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HKU Faculty of Education Distinguished Lecture
"The Effects of Early Childhood Education on ‘Learning How To Learn’"

06 Jun 2013

Every child is unique with different developmental needs and abilities.  What kind of early childhood education would be the best to lay the foundation for children’s future learning as well as to prepare them for the fast-changing world?  In addition to whole-person development, a major question regarding early childhood education is the impact it has on children’s longer-term academic progress.  In what ways can the quality of kindergarten affects children’s academic performance, disposition to learn and ability to learn when they move on to primary and secondary schools and beyond?

The Faculty of Education of the University of Hong Kong (HKU) will hold a distinguished lecture “The Effects of Early Childhood Education on ‘Learning How To Learn’” on June 11 (Tuesday). The speaker Professor Kathy Sylva is Professor of Educational Psychology at the Department of Education, University of Oxford. The lecture is sponsored by Tin Ka Ping Education Fund of Tin Ka Ping Foundation and UGC Knowledge Exchange Funds.

In the lecture, Professor Kathy Sylva will share the findings of longitudinal research in the UK that clearly demonstrates the long-term benefits of high quality early childhood education and will explore the possible implications of such research for Hong Kong.

Date:  June 11, 2013 (Tuesday)
Time:  5:00pm – 6:30pm
Venue:   Hui Pun Hing Lecture Hall, Library Extension Building (LE1), HKU
Language:  English

Professor Kathy Sylva is Professor of Educational Psychology at the University of Oxford, Department of Education.  She has conducted large scale studies on the effects of Early Childhood education and care on children’s development.  She has been lead researcher on the Effective Pre-school and Primary Education longitudinal study (EPPE).  She also leads randomised controlled trials to evaluate parenting programmes aimed at supporting children’s reading in Year 1.  She has published 7 books and more than 100 papers, most on early childhood, early literacy and ways to support families.  She has been specialist adviser to the UK Parliamentary Select Committee on Education (2000-2009) and was awarded an OBE in 2008 for services to children and families.

For media enquiries, please contact Ms Queenie Wong, Senior Manager (Development and Communications) (Tel.: 2219 4270 / Mobile: 9220 5840 / Fax: 2540 6360 / E-mail: qlpwong@hku.hk ).