Growth Highlights: Recipient of the Dean’s Honours List Award; Recipient of the Master of Arts in Chinese Values-Based Leadership Education Scholarship
Current Employment: Head of Science Panel and Teacher, Coastal Primary School, Shenzhen Nanshan Second Foreign Language School Group
As a primary science teacher, my concern has never been limited to students’ scientific literacy. I am equally interested in how their values and character are formed through education. It was this concern that led me to pursue the Master of Arts in Chinese Values-Based Leadership Education — MA(CVBLE), where I hoped to explore how traditional Chinese wisdom might respond to the challenges of contemporary education and offer new possibilities for educational practice. The programme has encouraged me to rethink teaching through the lenses of values education, educational leadership, and Chinese culture, while further deepening my understanding of the true essence of education.
During my studies, the greatest challenge was to bring traditional wisdom, which may initially appear distant from contemporary classrooms, into meaningful dialogue with modern educational theories and international educational issues, rather than leaving it at the level of abstract concepts. To do so, I returned repeatedly to the original classical texts, seeking to understand their underlying spirit and intellectual core. At the same time, I engaged with a wide range of international education research and case studies in Hong Kong, using comparison and reflection to identify connections between Chinese thought and global educational discourse.
This experience enabled me to transform traditional Chinese philosophy into practical theoretical tools for education. It also marked the beginning of a shift in perspective: I started to re-examine my own classroom and teaching practice through the eyes of a researcher.
The learning outcome that best reflects my growth is my attempt to integrate the educational wisdom of Confucianism and Daoism into the design of primary science education. In particular, by considering how teaching may move from deliberate guidance to empowering facilitation, I was able to re-examine the structure of the science classroom and the role of the teacher within it. This exploration became an important milestone in developing my researcher mindset. More importantly, it helped me realize that the true value of education lies in the ongoing interaction and dialogue between theory and practice.
Guided by the belief of “Always be a kid,” I believe that childlike curiosity and the desire to learn are among the most precious forces in education. Looking ahead, I hope to become a different kind of teacher — not one who simply delivers knowledge, but one who continues to explore possibilities between science education and values education. I hope to accompany students in keeping their courage alive to ask questions and their passion for exploring the world, so that education may open up more opportunities for growth, discovery, and wonder.
（As the student’s reflection was originally written in Chinese, certain aspects of the content may not be fully conveyed in translation. For a more comprehensive understanding of her learning journey and reflections, please refer to the Chinese version. ）
