We are highly aware that teaching is an ongoing process and for teachers, it is an ever-improved mission in terms of teaching methodology, which can only be fulfilled through continuous professional development. Similarly for parents, education takes place both in school and at home. What parents can do to help has been widely debated due to the misconception that they have limitations in knowledge and strategy. However, teacher-parent collaboration is indispensable. Since our establishment in 2002, parents have been viewed as one of the stakeholders of success in learning and we treasure the chance of sharing with them for overall progress in English teaching and learning.

With the support of the HKEDB-approved English Enhancement Scheme (EES) initiated in 2008-09, our team has stepped in its fourth year of implementation. Last year, the whole English teaching team benefited from the Teacher Training Workshops focused on “Journalistic and Publication Skills”. In the current year, the EES teacher training is going on with a new focus on “the Teaching of Argumentative and Persuasive Writing” intended for all Secondary 5 students, which facilitates their familiarization with one of the major writing genres in NSS English as well as the expansion of our English Editorial Board and its product “Elegantianism”, which contains a large number of pieces of writing displaying students’ arguments and opinions of social issues.

As our committed collaborators, quite a number of “Elegantian” parents from Forms 1-2 have been maintaining a sincere attitude towards their children’s learning of English and playing an active role in fostering their own language skills as well as the skills in helping their children to acquire English, such as phonics and pronunciation, English home reading support and International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA). For this end, the English Development has been continuing with our English Language Teaching (ELT) Parent Workshops which take place at the beginning of each school year as an annual highlight. The ELT Parent Workshops 2011 achieved a good response from the parent-participants. Tremendous parental support in English teaching and learning is regarded as one of the crucial factors of success throughout the academic year.