Native English Teacher (NET) broadcasts 'Hong Kong News' and 'World News' to the school in easy-to-understand, one minute episodes. These also include questions, quizzes and even opportunities to win prizes. This keeps students entertained, but also allows them to listen to natural spoken English.

English Cafe

For students who want to practise their English in a more relaxing atmosphere, we provide a daily 'English Cafe' at lunchtime, hosted by a range of English teachers. This is a calm environment, open to all students, where they can socialise with classmates, play some games, and chat to English teachers.

English Activity Day and English Speaking Day

Several times throughout the year, Form 3-5 will host 'English Activity Days'. Inserting an aspect of competition into their English learning, these forms have to design and host their own game stall, all in English, to the rest of the school. The best stalls, games and hosts are then rewarded with prizes, which promote an incredibly exciting atmosphere!

We like to show students how important English can be in all subjects not just in English lessons. Throughout the year, the whole teaching staff comes together to create our ‘English Speaking Days’. This is a day dedicated to bringing English to our students across the curriculum. Using carefully selected phrases and discussion points, teachers from across the school converse and engage with our students in English throughout the day.

Read more:

English in PESS junior form

Reaching for the Stars: Tips for Success

News

Our students consistently receive highly satisfactory results in the Hong Kong Schools Speech Festival.

Champion of Solo Speaking, 4A Chan Ting Yui 
and his trainer Mr. Yeung

 Mark sheet of the 1st place solo speaking

 
Principal Lau, trainer Ms Cheung and the 
champion of choral speaking, 3A students    

Mark sheet of the 1st place choral speaking

Activities

English Café

Students practise speaking English through playing various board games and computer games with schoolmates during lunchtime.

English Activity Day & English Speaking Day

Students practise speaking English through playing English games and sharing their feelings with their teachers and classmates.

Life-wide Learning Activities

S1 students visiting Hong Kong Wetland Park	Looking at birds through the telescope	"Who's got the eye of the tiger?"
S5 students experiencing rugby ball games	Encircling your oppoents as a team	Getting punished as a game when losing the competition
S3 students acting out a drama performance of Romeo and Juliet	Following the drama teacher	Improvisation (a performance without preparation) of Romeo and Juliet

English Magazine (Pessian Vol. 14)

Pessian, our annual English magazine, records the colourful school life in PESS.

English and News

Twice a week a Native English Teacher (NET) broadcasts 'Hong Kong News' and 'World News' to the school in easy-to-understand, one minute episodes.

Useful Links 

HKedCity-English Campus

British Council - Learn English Kids 

Young Post

BBC Learning English

SCMP

Standard

BBC News Videos 

VoiceTube《看影片學英語》