Creativity in Hong Kong schools

This paper examines discourses of creativity in English-language education in post-colonial Hong Kong, where educational reform has mandated a change from transmissive to interactive modes of teaching and learning and a shift towards more creative methods of teaching English. The literature is reviewed with regard to discourses of creativity both internationally and in the Hong Kong context. An ethnographic study of an innovative project in a Hong Kong secondary school, using poetry and creative writing in the language classroom, is presented. Findings from this study, carried out between 1999 and 2001, illustrate how pedagogical discourses of creativity - such as creative tasks, the creative process and communities of practice - are more significant at classroom level than simple East-West dichotomies, and how such discourses can be productive both for teachers and students despite institutional and social constraints.