SENSE

(The following information is provided by the school.)

Background

Established in 1948, Hong Kong Juvenile Care Centre, the sponsoring body of the school, served children who were born into impoverished families and those who committed slight offences, by providing them with accommodation and education.  Moved into the current premises at Nam Long Shan in February 1994, the school is now a school for social development,  providing mainstream secondary school education for school-age boys.  The maximum capacity of the school stands at 144, with a capacity of 120 and 24 for resident and non-resident day students respectively. It mainly servesing secondary school students experiencing behavioural or emotional difficulties, all of whom are referred to the school via the Central Coordinating Referral Mechanism by the Education Bureau.  Apart from offering the HKDSE curriculum, there are also short-term adaptation programmes available, upon the completion of which students will be eligible to further their studies back at their original schools.

With the philosophy that “every experience is an opportunity for learning and development in progress”, the school’s professional staff help students overcome their own difficulties by providing them with a diversified and comprehensive curriculum facilitated by the integration of innovative and forward-looking life-wide learning activities.  Through class management, the school builds a friendly, safe and harmonious learning environment in which students develop into good citizens who exercise self-discipline, embrace positive thinking and set goals with clear directions for future development.
 

Highlights

A multifaceted and flexible all-round education

As a school for social development, it provides education for boys by teaching the mainstream curriculum.  The school recogniszes that every student possesses their own gift and talent.  It is also the school’s firm belief that through education, the notion that “any child who is sent to the schoolus will return as a brilliant teenager” will be realised.  Through its design of teaching and learning with a layered curriculum approach, the school plans and develops an innovative and diversified experiential curriculum which explores the potentials of the students.  With a learning mode which emphasises on exploration and inspiration, the school facilitates the continuous progress of each student, in terms of both academic performances and achievements in other aspects, so that the campus can become a transitional venue which equips students for further studies or works.

 

An innovative school-based approach that nurtures students with talents and virtues

The design of the curriculum embraces four core values - the focus on students, the emphasis on quality, the flexibility in dealing with student needs, and the provision of equal learning opportunities.  The curriculum consists of three parts - core subjects, elective subjects (according to the abilities and interests of students), and other learning experiences (which are related to arts, physical education, moral and civic education, social service, and the workplace).  The curriculum aims to help students develop their individual, social and emotional well-beings.  Through the specialiszed school-based materials and activities, and with the use of different media, the school aims to nurture the creativity, problem-solving skills and positive thinking of students, by facilitating the display of their different talents on campus.  With a student-oriented approach, teachers utilise project learning and modular learning materials, and “mini-tasks” specially designed according to different special needs of students.  Through these materials and tasks, not only can the basic knowledge of students be consolidated, but their interests in learning and their earnestness in the exploration of knowledge can also be nurtured.

To take care of a group of students with different special educational needs, the foundation of success lies in a school culture with an emphasis on caring as well as strategies that encourage continuous learning with  experiences of success.  In recent years, the school has been instilling mindfulness into different subjects, including Life and Society, Life Education, Physical Education, Music, and Visual Arts.  Through the practice of mindfulness, students are able to enjoy greater emotional stability and develop a longer attention spans, enabling them to concentrate on different learning activities.  Through a consummate discipline and counselling system, a variety of reward schemes and physical trainings, students can develop perseverance and live a healthy lifestyle, and thus equipping themselves into youngsters showing talents and virtues.