Yung An Wan

In 1943, on the advice of a relative and supported by her mother, Yung An Wan successfully applied for the grant from the Tung Wah Group of Hospitals. Later, she sat for the entrance examination of the St. Paul’s Convent School (Primary Section) in Causeway Bay. She thought she was admitted because she had prepared for the examination by studying some Chinese essays. She was enrolled in Primary 4. Before the Second World War, St. Paul’s Convent School was a famous school with a well-equipped campus. The grant from the Tung Wah Group of Hospitals made it possible for her to study there. Otherwise a girl from a poor family background would never have this opportunity. The classrooms in this school at the time were as spacious as how a standard classroom is like nowadays. Various subjects were taught including Chinese Language, Arithmetic, History, Physical Training, Handicraft and Music. Free textbooks and pencils were provided. School uniforms for summer semesters and winter semesters were also offered to the students each year. The uniform was a double-breasted blouse and trousers with a waistband.

In those days, students with good results were allowed to skip one level - to study one level higher. Yung An Wan had good results and was ranked third in the examination. She was not happy to have lost the first and second places to the female classmates who came from Catholic schools just because she did not sing as good as they did. Therefore, she asked the school principal Sister Zhou (a lady from northern China) to let her skip one level. In the new school year, she was allowed to study Primary 5. During the Japanese Occupation, Japanese Language was a compulsory subject. She started to learn Japanese in Primary 5. She did not do well in Japanese but the result was improved later. She also learned fractions in Mathematics in Primary 5. As St. Paul’s Convent School was run by a church, all students had to study Bible. They chanted Lord’s Prayer and Hail Mary in class. There was no examination in bible class but students had to pray at the school chapel before every examination started. Yung An Wan seldom socialized with her classmates. Once a classmate of hers suggested they became sworn sisters but Yung An Wan’s mother refused the idea.

On 4 April 1944, the allied army set bombs in Hong Kong. The exterior walls of St. Paul’s Convent School were destroyed. Fortunately it happened in Children’s Day which was a school holiday, but classes were suspended since that day. At that time, the second school term had just started. During the Japanese Occupation, Yung An Wan’s elder brother went to mainland China to study, and returned to Hong Kong in 1946. He encouraged Yung An Wan to go back to school. By the end of the school term, she was informed by St Paul’s Convent School that she was admitted to the first level of junior secondary school in the next semester. In the secondary school, she learned the basics of zoology and botany, English Language and some other subjects. At the time, she did not know even one alphabet. She recalls that the male English teacher taught her how to write her name in English. When she was promoted to Junior Secondary Two, she could not afford to pay the expensive registration fee and tuition fees. Together with some classmates, she applied to study in the Northcote College of Education’s School Subsidiary Secondary School.

In 1947, Yung An Wan sat for the entrance examination of Northcote College of Education’s Subsidiary Secondary School. She passed the English Language paper but failed the Mathematics paper. She was included in the waiting list. Yung An Wan asked for discretion from the school principal (Miss Yuen Ngan Ming). Based on her school results in St Paul’s convent, she was admitted to Junior Secondary Two of Northcote College of Education’s Subsidiary Secondary School. At that time, there was no strict rules in the school system, students could jump levels and change schools if they were accepted by the schools.

When Yung An Wan joined the Northcote College of Education’s Subsidiary Secondary School, the campus was shared by the Government Vernacular Middle School. Later, the two schools were merged into one. When she was in Junior Secondary Three, the merged school was renamed the Government Vernacular Senior Middle School. The Northcote College of Education’s Subsidiary Secondary School had three classes for junior secondary two - A, B and C. Classes A and B were for students from the Government Vernacular Middle School and Class C for students from the Northcote College of Eduction’s Subsidiary Secondary School. [Editor’s note: Yung An Wan later corrected that Classes B and C were for students of the Northcote College of Education’s Subsidiary Secondary School.] Yuen Ngan Ming was the principal of the Northcote College of Education’s Subsidiary Secondary School, while the Government Vernacular Middle School had another principal. Kwok Chuen Boon the class master of Class 2C formed a class club which had its own anthem. Later, Kwok Chuen Boon taught in the King’s College. The Northcote College of Education’s Subsidiary Secondary School organized picnics and inter-class competitions. Yung An Wan was happy to study in this school (which was a government school), because students were given free pencils, and they enjoyed free milk and biscuits during recesses. A monthly tuition fee of $5 was charged. Her family paid the fees for her at the beginning.

She still remembers several teachers of junior secondary classes - Kwok Chuen Boon who taught Geometry and his wife Chan gi Ling who taught history including the Opium War. Poon Pak Heng taught Chinese Language, the essay Retreating Figure was in the textbook. When she was in Junior Secondary Three, the Government Vernacular Senior Middle School moved to the previous site of the Japanese children school on Kennedy Road. It was a nice campus with streams around. However the number of classes was reduced from 3 to 2 with about 40 students each, resulting that the students who were not admitted promotion had to go to other schools to continue their studies. The Government Vernacular Senior Middle School shared the campus with the Queen’s College because Queen’s College had not enough space for all its students. Queen’s College used the campus in the morning and the Government Vernacular Senior Middle School used it in the afternoon. At the time, Leung Sai Wah was the principal of Government Vernacular Senior Middle School.

When Yung An Wan was in Senior Secondary One, the Government Vernacular Senior Middle School was eager to train its students to be as competitive as those in English schools. Students used English textbooks for all subjects except Chinese Language. The lessons were taught in both English and Chinese, but Yung An Wan found it difficult to catch up with the course contents. School principal Leung Sai Wah taught British History, but he seldom gave lectures because he was busy with matters of school management. As a result, the students only learned the French Revolution. Mathematics was easier by level when it was taught in English. Yung An Wan could tell the answer from looking at the questions but she had to show the calculation step by step. Mathematics teacher Ho Ka Chi taught Algebra in English. Geography teacher Tse Chun Yau later became Principal of Queen’s College. About Geography, she only remembers monsoon. English Language teacher Mrs. Cheung Tse Chung Yin (wife of Principal of the Grantham College of Education) was her class mistress, she taught English in an interesting way. Mrs. Cheung learned Cantonese from her maid. Her Cantonese was funny. Whenever she spoke Cantonese in class, the students would laugh to tears. The school English Language textbooks published by Fundamental and Oxford. Students learned grammar in class. In oral examinations, students were asked to recite textbook contents. Yung An Wan was attentive in class and she made great improvement in English.

From 1949 to 1950 when she was in the Senior Secondary Two, the school used Chinese textbooks again except English Language because the school noticed that the performance of the students in Mathematics was not satisfactory. In those days, students were not streamed into arts class and science class in the senior secondary levels. She had to work hard to study Mathematics. The Government Vernacular Senior Middle School was not strict in discipline. Students could be absent from classes as long as they did well in examinations. For example, Chinese Painting teacher Ho Chak Yuen turned a blind eye to students at the back doing Mathematics exercises when he taught in the front. Yung An Wan was not interested in Chinese painting. When the examination came, she asked a classmate to do a painting for her (colloquially called ‘ghost painter’). Ho Chak Yuen never failed anyone in the examination. She got similar scores in Visual Art every year - 62 for the first term and 64 for the second term. Ho Chak Yuen later became the Visual Art lecturer in the Grantham College of Education.

Civic Education was a subject which Yung An Wan had studied in every class in the Government Vernacular Senior Middle School. One session was given per week and the syllabus included the systems in China. The teachers were law graduates from mainland China. She also had Civic Education in St. Paul’s Convent School (Primary Section). The syllabus of St. Paul’s Convent School was the same as other schools’, including calculation with an abacus. She had her first lesson on ancient Chinese text in Primary 5. She remembers learning Ode to the Humble Hut and Tyranny is more savage than a tiger. Several phrases were taught in each lesson. During the Japanese Occupation, Japanese Language was taught in St. Paul’s Convent School (Primary Section) as required by the Japanese government. After the war, simple English was taught since Junior Secondary 1.

In examinations, the teachers wrote the questions on the blackboard and the students copied them on the papers and answered them with a pencil. In the classroom, the standard student chairs and desks were provided but not the lift-top type that widely used in other schools. The primary students did not wear school uniform. Most of the teachers were female and not all were subject teachers. Not many teachers were Catholic nuns, except for bible classes which were taught by a Chinese Catholic nun. In the school, Principal Chow and her successor, the French Principal, were both Catholic nuns. She also remembers Miss Tam who taught her in Primary 5. Miss Tam wore a cheongsam and sat on the teacher’s desk while teaching. The school did not arrange home visits to parents and students. Teacher-student relationship was not close before and after the Second World War when Yung An Wan studied there. Each class had 20 students, with more girls than boys. During recess, Yung An Wan liked to play with classmates on the stairways in front of the school chapel. At Primary 3, Yung remembers, the two students who ranked first and second had tried to learn to be nuns, but she was not close to these two classmates. Yung recalled that a schoolmate called Kong Yun Fan studying in another level at St Paul’s Convent School also graduated from Grantham College of Education. She was a teacher of Chinese Language at the University of Hong Kong. Before the War, students in the same class were of similar age, but age difference became more divide after the War. Yung An Wan did not believe that St Paul’s Convent was controlled by the Japanese during the Japanese Occupation. She recalled that there were no gatherings or activities of this nature. In fact she met more Taiwanese than Japanese on the streets. The greatest impact on daily life was the use of the Japanese Military Yen and adoption of the reign title of Meiji to name dates.

Yung An Wan had studied in Tak Ying Primary School which was probably a branch of Tack Ching Girls’ Secondary School. In Primary 2, she took part in a story-telling competition. The school was situated on Hennessy Road, Wan Chai near the Wo Cheong Pawn Shop. Back in the native place, she lived in the ancestral house. Students were taught to sing war songs at school such as the National Anthem of the Republic of China, and they also recited Teachings of the Premier.

Yung An Wan corrected her accounts earlier about classes of Junior Secondary 2 in the Government Vernacular Senior Middle School. Of the three classes, Class A was for students from the Government Vernacular Middle School, while Classes B and C were for Northcote students. The students of Northcote College of Education’s Subsidiary Secondary School had to wear a blue jacket with a school pin which showed the school motto of ‘Knowledge, Integrity, Loyalty and Sincerity’. However the school did not require students to wear this jacket. Generally the female students wore cheongsam or short-sleeve shirt and shorts. Students from wealthier families wore trendy clothes, they would go to school in dungarees and the better-off students wore trousers or skirts of western style. When she was in Junior Secondary 3 (1947 to 1948), they had lessons in the campus on Kennedy Road. By then, the Northcote College of Education’s Subsidiary Secondary School was merged with Government Vernacular Middle School and renamed the Government Vernacular Senior Middle School. It was not until then that Yung An Wan realized the existence of the Government Vernacular Middle School in the campus. Before that, she thought that there was only Northcote College of Education’s Subsidiary Secondary School. On the cover of the school exercise books that she used in Junior Secondary 2 and 3, she could only find “Education Department” but not any school name. The Northcote College of Education’s Subsidiary Secondary School had morning assemblies. The school had a library but Yung An Wan liked to visit bookshops and read a lot of books there. The most popular books at that time were the literary works written by Zhu Ziqing during the May Fourth Movement. Besides, she also liked readings on chemistry and physics.

When she was promoted to higher levels, Yung An Wan and some classmates formed a study group, to help each other in their studies. She visited them at home, had dinner there and did revision together. The Government Vernacular Senior Middle School had more boys than girls. In Senior Secondary 3, the school no longer shared the campus with Queen’s College. Young people loved to join school activities, such as picnic at Hung Mui Kuk or group dance. She remembers they danced Rice Sprout Song in 1949 when the new regime in mainland China came to power. Every year, the Sports Day was held on the sports ground of other schools, although the school had a playground where students played balls. The school had a basketball team, formed by the students from the Government Vernacular Middle School. In secondary school, Yung An Wan ran away from classes of physical education. She preferred to socialize with classmates at the school’s tug shop. She liked this school because the school atmosphere was liberal and the students were enthusiastic in learning. Schoolwork was not heavy except in Junior Secondary 2 and Senior Secondary 1. Yung An Wan considers that the examinations at that time were able to test students’ capability.

Upon graduation, most of Yung An Wan’s classmates in the Government Vernacular Senior Middle School chose to work for earnings or continue their studies in teachers’ training colleges. Very few of them chose to be nurses because candidates had to be proficient in English to be admitted into the nursing school of Queen Mary Hospital. To sit for the entrance examination of the University of Hong Kong, the Government Vernacular Middle School’s graduates had to complete the English classes at the Queen’s College. At the time, most graduates of the middle school only were only up to the standard of Senior Secondary 3. Only students from well-off families could afford to join the English classes. To pursue university studies, some of them went to mainland China and enrolled in the universities in Guangzhou, Northeast and Wuhan. When they were graduated in 1951, China was already under the new regime who offered free post-secondary education to Hong Kong students. Those who chose to study in mainland China were patriotic to their home country. Yung An Wan wanted to pursue further studies as well but she had to work for earnings. At the time, a teacher could earn good salary. A female teacher generally earned $265 per month and a male teacher earned $280. Government school teachers earned higher pay. It is noted that a domestic maid earned about $30 a month.

In those days, only graduates from English schools were admitted in the Northcote College of Education. None of the applicants from the Government Vernacular Middle School were admitted. Northcote graduates were qualified to teach in secondary schools, whereas graduates from Grantham could only teach in primary schools. Grantham graduates would be qualified to teach in secondary schools if they completed the evening courses offered by the Hong Kong Government Literary and Commerce Vocational School. Classes were held in King’s College. The students pursued advanced studies in English and Chinese Languages in the evening classes. With the post-secondary certificate, the graduates were qualified to teach in secondary schools and the Grantham Training School.

Students of the Grantham College of Education had to do two internships of one-month each. The first internship started in November, two months after the start of the school year. The second internship had to be finished before graduation. Yung An Wan had both internships in the St. Paul’s Primary Catholic School in Happy Valley. During internship, she taught physical training and natural science. She had 1 to 2 lessons every day. She used pictures, word cards and physical objects to teach natural science. The teachers of the school watched the class while checking students’ exercise books outside the classroom. Lecturer Wu Hei Tak, who was also the academic director of Grantham College of Education, assessed the interns by observing their class performance and their lesson plans.

The school admitting interns decided which subjects were opened for intern teaching according to the school’s situations, instead of the intern’s preference and capability. Yung An Wan had insisted on teaching physical training which was her elective subject. Yung An Wan recalled that for a lesson on coconut, she brought a coconut to the classroom, cut it into halves in front of the students and showed to the students the physical structure of a coconut. She also taught students of writing letters with the aid of a real letter at her hand. During internship, Yung An Wan was popular among the students because intern teacher was perceived to be more approachable than real teachers. In addition, she used physical objects in teaching, which most students found interesting, while most teachers were serious and seldom showed physical objects. When she became a full time teacher, she continued to use physical objects to teach natural science. For example, she showed the mechanics of pulley system with threads and reels. She also made beepers and generators to show electricity. However physical objects were less useful for teaching other subjects. Yung An Wan also learned classroom management in the teachers’ training course at Grantham. For example, students must raise their hands before talking to the teacher. Yung believed that a teacher should pay attention to all the students in the classroom and remember the name of every student as soon as possible. Yung An Wan thought these were useful for a teacher in his/her life time. Social Studies curriculum included Hong Kong’s history and geography, as well as civic knowledge which was similar to the liberal studies today. Before graduation, all Grantham students sat for written examinations. They were asked about Dewey’s educational theories, pedagogical methods, teaching plan and child psychology.

After graduating from the Grantham College of Education, the Education Department asked Yung An Wan to teach in Pui Tak Canossian Primary School, a subsidized school in Aberdeen. It was a replacement left by a classmate of Yung An Wan in Grantham to teach physical education. Pui Tak Canossian Primary School had a long history. The school was located in a two-storey residential building. The teachers’ room was set in the kitchen and the classrooms were outside the kitchen. Teachers at the teachers’ room could hear how other teachers delivered classes. Yung An Wan was frightened when she delivered the first class as she felt she was watched. School Principal Sister Tsang inspected classes very often; she was responsible for assigning teachers to classes and subjects. Yung An Wan was arranged to teach Chinese language, Arithmetic and Natural Science. She was also Class Mistress of Primary 3. In this school, as the Catholic nuns were responsible for students’ discipline, the class teachers did not pay much attention to the students during recesses and assemblies.

In those days, Pui Tak Canossian Primary School was a village school. The class teacher taught most of the subjects of a class and he/she could arrange the timetable at his/her convenience. For example, Yung An Wan had physical training lessons consecutively for two different classes, so that she did not have to change between cheongsam and sportswear in the day. Teachers enjoyed this kind of convenience when school system was less rigid in those days than what it is like nowadays. In the 1950s, Yung An Wan wrote examination questions on stencil papers while other teachers preferred to write the questions on the blackboard for students to copy them onto their answer sheets. She prepared “fill in the blank” and “true or false” types of questions, which were considered modern forms of assessment at the time. Teachers did not have to seek endorsement from the Principal about the exam questions. Shortly afterwards, this type of small village school could not cope with the new demand when both the numbers of students and teachers expanded. The school therefore set up rules and regulations for smooth operation.

Pui Tak Canossian Primary School was a girls’ college. Most of its students came from the Tankas in Ap Lei Chau because the school was near to a typhoon shelter. In the early post-war period, the students were older than those in other schools and the age difference was also great. Many Primary 6 students were 16 or 17 years old. Several years later, the school set the rule in enrollment that all graduates would be 12 years old. At first, each class had around 10 students. Not many Tanka children had the chance to go to school, especially those who were 16 or 17 years old. These children were particularly obedient and hard working. With good fame in Aberdeen, Pui Tak Canossian Primary School gradually raised the standard of admission. Most boat people therefore sent their children to the Island Road Government Primary School in Aberdeen. To cope with the growing size of students, Pui Tak redeveloped the 2-storey building into a 4-storey building. During the period of construction, Primary 6 students were arranged to have classes in Sacred Heart Canossian College until the construction work completed. Yung An Wan went to Sacred Heart to deliver classes .

The Primary 6 students of Pui Tak who did well in the Primary School Certificate Examination (PSCE) were admitted to the Sacred Heart Canossian College. Having gained much popularity, Pui Tak Canossian Primary School ran preparatory classes to admit more Primary 1 students. From then on, Yung An Wan was assigned to teach Primary 6 students who prepared to sit for PSCE. She taught Chinese language, Arithmetic and Social Studies. Pui Tak Canossian Primary School tended to train students to be obedient and well-disciplined. Students had to chant the scriptures together in the morning and keep quiet in the class. As a result they were afraid of the teachers and were not motivated to raise questions in the class. The principal taught students to behave in good manners and to become ladies. The parents had great trust in the teachers. They even asked the teachers to help resolve conflicts at home.

Most teachers of the school held certificates of teachers’ training after teaching for years. They were older than Yung An Wan. Because Yung An Wan was the only graduate from the teachers training college, she was assigned to teach Primary 6 students. Yung An Wan was a church goer when she was in primary school. She used to chant the scriptures at the church, but not anymore after she went to the Northcote College of Education’s Subsidiary Secondary School. The Pui Tak principal and colleagues wanted her to become a Catholic. The principal even preached to her when she had no class but was in vain. Yung An Wan thought that she could not stay in this school for long. So she decided to leave the school. She believed that if she had not left the school, she might have promoted to Principal. The school offered the teachers annual increments in salary. Teachers who reached supervisor grade would have the chance of promotion and corresponding pay rise. After Yung An Wan taught for a certain period, she gained the officer’s title but was not given pay rise. She didn’t consider it a promotion. In Pui Tak, the Principal was also the Discipline Master.

Pui Tak had no Sports Day or Fun Fair but it organized school picnics annually. Activities were also held to celebrate Christmas. On the eve of Good Friday, the teachers would take students to the Catholic Church in Ap Lei Chau where they performed the traditional worshipping practice in the form of three kneelings and nine kowtows. The school also participated in charity work through the school organization Legion of Mary. The Education Department had so much trust in Canossian Daughters of Charity (who ran the school) that the Department seldom sent inspectors to the school. When they came, they only looked around the campus and talked with the Principal but never inspect the classes in progress. Pui Tak seldom had joint activities with other schools. However, Yung An Wan believed that the school was associated with Sacred Heart Canossian College and that was why most Pui Tak students were eager to study in Sacred Heart. Some students applied to the Clementi Secondary School (formerly the Government Vernacular Senior Middle School). Pui Tak also encouraged students to apply to the Canossa College in Shau Kei Wan. Pui Tak students with poorer results would choose the vocational school run by the church in Tin Wan. In the earlier years, many young people chose to work for earnings after completing primary education. In the 1960s, however more students chose to continue their studies.

G.T.C. Past Students’ Association Tsz Wan Shan Primary School was founded by the alumni of Grantham College of Education. When the school was just established, Yung An Wan was committed to the work of administration, enrolment, fundraising and teaching. The school was established in the 1960s with the support of Grantham College of Education’s Principal Mr. Cheung, the teachers and the students. At the time, the government provided one or two schools in each resettlement area and let them run by non-governmental bodies. The G.T.C. Past Students’ Association was given a site in Tsz Wan Shan to open a school. Yung An Wan believed that the government considered the Past Students’ Association a reliable organization as it was formed by Grantham graduates. The school was originally scheduled to open in 1966, but it was delayed to 1967. To raise funds, a teacher in each school was appointed to be contact person so as to collect donations from Grantham alumni. The minimum amount of donation per head was $120 to be paid in 12 monthly installments.

When new equipment was needed, the Tsz Wan Shan Primary School asked for funds from the Past Students’ Association. The Association also raised funds from alumni by performing dramas in the assembly hall of Grantham College of Education. The fund-raising dramas were adapted from the French plays such as Lady Windermere’s Fan and The Admirable Crichton. The Tze Wan Shan Primary School complied to the standard curriculum designed by the Education Department. It charged a monthly tuition fee of $5 until free primary education was provided by the government. It was a co-educational school with more boys than girls. Each class had 45 students but the schools admitted 46 students in Primary 6 classes. Because the intake included many overaged students, the classrooms became too small for these grown up students, whom Yung An Wan taught arithmetic, natural science and social studies. She is still in touch with some of these students now. In those days, Tsz Wan Shan had a population of mixed backgrounds. The complicated environment in Tze Wan Shan appeared to be an alien place to her.

G.T.C. Past Students’ Association Tsz Wan Shan Primary School had a high rate of enrolment at the beginning. By the 1980s, the number of students was lower because there were fewer children of school age in the district. The school campus was eventually torn down and redeveloped into a residential building. When Yung An Wan retired in 1989, she had taught in the school for 21 years. To her, teaching was a happy job because the students were nice if the teacher was friendly to them. She thought a teacher should be considerate and managed students’ problems from their point of view so that students could feel happy at school. For students who did not do their homework, revise lessons and were not supervised by their families, Yung An Wan would ask them to finish their homework at school. She asked them questions about what they had learnt in the class to help them consolidate the basic knowledge learned. For all the subjects she taught, Yung An Wan asked her students to write diary as a way of communication. Although she insisted that students should comply to rules, she disapproved of scolding them in front of other students. Besides, a teacher should act more prudently and efficiently than students. Through home visits, she was well acquainted with the students’ families. In her teaching career, the only professional course she had taken was the first one-year diploma course on library science offered by the University of Hong Kong’s Department of Extra Mural Studies.