Speaking to reporters ahead of the festive season, the Secretary for Education Kevin Yeung Yun-hung urged school operators to lessen homework for pupils to free up time for traditional activities such as visiting relatives, which he said were also important for a child’s development.
“One operator I spoke to said it had asked its schools to not give out any homework during this period,” he said.
Yeung also said his bureau had been discussing with schools ways to improve the city’s homework policies, with a focus on making assignments more diverse and interesting.
With an increasingly competitive education system, homework is a contentious issue in Hong Kong, with some parents and children complaining of spending more than 2.5 hours on homework each day.
Reverend Peter Koon Ho-ming, provincial secretary general of the Sheng Kung Hui, the Anglican Church in Hong Kong and Macau, said the church had advised its schools to reduce homework for the Lunar New Year period.
Its schools were also told to avoid assignments that are based on drilling – or a rote learning approach that relies heavily on memorisation, reported the South China Morning Post.
The guidelines were issued in view of parents’ growing unease on the amount homework being given to their children, he said.
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